Where Real Church meets Real Life

There are so many wonderful Fresh Expressions of church all around us today. As I continued to read Ancient Faith, Future Mission, I felt like a kid on a storybook Christmas morning, unwrapping one bright expression of church after another.

I’m looking forward to meeting Stephanie Miller and the members of the Leadership Team from The Crossing @ St. Paul’s Cathedral in Boston. Having lived and worked in Boston for 18 years, I know the church’s neighborhood and the Boston Common well. It contains quite the mix of people with money and power, people who live on the street, and everyone in between. I’ll have to explore the web links mentioned in the text, the band U2 and U2Charists. I’m such an old fogey that I don’t think I could name a single U2 song!

I laughed as I read Abbot Stuart Burns' “Concluding Thoughts” in Ancient Faith, Future Mission (Ancient Faith, Future Mission, p. 173): “Remember, the disciples were with Jesus day in, day out, for three years, and still they persisted in getting hold of the wrong end of every stick Jesus gave them.” He continues, “It’s no wonder the genera­tions that have followed have been slow to grasp his meaning and have often mistakenly taken his metaphors literally.” It seems to me that many have, likely, mistakenly taken much that Jesus wanted to be taken literally as metaphor, essential things like “Love your enemies” and “Love one another”!

I agree with Burns’ words, “It takes time – a lot of time – to get to the point where we can allow God to be who God is, rather than what we would like God to be.” I cannot help but wonder about Burns next thoughts: “This God, who meets us in our neighbour, chal­lenges us to recognize the sacredness of other people, and espe­cially those we find difficult, and to receive them as gift.” (Ibid, p. 175). While I think Burns’ statement is generally true, I also believe that there are people who are so scarred by life that they become highly destructive of life around them, including themselves—people that M Scott Peck would describe as “evil.” I can love the one potentially evil person I believe I’ve personally encountered, and grieve for the destruction in his life that brought him to this point, but I find it hard to receive him as a gift or my encounter with him as an encounter with God. Likewise, the behavior of the drunk driver who killed my 19-year-old cousin Ricky was so contemptible in the years before, during, and after the accident one could argue that he met Peck’s criteria for being diagnosed as evil. I just can’t see that Rick’s encounter with him was a gift or an encounter with God.

Namaste!

I loved being introduced this week to Church of the Loving Shepherd, a church located on a farm (what a lovely place to be) and exploring the website for the church’s Camp Bournleyf, which serves children and youth with developmental disabilities.

I also appreciated the opportunity to learn about the International Council of Community Churches, of which Church of the Loving Shepherd is a part. This denomination is new to me. It reminds me a great deal of my own denomination, the United Church of Christ, except it doesn’t appear to have nearly as much centralized activity. Their mission is even the same: Jesus’ words “That they may all be one.” The sermon on Ruth, “Skeletons in the Closet,” by Rev. Martin C. Singley III, which won the ICCC’s 2010 Homiletics Award, concludes with these words:

“And finally, learn from the story of Ruth that the community is strengthened when we welcome strangers and take care of people others exclude. That’s one of the reasons I so strongly believe in this Community Church concept that refuses to close in on itself and to care exclusively for its own needs without regard to others, but chooses to open its arms and doors to all who would come.

          I believe in a church that welcomes Moabites! So go this week, and claim your identity as a beautiful child of God! Live out that beauty by looking up to and loving others! And work hard to help us be the kind of church that understands that even skeletons in the closet have names like Ruth.

Thanks be to God!”

The sermon can be downloaded from http://www.icccusa.com/default.cfm/PID=1.19

I was also eager to learn about the Open Door Mission @ Garden Court, another ICCC community, which is part of a facility used by practitioners of a variety of alternative therapies, another wonderful setting for a church!  The mission has a wide range of offerings, including programs of interest to people in recovery and others, such as their 11^th Step Meeting. The website’s invitation to their Contemplative Holy Eucharist, found at http://theopendoormission.org/holy-eucharist/ is “Come experience this alternative form of worship and like Elijah, be prepared to hear the still small voice of God speak to your heart and your soul.” This sounds enticing indeed.

I was delighted that Pastor Carol closed the letter on her home page, http://theopendoormission.org/, with the words “Blessings & Namaste.” “Namaste,” as you may know, is the universal Hindu greeting meaning, “The God in me greets the God in you.” It recognizes that there is that which is divine in us and in everyone we meet. What better way to greet friend and stranger alike?

Finally, I was excited to explore the link to Rev. Martin Singley’s webpage,  http://www.tellicochurch.com/about-tellico-village-community-church/meet-our-pastors/martin-singley-senior-pastor.html. I found the link posted on ICCC’s Facebook wall, http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=34281278581#!/group.php?gid=34281278581&v=wall, (which I notice has not been written on since 11/13/10):

Singley said,

Thirty-four years of ministry have changed me a lot! ….Today, a simple theology that centers on the life and teachings of Jesus is more than challenging enough to shape and empower my ministry. For me, Christianity is all about being gripped by a grace that leads to loving neighbor as self. Everything else is window-dressing.

Amen!

If I could live in the woods...

I don’t know what I’m doing here, on this page, er, blog, I mean. I do know I love walking in the woods, especially with Fred and Barry. Barry and I often do it together. So I thought, while this page is under construction, I would share a couple of pictures from our woodland adventures with you. The snow scene was snapped by Fred as I’m not equipped for extreme winter travel. Spring, come soon!!!