Weaving Together Our Beloved Community

“… Remember the joy God intends for us”

I am honored and grateful that you have called me to be your settled pastor at Pilgrim Congregational United Church of Christ. I look forward to our time together serving St. Joseph, southwest Michigan, and God’s good earth.

My hope is that we will do all that with fun and celebration. We can often forget that God intends joy for us. Jesus enjoyed life to the point where one of the accusations made against him was that he was a glutton and a drunkard. I’m not sure that rates with me stealing cookies from the church freezer but Jesus clearly did celebrate community life well. 

One of my favorite artist renderings of Jesus is one I remember seeing for the first time several years ago. His head is tilted back in uproarious laughter—like he just heard Mary of Magdala tell a great joke or he watched one of the disciples slip and fall for the fourth time. Better yet, maybe Jesus is laughing at himself as he fails miserably at trying to press olives.

With so many mainline churches losing money and members, we can get caught in a negative narrative that makes us feel like we are failing. I don’t believe that. If we do believe that, life in the church can seem pretty dour and disappointing. 

Instead, I hope we can make a concerted effort to remember the joy God intends for us—no matter how small we are. Coming out of pandemic (it will happen, won’t it), I want to be intentional about becoming closer to one another and making regular fun and celebration a big part of who we are. To the point where other people in St. Joseph might say, “That church on Glenlord and Washington sure has a lot of fun!” 

A congregation that continues to serve its community and love its neighbors

“This time together has been a unique one for discerning how to live out our faith”

I have enjoyed and continue to enjoy being pastor at Pilgrim Congregational United Church of Christ. Church Council is now tasked to determine whether our relationship will continue. Whatever their decision, I am grateful for this opportunity to serve you all, for the love and care you shared with me, and for the ways you all integrated my ministry with yours.

I have especially enjoyed the gentle ribbing I get from Carol about my freezer cookie-raiding, from Bob and my questionable miracles with prayer, and the many ways you all reminded me not to take myself too seriously. I loved working together to weave together the Beloved Community.

This time together has been a unique one for discerning how to live out our faith. Figuring out how to do communion, baptism, and regular Sunday worship can be a challenge in this pandemic era but also a joy as we figure out how to do the work together.

These past six months I loved seeing the young girls in our church sharing their wisdom during Children’s Sermons and providing leadership in reading from their new Family Story Bibles and during our lectio divina.

We embraced taking ancient practices and making them new again. Lectio divina, examen, Julian of Norwich’s Body Prayer, Encircling Prayer, the Imposition of Ashes, and Breath Prayers were all spiritual forms we practiced through this time.

Ronda Collier and Nicole Gibby humbled me with the great presentation they made on their study with other churches around the book, Me and White Supremacy. They helped us begin the hard work of developing a resource center for antiracism work. In February, Black History Month, we registered significant dates in U.S. history and adapted courageous poetry for responsive readings.

This last Thursday I completed Bible 101 with the hardy souls who were willing to stick with me, ask questions, and understand the Bible in a way that was counter to many of the ways we were taught the Bible. My hope is that this faith formation experience made the Bible more approachable and whets their appetite for further curiosity and study.

Finally, I am proud to serve a congregation that continues to serve its community and love its neighbors. From supplying essentials to migrant farm workers to CROP Walk to boxing food essentials for the indigent to a discretionary fund to provide emergency help for people in distress to supplying water dispensers for Benton Harbor residents, Pilgrim Congregational UCC continues to share God’s love in prolific ways. Even now, to taking the lead in hosting an Afghan family reflects ancient Christian values of hospitality that we are making new.

Again, thanks to Pilgrim Congregational UCC for this opportunity to serve. Whatever Church Council decides, I pray that you will continue in your faithfulness.

Shalom,

Mike

✝

Turn Your Face to Jerusalem

As we walk the hard road of Lent, our faith tradition tells us that a time soon coming will lead to our necessary public statement of faith amidst conflict and upheaval. The rigors of Lent prepare us for what is to come. Jesus turns his faith to Jerusalem, the holy city, where so many of the prophets have been killed in the name of political expediency and religious conviction. Holy Week awaits.

As I have shared, a baptism tradition in the ancient Christian Church was to have the candidates for baptism prepare through rigorous spiritual practice and devotion during Lent. Prayer, politically, was about giving our heart to the things devoted to by the Heart of God. Fasting, politically, was about detaching the will from the direction of a Domination System caught up in war, slavery, and violence. Almsgiving, politically, was about recognizing that the wider system was not as how God intended it and a necessary connection we have to the poor.

Baptism was a difficult decision. It was a definitive cut from the values and things espoused by the wider world. Who wants to be that radical? That devoted? Lent was about proving our mettle for the wilderness that would certainly follow after the baptism.

This year our Holy Week corresponds with the sacred seasons of so many other historic faiths. Passover is around the same time. Ramadan begins. A holy convergence is taking place. A reminder of the holiness of the whole earth is being placed before us. Holi. Vaisakhi. Ramadan. Passover. Holy Week and Easter. Vesak. Naw Ruz. Ridvan.

These religious holidays - which take place between March 17th and May 6th - attract billions of people. The Equinox, Earth Day, and World Water Day, which also occur during this time, engage even more people.

Green Faith (www.greenfaith.org) is referencing this as a sacred season for climate justice. My plan is to participate in one of the street seders corresponding with Passover. This action will spill out into prayer and fasting around a large financial institution to see transformation occur so that the fossil fuel industry, crumbling as it is, no longer receives the large welfare checks from these financial institutions and governments. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates that the fossil fuel industry receives welfare checks from these large banks and governments to the tune of $11 million dollars a minute! And the IMF has long been considered a very conservative institution.

What will we do in these sacred seasons? How will we be people of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving? How do we devote ourselves to those values which go straight to the Heart of God? How do we show our freedom and balance to fast from that which destroys and makes war? How do we show our connection to those who have been spit out by the system?

Holy Week beckons to us this year. It calls, as it always has, to those who are willing to turn their face to Jerusalem and show the mettle of their faith. May all of us remember our baptism in preparation.

Blessings,

Mike

Congratulations Don Kretchman!

At the Annual Royalton Township Appreciation Dinner in February,

Don Kretchman was honored for his fifty years of service with the Royalton Township Fire Department. A husband, father, grandfather, Chairman at his church, and fiercely loyal friend, Don is incredibly deserving of this recognition and celebration.

“Everyone who meets our dad, Don, feels like they are the most important person in the room. He has the ability to captivate your heart with his quiet, loving energy, and has spent his entire life giving that energy, his time, and his heart to our community.” Trish Gardini, daughter of Don Kretchman, describes her father with love, reverence, and devotion, as she lists his accomplishments and shares a little of his personal history.

Don joined the fire department on September 7, 1971, and held the title of Assistant Chief for many years. Chief Jonatzke at the Royalton Township Fire Department says, “I have worked with Don for 35 years on the fire department, and he still continues to be a mentor to me. He has mentored all of our firefighters, making this the best fire department around. He is the highest quality of firefighter a chief or township could possibly ask for. It is a monumental achievement to spend the last fifty years leaving important family events, day or night, to come to the aid of others.”

Don Kretchman has lived in Royalton Township his entire life. From birth, marrying the love of his life, starting a business, and raising three children, Don is a community servant and pillar of strength and leadership. He and his wife, Terry (Zinkil), owned and operated the Wash Station Car Wash across from Lakeshore High School for many years, and have been longtime supporters of Lakeshore Athletics. All three children attended Lakeshore Schools, and he never missed a concert, game, or event.

This community is overflowing with feel-good stories and praise for Don. “Don would give anyone the shirt off of his back, and though his 6’4” stature is protective and commanding, he has the ability to put anyone at ease,” Trish says. Countless community members reminisce about Don offering comfort during a crisis, holding their hands during the chaos of an extraction after a car accident.

Physically and emotionally demanding, being a firefighter is not an easy task. Combining the desire to help others, dedication to the community, and the time and energy sacrificed for the safety of others, the duty of a firefighter deserves honor and praise. Don has given over 10,000 hours of firefighting, with many more to come. Congratulations to Don on his 50 Years of Service!

By Jocelyne Tuszynski, MOTM contributor

There are angels among us!

Thank you, Don, for your selfless giving.

The Sabbath - A Cathedral in Time

“Sabbath is what we are to sew into our every day, every week, every year for ourselves, for our neighbors, for the water, and for the land. “

In an achieving culture, many of us reflect on what we are going to “do” this year in New Year’s resolutions. Especially in this age of pandemic, being asked to “do” one more thing can feel overwhelming. We live in a culture which equates our worth with our work.

All of creation was lovingly fashioned by God as a reflection, mirror, or image of God. We are the beloved Children of God woven together as the Beloved Community. Whoa! Wait! Put that down. Stop. Deep breath. That’s who you are without ever asking you to “do” anything. Take that in. You are a Beloved Child of God - created that way.

More than any other part of the creation, Sabbath is the centerpiece. Sabbath is referenced as a cathedral in time. Its intent is to be liberative and remind you of the foundational truth of your being. The Children of Israel, held in slavery for centuries, were taught that “work” was the meaning of their lives. Sabbath is the antidote.

Sabbath includes practices and rhythms of rest, play, fun, and celebration. God does not intend Sabbath as a “tack-on.” Like, if you get all your chores done, go out and play in the yard. No. Sabbath is what we are to sew into our every day, every week, every year for ourselves, for our neighbors, for the water, and for the land. Jesus proclaims this when he gets up in front of the synagogue in the gospel of Luke and declares his mission statement with “the year of the Living God’s favor” (the Year of Jubilee). The Year of Jubilee was a re-set of the whole system of life within Judaism and it came out of Sabbath tradition and story.

So, in New Year’s resolution, what are we going to sew into our every day, every week, every year for ourselves to know God’s intent for us? What practices or rhythms of rest, play, joy, and celebration will not “tack-on” but make central? Maybe that means a letting go or fasting of something that is just too much. Maybe it is recognizing that a weekly “bubble bath” is just what the doctor ordered. Or a forest bath will remind you of the wonders God intends for you. Who knew that your weekly card game was part of God’s plan for you?

Resolve to live in God’s cathedral of time. Resolve, plan for, sew into the regular God’s Sabbath. For you are a Beloved Child of God. Then radiate out.

Blessings,

Mike

Just Breathe

“Advent comes and the cultural Christmas is going to try and tell us that we measure up by knocking ourselves out. I hope you are able to hear the voice of God in the background saying, “Slow. Sometimes stop. Just breathe.”

One of the most beautiful songs from Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Broadway musical, In the Heights, is a song sung by the favored daughter (her name is Nina) of the community who has returned home after a semester at Stanford University. The song reflects the angst and anxiety Nina feels as she returns home thinking that she has failed everyone by not hacking it at Stanford.

I love the song because, in the background, members of the community are singing in Spanish words of love and encouragement—telling her to just “resipira” (breathe). Meanwhile, Nina has this inner dialogue where she thought she was the one who was different, the over-achiever who made it out of the neighborhood. The community clearly loves Nina. Nina interprets that love as a need for her to perform and do better. The one thing that does come through, repeated to her over and over, is “breathe.” Just breathe, Nina.

I think that is a powerful narrative for our day. In the midst of pandemic, we can still hear those narratives which tell us we’re supposed to be better, supposed to be doing more work, supposed to be being more.

I think it is God’s fondest desire that we might hear over and over, “Just breathe.” In all of your glory and wonder as a very small part of creation, “Just breathe.”

Advent comes and the cultural Christmas is going to try and tell us that we measure up by knocking ourselves out. I hope you are able to hear the voice of God in the background saying, “Slow. Sometimes stop. Just breathe.”

We are all daughters and sons, siblings and cousins, who need to be able to sing the song of the community reminding others that “hacking” it is not what life is about. Just breathe. Don’t get caught up in those inner dialogues of worth. There is work to be done, and we need everyone. If we are caught up in narratives of guild or falling short, we feel to hear the voice of God singing along with the community, “Just breathe. Breathe. And take my hand for the work we can do together.”

Shalom,

Mike

Our Beloved Community (Copy)

“What might it mean to know, deep within you, that there are whole peoples who are treated as lesser?”

Every Sunday I hope you hear from me that you are a Beloved Child of God. I thought it was always disempowering and not true to the deeper tradition to name us as “sinners” who were in need of forgiveness. While repentance is an important spiritual practice, I don’t think that’s where we begin. That’s why I have always bent away from the Reformed Tradition practice of Prayer of Repentance, followed by an Assurance of Pardon, and then we sing the Gloria Patri as a way of praising God for pardoning worms like us. I think we begin with the idea that we are made in the image of God, the imago dei. That is found in Genesis 2:27 and in Wisdom Literature in the Apocrypha, Wisdom 2:23 (For God created humankind to be immortal, and made humankind to be an image of God’s own eternity. The righteous, because they are made in the image of God, can rest in the full hope of eternal life.) You can hear in that powerful Scripture from Wisdom a question about what endures or what is of value. Is it wealth, power, or fame? Or is it righteousness, jus<ce, and equity? My prayer is that we all begin worship, from age 2 to 92, with that understanding firmly planted in our consciousness. We are made as Beloved Children of God, as part of God’s Beloved Community, to do justice, righteousness, and equity. The prophecy tradition in the Bible switches out “equity” with “steadfast love.” Creation stories define us. They tell us who we are at our core. They also tell us who everybody else is. That is why I have made going to Benton Harbor at 3:00 p.m. a spiritual practice I hope I can keep. I may miss November 14th to celebrate the installation of Rev. Nevenzel in Baroda but I plan to be there as long as they need me. I want to affirm that the people of Benton Harbor are Beloved Children of God. The amazing thing about such efforts is that God is already there seeking to restore the preciousness of Benton Harbor. What I did was small this past week. But, hopefully, I can be faithful. Hopefully. I am also thinking about that as Thanksgiving approaches. I was reminded time after time by my Native sisters and brothers, sisters and cousins, that Thanksgiving may be a time together with family, but most often it was a remembrance of trauma for Native people. Our faithful daughter, in remembering that Native people are also Beloved Children of God, had us drive to Standing Rock one Thanksgiving. We became Water Protectors. It was wet. It was cold. It was glorious.

What does it mean to peacefully pray in a wide circle, with barricades in front of you and surveillance drones circling overhead? How easily I was affirmed as belonging to a wider community of Elders and Saints that day! How easily I was affirmed as belonging as a Beloved Child of Creator as I gripped the hand of my daughter on one side and a stranger on the other to pray together. We should also listen to the creation stories of other peoples to critique and learn both the power of our own story and its limits. The Potawatomi creation story has the land and food brought forth for humankind only by animals (namely, a muskrat) diving into the water to provide soil and roots. Thus, humankind flourishes as a result of animal sisters and brothers, siblings and cousins who are a part of our Beloved Community.

What might it mean to know, every day, that you are a Beloved Child of God? What might it mean to know, deep within you, that there are whole peoples who are treated as lesser? What might it mean to know, as we consider the limits of our own creation story, that the Beloved Community is far larger than we ever imagined?

Autumn Remembrance

“We are to remember by giving thanks not only for the blessings the good earth yields by God's kind and gentle hands but also gather around us the memories and community of saints that will enfold and protect us.”

With the changing of the seasons, also comes a sense of melancholy. Earth in this hemisphere slows. Certain animals turn to hibernate. Much of green life turns to amber, bittersweet, and scarlet. We are reminded that all things perish and that we, ourselves, are mortal. The harvest begins and ends - preparing for the cold of winter.

We are to remember by giving thanks not only for the blessings the good earth yields by God's kind and gentle hands but also gather around us the memories and community of saints that will enfold and protect us. In worship we will be studying the enigmatic story of Job and how Job's friends left him to affirm what they believed to be God and God's morality.

The first Sunday of November we will celebrate All Saints Sunday by remembering those we have lost in this earthly life over the last two years but remain with us as a circle to propel and protect us. As a new pastor to this church, if there is someone you would like to remember who was closely tied to this church, please communicate the date of birth and date of death of the loved one so that I might use it on Sunday, November 7th. If you have an electronicphoto you would like to share, please pass that along as well.

Resiliency

Resiliency is about not only bouncing back but also about hardiness, sustainability, and the ability to grow and develop under trying circumstances.

One of the topics I regularly tune into around organizational theory is resiliency. Resiliency is about not only bouncing back but also about hardiness, sustainability, and the ability to grow and develop under trying circumstances. In the conflict resolution work that I do, I often have to remind churches that conflict is normal and natural and a sign of normal growth and development.

One organizational theorist I regularly read says that healthy organizations are diverse on their outer edges, allowing for people to plug in at different places. Healthy organizations are also uniform and cogent at their core. People know what the deep values are of the organization, can repeat those values, and there is a certain logic surrounding those values and how they are acted upon.

Almost all churches I work with want to grow numerically. But leaders often put a ceiling on that growth by insisting that all that goes on at the church is known and controlled by them. They bristle fearing that the intimacy they have at the church will be disrupted by work or a ministry or an offering is not something they can control. Anxiety and fear build until the energy is expelled and the crisis averted.

In mid-September I will be working with a church that was ready to take off and excited about the new ministries and direction. That is, until all of that energy and excitement meant that the church was really going to change. So my job will be to go in and help them to observe themselves, hold up a mirror to ask them what their true values are and where they really want to go.

We have a number of offerings, changes, and possibilities coming this fall. I want to make sure that nobody believes they have to attend to all of them or be a part of every single thing for the church to be healthy. When a church can know that they are doing God’s work over here, with my participation, and God’s work is also being done over there, without my participation, the congregation has a chance to flourish.

As you look over the many offerings for this fall, I hope you will revel at all the different possibilities found at our church without the anxiety and fear that something might be amiss. I do object meditation on the regular to manage my own fear and anxiety that the world is going to heck in a handbasket unless I do this or this or this. On the contrary, Sabbath teaches that when I rest and release, give up my need for control, God is often spotted working outside of me. And my faith returns.

Worship

On the Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time, between Sturgeon Moon and Corn Moon (Sunday, September 5th), we will celebrate worship in the narthex. In keeping with the recent history of our church, this will be a more informal service. The sermon will come from you! That’s right, I said it.

I want us to think about the proverbs, stories, or parables that have held meaning for our lives. Deep wisdom can often be found by holding two opposing things together. So we may have found that one proverb holds wisdom for us in a given moment in time. I will share mine. I’ll look forward to having you share yours. In that way, we will teach other and continue to weave together a cord that cannot be quickly broken.

Weaving Together Our Beloved Community

Make it stand out

“On the Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time, between Sturgeon Moon and Corn Moon (Sunday, September 5th), we will celebrate worship in the narthex. In keeping with the recent history of our church, this will be a more informal service. The sermon will come from you! That’s right, I said it.”

You can imagine, as a baseball fan, how I believe some of the greatest wisdom can be found on the baseball diamond. Yogi Berra was famous for proverbs that, at first, seemed nonsensical, but with a deeper look actually had a deeper wisdom. Proverbs like “It ain’t over until it's over” can be about our own agency in giving up or pushing forward. “Never answer an anonymous letter” can be about not giving your time or energy who people who refuse to be accountable. Ok, some were nonsensical. But a good proverb is usually about seeing something on second glance. Simplicity unfolds into something broader and longer.

At the end of the summer and on into autumn, the Revised Common Lectionary turns to stories of Wisdom Literature and Responses to Ethnocentrism in its Hebrew Scripture readings. Wisdom Literature is the oldest text we have in our Bibles - filled with proverbs and parables, maxims, and the natural order of the universe. Wisdom Literature values “a fear of the Lord.” Too often that has been coupled with a God of hellfire and judgment. But “fear of the Lord” had much more to do with offering a counter and challenge to rulers, wealthy, and the powerful who believed themselves unaccountable and unanswerable to anything outside themselves. Jesus regularly used consciousness-raising wisdom and parable to help people form community and understand the world they lived in.

On the Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time, between Sturgeon Moon and Corn Moon (Sunday, September 5th), we will celebrate worship in the narthex. In keeping with the recent history of our church, this will be a more informal service. The sermon will come from you! That’s right, I said it.

I want us to think about the proverbs, stories, or parables that have held meaning for our lives. Deep wisdom can often be found by holding two opposing things together. So we may have found that one proverb holds wisdom for us in a given moment in time.

Two of my favorite Scripture passages are from the Wisdom Literature tradition. One is a parable from Hebrew Scripture and the other is a consciousness-raising saying from Jesus in the New Testament. I will share mine. I’ll look forward to having you share yours. In that way, we will teach other and continue to weave together a cord that cannot be quickly broken.

Examples of Wisdom Literature in Scripture:

Hebrew Scripture books like: Ecclesiastes, Ruth, Esther, Job, Jonah

Ecclesiastes 3: “For everything there is a season. A time for every activity under heaven.”

Proverbs 8:11: “For wisdom is better than jewels, and all that you desire may not compare with her.”

Gospel of Thomas 42: “Be a passerby.”

Luke 4:24: “Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown.”

Questions from Rev. Mishra-Marzetti

• What are we bringing our attention and love to? Allowing in that circle of care? What has the pandemic revealed to us?

• What does inclusivity look like here?

• Who is not a part of our community but living nearby?

• Why are some people a part of other communities and not our community?

• How can we expand who we are today to live more deeply into open-heartedness, and love and care?

• How can we build sustained, ongoing relationships across difference?

• How do we begin with other like-minded communities or

groups or people that are committed to the same kinds

of transformation and growth and embodiment of spiritual

goodness, good-heartedness that we ourselves are?

• How do we honor the multiplicity of experience without trying to change the other person?

• How do we honor ourselves across difference stepping into true authenticity, integrity, and inclusiveness?

The Socratic Board

The first question on the Socratic Board will always be a question of imagination beginning with “I wonder. . . . “ The second question will always be about your experience. What great wisdom does your life teach you? The final question will be our “shazam” question. It asks what action is necessary going forward.

Faith and Democracy

In following the Revised Common Lectionary, we have been reading Scriptures from I and 2 Samuel which share the juxtaposition of God’s values and the reach of authoritarian power. Scripture has democratic values and the command for those in power to be judged by how they treat the most vulnerable.

Wonder: I wonder what local faith communities should do to support democracy?

Experience: What has been your greatest corporate experience of democracy?

Shazam/Action: My faith calls me to support democracy and oppose authoritarianism. What will I do to regularly support democracy and oppose authoritarianism throughout this year?

Wisdom and Responses to Ethnocentrism

Wonder: I wonder what proverb, maxim, aphorism, or parable would change the world if it were read and its message followed?

Experience: What consciousness-raising wisdom or parable have you used to grow or get through a tough time?

Shazam/Action: How do we use the wisdom of our faith tradition to unseat the ethnocentrism/racism in our day?

The 33rd General Synod of the United Church of Christ

Worship Services

The worship services for the 33rd General Synod of the United Church of Christ are available online! I found them to be meaningful and powerful with an incredible diversity of liturgy and music. I especially loved the music in the Opening Worship and the powerful preaching of Rev. Michelle Higgins in the Mid-Week Worship.

You can find them here:

Opening Worship: https://www.generalsynod.org/worship-services-july-11/

Mid-Week Worship: https://www.generalsynod.org/worship-services-july-14/

Closing Worship: https://www.generalsynod.org/worship-services-july-18/

*****

Climate Change and Migration:

What it means for southwest Michigan, northwest Indiana,

and crafting a faithful response

Wednesday, September 15, 2021,

Pilgrim Congregational UCC, St. Joseph

6:30-7:30 p.m. Presentation;

7:30-8:30 p.m. Legislative Training

The Interfaith Action Southwest Michigan Peace & Justice and Collaborative and the Mennonite Central Committee present “Climate Change and Migration: What it means for southwest Michigan and northwest Indiana and crafting a faithful response.” As climate disruption continues to intensify, climate migrants and refugees will become more commonplace seeking refuge from rising temperatures, drought, famine, fire, and natural disaster. The Great Lakes area could very well become an anticipated geographical refuge with its proximity to water and temperate climate.

How are people of faith called to respond to the resulting climate refugees? How do we seek justice and live out our faith stories with political movements charged with xenophobia and hatred?

Participants registering for the event will have the opportunity to meet virtually with the offices of their members of Congress to advocate on behalf of positive climate and migration policy. Training for these optional lobby visits will immediately follow the event. Please fill out the online form found here https://rb.gy/yivqxr to register.

Presenters: (see https://rb.gy/lhme3s for more complete descriptions)

Kayly Ober is the Senior Advocate and Program Manager for the Climate Displacement Program at Refugees International. She also currently serves as a steering group member of the Climate, Migration, and Displacement Platform; a global network of practitioners and advocates with a common concern for climate justice and the human rights of migrants and displaced people.

Keith Schneider is a New York Times writer, and senior editor and chief correspondent for Circle of Blue, the Traverse City-based network of journalists and scientists reporting on global trends affecting water, energy, and food.

Katerina Parsons Katerina (Kate) Parsons is a legislative associate for international affairs with Mennonite Central Committee. After living and working in Tegucigalpa, Honduras for four years, Kate is now based in Washington D.C., where she advocates on U.S. foreign policy including the root causes of migration from Central America and U.S. foreign assistance addressing climate change.

Pilgrim Congregational United Church of Christ is at the corner of Glenlord Road and Washington (1200 W. Glenlord Road) in St. Joseph, Michigan. Details for remote Zoom availability will be offered closer to the event.

Weaving Together the Beloved Community

“What does inclusivity look like here?”

This past week, (Sunday, June 27), we celebrated Open and Affirming Sunday by hearing the great questions offered by Rev. Manish Mishra-Marzetti, a pastor in Ann Arbor, Michigan. If you were not able to hear his presentation, you can go to this youtube page to view and listen:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFftWxIUuB8

What I have found in over 30 years of ordained ministry is that deep faith tends to have more questions than it has answers. I know the most immature parts of my faith tend to be the places where I have little curiosity while thinking I have all the answers. Questions call to me a journey deeper into the heart of God.

Rev. Mishra-Marzetti was trying to help us get on that journey by taking baby steps. He asked us to do what we can, right where we are. I think he offered excellent questions for us to begin the journey and then augment from there:

What are we bringing our attention and love to? Allowing in that circle of care? What has the pandemic revealed to us?

What does inclusivity look like here?

Who is not a part of our community but living nearby?

Why are some people a part of other communities and not our community?

How can we expand who we are today to live more deeply into open-heartedness, and love and care?

How can we build sustained, ongoing relationships across difference?

How do we begin with other like-minded communities or groups or people that are committed to the same kinds of transformation and growth and embodiment of spiritual goodness, good-heartedness that we ourselves are?

How do we honor the multiplicity of experience without trying to change the other person?

How do we honor ourselves across difference stepping into true authenticity, integrity, and inclusiveness?

I think if we began our mission work by answering these discernment questions, and kept these questions ever before us, we would continue to journey deeper into the heart of God.

In July will appear a Socratic Board. One of my remote mentors in faith is

Dr. Cornel West. Dr. West regularly shares the need for a Socratic faith that asks the most questions to challenge assumptions and liberate us all into God’s goodness and life.

The first question on the Socratic Board will always be a question of imagination beginning with “I wonder. . . . “ The second question will always be about your experience. What great wisdom does your life teach you? The final question will be our “shazam” question. It asks what action is necessary going forward.

Look for the Socratic Board and please participate as we learn from each other!

Shalom,

Mike

Traveling the Road Together

Make it stand out

Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.

I am excited to begin our work together as Pilgrim Congregational United Church of Christ! I am grateful to all the leaders, saints, and apostles who have brought you to this time in your spiritual lives. You have called me to be your designated pastor. In the United Church of Christ, “designated” references a time where we discern whether we want our time to be an interim time in working toward another settled pastor or whether we continue the relationship through toward a long-term journey that will lead to our mutual growth and health. I find life and Divine in either one of these paths.

Regardless of the path, I hope you all will experience me who loves you, creates healthy boundaries for us all to experience a space of goodness and vitality, and deeply desires our growth and well-being as a community of faith. I love to be part of a team that is gets things done and is more than the sum of our parts. When I am a part of a community like that, my faith in a God who is on the move, actively working, and teaches me of a love that is ever-expanding.

That sounds so overly romantic about church, right? But I have experienced that groove. It is what keeps me in the church. Like you, I will probably get frustrated with what it means to be “church” and wonder why I continue in the institution that can be so hard and difficult. I am reminded, though, that God delights in a community willing to do the hard work and can be found walking with us through our wilderness.

Please pray for me. I see prayer as a form of solidarity, and I lose hope when I think I’m the only one walking in the wilderness. I will be praying for you. God is on the road. I cannot wait to join hands with you to step out on that road and begin to see where that road will take us.

Our National Meeting:

General Synod of the United Church of Christ,

July 11-18, 2021

I think one of the best things our national church continues to do well is national meetings. Events like General Synod and National Youth Event have been powerful for every congregational member who has participated in these events. I have been honored to present a resolution I wrote to the General Synod and see that process and to be part of an ongoing display and engage with other participants.

I hate to admit this, but it has also been the place where I have renewed my pen supply as I pilfer all the promotional pens found at the hundreds of displays in the event hall. (Tracy and I have way too many of the post-it notes wallets offered by a UCC organization. Yes, our life should have more meaning.)

In the past, the sole road-blocks for these events have been the time, travel, and the expense. This year the entire General Synod will be an online, virtual event! And the cost for visitors is only $100! This is a great time for us as individuals, and for us, as a local church, to participate in the best the United Church of Christ has to offer. I will also be leading out a workshop on the relationship between food, farm, and the church as part of my work with the UCC Council on Climate Justice.

Registration for the event, July 11-18, just opened this past week!

You can register as a visitor by going here:

https://www.generalsynod.org/. If you need help financially or with registering electronically, please contact me (mmulberry@gmail.com). I don’t want anyone left out who wants to be a part of this event.

I will also be asking the United Church of Christ if we might register as a church to watch some of the General Synod together! Please

consider it. We have many people who do fantastic work in the wider church. I also find that the connections we make with the wider church end up coming back to the local church in profound ways. I want us to expand and deepen our hearts through events just like this!

Final Words of Wisdom and Love

Greetings!

It seems hard to believe, but this is my last edition of The Dave Rave. I would therefore like to close out with the top three things that I hope you will keep in mind from our time together and then add a few personal words of farewell.

In the third spot is the fact that there is no particular correlation between the reign of God and any political party. Republicans, Democrats, Independents, and other lesser political organizations get some things right and other things wrong. They always have and always will. It’s also worth noting that no party in any time or place has ever gotten everything right, though numerous ones have gotten everything wrong. Psalm 146:3 is therefore spot on when it says, “Put not your trust in princes, nor the son of man, in whom there is no help.” (The phrase, son of man, here is just another way of saying human being and has no connection to the title, Son of Man, which is often used of Jesus.)

Along with that fact is my observation that much of the true power in our nation lies in the hands of the folks that control media and social media outlets. Always remember that the way they make money is by ginning up animosity and outrage. They are therefore the very antithesis of what Jesus was and is about. Put simply, if you want to improve your spiritual and mental health, stop watching cable news and Twitter. Watch the BBC, Al Jazeera, PBS, or one of the normal newscasts instead and take the time to read from conservative, liberal, and centrist publications. And if you find yourself seeing your political opponents as the embodiment of evil, step away from the news and have a little talk with Jesus. Remember that our true struggle is “not against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places,” as we read in Ephesians 6:12.

There is a very practical dimension to this counsel. Pilgrim is made up of people from several different political backgrounds and stances who worship and work together remarkably well. To allow partisan outrage to destroy that unity would be a great tragedy. Remember, Jesus is our ultimate authority, not the President, not the cable news networks, and not the assortment of folks you’ll find on social media platforms.

Second place goes to a realization of what a great and capable group of people you are. From founding members to people who are just starting to join us, there is a remarkable depth of love, compassion, thought, and service. Take some time to look at all the good you have done for each other and the broader community - supporting the grieving, feeding the hungry, raising awareness of issues like hunger, water, immigration, violence against women, and the threat of identity theft, providing school supplies and disaster relief - the list goes on and on.

In addition to all these tangible things, I have been delighted and privileged to experience a general ambiance of faith, hope, love, and joy. This is a delightful church to be a part of, whether the activity is worship, a service project, a meal, or even a Council meeting. And it’s not just me; so many people have told me how welcomed they felt when they first started coming here. One person even started coming here because she was so impressed by the way our people cared for Fred Gibby during one of his hospital stays. As I have said many times, this is a great church.

At number one in this month’s countdown is the reality and importance of maintaining the three crucial beliefs/truths of Christianity - God as a personal being, the reality of Jesus’ resurrection, and the presence and power of the Holy Spirit. Take away any of these and you are left with my, “Coffee I can get at Starbuck’s” scenario. People can find friendships, causes, food, and activities in any number of places today, whether in person or in cyberspace. What they cannot find is a God who actually knows, loves, and cares for them, a solid hope in the face of death, and the guidance and wonder working power of this love and hope working in, on, and around them on a moment by moment basis.

With these three convictions in play, human life cannot be reduced to bio-electrical currents interacting with their surrounding environment. Human life has meaning and purpose. It is not predetermined by physics. We can make actual choices that shape our lives and the lives of those around us. We have real, not pseudo, freedom. Whereas atheists regularly jettison their allegedly scientific view of the world every time they argue that society should be some other way than it actually is (as though people made real choices and that those choices mattered), Christians can consistently work for a better world, knowing that good and evil are rooted in the will of a personal God rather than in whatever a particular society deems acceptable.

The more honest atheists (e.g., Nietzsche and Camus) admit this.

I think the reason so many don’t is that they don’t have the courage to face the implications of their presuppositions and/or don’t want to recognize that the ideals we hold are based in the Judeo-Christian tradition. Again, the key value in ancient Greece and Rome was valor, not love. As Nietzsche rightly observed, when you get rid of God all you ultimately have is the quest for power. In contrast, Christ taught and demonstrated the value of giving away one’s own power for the benefit of others. As he said in Mark 8:34-36:

“If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross, and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake of the Good News, you will save it. And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?”

The whole sensibility and rationale for a life of self giving service is rooted in a personal God who raised Jesus (and will raise us) from the dead and who maintains constant contact with us through the Holy Spirit. Take that rationale away and you simply have an empty husk of an idea which is objectively no better than any other way of life, be it that of western democracy, Islamic theocracy, or Spartan monarchy.

To boil it all down, don’t lose sight of the importance of your faith in Christ. It’s what makes a church a church. And with this faith, you can and will see all sorts of tremendously good things happen to and through you, for God loves you and will never leave you or give up on you.

And now for the personal farewell. You have all made my five, almost six, years here a true delight. I so appreciate the many ways you have supported Anita and me. I have always known that your love is genuine. There is no greater gift that a congregation can give its pastor than that. Thank you and God bless you all.

Love,

Dave

You Only Live Once?

The Resurrection Changes Everything

“Because Jesus rose from the dead, he gave us the gift of the Holy Spirit so that we could experience in our own lives right now some of the same power that raised Jesus 2000 years ago. ”

The resurrection of Jesus Christ was essentially the eternal breaking into the temporal. Our world of space-time was interrupted by a different dimension of existence - one that incorporates our world of height, width, depth and time while transcending it. (Think of a three dimensional object like a sphere passing through a two dimensional plane. The cube includes the plane’s two dimensions while adding a third.) The resurrection, however, is not an exercise in geometry and physics. It is an exercise in living life to the fullest.

In John 10:10, Jesus says, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” The various things that are stolen from us - goodness, health, justice, and life itself - are, or one day will be, restored to us and enhanced through the resurrection. There are two ways to think about this.

The first is perspective. When viewed from the perspective of materialism (the belief that this world is all there is), life becomes one giant series of getting your hopes up only to have them dashed. The vibrancy of youth slowly drains away or is cut short by some unforeseen accident or illness. Our relationships change in unhelpful or even destructive ways or they simply vanish or are taken from us. Livelihoods and retirement plans are eaten up or rendered inadequate. Even our accomplishments lose some of their luster and will eventually be forgotten as one generation succeeds another. In other words, the reality of sin and death eventually takes its toll.

This is a reality that many would just as soon ignore completely. Alternatively, some insist that this situation means that life must be lived and any mention of God is just useless pie in the sky. And since you only live once, you have to grab all the gusto you can and make everything perfect now - even if you have to crush your opponents in the process.

What both of these approaches miss is the fact that sin and death are unavoidable and therefore no matter how well or poorly you live your life you still wind up going extinct. Another factor that the “you only live once” crowd tend to overlook is the reality of crushing poverty, disability, or other circumstances that make it impossible to obtain justice in this life, much less live well. In other words, “you only live once” works very well if you’re in good shape and have access to resources. Take those conditions away and the slogan leaves much to be desired.

The resurrection changes all that. It means that we can see things from the perspective of eternity in which justice, love, health, and life prevail. No sickness, no broken relationship, no deprivation is ever final. As St. Paul wrote, “Death is swallowed up in victory.”

This in turn gives eternal significance to our lives. Who we are, what we think, say, and do, how we treat others matters, not just for the present but for ever. Seeking to help others, to make society more just and more civil, and to improve ourselves in the process are not just nice things to do if you should so choose. They are eminently sensible activities because our good works do indeed follow us - literally. On top of that, the resurrection means that nobody, no matter how powerful they think they are now, is going to get away with unrepentant evil and injustice. Every wrong will be put right.

The second way to think about the reality of the resurrection follows from the first. The resurrection is not just about perspective, it’s about power. Because Jesus rose from the dead, he gave us the gift of the Holy Spirit so that we could experience in our own lives right now some of the same power that raised Jesus 2000 years ago. While the fullness of the resurrection lies in the future, we still have access to some aspects of resurrection in the present.

Whenever we see healing, wholeness, and the growth of good relationships, both personal and societal, we are witnessing the

in-breaking of God’s Kingdom or Reign. Anytime we are moved to act in faith, hope, and love we are experiencing the power of Jesus’ resurrection today. Sometimes these events are small scale and/or hidden. Other times they are grand and obvious. But whatever the level or visibility of a particular “resurrection event”, life becomes fuller and better and more abundant than it was before.

This is at least part of what Jesus meant when he said that he had come to give abundant life. He wanted us to understand that, regardless of our circumstances, our lives can be lived with a joy and a hope that is not going to disappoint us. Not even death can squelch our hope because death doesn’t get the last word. Jesus gets the last word, and that word is life - life in abundance with unlimited joy and love. Life in the presence of a loving Father or Mother (take your pick or choose both if you like) who will never abandon us and who does and always will seek and work for our good.

In other words, eternal life is about both the duration and quality of life. Jesus’ resurrection gives us an eternal perspective from which to see all the events of our lives and also gives us the power to live in the present with the power of his presence. How great is that?

So this Easter, take some time to reflect upon your life from the perspective of Jesus’ resurrection. Realize that all that has been or is painful in your life will be washed away or reshaped so that it becomes a source of strength for you - a source you can use to bless and benefit others. Also realize that all the good and wonderful events of your life will indeed follow you, that there are some things that you actually can take with you - and will.

And as you reflect and realize, pray. Pray that you will be able to see more and more of Jesus’ resurrection power at work in your own life and in the life of the world around you. And as you pray, act. Act in ways that bring others to see for themselves that Jesus has indeed risen and desires to raise them up too. Help them to see that their lives have meaning and that their circumstances do not determine their destiny, much less their identity. Sin and death have themselves been dealt a fatal blow in the resurrection of Jesus. Therefore, as

St. Paul again so famously put it, “ And now these three remain:

faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

The reason love remains, and not death, is because Jesus is risen. He is risen indeed.

Blessings!

To Grow or Not to Grow?

“... think in terms of ushering people into the presence of God. You can have the best performance in town, but if people aren’t touched by the Holy Spirit, you might just as well be a theater or coffee house.”

Greetings!

As I prepare to retire, the toughest item to find a home for is my clerical garb. Robes and stoles just aren’t used any more, though when I started in ministry 35 years ago they were standard garb for a Protestant minister. This little predicament of mine is symbolic of a larger issue that has helped turn mainline Protestantism into sideline Protestantism - mainly the drastic change in worship that has taken place over the last three or four decades. Finding a way to deal with this change will be a vital key in Pilgrim navigating the future.

The first question to ask is, “Do we want Pilgrim to continue for generations to come or are we content with allowing it to dwindle until remaining open is no longer an option?” If the answer is the latter, then no changes are necessary. Simply keep doing what you’ve been doing until you can’t do it anymore. Just when that time will come is, of course, difficult to say. It will depend on finances, age, mobility, and the availability of organists and choir directors when Perry and Shane decide to retire or move on.

If, however, the desire is to help Pilgrim continue in ministry for decades to come, then certain changes will be necessary. The only questions are “What?” and “How?” I will look at those two questions in a moment but first I want to provide some background and context so that you can have a better understanding of what is involved.

In the mid to late 1960s, a group of young people turned from drugs to Jesus and began to express their conversion in songs that used simple lyrics set to various forms of rock music. Initially it was more like stuff by the Mamas and the Papas but it didn’t take long to move into territory associated with the Rolling Stones. By the end of the decade there were a few recordings being made, though the production quality was terrible (and I’m being kind).

During the next decade, the availability of this music increased and began to proliferate on college campuses in such groups as Campus Crusade for Christ, an evangelical parachurch organization. This meant that more and more people born in the baby boom era were coming to faith and/or expressing that faith in music that was guitar based and not infrequently involved percussion as well. When, however, those students returned home, they found the churches they had grown up in still using the hymns and rituals from centuries past. This led a few of them to start loosely knit fellowships where their new music combined with informal sharing and Bible study to form the beginnings of what would become contemporary worship. I should add that a dose of Pentecostalism was pretty common in that mix.

In the 1980s, with people now in their 20s and 30s, these fellowships became churches. At the same time, the mainline churches were growing older and still using traditional hymns and worship. Eventually the generation gap began to produce more and more contemporary worship churches and fewer and fewer traditional worship churches. By the time the 1990s hit, the balance between the two hit a tipping point. Today, what were once known as the “Worship Wars” are over. The vast majority of growing, vital, and younger churches take contemporary music as a given. Traditional music, choirs, and robes and stoles are a dying breed in the world of Protestantism. Even many mainline Protestant churches have gone to offering (or trying to offer) contemporary services.

This means that any church seeking to reach a younger crowd with a traditional service is fighting an uphill battle. There are a few exceptions of course, but they are the proverbial exception that proves the rule. So what are older, traditional churches that still want to reach a younger generation (i.e., anyone who is not yet on Medicare) to do?

I think there are three basic options. One is to offer two services - one for the older folks and one for the younger. Eventually, the traditional service will die out, but until then it provides an opportunity for people who just don’t like contemporary worship to maintain their traditions, while allowing the younger portion of the congregation to grow. I have known a number of churches that followed this path. Some succeeded, some didn’t. It depends a lot on how willing the older folks are to increasingly find themselves as a minority in the church they once ran. It also depends on finding people who know how to do contemporary worship. (I can assure you that contemporary worship is much more difficult to plan and execute than traditional worship.)

Option two is to try and blend elements of both traditional and contemporary worship. I have known churches that have done very well with this, although one of the best eventually became another “contemporary worship only” congregation. It is also the least recommended approach by church growth experts. Nevertheless, Pioneer Memorial Church in Berrien Springs does very well with it. (Of course, a college campus does give you an awful lot of talent to work with that most local congregations can’t begin to match.) I would add that some contemporary churches have added some elements of traditional worship. Word of Life Church in St. Joseph, Missouri, is an excellent example.

Option three is to tweak a traditional service so as to be more appealing to a younger crowd. I know of churches that have done this successfully. Redeemer Presbyterian in NYC and LaGrave Avenue CRC in Grand Rapids are good examples. I also think options two and three might be on a continuum. The Pillar Church in Holland has worship that strikes me as being halfway between a blended service and a tweaked traditional one.

Clearly none of these options guarantees success or failure. It all depends on who’s doing it, how they’re doing it, and for whom they’re doing it. What works in one situation won’t necessarily work in another. NYC, GR, and Holland are not St. Joseph.

I think the best option for Pilgrim is to look at options two and three. I don’t see us having the resources to do option one very well and I seriously doubt there would be enough buy in from the majority of our members. With that in mind, let me make a few suggestions

First, talk with some of the younger newcomers. I’m afraid we’ve lost some contact due to the virus, but I think they will still come back once things return to some semblance of normalcy. Some of you have younger relatives that visit often enough to be familiar with Pilgrim worship. Find out what these people enjoy about our current style and what would make them feel more engaged.

Second, take some time to watch other churches that are somewhere on this spectrum. Most of the ones I’ve mentioned can be found online and two of them - The Pillar Church and LaGrave Avenue are within easy driving distance. If you visit and see something you think might work here, call the church and ask to speak with someone who works with worship. Don’t try to copy these churches; just see what you might learn from them.

Third, take an inventory of what resources you have to work with. Right now, you have a phenomenal organist and a really good choir. Without wishing to single out anybody, I’d add that there are at least a few people who play different instruments very well. Don’t overlook the fact that you are in a building with acoustics that are very favorable to most kinds of softer music. (This would include guitars, violins, cellos, flutes, electric or stand up bass, and light percussion such as a snare drum or cajon.) It seems like more could be done with the musical side of worship, though it would take some work.

Fourth, don’t ignore the power of visuals. I think the most important thing that I’ve seen in terms of worship resources during my time here is the TV. That, a computer, a good internet connection, and some people that know how to use them open up a whole world of opportunities and resources. Regardless of the various tastes among younger people, screens are second nature to all of them. For that matter, I think exploring ways to engage people via their smart phones would be a very worthwhile endeavor. Besides, as our Zoom worship has demonstrated, you can have people participating from Florida (Linda), South Carolina (Ronda), and elsewhere.

In conjunction with screens, I think our sanctuary might lend itself to the display of other visuals such as paintings, sculpture, and multi-media.

Fifth, we have some people who are good public readers. Marsan was one of the best, but there are a number of other people that I really enjoy listening to. How might this skill be incorporated into a worship service in ways other than reading a Bible passage?

Sixth, use silence creatively. Giving time for quiet reflection (often with a visual focus point) can be very powerful. Again, our sanctuary is quite conducive to reverent silence. It’s beautiful without being gaudy.

Seventh, be aware of the flow and pace of the service. Dead space between a hymn and a reading, for example, is like dead air on a radio station - you lose your audience. Make sure the various parts of the service are put together in an intentional manner and that any silence in the service is deliberate. Don’t wait 30 seconds while a reader or musician gets into place. If you want to see how transitions are used effectively, watch some TV shows, movies, or even ads, including those on the radio.

Eighth, and most importantly of all, think in terms of ushering people into the presence of God. You can have the best performance in town, but if people aren’t touched by the Holy Spirit, you might just as well be a theater or coffee house. One of the things I have done before every in-person worship since I’ve been here is to go through the sanctuary sometime during the preceding week and pray. I pray for the service in general, for the sermon, for the choir, for Perry, for communion, and for the people in every pew. I even pray that people will sense God’s presence when they walk through the sanctuary doors. (And that the emergency exit doors will never have to be used but will work properly if they are.) I believe that a good deal of our growth is a result of that prayer. What might happen if a whole group of Pilgrims took turns doing that each week?

The overall message here is that it is possible to make some meaningful changes that are acceptable to older and more traditional members while making worship more attractive to younger newcomers. It will, however, take some serious buy in and work by a significant number of Pilgrims to make it all happen. Leaving it to the new pastor and the worship committee will only decrease the effectiveness of the project and increase the frustration of those involved. That said, putting in the effort to provide a high quality, imaginative worship celebration that allows people to connect with Jesus can’t help but bring great blessing to everyone.

Blessings!

Wholeness Through Connection

“Think of a good church as a network of various relationships instead of a potpourri of programs. Fundamentally, you don’t have classes, community service projects, or even worship services. You have people who need to connect with God and other people in order to find wholeness (shalom in Hebrew). The more people become properly related to each other (zedek in Hebrew, most often translated as righteousness), the more whole they become, and the more visible Christ becomes in that church.”

Greetings!

Last month I wrote about the need to keep Jesus and his actual (as opposed to symbolic) resurrection at the center of a congregation’s life. When other things, even and especially good things, take center stage, the church ceases to be a church and becomes a cut-rate provider of things that can be gotten elsewhere. In this month’s virtual sermon for people who don’t necessarily do virtual, I want to look at the need for an intentional method of keeping people connected and involved with God, each other, and the community. This includes helping first time guests become fully involved participants in the life of the congregation.

Let’s start with those basic connections. The essence of being a Christian is to live with a healthy relationship to God and other people. As Jesus put it, we are to love God with our whole being and love our neighbors as ourselves. Christianity is thus more relational than moral or ethical. More accurately, Christianity is interested in morals and ethics to the extent that those things improve relationships. Being moral just for the sake of morality or wanting to be thought a “good” person does not cut it. What’s more, Christianity’s emphasis on grace and forgiveness does not always play well with folks who are sticklers for ethical behavior. Grace and forgiveness are, however, excellent values when it comes to relationships.

So, how do we best develop our relationships with God and other people? By making a conscious effort; by being aware of God and other people and by being aware of how we treat them. If I take others (God or people) for granted or casually, my relationships with them will always be pretty shallow. Consider the difference between a business luncheon and a dinner with a good friend. In the former, there is little interest in the other person’s background except as it relates to the business at hand. In the latter, there is a sharing of not only information, but feelings, family life, opinions and convictions, joys, challenges, heartaches, fears, and opportunities. The intent is to show and receive love, not to close a contract.

The same dynamic holds true for our relationship with God. If prayer is just a perfunctory activity or a wish list, if God is just another “business transaction” then our faith, such as it is, isn’t going to do anybody much good. If, however, we take the time to share all those things I mentioned in the previous paragraph with God, and take the time to listen to what God might want to share, then our relationship with God will deepen and shape our lives and the lives of those around us.

Of course, no relationship with other humans starts out by sharing the depths of our heart. It takes time to build the kind of trust necessary for such levels of intimacy. Not only is it not safe to share everything with someone you just met, but it’s also extremely uncomfortable for the other individual. Relationships are a process. They start on the surface and gradually build. It’s also the case that you can’t have really deep relationships with a whole bunch of people. Our social networks might be quite broad, but the number of in-depth relationships we will have is of necessity going to be much smaller. There simply isn’t the time to get to really know a lot of people really well.

So how does all of this relate to church? Glad you asked.

Think of a good church as a network of various relationships instead of a potpourri of programs. Fundamentally, you don’t have classes, community service projects, or even worship services. You have people who need to connect with God and other people in order to find wholeness (shalom in Hebrew). The more people become properly related to each other (zedek in Hebrew, most often translated as righteousness), the more whole they become, and the more visible Christ becomes in that church.

Now think of that relational network as comprising a variety of kinds and depths of relationships. Some will be on little more than a “Hi, how’re you doing?” level while others will involve a powerful sense of kinship, the kind of bonds that will support you through thick and thin. Even those relationships, however, started with a “Hi, how’re you doing?” or even a more basic, “ Hi! I’m Dave. What’s your name?” In other words, there will be all sorts of relationships developing in a healthy congregation, but everyone will have the opportunity and be encouraged to find at least one or two of those powerful connections.

To achieve this goal requires intentionality. Just inviting people for coffee after church is a place to start but unless that invitation is part of a larger and intentional plan, it will never develop the kind of relational network that the body of Christ is supposed to be. So what does such a network look like and how is it developed? While each congregation is different, there are some common principles.

First, the different needs and interests of people have to be taken into account. Some people like to discuss ideas, some enjoy the opportunity to share what’s going on in their lives (at various levels), and others are all about joining in some sort of activity. A researcher at the U of M found that guys (of all ages) tend to develop relationships in the context of activity far more than girls and women, who seem to be quite comfortable just sitting down and chatting. The more and varied opportunities for interaction a congregation can provide, the better.

Life situations also matter. A single 25-year-old mom is going to be looking for different connections than a retired couple with several grandchildren. Do not, however, think that these individuals are automatically disqualified from connecting with each other. It might well be the case that all of them have much to give and gain from getting to know each other. Still, being aware of where people are in their respective journeys is a very good thing.

Second, keep in mind the different level of connections people are looking for and need. There have to be entry level opportunities where people can meet others for the first time, have some fun, share a story or two, and just get to know each other. These groups can be quite large, though breaking up into groups of three or four for a while is a smart thing to do. There also have to be a few groups where people can share some of the things that are on their hearts and feel safe and comfortable doing so. Support groups are a common example, but they are not the only ones. I know of many churches who offer discipleship groups that feature some remarkable levels of sharing and commitment to each other. A key characteristic of such groups is that they are not very large and maintain high levels of trust and confidentiality.

Third, keep in mind the absolute necessity of keeping Christ at the center of all these groups. Our relationships with other people need to be in the context of our relationship with Jesus. We aren’t just being nice to people, we are helping them experience the love of God which is the deepest need of every person. This, in turn, leads to principle four.

Any group should have three components which will vary in terms of time and centrality from group to group. The components are prayer, sharing, and activity. A prayer group will obviously center on prayer, but it should also have time for some sharing and some sort of activity as well (sending cards to people you prayed for, for example). A men’s cookout or a book discussion will be activity centered, but again some time for sharing and a brief prayer time are essential to maintain balance. The idea here is that people are given a chance to intentionally integrate the different dimensions of a healthy spirituality in the context of their everyday lives.

A special word needs to be said about community and service. Jesus never limits the “others” in our lives to our congregation or even circle of friends. Anybody in need constitutes a neighbor to Jesus. This is why any healthy congregation is not only developing internal relationships, it’s fostering external ones as well. Note too that serving others in the community is a great way to develop both internal and external relationships. The folks who have been serving food this past year have gotten to know each other a little better as well as meeting new people.

I might add that many people are attracted to a church that has a healthy ministry to the surrounding community and world. One of the more effective methods of evangelism employed by Anita’s church is asking some of their neighbors and friends to join in one of the church’s plethora of service projects. Even if they don’t join, they come away with a very positive view of the church, which is not a bad thing. As a matter of fact, church members are told not to try and pressure anyone into joining, yet, interestingly enough, the simple combination of relationship and service leads a lot of people start asking questions and eventually being baptized.

The last key that binds all the others together is intentionality. These things don’t just happen. A church has to sit down, evaluate its particular setting, and then plan and implement a way to provide and encourage the development of these various relationships. This will always be a trial and error process, but if it isn’t tried, the network of relationships isn’t going to happen.

I will close by drawing your attention to some of Pilgrim’s dynamics that will perhaps underscore what I’ve written and provide a starting point for further development.

Relationships are already a big part of Pilgrim. It is the level of friendship and support that many people have found that has drawn long time members and newcomers alike into the life of the church. In other words, there is no need to convince people of the importance of relationships. We also have a very good Membership Team so there is already some intentional activity in terms of improving our relationships.

The basic direction that needs to be taken (from my perspective) is one of developing a comprehensive relational ministry that helps everyone who joins us for worship (or other activities) make some immediate initial relationships to the degree that they are comfortable. We want to welcome people, not smother them. (And let me once again emphasize the importance of getting their contact information if they are willing to give it.)

We have attracted quite a number of new people in the last five years. We have a friendly group of people and a good worship service which have gotten us a good number of return visits. Where things have become a mixed bag is in terms of incorporation into the life of Pilgrim. I would point out that the ones who are now members (in the 2021 sense of the term), that is, those who are participating regularly, are the people who were able to connect with the more established members of the church. I would also point out that the choir (a small group that combines the activity of singing with prayer and sharing) is probably the most effective gateway into those connections.

But there are also a good number of people who have not been incorporated into Pilgrim. They come occasionally but they have few connections beyond a “Hi. How’re you doing?” A good number of them are on the younger side which means they are vital for Pilgrim continuing on for another generation, if that is what Pilgrim wants to do. To connect them will require some intentional effort. They don’t need a friendly church to do this. They need friends—people who will invite them to dinner, check in on them, etc. While I have tried to do some of this, it really needs to come from the congregation, not the pastor.

These are also the people who would probably be most interested in invitations to service projects. If you’re looking for a prototype here, consider Ronda Collier. Her interest in social justice and service in the context of Christian faith is a major reason for her now being a major part of Pilgrim’s current outreach efforts. The more Pilgrim can offer genuine Christian spirituality combined with service and justice activities, the more people like Ronda will be attracted to this congregation.

If you have any thoughts about any of this, please give me a call. Better yet, start thinking and talking with each other as to how to best take something you’re already good at (loving God and people) and expanding that to reach and enfold more newcomers and part-time attenders. Just think what a growing and vital congregation Pilgrim could be if 80% of first-time attenders became active members. It can happen, but it will take faith and intentional effort. By God’s grace, you can do this.

Blessings!

Dave

Finding Jesus in Church

“... if people can actually encounter and experience the Holy Spirit in and through that congregation, then not only will people’s thinking be changed but so will their lives. ”

Greetings!

I would like to use this year’s Dave Raves to talk about some important matters that I think Pilgrim needs to give some thought to, especially when things return to some semblance of normalcy. To be clear, they’re not really articles, they’re sermon manuscripts. In other words, they’re going to take a little time and thought to digest. Think of them as virtual sermons for people who aren’t on Zoom or YouTube. This month’s message is entitled, Coffee I Can Get at Starbuck’s.

If you go into a car dealership, there’s a good chance that you’ll be offered a cup of coffee. It might even be a very good cup of coffee and come with a cookie. I’ve known dealerships that will offer a variety of other things - a barbecue sandwich complete with chips and a drink or tickets to some recreational event. As nice as all these things are, however, car dealerships are in business to sell cars. That’s the main reason I or anyone else goes into a dealership. Coffee I can get at Starbuck’s. Any dealership that somehow forgets this fact isn’t going to sell many cars and probably isn’t going to make much money on coffee either.

With this four wheeled intro in mind, let me now turn to the subject of churches. They, like car dealerships, need to be clear about who they are and what they offer. I could say the same about other non-profit and service organizations. If I make a donation to the American Heart Association, I don’t want to find out that the money was used to feed the hungry. It’s not that I object to feeding the hungry; it’s just that I expect the American Heart Association to fight (Wait for it.) heart disease. There are other organizations out there to help provide food

Unfortunately, many mainline churches are not at all clear as to what they are about. Some think they’re main job is to provide meaningful relationships between and among its members, not infrequently beginning with a coffee hour before or after worship. Others feel it’s their calling to address various social ills. (For our purposes, the precise issues and stances are irrelevant.) Still others see it as their mission in life to provide a variety of cultural offerings such as music, art, lecture series, etc. A final option is to provide a variety of community activities, or as is often the case, provide space for said activities. Examples would include twelve step groups, daycare, tutoring, and financial planning.

If you’re asking, “What’s wrong with these things?” the answer is, in one sense, “Nothing.” These are all obviously perfectly decent and beneficial things to do, just as there’s nothing wrong with a car dealer providing coffee, cookies, or concert tickets. In another sense, however, the answer is, “A lot.” You see none of these things is the central purpose of a church. It’s like a Chevy dealer that somehow doesn’t sell Chevrolets. And just as I can get coffee at Starbuck’s (and probably a much better cup at that) so I can get all of these other things in other places (and probably with considerably better quality).

Friendships can be found in any number of activities, places, and organizations (for some, even at Starbuck’s). Specific social and political issues have any number of well defined, organized, and funded organizations that would love my support. If I’m more of a generalist, there are the Democrats and Republicans. Cultural activities are easy to come by, either by attending a concert, museum, theater, or lecture hall or by tuning in on my TV or assorted electronic devices. The one exception might be organ concerts which are for the most part still found in churches alone. Even there, however, it’s usually only the larger churches that have the talent and organ to really provide topnotch quality. (Pilgrim, thanks to Perry, is one of the rare exceptions.) As to community activities, again not hard to find elsewhere, and if it’s just a matter of renting space, can a church really claim to be the one offering that program? To complete this circle, I would point out that most people develop their friendships through their activities. If you like gardening and are looking for friends, a garden club of some sort would be an excellent place to look.

So what is the central purpose of a church, the ecclesiastical equivalent of a dealer selling cars? What can churches offer that other organizations and activities can’t? I would like to suggest that the answer to that question is Jesus. I know this should be obvious, but 35+ years of ministry tells me it’s not. This is especially, though hardly exclusively, true in churches that are heirs to the “liberal” side of the theological split that hit the US in the early part of the 20th century (albeit with beginnings as early as the 1700s). Here’s how this worked and works.

Due, ironically, to an overblown emphasis on God’s greatness on the part of Protestants like John Calvin way back in the 1500s, God was slowly pushed further and further from the day-to-day life of western Europeans and their descendants. Eventually, this led to a an increasingly secularized view of reality. Two lines of response to this secularism emerged. One essentially doubled down on Christianity’s traditional claims, including a number of claims that were pretty easily disproved by the rising disciplines of modern science and history.

The other tried to work out a compromise with the modern world, which on the surface makes pretty good sense. Unfortunately, there came a point where so much ground was ceded to secularism that it became very difficult to say that what was left was anything other that secularism with a religious vocabulary or veneer. “God” became just another word for the universe, or for various philosophical concepts that were actually even more fetched than anything traditional Christianity ever taught. In other cases “God” became the equivalent of Eastern concepts such as “Brahman” or “Emptiness” or “Oneness” which all make perfect sense in Hinduism or Buddhism but are the very antithesis of what Jews, Christians, Muslims, and even classical Pagans understand by “God.”

Jesus became just another great religious figure or a great political and social teacher whose death was yet another illustration of what happens when the powers that be are threatened. His resurrection was then reinterpreted as an expression of the human capacity to hope against hope or the belief that life will continue for the living, even in the face of great loss. Alternatively, it’s a metaphor for the cycle of death and rebirth we see in nature. One generation dies off but another arises. Christ’s resurrection was no longer an event in which Jesus actually rose from the dead; it was just a symbol. Think of the way Santa Claus is frequently explained. No, he’s not real, but he’s a good symbol of kindness to children and the importance of giving. Rather obviously, it’s possible to have those benefits without Santa. In like manner, it’s possible to have hope and believe in the next generation without Jesus’ resurrection.

The end result of this shift was and is a form of Protestant liberalism that is more about philosophy, history, psychology, and sociology than anything recognizable as Christian Theology. This has been a slow process that has slowly filtered from seminaries into the pulpits and often the pews of mainline churches.

Perhaps you will think this odd, but I really have few difficulties with people who do not believe in God as traditionally understood in the west or who do not believe that Jesus rose from the dead. What I have a problem with is those who hold such beliefs (or lack thereof) and continue to call themselves Christian. In practical terms, I like the Unitarian Universalists. They make it very clear up front that while their roots are in Christianity, they themselves are not Christian. They are like a car dealer who decided to give up selling cars and opened a coffee shop instead. When I go into his store, he sells me a cup of coffee. He doesn’t try and convince me that a caramel latte is really a Chevy Camaro (even if the price is in the same range).

Now here’s why all this is important. Beliefs have consequences and certain ideas necessitate certain conclusions. If I believe in a personal God (i.e., a being with the capacity to think, feel, decide, and act) then I can also speak of such things as freedom, agency, and love in meaningful ways. If I decide no such being exists, then I must also accept the fact that everything I think, do, or say, is determined by the way the neurons in my brain fire (or don’t fire) in response to whatever sense data is transmitted by my five senses.

Further, if I deny the reality of Jesus’ resurrection (or more generally, the concept of some sort of conscious life beyond the grave), then I am forced to admit that ultimately all human accomplishments will one day be forgotten and that the notion that anyone’s life “mattered” is simply another temporary arrangement of neurons. A dead grandfather is ultimately no different than a dead woodchuck. You might not think so right now but come dinner time you won’t be thinking of either one. After a few generations, neither will anyone else, ever

These concepts are of course very bleak. I have listened to and read many people who have therefore tried to get around them while still holding to the non-existence of God and the non-reality of resurrection. None has been at all successful and the standard response is simply a version of, “Well, that’s not true,” albeit without a single shred of rational argument to support it.

There are exceptions who are willing to accept the necessary consequences of atheism. The philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche is the best known. My favorite is a guy named Michael Shermer who was the editor of Skeptic Magazine. He admits that free will is just an illusion, but then also admits that he can’t live his life like that. Without some notion of choice, our world falls apart. For example, how can you try someone for any crime or appeal to justice when no one is free to choose other than what they have done? Shermer recognizes his hypocrisy but sees no way to live without it.

These are some of the key philosophical and logical issues involved. Now here is where they fit into the daily life of a church. Most obviously, when I or any other cleric (the proper singular of clergy) conduct a funeral, am I just saying some nice words about someone who is no more than a memory (or body, or ashes) or am I setting forth a genuine, substantial hope that we will one day be reunited with the departed loved one? Is this a final goodbye or is it a long farewell?

Second, what is the nature of our relationships now? Are we just another social species with an elaborate pack or herd mentality or are we beings capable of significant interaction and affection? Put another way, is love more than an abundance of Oxytocin? What is really happening during coffee hour—spiritual connection or just chemistry?

Third, in what are our ethics, morals, and values rooted? Are these just ephemeral concepts that change from culture to culture and time to time depending on the setting and circumstances or are they standards rooted in an eternal, personal being? Are there consequences to our choices that cannot be avoided through various forms of power and manipulation or does might make right? Is there any real reason why we should be socially involved other than it seems like a good thing to do? To use my favorite illustration, what would you say to an ancient Spartan warrior who sees your compassion for the downtrodden as nothing more than cowardly weakness? While you’re working on your answer, keep two things in mind. One, the guy probably has a sword and knows how to use it. Two, without his “barbarism” you don’t have any of your freedoms or your high-minded ideals. They died with the Persian invasion of Greece.

Fourth, is the dexterity in a guitarist’s or painter’s hand just a result of some prehistoric ancestor’s ability to more effectively crack open a nut or grab a stick with which to discourage a predator or is it an expression of an infinite Creator? Is your appreciation of a sunset just a vestige of some predecessor’s need to see patterns and colors in order to tell a tiger from a patch of tall grass or is it a reflection of a loving God’s appreciation of beauty?

Fifth, is meaning something more than a concept? Do our lives actually matter in a universe that is spatially infinite and over 13 billion years old or are we just infinitesimal, inconsequential specks? What does it mean to be human--nothing or everything?

If you want to be someone who actually does think, these are the questions that authentic Christian Faith poses and insists that you take the time to answer. They are questions that underlie everything you think, say, and do. They involve everything from the joy you feel when you see a newborn baby to the aching emptiness of losing a loved one. Perhaps it is because I have seen my share of both that I take my faith quite seriously and tend to think that it would behoove others to do likewise.

This is also why I think that the fundamental purpose of any church that calls itself Christian needs to be making Jesus, and the Christian Faith that arises from him, the central feature of its ministry. Belief in the basics of Christian Faith (a personal God, the actual resurrection of Jesus, the ongoing presence of the Holy Spirit, and a life lived in accordance with those realities) provides an intellectually consistent basis for also affirming the eternal worth and significance of human life, relationships, morals, and accomplishments. It gives a grounded hope in times of loss and defeat and says that how we treat others and the world around us is not a matter of time and culture but of divine decree.

It also challenges some of the assumptions and prejudices of secularism, reminding all of us that scientists and historians and other highly educated folks also have their blind spots and can be just as irrationally stubborn as any religious fundamentalist. The lengths to which some will go to discount what are, to any fair-minded observer, clear demonstrations of the divine does not reflect well on claims to objectivity. If Americans were more willing to seriously listen to people in the two thirds world instead of taking a paternalistic, condescending attitude towards them, they might learn a few things. Calling for justice for an African while at the same time discounting her claims to divine healing as being “primitive” even though there are plenty of witnesses to that healing is not nearly as enlightened as we’d like to think.

Let me now try to bring all of this home. In our day there is no need for a church if all it’s about are activities that can be found elsewhere. The days of the church as a community hub are over. If, however, a church has thought through the implications of faith in Jesus, it can offer a solid rationale for all human activity that cannot be found in social clubs, political parties, entertainment, or even various charity works, but which endows all of these things with great and eternal significance. If a church can go beyond the level of thought and theology to an active relationship with God in Christ, if people can actually encounter and experience the Holy Spirit in and through that congregation, then not only will people’s thinking be changed but so will their lives.

And a changed life, filled with hope and the Presence of a loving God, is something you cannot get at Starbuck’s.

Blessings!

Joy to the World!

“By putting Jesus first, we get a clear picture of who we were created to be and what we were created to do. ”

Greetings! If ever the difference between Deck the Halls and Joy to the World needed to be illustrated, this year would do it. The pandemic and other upheavals of 2020 have ensured that there will be considerably less “fa la la la la ing” this year than in years past. And yet, because Christmas is still the celebration of the Savior’s birth, there is still plenty of joy to be had. Indeed, it is precisely because of Jesus that we can face the past, present, and future with genuine hope - a hope born of faith in the love of God which became incarnate on that holy night. A former running back for the Chicago Bears (I think it was Walter Payton but it might have been Gale Sayers) used to say that JOY was an acrostic for Jesus, Others, and You. When we put our priorities in that order we experience a joy that is far deeper than any circumstantially based happiness. We find a sense of well-being that holds up in even the strongest storm. I think he was right. By putting Jesus first, we get a clear picture of who we were created to be and what we were created to do. We find the grace and power of his Spirit to help us reach those ends. We find comfort, compassion, and healing from the One who truly understands us and we begin to see things in a very different light - the Light of Christ. We then turn, in obedience to Christ’s command, to help meet the needs of others. In so doing we find that our own burdens are lightened as our minds are taken off of our own struggles. It is remarkably difficult to help someone else and worry about yourself at the same time. Note, however, that while we put our own concerns last on this list, we do not ignore them. We do not seek asceticism, self-abnegation, or to be absorbed by some universal oneness or nothingness. The Christian Faith insists on the importance and permanence of individuals. You and I will always be distinct entities. Our oneness is that of relationship, not identity. (We will never actually become our parents, as much as it sometimes might seem so at times.) This means that we do bring our needs, desires, hopes and dreams to God and we make the effort to take care of ourselves. Taking time for oneself, resting, and pursuing our particular interests are good things. Taking on the weight of the world is not. The way to joy is not through ignoring our own lives; it’s through putting them in their proper place and perspective. Pilgrim has gone through much this year. We will take a shot at decking our building with a few tokens of the season but there is still going to be some inevitable melancholy, if not outright sadness. Nevertheless, because of the One whose birth we celebrate, we can face our losses with a solid, reasonable hope. We can look at the many ways we have been there for our community and each other. We can know that we come from, live in, and go to the love of God. We can have joy. Blessings!

The Dave Rave - November 2020

“It is my hope and prayer for all of us that thanksgiving will reign in all of our hearts and reign in all the fears, uncertainties, animosities, and disappointments that these troubling times might bring. May our faith be greater than our fears, and our love greater than our politics. Happy Thanksgiving!”

Greetings!

This month begins with a major election and ends with the Thanksgiving Day weekend. It's an odd juxtaposition. On the one hand, you have a particularly contentious event; on the other hand, a day of gratitude and festivity. On top of that, you have the ongoing pandemic which feeds the contention and promises to put a damper on a good deal of the festivities as well. Then there is the possibility that the election results could be contested in court, dragging out the contention for who knows how long. Toss in some inevitable expressions of being a sore loser and you have a recipe for chaos and ill will that is as nasty as the recipe for your grandmother's pumpkin pie is tasty.

My concern here is that Thanksgiving might get drowned out in the process. It is therefore against this gloomy backdrop that I read

St. Paul's words in I Thessalonians 5.18, "In everything give thanks; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." Note that he doesn't say, "For everything," but rather. "In everything." Contention, ill will, animosity, disease, isolation, economic hardship, and death are not things for which any sane person is grateful. They are all various expressions of forces that are most definitely not God's will for us or any of his or her children. Yet it is God's will that we not lose our sense of gratitude for our many blessings, even when remaining thankful is difficult. Why does God ask this of us?

I think the reason lies in the fact that gratitude is a powerful "vaccine" and antidote for despair and hatred. When we remain grateful, we remain hopeful. We remember that God is, and has always been, with us. God's plan is to prosper us. Jeremiah 29.11 says, "For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope." This gives us the confidence that things will eventually turn out all right. God has not forgotten us. God is not withholding blessings. Even though the nations rage and chaos seems to be the norm, "The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge" (Psalm 46.7). We claim and experience these promises when we gratefully focus on God's goodness and compassion toward us.

Gratitude is also an expression of love and love has a way of driving fear and hatred away. While Thanksgiving dinners can turn ugly when the conversation turns to politics, the act of giving thanks to God can never yield anything but a tender, forgiving, and compassionate heart. When we focus on our blessings, we become mindful of God's mercy and grace. I like the way someone defined the difference between mercy and grace. Mercy, according to this way of looking at it, is when you don't get what you do deserve and grace is when you do get what you don't deserve.

The simple fact of the matter is that God continues to love us even when we are unloveable. As St. Paul put it, "But God demonstrates his own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5.8). Jesus, executed by political and religious establishments gone horribly and lethally wrong, still showed love and forgiveness to his enemies. If we take the time to realize that one of God's greatest blessings to us is forgiving, redeeming love, that should create a profound sense of gratitude in us. It should also remind us that we are just as capable of churlishness, bias, stupidity, and hatred as anybody else. In other words, God's mercy and grace given to us in Christ should lead us to a sense of humility and gratitude that express themselves in love and forgiveness to others, even those with whom we profoundly disagree.

It is my hope and prayer for all of us that thanksgiving will reign in all of our hearts and reign in all the fears, uncertainties, animosities, and disappointments that these troubling times might bring. May our faith be greater than our fears, and our love greater than our politics. Happy Thanksgiving!

Blessings!

Dave

The Dave Rave - October 2020

“We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. ”

Greetings!

The month of October is often associated with scary things like ghosts, goblins, and other things pertaining to Halloween. This year features something far more terrifying, mainly, the final month of a particularly nasty federal election. The thing that I find frightening about it is that it is an expression of a growing split in our society that does not bode well for our nation. As Lincoln, quoting Jesus, famously said, “A house divided against itself, cannot stand.”

The gospel, however, is about reconciliation. St. Paul even described our ministry this way in II Corinthians 5.16-20.

So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God was making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.

You will notice that Christ’s ministry is described as a ministry of reconciliation and that that ministry has been given to us. You will also notice that seeing things from Christ’s perspective, as opposed to the natural, worldly perspective, is the prerequisite of this ministry. As long as we insist on seeing others as unthinking, misguided dolts at best, and as an enemy to be crushed at worst, we will be part of the problem and abject failures in carrying out Christ’s ministry.

One of the very practical implications of Paul’s instruction has a direct bearing on Pilgrim. When I came here five years ago I was under the impression that this might be the most liberal Christian (UUs do not identify as Christian) church in town. As I have come to know the congregation, however, I have discovered that it is actually one of a sadly dying breed—a church where people from a variety of points on the political spectrum somehow manage to worship and serve together and support each other. In other words, there is evidence here that the ministry of reconciliation is actually taking place.

I want to highlight something about my discovery and that is the fact that our congregation as a whole is not as liberal as its reputation. This raises the question of how it got that reputation. I think there are two non-mutually exclusive possibilities. One is that we are an open and affirming congregation. From there, people make the assumption that if a church accepts and affirms gays and lesbians, it must be liberal on everything else. This is a false assumption. One can easily affirm the LGBT community and still be very conservative on any number of issues. It’s perhaps worth remembering that the CEO of the most successful expression of capitalism in the history of the world, Apple Corporation, is a gay man, Tim Cook. This also means that Apple’s socially aware policies are driven and financed by capitalism on steroids.

The other reason concerns me a bit more. I get the impression that some of our more conservative members are a little hesitant to express their views for fear that they will just be starting an argument and/or be seen as somehow “less than”. I’m not sure whether or not such would be the case, but it’s something to consider.

Keep in mind that this reason isn’t about a false and easily disproved assumption; it’s about the way we make our brothers and sisters feel. I see nothing wrong with our more liberal members expressing their views and seeking to act upon them. In many cases I myself agree with those views. If and when those expressions are said with the expectancy that they are somehow self-evident and that any sane, decent person will agree with them, then there is a problem. We need to be careful that we express our own views in a way that allows and invites others to do the same. There are at least two good reasons for doing so.

In the first place, few political stances are nearly as self-evident as their holders like to think. The fact that a nation of 300 million people is sharply and pretty evenly divided on many issues should be an indication that there might be another, perfectly legitimate side to a story, not an indication that 150 million Americans are evil morons. We need to temper our convictions with a little humility. Snoopy (of Peanuts fame) once wrote a book on politics with a most instructive title, You Might Be Wrong. Smart little dog, that cartoon beagle.

Second, and more importantly, the people we share a pew with are our brothers and sisters, our friends. We claim to be followers of the same Jesus Christ who had a Roman flunky (Matthew) and an independence oriented radical (Simon Zealot) as part of his band of disciples. If those two could somehow find reconciliation, then surely we should all be able to express our views in a respectful and mutually edifying way. In most cases, it isn’t until we truly understand both sides of an issue that we can really be said to hold a genuine view on it. Until then, we are simply spouting our own or, worse, somebody else’s biases.

It is my hope and prayer that we will be able to get through this election cycle and its consequences in a manner that demonstrates our capacity to see each other, not primarily as Democrats or Republicans, but as beloved children of God. In so doing we will be helping to fulfill Jesus’ ministry of reconciliation. As Phil Strout, the current President of the Vineyard Churches, put it, “Never let your cause become greater than your love.” I might add, “Never confuse your political affiliation with the Kingdom of God.”

May God guide us and help us to deepen our love for each other by deepening our understanding and acceptance of each other. Blessings! Dave