HISTORY

Dear Congregation,

Each year as part our annual business meeting the Elders add another year in review to what God has/is doing through the ministry of Living Water Community Church. Thank you for your generous support in serving and financially supporting this effort in 2023. Hope you enjoy reading about God’s progress. –Living Water Elders

2022

As usual, God blessed the finances of Living Water Community Church. We were able to make a separate, principal payment (of $50,000) on our building loan reducing our balance to under $60,000. Sheila Berg, Ron Harms, and David Johnson continued their faithful service on the Deacon Board of Directors. Chris Bender officially joined the staff (as Teaching Pastor) on 1/16/2022. In addition to individual topical sermons, the series covered in 2022 were How to Study the Bible, Luke’s Story of the Resurrection, the Epistle of James, Spiritual Warfare, and The Christmas Story According to Luke and Matthew.

After 6 years of service as an elder/ pastor, Curt Samo stepped down (in April) with his family’s upcoming move to Tennessee. Brent Braski, Joe Meadows, Mike Vogeler, and newly added Chris Bender continued as elders/ pastors. Elder/ pastor candidates Doug Bunger, Bruce Reumann, and Adrian Daugherty began attending elder meetings monthly in the spring preparation for future eldership.

After 3 years of serving as the worship director, Wes Carr stepped down in July. Adrian Daugherty moved from the youth director role to become the new worship director. Joe Mortimer was chosen as the new youth director to oversee the Submerge youth ministry. Mandy Barnes continued her role as the office administrator. Splash and Swim continued their ministry to the children of Living Water with an expansion of ministry to those in Splash as Molly Johnson and her team began providing instruction from ages 3 to kindergarten.

Seven C’s saw its biggest year of attendance and growth of new families. After multiple years of faithful service in the leadership of that ministry, Brooke Smith stepped down at the close of 2022. Gigi Gardner and Paula Bender took over her responsibilities (at the beginning of 2023). New ministries began in the areas of men and women. Eileen Braski, Paula Bender, Miranda Daugherty, Jillian Condon, and Kayla Wicklund stepped into women’s leadership with regular events occurring throughout the year. Rich Smith and Blake Vogeler stepped into men’s leadership roles and began leading a monthly community men’s group. Gigi Gardner consistently led the ladies’ Bible study on Tuesday mornings.

Small groups expanded from 1 to 2 with fellowship on Mondays and Tuesdays. Later in the year, life group sessions expanded from 6 weeks to 10 weeks to allow for deeper connection within each group. Then, near the close of 2022, we added the Christian video program RightNow Media to help with discipleship in each household. We serve an amazing God with amazing people in our congregation and are excited to continue to follow God’s lead!

2021

The ministry has completed its 5th year in 2021. Much of the pandemic carried over from 2020 with new COVID strains to the original virus and various CDC (Centers for Disease Control) orders. While the virus did affect the way which we continued to do ministry (i.e. virtual services, remaining at home, limited interaction). Between a lack of attendance and volunteers, it did cause us to decide to cancel our Saturday night service. As the year progressed, we did “fight back” to worship in a “normal” fashion, launching youth ministry, small, and life groups (all in person) in addition to the weekend service. We did lose Bob Cartwright from the board of directors and added Dave Johnson. Serving the board of directors is Ron Harms as president, Sheila Berg as secretary/ treasurer, and Dave Johnson as vice president.

In June we did accept the resignation of our first staff pastor, Bobby Gardner. Bobby and his wife, Megan, did choose to remain as part of the Living Water congregation and we welcomed and encouraged them to do so. Brent Braski carried much of the weekend preaching/ teaching responsibilities and Joe Meadows was assigned by the Elders to lead the pastoral search team. This team was organized with 12 members and they began their work on September 1st. On November 28th, a call was extended to and accepted by Chris Bender (wife Paula) to serve full-time as the second staff teaching pastor of Living Water Community Church.

Praise God that our mission’s giving was, once again, pre-funded by the Lord for the upcoming year! Additionally, our financial priorities included eliminating debt, creating a solid emergency fund for expenses, and developing resources for a new church plant in the future. 7 C’s continues a strong ministry to the community by meeting physical and spiritual needs on a monthly basis. God is leading us clearly and deeper as a congregation. He is opening each door as we wait on Him and ask, “what’s next for us?”

2020

The ministry began by launching our Youth ministry “Submerged” on Wednesday, January 8^th. It was a great night of connecting, worship and Adrian’s teaching with 20 youth in attendance at the inaugural service. Our annual business meeting took place January 26^th with Bob Cartwright being commissioned by the Elders to serve as part of our Board of Directors (BOD). Bob joined Ron Harms, Sheila Berg and Dale Lawhorn. The budget was set at $158,390 for the year. The Elder initiatives presented were;

1.) Reaching/Building the Youth ministry 2.) Determining a permanent location 3.) Developing additional leadership within the church. Then February-April happened! A world-wide pandemic hit the United States. The Corona Virus (COVID-19) caused the cancellation of all groups larger than 10 people and often a mandated “stay at home order” was in place. Much of life as we had known it, had stopped. God continued to be faithful, with us and lead by his Holy Spirit, we took our services virtual for the 1^st time for the entire world to see Jesus. Much of ordinary life and live ministry was put on hold for 3-4 months with closures, restrictions and “stay at home orders.” In all the up’s and downs of 2020, God was protecting the ministry and those calling Living Water home. Finances struggled in the early part of the year. However, God’s faithful people rebounded and God supplied all of our needs to provide for our staff payroll, rent and utilities. God provided us an abundance that we could once again pre-fund our 2021 mission funding and purchase the existing building we have been meeting in for the last 4 years. The word of God was consistently proclaimed and people in the congregation and community (and world) were challenged and strengthened by our teaching. God gets all the glory as we look forward to 2021!

2019

The church became 3 years old this year. The Elders have focused their best attention “internally” to strengthen and build the body of Christ through discipleship. With our first priority speaking the gospel, proclaiming sound doctrine and developing fully devoted followers of Christ. Additionally, equipping church staff, leadership and ministry team leaders has been central to the Elders attention and direction this year. The assembly is growing both in spiritual maturity and understanding through our weekend services and discipleship opportunities. Attendance for our weekend services (now 2 services) has also increased to a weekend average of 130. Our single service Christmas Eve attendance was a packed out house with standing room only with 163 people in attendance.

During our January annual meeting the church accepted the resignation of John Rimstidt from the BOD while adding Ron Harms to this board to serve in the leadership of the church. March 17^th Wes Carr was announced before the congregation with the laying of hands by the Elders to serve as our next Worship Director effective April 1st. Wes, Cristal and Eden reside in the Rochelle area and we are pleased to have them as part of the Living Water ministry. Many thanks go out to Noah Stecker who volunteered to serve the Lord well in this ministry roll for the past year and a half. He announced earlier, this spring he would be attending college in California. April 20^th we launched our first 5:00pm Saturday night identical service. On Aug 4^th Dale Lawhorn was commissioned by the Elders to serve on the board of directors (BOD) along with Ron Harms, President and Sheila Berg, Treasurer. November 1^st Adrian Daugherty was brought before the congregation with the laying on of hands of the Elders and added to our part-time staff to lead our High school and Middle school youth ministry. Adrian and his wife Miranda live in Dixon and will launch “Submerged” in January of 2020. Once again, financially the Lord provided the ministry of Living Water with a year-end abundance and our income outpaced our expenses.

2018

With the church becoming 2 years old this year, much is happening in the way of ministry. Some have received Christ as savior and many are finding themselves growing in their faith throughout this year of ministry. The weekly attendance has increased to 90 to 100 regular attenders each weekend. God is multiplying and bringing the increase as the Elders are praying/serving hard to stay up with what God is doing but not get ahead of Him. During our annual meeting we increased Pastor Bobby’s hours to 30 and Mandy Barnes as Office Manager to 20. Additionally, as part of our Elder initiatives for the year the church made 2 large financial commitments with God’s resources to: 1st) Investing in a 4^th building location to provide our Community Care Center with a more visible, centralized location to better serve/reach people for Christ within our community. This new location is located at 1135 Lincoln Hwy and Lisa Smith continues as our ministry team leader on the front lines of serving these needs. Along with our Compassion ministry team led by Rich Smith they complement one another by serving from the same location those individuals/families hurting and facing physical, financial & spiritual hardships. 2nd) The church launched a local, regional and global missions outreach ministry. Angie Montes serves as our 1^st Missions team leader and we now find our church is involved in carrying the gospel worldwide. Both are exciting ministries, with several from the congregation serving on these ministry teams. In the Spring Alex Hauck resigned from the Board of Directors leaving us with two (John & Sheila) continuing on this board. Through the Summer and into the early Fall, the Elders worked through a process to enhance our small group ministry by adding opportunities for teaching, discipleship and relationship building to the congregation by establishing “Life Groups” and “Workshops.” These opportunities have been successful and continue to build momentum in equipping and connecting the body of Christ. On November 19, 2018 we added our 6^th Elder to the team when Brent Braski was commissioned by the Elders to serve in the leadership of the church. Brent currently oversees the Tech Team and Life Groups ministries. Financial budgets were exceeded with surplus being invested right back into the ministry with all the glory going to God! We continue to focus the ministry on building the kingdom by reaching our neighborhood, community and world for Jesus Christ and teaching all believers to walk in full devotion to Christ for the glory of God.

2017

The work of Living Water Community Church has flourished in 2017. The Lord has blessed the ministry in many ways this year. It started on February 1, 2017 with God calling one of our Elders to part-time Pastoral ministry responsibilities in Bobby Gardner. Bobby carries 50% of the weekend speaking duties and he and his wife Megan have been a total blessing to the ministry. An additional layer of leadership was put in place in March with the Elders appointing the church’s first Board of Directors (Deacons). They oversee the business, financial and building needs of the church. They also serve as the corporate officers as follows: John Rimstidt- President, Sheila Berg- Treasurer and Alex Hauck- Secretary. As the Fall arrived, so did the hiring of our first part-time (10 hour per week) office manager in Amanda Barnes. Mandy has also been a huge administrative asset. This full year of ministry has been a year of growth in every area of the church. Nursery, Toddlers, Children, Middle School, High School, College and Adults all have grown physically & spiritually. Additionally, we have increased the focus to teach/disciple all areas of ministry to compensate. Our 80% full capacity number is 130 regular attenders, we are monitoring this very closely to determine the need to offer a second service option in the future. Our 2017 budget was set at $88,872 and the congregation more than exceeded this all for the glory of God. We continue to focus the ministry on building the kingdom by reaching our neighborhood and community for Jesus Christ and teaching all believers to walk in full devotion to Christ for the glory of God.

2016

In the Spring of 2016 the church held several organizational meetings to determine the interest in planting an Acts 2 church in downtown Rochelle. A small group of 20 to 25 people gathered for several meetings in prayer and discussion before undertaking this new work. Following earnest prayer and confirmation from the Lord, the new work was launched on March 22, 2016. The original Elders included; David Johnson, Joe Meadows, Curt Samo & Mike Vogeler. A downtown storefront located at 405 N. Main St was selected and unanimously approved by the Rochelle City council, allowing a 2 year temporary usage permit as a “house of worship” and the renovations began on May 9, 2016. The church received its federal 501c3 charitable tax exempt status on June 14, 2016. And the State of Illinois sales tax exemption status on September 9, 2016. Following the adding of Bobby Gardner as the 5^th Elder and a summer of meetings at Paddock Hall inside the Hickory Grove Civic Center meeting on the “odd” Sunday’s of the month, the church finished the renovations at 405 N. Main St. and prepared for its first service. After receiving a verbal occupancy permit approval, the church held its first service in the new location on October 9, 2016 with 80 people in attendance. Two months later, the church began meeting WEEKLY for worship and ministry. The Lord has blessed and increased the work by adding numbers to His kingdom and renting two additional storefronts for use to conduct children’s ministry through “Splash.”