Ecclesio-simple

For the past few days, I’ve been reading a book called Simple Church, by Thom Rainer and Eric Geiger. Eric Geiger is coming to talk to a conference event in a few weeks that some of our church staff is attending, so this is like homework. And if you happened to see my Facebook status earlier today, you already know that I am not happy about it.

It's not just the patronizing language or the vapid metaphors that make the whole thing read like a cheesy children's sermon. It's not just the chauvinism that blares through whenever the authors mention their wives, or the rampant biblical eisegesis in defense of their premise. OK, it is partially all of those things. But I have some actual questions, too.

The premise of the book is that simple churches--churches with a clear, streamlined process for making disciples--tend to be healthier. I don't completely disagree with this premise. I think there's probably a lot to be said for getting rid of outgrown or ill-conceived ministries, and eliminating special programs that turn out to be more for show than for effectively reaching and forming people. So I admit there's some validity to their argument, even if I do wish they'd given ME their research and let me write a book targeted at moderately intelligent readers. I also admit I haven't read the whole book yet, so it's possible my questions might be answered or opinions changed by the end.

I also don't disagree with their assumption of spiritual growth as process. What good Wesleyan could?

But I do wonder how well we can assign parts of that process to aspects of an individual's involvement within the life of a church. Most of the churches they rank highly have a model that looks something like: people come to worship and meet God, people join small groups and learn about living in community, people pick a ministry and serve.

But what if I don't come to church first? I can't find a welcoming small group or a community ministry as an invitation into a relationship with God? I can't come to church and get plugged into the congregation by joining a Saturday service event? I have to go through a small group first? And couldn't there be some value in having a wide variety of ministries for people to choose to be involved in--even if they do clutter up the calendar, even if they're not particularly streamlined? I'm simply not convinced that the process of salvation "from the first dawning of light in the soul till it is consumed in glory" (that's probably misquoted slightly, sorry Wesley) is as neat as a three-step program. This "simple church" idea seems to want to plug people into a machine that spits them out as disciples on the other side.

And what happens when I do get the service stage of my spiritual growth process? I graduate? I'm good to go? How does continuing sanctification factor into the life of the individual and the church? When I think of how worship, education, fellowship, and service contribute to growth and discipleship, I envision less of a line and more of a positive feedback loop.

And of course, what their data show is not technically that simple churches are healthier, but that they are more popular. It's about growth--attendance and baptisms and membership. And really, if the church really, really faithfully lived out its calling as the church and expected its members to do the same--don't you think there would be far fewer Christians, rather than more?

That's not to say that people are leaving mainline Protestant churches in droves due to our stringent views on discipleship. It's also not to claim that numbers aren't useful, because they do speak to relevance. But there's really no good way to quantify faithful, transformative ministry.

Still, I wonder how the study would change if we picked some different y-variables. What if we looked not at membership and attendance, but at ways churches positively impacted and transformed their communities? What if we looked at how much they made their little corner of the world look more like the Kingdom of God? I don't know what those variables would be, but I wonder if the x-variable would still turn out to be simplicity. Because if not, I want to know what it would be, and that's the way I would want to run my church.

The Kingdom and Awkward Turtle

Today at Rising Hope I was having a pleasant conversation about football over lunch. Yes, it was off season--the woman across the table from me was wearing a Redskins shirt--and no, it didn't involve much actual knowledge of the sport. We were having this conversation when a woman with long brown hair and a slightly vacant expression sat down and introduced herself as K. She opened her Bible on the table and told us she wanted to share some things from Luke.

Oh God, I thought. The woman in the Redskins shirt, who seemed to know K, rolled her eyes at me from across the table. I was careful not to return the look.

K began reading about earthquakes and persecutions. And then she kept reading. And then she kept reading some more. Gradually almost everyone at the table left while I listened politely, feeling a little trapped.

Finally I found a breaking point and said--a little desperately--"K, what does this mean to you?"

She stared at me for a second, surprised, and then said, "I can hear the earthquakes. I can hear the persecutions." I wasn't sure quite how literally she meant that, but wasn't about to ask.

Not really knowing what to say, I ventured, "I think this passage is about how hard it is to follow Christ, and about the challenges we'll face, but how God is with us through that."

K stared at me again and then repeated, "I can hear the earthquakes..."

I waited for her to finish, thanked her for sharing, and then excused myself to go back to the office. "You told her what she wanted to hear," said the woman in the Redskins shirt as I walked past her. I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing.

I've often found myself in that kind of situation at Rising Hope and other places--listening to someone who's mentally unstable or just not quite with it--and not knowing what to say. I really want to know what to say. Or at least how to listen. I want to know how to take people seriously as people without always being able to take what they say seriously. I want to know how to love people without getting stuck in an endless stream of doomsday prophecies. Of course, there probably aren't any right answers, and most people probably don't know what to do any better than I do, but I do wish I knew some way to make those encounters less wrenchingly awkward.

But when I think about it--usually after the fact, but on better days during, too--I remind myself that I'm thankful for those awkward and uncomfortable encounters, too. Partially because it's good experience for me to get used to them and learn different approaches. But mostly because I am honestly thankful that K has a community where she can come and hang out, doomsday prophecies and questionable mental health and all, and I'm glad to be a part of that community.

A few years ago at Trinity I remember thinking something similar, when a probably-homeless woman got up during Joys and Concerns, walked to the front of the church, and began singing a song she appeared to be making up on the spot. Kathy, up front, had an expression that clearly said, "What on earth is going on?" No one knew what to do. We all listened politely. That was awkward enough, so imagine the awkward-turtle moment next week when the exact same thing happened again. And I thought--as uncomfortable as the whole thing was--how glad I was to go to a church where that kind of thing happened, because that woman could come in.

I fear--and laugh at--the thought of things like that happening in my own ministry down the road. But I hope those things do happen. I hope they happen all the time. Otherwise I'll have to wonder why the people who create those moments aren't around. I don't think the Kingdom would be the Kingdom without those painful-at-the-time, funny-in-retrospect, awkward, uncomfortable moments.

Grace with a vengeance

Today I ran. It was the first time in about a month, which is the longest I've gone without running in a while. The not running has been frustrating. And it was slow going today--I got winded at about a mile and half, and when I stopped to walk at two my legs shook ever so slightly. But it didn't matter. It was good to feel my body move in that way again, and even when I got home I kept going around the block, sometimes running and sometimes walking, because I kept thinking of more songs on my iPod I wanted to run to for the first time in so long.

As much as I wish I hadn't been forced to spend most of March losing muscle mass, I'm embracing the fact that there is grace in starting over.

In high school, when it wasn't crew season, I used to come home from school and run five miles every day. (I thought it was six at the time, actually, but Google Maps has since proved me wrong.) In college and the beginning of seminary I gradually fell away from that habit, until I was running maybe three or four miles a few times a week, sometimes less, once in a while throwing in a longer run if I felt particularly inspired or fat.

Then second year of seminary I mysteriously injured my foot, spent a few weeks in a boot that made me look like half an astronaut, and didn't run for the rest of the year. I mean, I tried every once in a while. But I was never able to build up any sort of pain-free consistency. Then that summer I headed off for two months in India, good walking sandals in tow, and never once tried to run. I let myself have the break I needed. When I got back to Atlanta, my foot was better and I was ready to start over--which I did, eventually running two half marathons and a full one before graduation. I'm convinced if I hadn't been forced to start over, I'd still be chugging out three miles twice a week. Instead, I came back with a vengeance. Maybe grace and vengeance don't ordinarily go together, but here they do.

There's grace in starting over. It's New Years resolutions and covenant renewal and baptism. None of those things mean much in the long term without the discipline that comes after, but those moments where something new begins to emerge are significant in themselves. From time to time we just need that swift kick in the ass (OK, I wouldn't describe baptism that way to the Board of Ordained Ministry) that comes after a time of knowing something is missing. I wonder when my next race will be. I wonder what I'll be able to do and how I'll be able to improve this time, and I can't wait to get to work.

High Stakes

This past Friday, in the middle of my travels to a few different churches looking for associate pastors, I spent the night at Kim's. She and her mom were in the process of picking out a dining room table for Kim's new house, and I was (willingly) put to work helping measure spaces, and comparing shapes, prices, and relative levels of ornateness.

At one point in the deliberation, being the practical and thoroughly untrendy person that I am, I put this thought out there: "Whichever table you get, it's going to be fine."

"I know," Kim said, "it's just that it's so much money..."

Which sums up, in a way, my feelings about meeting with people from all these churches. I could end up at any of these places, and it would be fine. More than fine, even. And yet, it all still somehow seems high stakes. There still seems to be so much riding on my decisions of where I want to go and what I want to do and what I'll tell my DS my top choices are.

It would be a bad idea, of course, to blog about any of my thoughts on specific churches at this point. But here are some general thoughts that have been swimming around in my head during and since this interview-ful weekend.

1. Unsurprisingly, there have been one or two churches that I had really high hopes for, and walked away--not disappointed--but maybe less excited than I had anticipated, for whatever reason. And on the other side, of course, there have been a few that I went to more to keep my options open than anything else, and that I walked away from much more excited than I would have thought. The more surprising part is how those realizations are really kind of scary. They mean the future might look a lot different than I had planned. In a way, I'm prepared for a future that I don't plan...which sounds terribly pious of me, but I really just mean that I've agreed that the bishop can put me anywhere she wants. But going for an associate position, I do have some say, and the scary part is not that I might end up somewhere I never wanted or expected, but that there's a possibility of me having some level of control, and actually making choices I never expected to make. I don't know why that's scarier, except that it means actually having to face those choices and what I really want and what my call really is, instead of waiting for someone else to figure it out for me. I don't know how I feel about that.

2. On a related note, some of these interviews have kind of blurred together, and I hardly know how to distinguish what one place can offer me, and vice versa, compared to another. I've spent all this time writing about the beauty and purpose of itineracy with the consequence of actually convincing myself, and now part of me wants to say dear Bishop Kammerer, please just place me somewhere and don't make me decide anything. So many of the best and most transformative experiences of my life have been those where I would have chosen otherwise if I could have.

3. Of course, my decisions won't necessarily mean that much, anyway. The churches I want have to want me, and I'm pretty sure if there are discrepancies, the senior pastors are the ones with dibs. And I'm afraid that even if interviews have gone well, there's nothing that really distinguishes me, and I won't be anyone's first choice. And then what if everyone else is matched up with mutually high choices, and there's nothing left for me?

4. I'm also becoming more and more afraid (maybe contrary to thought #3) that the more I sit at tables talking about what gifts I have to offer a church, that I make a good sell now but will just end up being a huge disappointment, that I'll never be as effective in ministry as I might convince people I will be.

5. But I'm realizing something else, too. The best match for me might not be the church I walk out most excited about as a church, or the one I can "see myself in" the most clearly. In other words, the church I'd choose to be a member of might not be the church I should serve. For one thing, I like small churches, and I'm not going to be serving a small church--I need this experience in a big one. And maybe the church whose passions most match up with mine--whose missions program I adore, for example--isn't the church that needs me or that I need, because maybe there's not as much room for growth on either side. None of the churches or job descriptions have been "perfect matches." I think that's a good thing. To a degree.

All this is to say that I still have no idea what's next, but clearly I'm getting to the obligatory point where I'm obsessing instead of enjoying the sense of God-directed potential. Any of these churches will, I'm sure, be a wonderful place for me to serve and learn and grow in the next few years. But still, it all just seems so high stakes.

Original Sin

Today in Confirmation the plan was to party it up a little and have a nice talk about sin. So last night when I got home from my grand tour of church interviews, I sat down at my computer and tried to adapt Genesis 2-3 to a readable, informal little skit for the kids to do, as a starting point for our discussion.

As I decided which parts to keep and which parts to cut out--so that we could all understand what was going on without having to read two entire chapters out loud and risk losing everybody--I grew a little concerned. I started to remember that maybe I didn't really know what the point of the story was.

What did Adam and Eve do wrong? That's what I wanted to ask my class, but I wasn't sure I had the answer, or any good answers, even. OK, they weren't supposed to eat from this one tree, and they did, and that was a problem. But it seemed like a pretty arbitrary rule. Like God's just making up stuff for no reason. Isn't knowledge of good and evil a good thing? Isn't it what we try to instill in kids as they grow up? Doesn't it help us to make the right choices? You might say that it sets up a dichotomy that wasn't there before. But the tree doesn't create the existence of evil, it only helps us see it. So I was afraid of how this discussion might go. I wasn't quite sure what I was trying to teach using this story, besides that a discussion of sin without the story of the Fall seemed to lack a certain traditional quality.

I didn't wake up this morning with any better idea, but we read the skit together, and I asked, "So what did Adam and Eve do wrong?"

"They disobeyed. They ate from the tree when God said not to," a few of the kids offered.

"Yeah," I said, "and that's bad in itself, but why didn't God want them to eat from the tree? What's wrong with having a knowledge of good and evil?"

"Maybe," said a sixth-grade boy, "because then we can look at other people and call them good or evil."

Bam! I love it! What an insight! Eating the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil makes us judge people. Maybe this knowledge means we can't just accept each other as part of God's good creation anymore. Faults we didn't see before come into view. That might be a good and helpful thing when we're examining our own hearts and lives, but probably not so much when it means we start examining others.

Thinking about the story last night, I probably would have said that the core of the problem was wanting to be like God. That's a pretty standard reading; that's what the serpent offers with the fruit. And this new insight fits right in, I think. We want to be like God, deeming things righteous or not. Deciding for ourselves what (and who) is a blessing or a curse. When really, all God wanted for us was to accept, enjoy, and live the abundant life we're created for--the life that God called good.

So thanks, kids, for reminding me again that I don't need to show up with solid answers, and for giving me an interesting sermon somewhere down the line.

Confirmation, part 2

Two weeks ago I wrote about how I enjoyed teaching confirmation. I mostly enjoyed it today, too, but it also made me want to bang my head on the table a little.

That's not because of the kids. Sure, there was some throwing of donut holes and crawling under the table to tie someone's shoes together. Maybe that said something about how riveting my lesson on the Holy Spirit was or wasn't, but that didn't make me crazy. I'm a substitute teacher, after all.

It has more to do with the realization that we are behind on the class schedule (my schedule!!), need to catch up, barely have enough time to get through things without catching up, and omg it's my responsibility to teach these kids the basis of the Christian faith so they can make an informed decision and I'll never be able to do that by Easter gahhhhhhhhhhh.

Sometimes I need a reminder that it's not all about me. Luckily, God is pretty good about providing those reminders when you need them.

I've been trying to tell myself that, while maybe through this experience of teaching I'll learn things I might do differently in the future, it'll be fine this time too. As one of my favorite poems attributed to Oscar Romero (I think pseudonymously) says, "No statement says all that could be said. No prayer fully expresses our faith....No program accomplishes the church's mission. No set of goals and objectives includes everything....This is what we are about: We plant the seeds that will one day grow." In other words, no class is going to teach these kids all they need to know about the Christian faith. That kind of learning is the project of a whole lifetime. And how much do we need to know to make a decision, anyway? What's the cutoff? It is what it is, and God is famous for working through what is.

I tried to have a discussion of fruits of the spirit with the class. We got sidetracked into talking about what actual fruits the kids did and didn't like, so maybe not the most successful discussion ever. But then in church afterward, one of the scripture readings was from John 15: "I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit." And I found myself hoping something had sunk in and the kids would make a connection. Or maybe something like that will happen five years from now. Seeds that will someday grow.

I also told the kids to pay attention to what happened during communion today, so we could talk about it next week. Turns out two of the girls in the class helped serve communion. And I thought more about how they are being shaped in our common faith in all sorts of ways that don't have to do with me teaching. Not only has the church been doing that for a lot of those kids since they were born, but it will continue doing so after they are confirmed. It will continue shaping them and introducing new ideas about God and helping them experience God in different ways. Even if this class was too short and no one paid as much attention as I wanted, even if decisions to become a willing part of this community called the church were based on nothing (which I'm not saying is the case), there is prevenient grace in that, just like in baptism.

My prayer is that the class will be, as Romero or pseudo-Romero would say, "a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for the Lord's grace to enter and do the rest." And that remembering that prayer will save me from some headaches.

Hope to Account For

If I had one of those feelings charts with the rows of variously-emoting cartoon faces, today I would circle the face marked hopeful.

It was my first full day subbing since I came down with mono, and it was a good one, and I had enough energy for it. I lined up another church interview, which means opportunities and options are continuing to open up. The snow is finally melted enough that I could walk in my little park down by the creek, where it was chilly but not cold, and where I ran into neighbors with whom I shared the good news of this week. Life is good, and I am full of hope for the future.

With the word "hope" tumbling around in my head as I walked by the creek, I thought of how 1 Peter tells us to "always be ready to give an account of the hope that is within" us (3:15).

Well, I'm ready, Peter. But then I also thought how throughout February, I would not have been so ready. Between death and breakups and heinously gratuitous snowfall and illness and the threat of impending financial ruin that accompanied those last two things, I felt very little hope in February. And if it was there, hidden somewhere, I certainly wasn't putting much effort into accounting for it.

And since, of course, the hope I'm supposed to account for really doesn't have much to do with my own health or relationship status or job prospects or the weather, that kind of makes this newfound March hope seem a little cheap. A little selfish. If I'm honest, today's hope doesn't have much directly to do with resurrection or the advent of God's kingdom or eternal life. It has to do with my luck seemingly turning from bad to good, and my desire for that trend to continue. Although I must say, being happy about the superficial things makes it much easier to feel hopeful about the holy ones. Note to self: must try to cultivate deeper, more stable hope.

Still, I suppose if pressed in February, I would have told you that I did in fact hope for better things to come. That, in addition to the support of family and friends, what got me through was knowing that after February would come March, and the snow would melt, and I would gradually feel better, and I'd start talking to senior pastors about associate appointments. Those are all still the superficial things you can't count on, of course. But at the same time, knowing things will get better sounds a little like resurrection to me.