Actualizing the Kingdom by:Walter Wink
The early church did not seek to formulate a theory of illness;
instead, it healed the sick.
It did not attempt to explain how the demonic could exist in a good world made by a good God; instead, they cast out demons.
They had no hypotheses about how prayer works.
They simply prayed....
Their attitude was not anti-rational or anti-theological, but merely concrete.
They looked, not for adequate ways to conceptualize the Kingdom, but for ways to actualize it.
Source: Engaging the Powers
Rationalization. Theories. Today we are all about coming up with these explanations for why something exists; these explanations for why someone is messed up. This was the way of the others in the early church. Illnesses and disease existed because you had sinned. Or, even worse, your parents had sinned, and you were being punished. They gave reasoning for everything under the sun.
But what has happened to our faith? We are a world of fact and not enough of hope. Even those of us who call ourselves people of faith are lacking. We are not of *this* world, but of God's world. The powers that be rest their hopes in wealth and success. We are told to rest our hopes in faith. To be active in our faith by doing good works for others, by being inviting and compassionate. By giving to the poor, even when we are told not to. By loving unconditionally because we are loved as so by God. It is faith, hope and love that abide. Where is it? The early church prayed because they could. There was no secret formula. No assurance that it would get them anywhere. But their faith and hope in God, and their love for God that made them certain prayers would be answered in some fashion.
This is a challenge. Not just to whoever is reading this, but to myself as well. I am challenged because my trust in God is minimal these days. And these coming days will be when I need it most.
Where do your faith, hope and love abide?
Monday, January 26, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
+==mission==+
These are tough times. The banks are not doing well. Stocks are down. If you're trying to sell a house, forget about it.
this time is not only affecting individuals and big corporations, but also the church.
Today we had our annual budget meeting after church... and holy shit. I realized that we really are in an economic crisis. As stated in church today, the debt we have is choking our budget. Now, i will admit we have a large chunk of debt because of building renovation and increased mortgage payments. BUT the current situation is not helping. We have to, reluctantly, dip into a large endowment fund. Not to mention out of 445 households, only 220 pledged this year. So, not only do we have a income deficit, but a large amount of debt, and a decrease in pledges. I was also informed that of those who are pledging, they are doing-so in a not so large fashion. Most households are pledging an average of $1000 a year. This is roughly $20 a week. Our church council president made the point that you cannot go to the movies and get soda and popcorn with one other person for less than that.
awesome.
Well, i have learned a lot from this. I was taught last semester by the pastor at my church (the one i interned at..) that if you are going to edit your budget, plan for your mission first, and the rest will fall into place. Now, this isn't to say you let building payments happen on their own. However, we are not servants to a budget but servants to God. Sounds easy, right? Well, not when you're told that if we don't aggresively attack our building deficit, the next option would be to rid of staff. First person to go (potentially?): our associate minister. aka my mentor and stronghold for the past 4 years. Not. cool. It isn't a bad thing just because she is one of my favorite people in the world, but because she is a great church leader, and by losing a leader, we are losing part of our mission.
We recently re-established the vision of our church. It is as follows:
• Christ-centered worship that is relevant today and true to our convictions,
• Meaningful prayer disciplines that orient our lives to God ,
• Biblically rooted study that guides us on our journey ,
• Inclusive openness that welcomes everyone on the journey,
• Transformative mission work in [our city] and throughout the world,
• Persistent efforts for social justice,
• Grateful generosity with our time, talents and treasures,
• Deepening community in small groups,
• Joyful celebrations,
Now how much of this represents mission? Most. The majority of our role as church people is to help promote the mission of our church. We talked today about how we need to devote our budget to our mission. And so the council proposed such things. This is a big deal for our church because even though you might say we are relatively liberal, we have a lot of older business focused church membetsr. Try telling them that we are going to rely on our faith... HAH. It went over somewhat well today. I'm proud. I'm proud of our church council for being so prayerful and thoughtful through these circumstances. To stand up and say we have a 1.5 million bulding renovation debt, a $70,000+ income deficit, and a huge loss in pledges... AND we are going to rely on our faith and plan our mission budget first and make conscious decisions surrounding that virtue, before we ignore our debt anymore. Thats tough. But we are doing it.
It was key that Pastor Tom spoke about the parable of the seeds falling on the different ground. (Matthew 13:1-17) We talked about, as we are trying to center our mission before our other budget items, how we are the seeds that have fallen on the good soil. We are supposed to be building our mission by growing deep roots and being open to the generosity of God... which then will allow us to pave the way for others. This is our mission: inclusive openness, grateful generosity, developing community.... Relying on faith to help others build theirs. That is the mission of Church.
Even though much of the economics and finance stuff is over my head (which will not be helpful in the future when I'm in a pastoral position) I will learn.... but this lesson may be one of the most important lessons I have ever learned.
this time is not only affecting individuals and big corporations, but also the church.
Today we had our annual budget meeting after church... and holy shit. I realized that we really are in an economic crisis. As stated in church today, the debt we have is choking our budget. Now, i will admit we have a large chunk of debt because of building renovation and increased mortgage payments. BUT the current situation is not helping. We have to, reluctantly, dip into a large endowment fund. Not to mention out of 445 households, only 220 pledged this year. So, not only do we have a income deficit, but a large amount of debt, and a decrease in pledges. I was also informed that of those who are pledging, they are doing-so in a not so large fashion. Most households are pledging an average of $1000 a year. This is roughly $20 a week. Our church council president made the point that you cannot go to the movies and get soda and popcorn with one other person for less than that.
awesome.
Well, i have learned a lot from this. I was taught last semester by the pastor at my church (the one i interned at..) that if you are going to edit your budget, plan for your mission first, and the rest will fall into place. Now, this isn't to say you let building payments happen on their own. However, we are not servants to a budget but servants to God. Sounds easy, right? Well, not when you're told that if we don't aggresively attack our building deficit, the next option would be to rid of staff. First person to go (potentially?): our associate minister. aka my mentor and stronghold for the past 4 years. Not. cool. It isn't a bad thing just because she is one of my favorite people in the world, but because she is a great church leader, and by losing a leader, we are losing part of our mission.
We recently re-established the vision of our church. It is as follows:
• Christ-centered worship that is relevant today and true to our convictions,
• Meaningful prayer disciplines that orient our lives to God ,
• Biblically rooted study that guides us on our journey ,
• Inclusive openness that welcomes everyone on the journey,
• Transformative mission work in [our city] and throughout the world,
• Persistent efforts for social justice,
• Grateful generosity with our time, talents and treasures,
• Deepening community in small groups,
• Joyful celebrations,
Now how much of this represents mission? Most. The majority of our role as church people is to help promote the mission of our church. We talked today about how we need to devote our budget to our mission. And so the council proposed such things. This is a big deal for our church because even though you might say we are relatively liberal, we have a lot of older business focused church membetsr. Try telling them that we are going to rely on our faith... HAH. It went over somewhat well today. I'm proud. I'm proud of our church council for being so prayerful and thoughtful through these circumstances. To stand up and say we have a 1.5 million bulding renovation debt, a $70,000+ income deficit, and a huge loss in pledges... AND we are going to rely on our faith and plan our mission budget first and make conscious decisions surrounding that virtue, before we ignore our debt anymore. Thats tough. But we are doing it.
It was key that Pastor Tom spoke about the parable of the seeds falling on the different ground. (Matthew 13:1-17) We talked about, as we are trying to center our mission before our other budget items, how we are the seeds that have fallen on the good soil. We are supposed to be building our mission by growing deep roots and being open to the generosity of God... which then will allow us to pave the way for others. This is our mission: inclusive openness, grateful generosity, developing community.... Relying on faith to help others build theirs. That is the mission of Church.
Even though much of the economics and finance stuff is over my head (which will not be helpful in the future when I'm in a pastoral position) I will learn.... but this lesson may be one of the most important lessons I have ever learned.
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