Guiding Principles/Philosophy for Plan: 

Glorifying God and staying centered on Jesus is an absolute

● Let the Spirit guide New Hope – adjustments to plan will occur as we follow His Plan

● Serving God and serving others must remain our goal

● Creativity and adaptability in building faith and worshiping God is critical

● Accept that God has something special that will come out of this and we will look for those new ways to serve and glorify Him while rejecting fear and defeat

We need to support our community and stay connected

● Building use for worship, classes, fellowship and outside groups will have new guidelines (detailed in this document)

● To the best of our ability, we will follow the guidance of our city, state and federal government

● Using online meeting services to conduct classes and meet together

● Regular communication is essential and should continue. We must seek to OVER communicate to support the New Hope Family.

We will be worshiping together in many ways

● Members at New Hope will respond differently based on their health and family situations to attending a worship service or other meeting at the church building so we must provide multiple ways to attend and participate

● Developing small groups to worship and study together should be encouraged to meet the needs of those who cannot or are nervous about attending larger group worship

● People without access or the ability to view online services should reach out to the New Hope Staff or Elders to assist with getting connected

Guidance Team/Ministry Staff are enabled to make decisions in a timely manner

● A smaller team consisting of Bob Peterson, Keith Davis, David Knight, Eric Newberg, Mark Ruff, Clete Ross, Calvin Weeks, Ken Johnson and Jacob Conger with meet weekly or semi-weekly to discuss needed changes to the plan, schedule, or guidelines to allow fast response to immediate needs and allow the Elders to focus on the spiritual needs of the church.

● Ministry Staff should feel empowered to work within these guidelines without having to seek approval unless they prefer to review

General Recommendations for members and visitors at the building for official gatherings:

1. Per the City of Edmond’s Face Covering Ordinance, all people entering and remaining inside the building are required to wear a face covering. Please refer the City of Edmond website for specific details regarding the ordinance. This will be effective from August 26 to October 12. Face covering requirements will continue to follow the guidance from local and state ordinances.

2. Members and visitors who are not feeling well or running a fever will be asked/expected to stay home

3. Members in a vulnerable or “at risk” group or members who have compromised immune systems will operate on a different schedule than other members and their return to the building for events will be delayed

4. Members will be encouraged to follow proper social distancing when at the building per current government guidelines

5. Body temperature readings will be the responsibility of individual attendees prior to attending worship service and group photos can be taken as a visual to refer to for contact tracking support. No individual photos or logging will be required.

6. Parents will be responsible for their children as there will be no classes or children’s church initially. Target date for children’s classes and children’s church is January. If conditions improve an earlier start to classes will be considered.

7. The church building will be set-up to facilitate proper spacing – auditorium will have every other row blocked off (Red tape indicates a non-seating row and Green tape indicates acceptable seating rows). and those in attendance will be asked to keep 2 seats between family groups. All who WANT to come should be allowed to, and they should be accommodated.

8. The gym will be set-up for overflow on Sunday morning if it is felt the auditorium is too full or if attendees have a preference to use it. Additionally, classrooms 1 & 2 could be used to provide even more distancing

9. No food or coffee at services and no meals served initially but can start when appropriate and follow proper serving protocol

10. Areas not in use should be blocked off – children’s area, kitchen, cry room, etc

Worship Services

● Current worship services will include live services at the building and a live stream on YouTube for those who cannot be at the building

● Ushers are in place to provide direction and guidance to people attending the service starting (Purpose is to assist and not police the people coming to the building)

● Proper preventative practices: hand-washing, avoiding touching eyes, nose, mouth, avoid close contact with others, practicing social distancing (6ft of separation), covering coughs and sneezes, cover nose and mouth with a face mask, staying at home if you are ill and staying at home if you are caring for the ill will be communicated to members and visitors through normal communication methods and postings on appropriate locations within the building in preparation for having people present

● Encourage small groups to view live stream from a home to limit the number of people in the building

● Munchkin Minute/Children’s Church will be introduced at the appropriate time – Target January

● No Wednesday night services at the building are planned at this time. No restart date yet determined.

● Communion – Sealed individual communion cups are provided at the entry points in the auditorium. Individuals who are gloved will pass them out. Please refrain from serving yourself.

Adult Classes (Sunday and Wednesday)

● Continue Zoom Classes indefinitely

● The plan for adult classes is currently being developed but no date for on-site classes has been determined yet

● A combined adult class meeting in the gym on Sunday mornings at 9am is under consideration

● Encourage small groups to meet and have a class or stream a class and then stay together for the streaming worship service

● Consider adding a time break between class and worship to allow for travel to the building from home

Children Classes (Sunday)

● No classes at building until the Spring Semester (Target - January). If conditions improve an opportunity to start sooner will be considered.

● Teachers will need to be located and trained on proper procedures/cleaning

● Cleaning procedures need to be documented. Supplies must be readily available.

Youth Classes/Activities

● Youth are currently using Youth Room for Hang-Out on Wednesday night. No Sunday classes are planned at this time. 

● Off-site gatherings of youth should occur following proper gathering guidelines

● Parents should be made aware of any gatherings and agree to their child attending

Communication/Social Media

● Continue supporting current Website, Newsletter, and Facebook activities. We need to improve on this by engaging interested and capable members, thus spreading out the work and providing backup.

● Continue with current videos and communication

● More defined plan around social media is needed – develop a team to define

Use of Building by Outside Groups

● Priority is getting operations running in support of New Hope services and classes

● Our expectations is that we will not open the building to outside groups until 2021

● Proper cleaning policies to be developed prior to allowing outside use

Food Preparation in Building

● All people handling food or serving people should wear face covering and gloves

● Proper cleaning and sanitizing of the area used is required

COVID 19 Response Plan

● If the New Hope Staff or Elders become aware of a possible COVID 19 infection the response plan will be initiated

● Based on the situation, the New Hope Staff and Eldership will decide what type of response is needed

● Should a positive infection be confirmed by someone who was in the building then the following steps will be taken:

1. An email to all members and visitors (who filled out an information card) will be written to notify about the exposure and provide further details about upcoming services. Due to privacy issues names and specific details will not be included. The general strategy would be to shutdown Sunday worship services for 2 weeks but this can be adjusted as required.

2. Each Elder will call every member of their flock and provide the same information as was provided in the email

3. Social media (Weekly Newsletter, Facebook and New Hope Website) will be updated to share this communication 

4. The building will be properly cleaned and sanitized:

▪ Full wipe down of all touch surfaces (door handles, light switches, tables and plastic chars.

▪ Disinfect carpets and fabric chairs

▪ Replace all HVAC Filters

▪ Using disinfecting fogger to treat the building twice 7 days apart and again prior to resuming services.

5. Communication will be reissued once services are allowed be back on site

6. Worship services will be prerecorded video format similar to what was done at the beginning of the outbreak