The Church Follows the Eyes

When I took my motorcycle safety course, I learned that “your wheels follow your eyes.”  If you look at the pothole you want to avoid, you’ll end up hitting it.  I learned instead to look at the patch of good pavement, and that’s where my bike would go.

Over the past several months, our eyes have been on the potholes of our church.  We’re very aware of the problems and difficulties that Old Union is facing, and many of us are worried about the future of our congregation.  But, to paraphrase my motorcycle instructors, the church follows the eyes.  As long as we focus on our church’s weaknesses and problems, we’ll never get onto the clean pavement.  Our ride will keep getting rockier and rockier.  It’s wise to be aware of the “potholes” around us, but our future lies on the good pavement.

The session and I encourage you to pay attention to what God is doing in our church.  What gifts and opportunities has he given us?  To word it another way, what are we good at as a congregation?  God’s desire for us is to respond to what he is doing in our church and in the community around us.  He wants us to use the gifts with which he’s blessed us.  He longs for us to build upon the strengths that we have.

Since September, the session has been working actively to plan for Old Union’s future.  There’s a good chance it will look very different from what we’re doing now.  Some of us may be uncomfortable with the plans that God has for the church.  But the session is convinced that the health of our congregation depends upon following God’s guidance as he leads us into the unknown.

To move forward, we first need to know where we are now.  You can’t reach a destination without knowing your starting point.  We cannot use the gifts God has given us if we don’t know what they are.  We can’t respond to what God is doing if we don’t know what he is doing.

The session wants your help to recognize how God is at work in our church.  As always, the best way to learn from God is through Scripture.  Prayerfully consider which story, or passage, or character from the Bible can help us understand what God is doing at Old Union.  Is there a passage that captures the spirit of our congregation?  Is there someone in the Bible who has been in a similar position to ours?  Is there a teaching from God that we can take to heart?  Is there a story in Scripture that relates to Old Union?  Please make time to discover where God leads you in Scripture.  Remember: we are not looking for the problems our church has, but for signs of what God is doing and how he has equipped us.

No later than January 11, please tell me what Scripture passages you find.  Your responses will help the session to recognize God’s presence and work as it leads us into the future the Lord has prepared for us.

Peter

Being a Healthy Church

We’ve been talking a lot lately about  how our church is doing.  Many of us feel anxiety, and perhaps even despair, when we look at some of the troubling trends in our congregation.  But there is only one way to have a healthy church.

Quit worrying about it.

None of us can create or sustain a healthy church.  Only the Holy Spirit can do that.  He is the one who calls a church into existence, gathers people into it, and shapes them into a community that builds the kingdom of God.  Let God do his work.  If Old Union truly is his church, he’ll be at work in it.  He will build it and fill it with life.  But if the Spirit doesn’t do it, there’s nothing any of us could ever do to make up for it.  All we could do on our own is make a cheap human imitation of what church is supposed to be.  I don’t know about you, but I have no desire to be part of a pretend church.  Either God fills it and empowers it, or it’s not worth having.

So what should we do?  After all, we can’t just sit on our hands and wait for God to act, can we?  To be honest, sometimes that’s the best thing we can do.  There have been too many times in my life when I was convinced I knew what the best path was.  All I ended up doing was getting in the way of God’s plans.  However, there are a few things that each of us can do to be part of the Lord’s work in our church.

1. Quit worrying about how well or poorly the church is doing.  Trust God to take care of it.  He’s been at work in Old Union for more than 200 years, at times that were much more dire than this.  To paraphrase Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, who of us by worrying can add a single spark to our church?

2. Pray.  First, pray for yourself.  A healthy church is a community of disciples.  The spirit of a church is only as strong as the spirit of its members.  Are you a disciple: a student and follower of Jesus Christ?  If so, what are you doing to develop your relationship with him?  How are you deepening your commitment, growing in your knowledge, taking the risks that God has put in front of you.?  Second, pray for our church.  I don’t mean “Pray that God will be at work in the church.”  He already is.  And I don’t mean “Pray for our church to grow.”  That’s up to God.  I mean “Pray that Old Union will pay attention to God and will get with his program.”

3. Find and follow our purpose.  God created Old Union for a reason.  It  is not to gather for an hour of worship once a week and make sure we can pay the bills to have our Sunday morning gathering.  Sunday worship is essential and critical.  But our church’s purpose grows out from that worship.  What does God want us to do?  Why did he create our church?  The reason for being a church isn’t about the building, the pastor, the budget, the next church program or function.  These are things to help the church pursue its purpose, but they are not the goal God has placed before us.  Then, once you figure out what God wants from us as a church, do it.   Get on board with what the Lord is already doing.  When we do that, there’s no stopping us.

Your Church's Personality and Purpose

Each congregation has its own personality.  Sometimes the differences are obvious: small family congregation or megachurch, traditional or contemporary worship style, Presbyterian or Roman Catholic or nondenominational.  But even among churches of the same size, worship style and denomination, the differences can be staggering.  You may have experienced this when worshiping at a relative’s church or while traveling.  Even if it’s another family-style Presbyterian church with traditional worship, the church may have seemed nothing like Old Union.

God loves variety.  Why else would he have created more than 350,000 species of beetles?  Each person you meet has a unique personality, background, interests, and abilities.  God loves the same variety when it comes to his churches.  He takes pleasure in the distinctiveness of each gathering of his people.  There is a quality about Old Union Church that no other congregation on the planet has.  It is the identity and personality that God has given to us.

When we realize this fact, we can draw two conclusions to guide us as we seek to address the challenges that our church is facing.  First, the solutions for our difficulties will not be approaches that work well at other churches.  Ben Roethlisberger throws the pigskin and Sidney Crosby handles the puck.  If Sidney took passing tips from Ben, it wouldn’t work out very well.  We may notice a concept that works wonderfully at another church, but it would make as much sense at Old Union as hitting a golf ball with a baseball bat.  Certainly, we can learn from other churches and get wonderful inspirations from them about how we can serve God and his people in powerful and exciting ways.  But not every idea survives the transplant.  And when it does, it needs to be adapted to thrive in our congregation’s environment.

Second, we serve God best when we are the kind of church he created us to be.  Michael Jordan did a decent job when he tried to be a baseball player, but he excelled at basketball.  His gifts suited the boards better than the diamond.  Old Union might be able to do a passable job of serving God in many different ways, but our gifts are best suited for the particular game that God created us to play.  To bring honor to God and to be a healthy church, we need to recognize our church’s own unique style, and use it to do the unique work that God has prepared for us.

This month, please spend some time in prayer reflecting on what makes Old Union the church that it is.  To guide you in this endeavor, here are some suggestions:

• What memories or stories best capture for you what Old Union is all about?
• Which hymns best describe the relationship with God that Old Union demonstrates?
• What passage from the Bible exemplifies the life of our church?
• Is there a picture, image, or symbol that portrays Old Union’s character?

Please tell me or a session member what God teaches you about our church.

What Do We Value?

In last month’s message I described some of the difficulties that Old Union Church is facing, to help us acknowledge and deal with issues that we’d rather not think about.  I ended my message by commenting that these difficulties are the symptoms of a problem that we haven’t identified…yet.  Instead of looking for quick fixes to address the symptoms without addressing the disease, or worrying that Old Union might have to close its doors, I encourage you to join the session and me as we seek to understand what our challenge is, and to find ways to address it.

The issue we’re facing, whatever it is, is not about what is happening or not happening it at Old Union; it is why these things are happening or not happening.  In other words, what are the values or purposes behind the things that we do as a church?  God created our church, he has brought each of us into it, and he is at work in our midst, for a reason.  Our job is to recognize what that reason is: why God wants us to be a church.  When we have a better sense of what our purpose is as a congregation, and when we focus our hearts and resources toward that purpose, we will be doing what God has created and called us to do.  And there is no doubt that when we follow where God is leading us, he will provide all the resources and opportunities we need to do so.

Our church has a statement of purpose: it’s posted above the steps to the church basement, and it’s on our church letterhead.  Our purpose, together, is to praise the Lord, grow in faith, spread God’s word through the community, and reach out to those in need.  Our session has identified the “core values” of Old Union Church, and you’ll find them on the first page of the picture directory: spiritual development and growth, providing a place for belonging, and caring for and supporting those in need. 

I invite you reflect on these statements, and spend time in thought and prayer with the following questions:

1. Lord, is this what you want Old Union to be and to do?
2. How well does the life of Old Union today reflect the values and the purpose we say that we have?
3. If someone were to walk into our church for the first time, what would they think our purpose is as a church, based on what they see us doing and hear us talking about?

Statements on pieces of paper are a waste of time if they have nothing to do who we are as a church.  They are meaningless if they do not describe the calling God has given us.  Until we discover what God wants, and respond to it, the symptoms will only get worse.

Please share the results of your prayers and thoughts with a session member or with me.  Next month I’ll offer some ideas about how we can recognize the identity that God has given Old Union Church.

Dressing the Emperor

Hans Christian Andersen told the familiar story of “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” in which two swindlers trick the emperor into believing that they have made him a suit of clothes that are invisible to people who are stupid or incompetent.  There are no clothes, of course, but everyone pretends that they can see them because they don’t want to admit to being stupid.  Eventually a young child who doesn’t know any better shouts out what everyone knows but doesn’t want to acknowledge.

It’s time to take off the emperor’s clothes at Old Union Church.  We’re very good at seeing the best in everyone and everything, at getting along and being positive.  If something isn’t going well, or if there’s a problem, we find ways to explain it away so it doesn’t sound so bad.  If someone voices a concern, most of us ignore what they say as a groundless complaint, a pessimistic attitude, or a lack of faith in what God can do in our congregation.  Over the years, I’ve done more than my share of explaining away problems, pointing out the good that is happening, and keeping everyone happy, instead of addressing issues of concern.

It’s time to say what we all know.  Our church is in decline.  Over the past ten years or so, worship attendance has dropped by about a third.  Our thriving children’s ministry has evaporated, and our youth group is getting smaller every year.  Mission giving is a fraction of what it used to be, and our outreach work has faded.  We are running a financial deficit and have to borrow money from ourselves to pay the monthly bills.  The level of energy and excitement has faded.  Those who are engaged in our church life beyond Sunday worship are overworked, because fewer people are taking part.

Old Union is an amazing church, and I’m proud to be your pastor.  People comment about how strongly they feel the Spirit when they come here.  We support one another through our struggles in a way that you won’t find in many other congregations.  I see people growing in their faith and developing their relationship with Christ in breath-taking ways.  God is doing fantastic things at Old Union, just as he has for more than two centuries.  I don’t want to see it all go away, and I’m convinced the Lord doesn’t want to either.

The first step to addressing a problem is to admit that it exists.  We can try to conduct business-as-usual at Old Union, telling ourselves that things will turn around “somehow,” or that what worked in the past will continue to work tomorrow.  We can keep pretending that the emperor is wearing clothes.  But if we do, our church will continue to decline until there’s nothing left.

I don’t know what the answer is, and I don’t even know what the problem is.  But I can see the symptoms, and I think you can, too.  I invite you to join me in declaring that the emperor has no clothes, and in finding a way to get him dressed.

Shadow Casting Monsters

God knew what he was doing when he created you.  He equipped you with everything you need to be an amazing presence in his world, to serve him with joy, and to find fulfillment in all that you do in his name.  And yet, far too often we don’t feel amazing.  Our passion goes stale, and our power dwindles away.  We lose our sense of purpose and doubt that we can make a difference in the world or bring pleasure to God.  Shadows blot out the brilliance of God’s plan for our lives and we lose heart.

If we don’t realize that shadows are darkening our lives, we may believe that the world is dim and gloomy.  But when we understand the shadows we can bring them into Christ’s presence to be dispelled, and they lose their control over us.  Which of these five “shadow-casting monsters” threaten to separate you from God’s good plan for you?  

1. INSECURITY: Humility is a Christian virtue, but this monster warps it into a cancerous disease.  It makes us question our worth and forget that there is anything valuable about us.  So we work like crazy to try to prove to ourselves that there is a spark of good in us, or we drift into a dark corner and hope that no one notices us.

 2. BATTLEGROUND: This monster wants us to think that the world is a dangerous, hostile place.  Everyone is out to get you, and you can’t trust even your closest companions.  Be prepared for everything to go wrong and for opposition at every turn.  We build such strong defenses that nothing can touch our heart, or we attack other people before they can get to us.

 3. FUNCTIONAL ATHEISM: If you’re reading a pastor's blog, you probably believe in God.  But this monster turns our belief in God into a theoretical concept that has nothing to do with our everyday life.  We assume that ultimate responsibility for everything rests with us.  We push ourselves relentlessly, to the point of exhaustion.  We pursue goals that we believe to be worthy, rather than taking time to discern where God is leading us.

 4. FEAR: This monster whispers to us that chaos is just around the corner.  All the good you’ve worked for is about to collapse.  Protect yourself while you have the chance.  Don’t use the resources that God has given you, because you may need them when the bad times come.

 5. DENIAL: We don’t like to say good-bye, and this last monster tells us that we don’t have to.  Everything will turn out fine if you just keep doing what you’ve always been doing.  There will be no decline, no loss, no death.  And above all, no painful choices.  

Which shadow-casting monster is haunting you?  Which monster is lurking in our church?  I invite you to bring this monster into the light of Jesus Christ, whose brilliance chases all shadows away and reveals our true nature as God’s beloved children.

The All-American Church

“I urge…that requests, prayers, intercession, and thanksgiving be made for…kings and all those in authority” (1 Timothy 2-12).

As we celebrate our nation’s birth, you’d be hard-pressed to find a more All-American church than the Presbyterians.  From the very beginning, we’ve been involved in and supported our nation’s work.

• 25% of the signers of the Declaration of Independence were Presbyterian.  The only minister to sign it, John Witherspoon, was a Presbyterian pastor.
• The Presbyterians were such a major influence in the War of Independence that King George  III and many members of the British Parliament called it “The Presbyterian Revolution.”
• When delegates for the Constitutional Convention met in 1787 to lay out the blueprint for our nation’s government, they used the Presbyterian form of church government as a model.

That’s not to say, however, that we Presbyterians always agreed with our government’s decisions.  Back in 1833, there was a bitter division over the US government that split Old Union in half.  Some of our forebears were upset about the Constitution’s claim that civil power comes from the people.  They were convinced that the authority to rule a nation comes from God alone, and refused to participate in a government that didn’t recognize its covenant relationship with God.  Old Union, however, traces its roots to the faction that decided to take part in our nation’s government, in spite of this flaw.

Our denomination has always found it important to speak to our nation’s policy-makers as part of its responsibility for the stewardship of our country.  As General Assembly stated clerk Gradye Parsons put it, on the one hand we “have been defenders of the role of government, and on the other hand, disturbers of governments. Presbyterians have argued with the government about many issues, such as slavery, education, temperance, labor conditions, segregation, war, and the environment.”  We recognize patriotism is not a simple support of whatever our nation does.  For Presbyterians, patriotism means speaking out on issues that will help our nation be a just land.

As I write this column, our church’s General Assembly, the national governing council, is preparing to meet in Detroit.  Every two years, elders and ministers from across the nation gather to discuss and vote on issues that affect our church.  During these meetings, General Assembly frequently speaks out about matters of national and international importance.  We recognize that God calls us to be good stewards of our nation and the work it does.  We are called to speak for what we believe to be God’s will for our nation.  Some of these topics are controversial, and you may disagree with what the General Assembly decides.  And that’s perfectly fine!  We are part of a church that recognizes freedom of conscience.  We are free, and in fact encouraged, to discuss and debate these issues among ourselves, with the goal that we may bear witness to God in a nation in need of his guidance.

The They

The Germans have an expression that doesn’t translate into English well: das Man.  It’s sort of like “someone:” people out there that aren’t identified.  Das Man describes an undefined group of people who set the tone for what’s expected of everyone.  No one is das Man, but everyone can be part of it.  In English, let’s call it “the they.”  If we’re not careful, The They can take over and paralyze us all.

Here’s an unfortunately common example.  The church session is discussing ways to solve a problem or to move in a new direction.  But The They shows up and takes control of the conversation.  It happens when an elder says, “There are some people who won’t like that.,” or “I’ve had people tell me that we should do it this way.”  The They has arrived, and they are very powerful if you let them.

The power of The They comes from the fact that you don’t know who “they” are.  If you were to express your concerns about an issue to an elder, the two of you could discuss it.  The elder could ask you about your concern, and you could ask the elder about the session’s consideration.  You may end up disagreeing with each other, but you will have had a chance to understand each other.  And who knows?  Your concern may be based on a misunderstanding, or your thoughts could help the session look at the issue in new ways.  But if you tell the elder, “I’ve had people come up to me and say they don’t like it,” what is the elder supposed to do?  There’s no one to ask what “they” don’t like, to explain the session’s thoughts, and to find out what “they” would like to do instead.  The They is not a partner in a conversation about how to move forward; it is a tyrant telling everyone the way things should be.

It’s a priority for our congregation to get along, not upset one another, and to care about each other.  It’s one of the things that makes our church special.  But it becomes a problem when our desire to keep everyone happy means we avoid doing anything that “someone” might not like.  When this happens, The They has veto power over everything that the church does.  It’s likely that someone will disagree with whatever we do, but that’s not a reason to do nothing.  When the overwhelming majority want to go in a particular direction, it’s unfair to let a few people prevent it from happening.

The They gets its power from two factors.  First, there’s fear.  If there’s something you don’t like, you’re afraid to speak up directly.  You express your concerns instead to someone that you trust.  Your friend now can tell others that “someone” doesn’t like what’s happening.  Or, perhaps you do speak up for yourself, but you are afraid to stand up for your opinion.  Instead of saying “I don’t like it,” you may say, “I know that there are people who don’t like it.”  When we have the courage to express our opinions directly to those who can do something about it, The They loses its power.  Second, there’s a lack of respect.  If the pastor, session, and other church leaders don’t have a good track record of listening carefully to people’s concerns and taking their ideas seriously, no one will want to voice them.  Instead, they’ll gripe to their friends and hope that “someone” does something about it.  Respectful consideration of expressed opinions is part of being a healthy church.

Let’s take the power away from The They, and claim it for ourselves.  When we all have the courage to express ourselves directly, and when we respect each other enough to listen closely and take it hear, we can give das Man the boot.

Patient Endurance

“Those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength” (Isaiah 40:31).

The New Testament tells us that the three great Christian virtues are faith, hope, and love.  But along with other virtues such as joy, gentleness, and humility, we are urged to pursue patience.  And patience is increasingly difficult for us to find.  When we want something, we want it right away.  Any delay in attaining our desires seems to be more than we can bear.

Patience is a critical part of the Christian way of life.  When we seek God’s answer for our prayers, do we ever get bent out of shape because he answers them too quickly?  Not that I’ve ever seen!  We struggle with how long it takes for God to do what we want him to, or what we expect him to.

This is not something unique to our microwave, instant oatmeal era.  For thousands of years, God’s people wrestled with how long it seems for him to get around to doing what we hope for.  I suspect that as the ancient Israelites suffered as slaves for four centuries in Egypt, more than a few of them wondered why God was taking so long to deliver them.  I count at least ten times that the psalmists ask the Lord, “How long?”  How long will you allow the wicked to prosper?  How long will you hide your face from me?  How long must I struggle?  One of the greatest crises in the early church was what scholars call “the delay of the parousia:” a fancy way to say that they thought Jesus would return very soon.  He didn’t, and he still hasn’t.  Nearly every generation of Christians since the resurrection has hoped that Christ would come in their time.  And so far, he hasn’t.

I suspect you’ve experienced the same thing in your life that I have: that which you’ve been hoping and praying for just never seems to happen.  It takes forever, and you don’t know how much longer you can last.  You simply can’t understand why God is taking so long.  Perhaps it even makes you wonder if he cares, or will ever take care of you.  “Waiting on the Lord” sounds inspirational when you read it in the Bible or hear about it in church, but living it can really drain you.

In the leadership program that I’m going through this year, we’ve talked about the need for changes to happen slowly.  When we see something as a church that “needs to be fixed,” we often jump in with a quick fix, without considering what’s really going on.  And we’re likely to latch onto one Big Idea that we think will take care of things, when in reality the process includes many different small steps, some of which will work and some of which won’t.

The Greek word (úπομονη) that we typically translate as “patience” doesn’t simply mean sitting around on the bench the hallway, waiting for something to happen.  It can also be translated into words like “endurance” and “perseverance.”  Waiting on the Lord takes effort, and it means we’re at work while we watch for what he will do.

Beyond Science

God created us to be a unity of body, mind, and spirit.  But that’s not how many of us view ourselves.  It’s an unfortunate side effect of the Scientific Revolution.  The scientific process, which began to take off in the 1600’s and 1700’s, is a remarkable way to understand and study the physical world.  None of the medical and technological advances that we enjoy today would be possible without it.

The downside, however, is that because science is so good at helping us learn about the physical aspect of reality, we’ve come to believe that everything worth knowing can be known through science.  In fact, it’s commonly assumed that if science can’t study it, then it doesn’t exist.  But there are aspects of reality that have nothing to do with what science can study.  There is more to what makes us human that what experiments and fancy equipment can measure.  We call it the spiritual part of who we are.

But because we’ve come to overlook, ignore, and even deny the fact that we are spiritual as well as physical beings, some interesting things have begun to happen.  While organized religion like churches are only one way to explore our spiritual nature, but the gradual decline that our nation is seeing across the board in church participation is one aspect of our lack of spiritual awareness.  Going to church for your spiritual development makes no sense for people who don’t know or care that they have a spirit that needs developing.

But there’s no denying the spiritual part of our humanity.  Our natural desires to connect with the spiritual part of life comes out in all sorts of odd ways, even while many people in our society refuse to accept any sort of formal spirituality.  Consider, for example, our society’s fascination with the “paranormal:” things that can’t be explained by science, things that fly in the face of what regular life is all about.  What else can explain the popularity of vampires, werewolves, zombies, and alien invasions?  It’s simply our instinctual urge to connect on the spiritual level, coming out in odd ways because we’ve forgotten that we are spiritual beings.

On the other hand, people have explored and developed their awareness of the spiritual part of existence for thousands of years.  We’ve learned a lot, and as Christians we recognize that God has shown us a lot, most importantly through Jesus Christ.  We don’t have all the answers, but at least we’re asking the questions that others don’t even know are out there.

That’s what church is all about: the opportunity to explore and understand the fullness of what it means to be a person.  It’s a place to develop your own spirit, and to understand the world in ways that science never can.