What do you see when you think about our place in the community" What are is your vision for our future? What does it encompass?

The Building and Grounds Vision Team was commissioned this fall to listen, learn and explore how our buildings and grounds can be utilized going forward to better serve our community. This is a different approach than we have taken in the past when we primarily examined what our own congregation needed and built a plan to meet that need. Instead, at this place and time, we believe God is calling us to look outside our four walls and find out what needs exist within our community that Mount Olivet is uniquely gifted to respond to and then together with our own ministry needs, devise a plan for our Buildings and Grounds that can help us better serve the community around us.

We have started over the last few months by listening to the partners we already have in the community – Prism, Home Free– as well as partners we hope to have in the future – Armstrong High School, Robbinsdale ECFE, Three Rivers Park District, to name a few. These conversations have consisted of a few questions, but mostly listening around the questions of “what are your hopes and dreams for your organization” and “how can MO help”?– especially as it relates to physical indoor and outdoor spaces.

We have also started listening to our own ministry leaders and staff at Mount Olivet, including the Childhood Learning Center – to find out what their hopes and dreams are as well. This has been in the form of an email survey in December.

We would like to listen to each of you. Please use the comments section below to tell us your thoughts. Don’t be afraid to THINK BIG (even if it is something beyond our current capacity) …were is Mount Olivet called to serve our community? What is possible?

After we receive your ideas and thoughts, we will translate what we have heard into a Vision for Mount Olivet’s Building and Grounds that reflects how Mount Olivet can better serve the community using our unique gifts. We imagine there will be short-term and long-term elements to this Vision as well as creative and unique ways to fund this vision, as we know building a Vision is not free. Stay tuned for a progress update in April – until then, keep telling us your hopes and dreams.

We are listening.

Pastor Beth Horsch

Mount Olivet Lutheran Church of Plymouth