Volkhardt Report to Shareholders

Every year our supporting churches ask us to fill out an annual report.  A "Report to the Shareholders" so to speak.  We'd like to share with you excerpts from one that we just did.

Please explain the nature of your current role with this missions organization (include what your responsibilities are, or job description).

Glen:  I continue to serve as the President and CEO of Paraclete Mission Group. As the leader of a small organization, I get involved in whatever it takes to care for Paraclete and Paraclete associates (missionaries).  I do recruiting, fund raising, member care, budgeting, Communications, IT—you name it.  

Paraclete Conference, September 2013

 

Shelly:  I spend a great deal of time mentoring women in leadership, both locally, nationally and internationally.  I also speak at women's retreats, missions conferences, etc.  I give training seminars, training in Kitchen Table Counseling (helping lay women develop a peer/biblical counseling ministry), cross-cultural communications, Praying in Color, as well as helping women develop their own mentoring/discipleship ministry.  I also serve as a Kitchen Table Counselor with missionaries, pastor's wives and women in leadership.  I participate on the Paraclete personnel committee, interviewing prospective missionaries, contacting and interviewing their references. We often host our missionaries and others in our home for meals, meetings and overnights. I also help with the annual reviews of our missionary staff which has a huge listening, challenging and encouragement component.  I also review most of the mission documents generated out of the president's (Glen's) office. Frankly, attaching percentages to this varied ministry is extremely difficult.

Please check all that apply and show % of time performing each category:

Glen:

 

• Support (of Paraclete missionaries and consulting with other agencies and domestic and international missionaries) 50% 
• Teaching or training nationals 5%  
• Mission mobilizers 25% 
• Mission Strategic Direction   20%

Shell:

• Evangelism 2%
• Support 15%
• Teaching or training nationals 5%   
• Mission mobilizers 5%  
• Training missionaries and women in leadership 10%
• Deeper life teaching at women's conferences 10% 
• Mentoring, Discipling and Counseling-face-to-face, on the phone and Skype 20% 
• Study and Prep time is a big chunk of my life too.

Share three significant ministry accomplishments from the past year (including personal ministry outside your job function including evangelism, mentoring, discipleship, etc.)

Glen:

1. A retreat/conference for all Paraclete associates for refreshment, networking and training.  We do these retreats every 18 months.  The venue of this year’s conference had to be moved at the last minute because of the Estes Park flooding.  God’s provision was great.
2. Closure of an operational office in Gilbert, Arizona last March and the conversion of many Paraclete systems to virtual and subcontracted services.  This has brought a new level of professionalism to the mission and prepared us for growth via the implementation of systems which are more scalable.
3. Training and networking in Honduras at COICOM 2013.  I continue to serve on the board of this thriving Latin American organization.  It was a blessing to see how the Lord is moving in the region so close to our hearts, and how he is using ministry partners from the 90s in powerful and influential ways.

Shelly:

1. Travelling to Latvia, teaching a Kitchen Table Counseling seminar for pastor's wives, seminary professors, missionaries and women in leadership.  Being the keynote speaker for the first inter-denominational women's conference ever held in Latvia.  We had 200 women attend and so many women raised their hands to indicate that God had done deep work in their lives that I was unable to get an accurate count.
2. Four of the women I mentor played large roles in women's retreats/conferences this year.  Two of them were the keynote speakers (I had the privilege of attending and hearing one them!!) one coordinated a weekend event for 100 women, another participated on the committee for a weekend retreat.   My desire that women that I work with be encouraged to fulfill the calling God has placed on their lives!
3. Seeing the book that I wrote with my mother, Muriel Cook, be translated into Chinese and be released mid-November to pastors and their wives in China--next year there will be KTC training in 4 cities in China!  My parents served in Taiwan as missionaries for 16 years, though their dream had been to go to China.  My initial call to missions was to China as well.  This is coming full circle as well as cementing my parent's legacy! The Japanese translation is finished and moving into editing and printing. The book is also in the process of being translated into Albanian as well!  At my age and stage, I am thrilled when my efforts for the furtherance of God's Kingdom are multiplied!

 

What is the status of your top three goals from the past year?

Glen:

1.  Spiritual Foundations: Improving here.  Point 2 below called for an extraordinary amount of energy and time.  Now that that transition is largely in the past, life has returned to a more healthy balance.  Even through the heaviest of loads, Shelly and I are very careful with our “Sabbath keeping.”

 

2.  Operational Transition: As anticipated last year, this took much of my time in late 2012 and the first half of 2013.  Some of the key components of the transitions were:

• A new online accounting system
• Contracted professional accounting services
• Online access to donor information for all missionaries
• The addition of online giving for missionaries, projects and the Paraclete Mission Fund (Operations)
• Closing our physical office in favor of three people working from home.
• A lockbox system that allows Wells Fargo to open, scan and deposit all checks
• New upgraded servers for Paraclete email and web site
• A Paraclete Intranet for community, information, cloud services, and communication tools among the Paraclete missionaries. (90% done)

3.  Recruiting: This area suffered as I focused my attention on point 2.  In the last twelve months two new associates have joined us.  I just began reporting this area to the Paraclete board with a set of metrics to help show progress in this area.  Ask for a copy if you are interested.  I’d be happy to share it.

 

Shelly: 

 

1.  My mentoring ministry continues to grow and my #2 highlight of this past year is evidence that the girls are developing and growing beyond me! 

 

2.  Yay!!The “Your Kingdom Come” series is not completed yet, it will be by Feb. 14 (which is the date of the first retreat that I’m scheduled to give the material.)  Two messages are completed and have been given, I am developing a companion workbook and the study and research for the messages is almost done.

 

3.  I am not actively writing a book--although my co-author, Mimi Wilson and I have had several planning sessions and we are asking God for a way forward.

Briefly give your top three goals for this year

Glen:

1. Roll out the Paraclete Intranet, to better serve associates in their ministry, networking, enrichment and fund raising.  The project is well on its way, but not ready for release as of November 2013. 
2. Recruit four new full-time associates and two partner or part-time associates.  This will involve new mobilization strategies for our web site, use of social media and events.  See KRAs, Recruiting.
3. Upgrade Paraclete plan documents for retirement and health insurance to better comply with changing regulations and new legislation.

 

Shelly:

1. Teach at least one Kitchen Table Counseling Seminar in Spanish
2. Get more training in the area of Spiritual Direction and developing listening skills
3. Be more intentional about keeping up blog posts and keeping our supporters informed of the return on their investment in the Kingdom through us.

Please share your greatest upcoming ministry challenge and how you plan to address it.

Shelly:

I have a huge passion for overseas ministry, particularly in Latin America.  Right now I have two opportunities in 2014 to go to Latin America to do training--however, it means raising travel money over and above our monthly support needs.  Also, there is a shifting of paradigms regarding women’s ministry in the US and I want to navigate that shift well while continuing to minister to women in my area of gifting.

Glen:

As I finish up this report, we are working on a calculation of the overhead cost per associate and how many associates we need to be sustainable without large donations to our general fund.  Raising money for the general fund is difficult for us for several reasons. Paraclete board members and a single major donor have stepped up and underwritten our short-fall in operational funds, but a broader support base would be more healthy.  So we need either, more associates, more general fund donors, lower expenses, or some combination of all three.

How has your ministry over the past 12 months helped fulfill the Great Commission?

Shelly:

The biggest way it has done that is the training of missionaries and national leaders in Latvia and Guatemala and here in the US to help them be better equipped, sometimes even help them catch a vision for the Great Commission and GOING into all the world. However, I believe that my greatest contribution has been the “teaching them to obey all that I’ve commanded…” The main thrust of my teaching is to help people find out who God is and what difference that can make in our daily lives—as we learn that, we WANT to obey because we love Him SO much!  (Can you tell I’m passionate about this?!?!)

Glen:

The church is exploding around the world.  With that growth comes growing pains.  By deploying experienced missionary veterans as Paraclete associates, we are able to help the vibrant church in the Global South (and elsewhere) avoid some of the pitfalls that they encounter, and encourage front-line kingdom workers who can get depleted and discouraged because of heavy workloads.  Paraclete associates get involved in a wide variety of ministry, all of which falls into the category of coming alongside.  Here is a short list to give an idea of the kinds of ministry our associates did in the last year.

 

• Counseling missionaries through a sabbatical process
• Working with IT security issues in dangerous locations
• Board service in other mission agencies
• Serving Ethiopian leadership in women’s and children’s ministries.
• Ministry to expat former Muslims in Europe
• Cross cultural training of new missionaries
• Language and cultural emersion of new missionaries going to Middle Eastern locations

Relationships

Describe the ways that you maintain spiritual health (i.e. accountability partner, discipleship, mentoring).

Glen: 

My spiritual life is the foundation of everything else.  I enjoy rising early to pray, read scripture and devotional books, and meditate through scripture.  Lectio divina has been helpful in recent years.  We are committed Sabbath-keepers.  We attend church mainly on Saturday evenings, leaving Sundays as down-time when we are not traveling or speaking.  I have been mentoring two men.  These relationships are reciprocal, not just me mentoring them.  As a matter of course, we pray together as staff (weekly) and associates (monthly) and distribute prayer requests to the larger Paraclete family (weekly).  The home group we lead grounds us in the realities of community life, with illnesses, family problems, work issues and the various joys and trials of life.

 

Shelly:

I meet with a prayer partner almost weekly for sharing and accountability.  I am also in regular communication with several women who mentor me.  Glen and I are very careful to guard our “Sabbath” time where we spend the better part of a day each week in prayer, scripture meditation and listening to the Father.  I meet monthly with a group of women in leadership roles to listen to God together through prayer and scripture. 

 

What is your largest source of stress?

 

Glen:

Too much to do.  Learning to walk away when the day is done.  Managing IT as “least ignorant person.”

Shelly:

Last year, Glen’s physical challenges were weighing heavy on my heart.  He is managing his health well and we are grateful to the Lord.  It still figures prominently in my mind.  Also, our church situation is stressful.  Our home group is really our source of fellowship. 

Is there anything happening in your life that could cause you and your family to make major changes within the next 12 months?

I, Glen, continue to manage my CTCL cancer.  All is well as of this report.  We will update you if there is any change.  That is the only known issue on the horizon.