OUR VALUES

What are your Sunday services like?

While there are some common elements to our worship services, this is a hard question to answer. We often begin the morning by saying, “we are doing something different today.”

 

We always begin with 10 minutes (sometimes longer) of gathering – usually around the coffee/tea station. Regular attendees provide the welcome while the music team finishes their morning preparations. Then we show a music video that calls everyone to be seated. The worship time usually includes worship songs, with occasional readings & poems or some special times of dance & creative art. We regularly pray for each other and receive an “offering” (see below). 

 

Most Sundays will include a sermon, which is based on reading a section of Scripture (from the Bible), learning about its background and how it might inform our life and worship today. Sometimes a sermon will change your life and sometimes it might not seem to apply at all. Either way, we recognize that some people have been deeply wounded by words spoken by someone in authority, and our intent is to have a safe space for you to have an encounter with God. 

 

Sometimes the sermon space is more participatory. We aim to create good questions and allow responses that challenge our own thinking or assumptions and share in each other’s lived and learned experience. 

 

How do you keep the doors open, heat running, and financially support a pastor?

Most of our support comes from the people who regularly attend our worship services. There is a traditional practice called tithing, which is giving 10% of your income to the Church. This may seem like a lot to give away. It is: 

 

If you earn $3,000 a month, then you are giving away $300 each month – that’s a lot of Lattes (at least 2 a day). But here is the crazy thing, if you talk to people who regularly tithe you will hear things like:

 

“It actually does not seem like I have less money”

“Money has less power over me, and I like practicing generosity.”

“I feel set free and less consumed by the money I do have.”

 

If you would like to practice radical generosity, you don’t have to start with 10%. You can start with 1%, and then 2%, and so on. And while we appreciate all the financial gifts that come to our community church, you do not have to give to us. So far we have been able to keep the doors open for over 100 years….

 

We are able to do the things we do by generous financial donations and also many people who give of their time. Ongoing upkeep and many of our recent building updates happened through donated labour.

 

As a final note, our “Council” is tasked to be financially responsible. Some of their recent decisions included reducing the paid pastor position to half-time, which has been quite a viable move. We have also decided to practice “tithing” as a church community. From our regular income, we give 10% away to organizations doing good work in our community (i.e. South Okanagan Gleaners & Adult/Teen Challenge) and around the world (Gleaners & Canadian Baptist Ministries).

 

 

What are this community's practices around the Lord’s Supper/Communion/Eucharist?

We have an Open Table at KCC, which means that everyone seeking God is invited to receive the bread and wine (okay, it’s actually locally made grape juice) for communion, which for us is the body and blood of Christ. This is His table.

 

Is this church part of a denomination?

Yep. The Canadian Baptist of Western Canada (CBWC). The CBWC is connected across Canada to: 

 - Canadian Baptists of Ontario and Quebec

 - L’Union d’Eglises Baptistes Francaises au Canada

 - Canadian Baptists of Atlantic Canada

And we all support the good work of Canadian Baptist Ministries around the world. Being Baptist means that we value the local churches and their independence (which means they can be who they are in the places they are situated), while we also recognize our need for each other and stay interconnected. Being Baptist also means that we practice Baptism (a ritual that symbolizes new life) as adults.

 

Is everyone Baptist at KCC?

Not even close. We emphasize “Community,” not “Baptist.” For example, during one of our discussion Sundays in 2019, about half the participants discussed their religious traditions as being different from traditional Baptist practice.

 

Why do we need the Kaleden Church?

KCC is important because:

• We are experimenting with new ways to do church.

• The good news of the kingdom of God is what Jesus announced and it matters & it’s all around us. We need a place to see it, talk about it and celebrate it.

• We are joining in with God’s work in the world.

·      We are bridging traditions of the church

 

Why is this Q & A so well stated?

The framework was borrowed from a church community in Denver, CO called “House for all Sinners and Saints.” HFASS is leading some great work in the name of Jesus.