Elder Nomination

The ball is rolling. In February JOY passed the bylaw and affirmed the decision to go forward with the eldership. After getting the board's input, I have selected the nominating committee. We decided to choose five members so that the burden would not fall on few shoulders but shared broadly. At the same time, we did not want the number to be too big thus causing the process to consume too much time. The nominating committee members are: Sung Park, Paul Lee, Kathy Lee, Sandy Moon and Susan Yom .

Nominating committee plays a very important role in selecting elders. Therefore, I prayed and looked for the following characteristics in selecting the nominating committee: People who deeply care about the church, are respected leaders of the church and will give discerning and unbiased opinions. I also chose people who represent different pools of people in the church.

There is no mystery in elder selection process. Besides the biblical requirements about elders (1 Timothy 3:1-7, Titus 1:5-9), we are looking for people who 1) have no selfish ambition in serving as an elder, 2) have wisdom and discernment, 3) are conciliatory in nature, and thus seeking harmony, 4) have leadership (others respect them as leaders), 5) are long time members of JOY, 6) supportive of pastors, and 7) people who together will bring a mixture of gifts to the church leadership.

Starting now, these people will take charge of the nomination process. They will ask for nominations, screen and interview them, and eventually provide me with the short list from which the elders will be chosen. Once chosen, they will be affirmed in the congregation vote, go through training (proposed period is six-months) and once they pass the elder ordination exam, they will be ordained publicly. This is an important step our church is taking, so please keep the elder selection process in prayer throughout the whole period.