Sermon
Good morning friends!
This Sunday, we're on week two of
reflecting on our congregational vision. Last week, you may
remember, I reflected on our task: evaluating the ways we are
spending time and energy, and see if there are things we should be
doing differently, new things we might try, and old things we might
let go. We aren't going to try and reinvent SLMF, but we are going
to try and talk together about who we are, and who we might be in the
next couple of years.
We are focusing on 5 questions in the
next 5 weeks.
1) Who We Are Right Now?
2) How did we Get Here?
3) How should we be?
4) What should we do?
5) And finally, How can
I help?
Today, I want to reflect on who we are
right now.
Church scholars often talk about a
congregation's 'lived theology'-how the things we say and do
communicate our understanding of God's will. I picked this passage
from James, because I think he captures so well that understanding
that our actions demonstrate our beliefs.
The lived theology
project, based off of Detrick Bonhoffer's work, phrases it this way:
“properly
interpreted, the lived experiences of faith are communicative not
only of a religious community’s collective self-understanding but
of modes of divine presence as well.”
(http://www.livedtheology.org/overview/)
In
other words, our actions express what we believe, and they express
the image of God in our midst.
So
that's what I'd like to engage for us this morning-who do we say God
is when we gather? What kind of community are we? What do we believe
in?
But before jumping in-a caveat or two.
These are just my observations, and they are brief. You will have
your own, which you will get to share at the end of my sermon. We
will divide into groups of 2 and have short conversations with one
another as well. Also, I offer these purely as observations, and
basically positive ones! I promise that I'm coming with the
perspective of 'look what these beloved children of God have created
here!' not with any major concerns about who we are as a
congregation. No church can do everything well, and there are
strengths and weaknesses to all our choices. I want to describe what
is, today.
Anyway, with that start, what is our
lived theology?
Lets start with our membership
covenant. This is a document that each member of the congregation
signs every year, as a way of claiming participation in our little
community. The covenant doesn't fully encapsulate who we are, but I
think it's a good way to start.
At a very meta level, having a
membership covenant says 'membership is not a one time
commitment-membership is a regular ritual, a daily choice to be part
of this community.' Our covenant speaks to the Anabaptist value of
choice. SLMF is a community of people who gather on purpose. Our
membership covenant also speaks to a bit of a rebellious streak-a
willingness to experiment in church structure, embracing being a
little different than the most traditional of church structures.
I notice our consensus decision making
process here too. For those of you who aren't familiar with it, our
congregation does not vote. At congregational meetings, we have a
consensus process, where proposals come from Committees through the
LCG, and then at a whole congregation gathering, we test the spirit
of the room, allowing every person to speak into the proposals that
are brought to the floor if they choose, and giving each member the
authority to break consensus, and send things back for more
discernment. This speaks to a high level of trust in one another,
and a commitment to a 'different' way of being church.
But I shouldn't get stuck at the meta
level! Within the document, we outline three tasks for the church
member-personal discipleship, faith community discipleship, and
earthly community discipleship.
We might call it a three-fold calling,
and we try to practice each of these goals.
Tending our personal relationship with
God is the focus of our primary collective practice: Sunday morning
worship. Like most churches through most of history, the most
significant way that we are visible is by gathering here, on Sunday
morning, lifting our voices in prayer and praise.
Our worship does a lot of work-we have
a blend of music styles, both traditional hymns and newer music, but
little contemporary praise music, aiming to serve a number of
traditions. We use volunteer music leaders, worship leaders,
scripture readers, and actors, which means that participating in
worship is part of how we practice spiritual development. But that
also means a low formality service, and the 'flow' is not as clean as
in some church styles. We have more talking, by a lot of different
people, which speaks to a commitment to full participation. We have
some significant rituals-communion, child dedication, baptism, that
focus on our relationship with God.
Christian Education is the other way we
work on personal discipleship, seeking to encourage adults and
children in their walk with Jesus.
Our children's activities are
significant. Our Sunday School program takes the time and energy of
about 1/3 of our adult members, and worship is very much open to
children-we have Children's time, a children's Christmas program, and
a high congregational tolerance to background noise. At the same
time, it means that for the most part, church is only a limited
respite for parents-it's a a time to keep track of young ones, to
teach Sunday School, to be fully engaged in the parenting world. One
of the things I want us to consider is how we do this important work
well.
I also notice that there are not many
activities outside of Sunday morning focused on personal
discipleship-our small groups generally do not explicitly engage
faith formation, and while I know many of us have personal devotional
practices, like the Rejoice Daily Devotional that MennoMedia puts
out, or other prayer and Bible study practices, we don't really have
collective efforts in that direction.
So I am curious how you practice your
personal relationship with God, and whether you feel like we are
doing a good job of faith formation together.
The second step is faith community
discipleship-our relationships with one another.
Here I think of the work of Hospitality
committee-regular potlucks, Guess who's coming to dinner, play group
for kids, wedding showers, baby quilts, and other social events. I
also think about pastoral care-LCG members who write notes to people
in need, our visitation ministries, and the congregational prayer
every Sunday. It is not unique to our congregation to have a
congregational prayer every Sunday, where we share our joys and
concerns with one another, but it is a significant marker that we
care about personal relationships within the church.
I think of our church retreat-we take a
weekend every year to gather together, and our church retreat has a
higher attendance percentage of any church I know of-we are invested
in being together.
I think of our organizational system
itself-the finance committee and building committee that have put so
much energy into making sure that the structure of the church
flourishes. We have a style of 'informal professionalism' where the
systems are designed to serve us well, and stand the test of time,
but are pretty flexible, and we sometimes discover things that have
fallen through the cracks.
This kind of community is something
that we have put some energy into in the last year, between Midweek
Mennos, a prayer E-mail chain, and small groups, we have been finding
new ways to connect to one another as we have grown as a
congregation, and have felt some stretching in our previous patterns.
So I might ask, how do you want to
share with your neighbors in the pews? Are you well enough connected?
Finally, we have relationships with the
world-
and here I think of the work of Peace
and Service Committee and our other outreach efforts. We have quite a
hodgepodge of missional activities-collecting offerings for Isaiah 58
Ministries, cooking the Peace Meal 6 times a year, The Church rummage
sale and fall festival, our work with Metropolitan Congregations
United, A Project COPE Team, City on a Hill, MCC Meat Canning,
Community Mediation Services with the Peace Center, our relationship
with Plowsharing Crafts, and the educational and prayer work we do
with Peace Candle and Birthday Offering every Sunday. And I would
also include the discipleship we practice as individuals, outside of
the formal structure of the church. Each one of us has ministries we
participate in, from caring for neighbors to rehabing houses, to
recycling and putting up solar panels, to feeding starving children
in Africa. Doing the work of God in the world is clearly very
important to all of us.
At the same time, I notice that, as I
described it, our mission is something of a hodgepodge. Most of the
ministries we do have a subset of the congregation participating in
them. In general, 5-10 of us, more or less. There are not many things
that we all do together. Which speaks to another unspoken theology-
we give people the freedom to practice their own calling, and will
celebrate the work of people in the congregation, but we don't all
need to be participants-could not all be participants in every
ministry that we do together. These ministries are also aimed more at
service than invitation-we don't have many explicit ways of inviting
new people to see the great things we are doing-we're a little shy
that way, and efforts like greeters don't really have a formal home
in our congregational structure.
Now, I could go on-my first list of
what to put in this sermon kept going. But I think I've hit the
highlights of who we are as a congregation-if I've forgotten anything
major I'm going to be a little embarrassed! Instead, I'd like to turn
it over to you, for that one on one conversation that I promised
earlier. I'd like you to turn to a neighbor, hopefully someone not
sitting in the same pew as you (unless it is your child). And I'd
like you to spend 3 minutes each answering 2 questions-
Question:
1) What aspect of how SLMF does church
is your favorite? What really works for you?
What aspect of our identity can
you imagine improving or growing as a congregation, or for yourself?
