The board of The Fellowship of Presbyterians is meeting this week in Chicago, and we continue to be invigorated as we dream and pray together about a new kind of ministry community. We will soon post drafts of our theology and polity documents and invite your feedback.-

But before we turn to the structural pieces, we want to restate the larger
vision – what The Fellowship of Presbyterians is seeking to do and the values that define how we will go about it. In the interests of keeping the “why” ahead of the “what,” we want to share with you some of what has come out of the board’s discussions today as we’ve talked about the mission and values of the Fellowship of Presbyterians. This is not final language, but a taste of what excites us for the future.

Our Mission:
To build flourishing churches that make disciples
Our Values:
§ Jesus-shaped Identity: We believe Jesus Christ should be at the center of our individual lives and making disciples of Jesus at the core of our ministry.
§ Thoughtful Theology: We believe in theological education, constant learning, and the life of the mind, and celebrate this as one of the treasures of our Reformed heritage.
§ Accountable Community: We believe guidance is a corporate, spiritual experience. We want to connect leaders to one another in healthy relationships of accountability, synergy, and care.
§ Egalitarian Ministry: We believe in unleashing the ministry gifts of women, men, and every ethnic group.
§ Missional Centrality: We believe in living out the whole of the Great Commission – including evangelism, spiritual formation, compassion, and redemptive justice – in our communities and around the world.
§ Center-focused Spirituality: We believe in calling people to the core of what it means to be followers of Jesus – what “mere Christianity” is and does – and not obsess over the boundaries.
§ Leadership Velocity: We believe identifying and developing gospel-centered leaders is critical for the church, and a great leadership culture is risk-taking, innovative, and organic.
§ Kingdom Vitality: We believe every congregation should vigorously reproduce new missional communities to expand the Kingdom of God.

Are Tiers Still an Option?
December 5, 2011
Many people have been asking about the current status of the “Four Tiers” proposal presented in August at the Minneapolis Gathering — our way of explaining options for congregations to consider, given their particular contexts, while we work together to be the Church of Jesus Christ in a new way. These four “tiers” ranged from no structural realignment to the creation of a totally new Reformed body. They were presented in good faith following conversations with members of the Middle Governing Bodies Administrative Commission and the Office of the Stated Clerk, PC(USA).

Since August, congregations and presbyteries in several regions have explored tiers two and three — the more entrepreneurial approaches to remaining in cooperative ministry with established presbyteries. Many have met with uneven and at times disappointing responses. While we are still very hopeful for continuing progress in some presbyteries, we now appear to have three options:
§ Affiliate with other like-minded individuals and congregations by joining The Fellowship of Presbyterians while remaining in your current presbytery or continuing to explore some form of differentiation within the PC(USA).
§ Differentiate more completely under the umbrella of The Fellowship by pursuing a union relationship (congregation or presbytery) with both the PC(USA) and the new Reformed body.
§ Separate from the PC(USA) by joining the new Reformed body, while maintaining important relationships and creating new ministry partnerships under the umbrella of The Fellowship of Presbyterians.

The Fellowship of Presbyterians remains supportive of any organizational change within the PC(USA) that will allow congregations and/or presbyteries to maintain theological integrity. We are deeply appreciative of the work of the Committees of Correspondence and the Presbyterian Coalition in these ongoing efforts. Our primary calling, however, is to encourage adaptive change — new ways of being the Church that nurture spiritual health and vital mission. In these areas we are pleased to be working with organizations like PFR and the Presbyterian Global Fellowship along with the Outreach Foundation and the Presbyterian Frontier Fellowship for nurturing global partnerships.

Source(Editor’s Note) There are many other documents and articles on this subject available at this web site.)