Church 3.0

Yesterday my friend and mentor, Dr. Elaine Heath, professor of evangelism at Perkins School of Theology in Dallas, shared this blog as a must read.  It is titled Church 3.0 and was written by Rev. Dr. John C. Dorhauer, current Conference Minister for the Southwest Conference of The United Church of Christ.  Dorhauer makes a striking case for a new reformation needed in the attractional church.  Church 2.0 happened 500 years ago during the Reformation and the changes were strongly resisted by the status quo Church.  

Dorhauer, like myself, is a steward of the institutional church.  We know and love the Church.  But our love for the Church must not get in the way of our love for the gospel.  It is time for a new version of our Christian faith to give birth to new ways of re-presenting Christ to the world.  It is time for Church 3.0.

"Postmodern communities of faith aren’t investing in buildings. Millions of dollars to buy and build property is a waste of missional resources. Stained glass windows used to be necessary when illiterate peoples could not read nor remember the stories of the faith. The stunning beauty and brilliance of story was captured in these magnificent pieces of art, and the gospel was kept alive because of it. Now, it is an opulence that can’t be justified to a world where access to story is but a mouse click away. If property doesn’t directly impact mission, it is a waste."

"Postmoderns don’t want to eliminate any possible means by which the sacred can be experienced. They want to eliminate stale rituals that no longer feed the spiritually hungry."

"This is only a glimpse of what I experienced in my exploration of church 3.0. I love deeply what I see. I trust this expression of the faith to be as authentic as mine – and to ensure that people everywhere will come to know that they are loved, valued, and respected. That is all I need my church and my religion to do or be. It is enough."

I commend this blog to you.
It is why I am involved in the Academy for Missional Wisdom
God is doing a new thing and we need eyes to see!

Grace Always,
Dave

On Leaving Alaska

I have been thinking about transitions lately.  It is no wonder since I will begin my ministry as pastor of First UMC, Bend, Oregon, on July 1 of this year.  I really want to leave well.  Five years ago after my final sermon at St. John where I served for ten years a staff member said, "Thank you for not making this all about you."

I really believe that what we do in ministry in Alaska are God-breathed words and actions.  Many go unnoticed and are lost in the fog of history.  But if what we do and say is God's work it will always matter.  God's kingdom being built one act of love at a time, especially with people pushed to the edges of society.

So I want this work to continue and find myself dreaming of a transition plan that will empower and equip the new superintendent.  The Alaska Conference has much to celebrate and build upon for the future.  Here's a short list.

• Payment of apportionments at 94% last year.  Highest ever.
• Sale of First Samoan property with money going back into our Legacy Fund.
• Major funding of leadership development initiatives through the Tuell Center.
• Imagine No Malaria events in every church has us halfway to our goal of $150,000.
• New Certified Lay Minister training to begin this spring in Kenai and beyond.
• Several new faith communities starting with training from the Academy for Missional Wisdom.
• Cooperative youth ministry in Juneau.
• Outside the box appointments such as Nome.
• Significant relationship with our two big sister conferences.
• Advocacy on social justice issues.

I am grateful to God and everyone in the Alaska conference for this opportunity to serve here.  My work is not completed and there is much to do until summer.  What I do from now on is done with a sense of preparing for the next leader to take up the mantle and carry on.  If you have ideas that will help with this transition please let me know.

Grace Always,

Dave

Week of Prayer for Christian Unity

This is a week set aside by the World Council of Churches asking Christians to pray for the unity of the body of Christ.  I respect any endeavor that seeks to eliminate the lines that separate not only Christians, but people.  We live in a world that tries to draw sharp distinctions between people.  Black and white, native and non-native, urban and rural, rich and poor.  Such distinctions lead to labels.  And when we look at people through the single lens of a label we fail to see the fullness of their humanity.

Certainly Jesus desired his followers to be united in love and mission.  But he also showed us how to look at all people with eyes of compassion to see them as whole persons.  People are more than labels.

So during this week of prayer for Christian unity let us also diminish and eliminate the lines that separate us from all people of the world.  Our union with God always comes with a mission to become one with others.

Grace Always,
Dave

Memorization

I have one of those Sunday School perfect attendance medals the Methodist Church used to give to children back in the 50's and 60's.  I earned them all...18 years of perfect attendance.  Other kids used to salute me walking the halls of Grace Methodist in Hamilton, Ohio.

In many of those Sunday School classes faithful teachers (most of them with gray hair) would have us memorize scripture.  To this day I still memorize scripture and prayers from time to time as part of my ongoing faith development.  I want to have a reserve of God words in my head during those critical times when I need a word from God.

This month I am memorizing Thomas Merton's famous prayer.  I have used it on the phone a few times talking with potential pastors praying about coming to Alaska.  It has been deeply helpful to them.  Here is that prayer.

MY LORD GOD, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. 

Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.

 But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. 

And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. 

Therefore I will trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

• Thomas Merton, “Thoughts in Solitude”

© Abbey of Gethsemani

Grace Always,

Dave

An Unwelcome Christmas Visitor

I have a gun I take with me when I am out in the Alaska backcountry for wildlife protection.  I never thought I would load it to possibly use it against a human being.  Late last Christmas the peace of our home was shattered literally by a man forcing his way into our home.  At the loud sound Kim retreated with the phone and locked herself into the bedroom where our 2 year old granddaughter was sleeping.  I  investigated the sound and was stunned to see a young man climbing into our living room through a broken window.  I did not know if he had a weapon so I ran back to the bedroom to load my revolver.  I'm not a gun enthusiast at all but it appeared that the most feared scenario was unfolding before my eyes.  I would do anything to protect my family.

But I am a person of faith and have had training in alternatives to violence.  So I hid the gun behind my back as I crept down the hall.  When I reached the kitchen I saw the young man laying on the floor in a pool of blood, his head moving back and forth.  Seeing no threat I put the gun away.

The police and ambulance arrived quickly and he was transported to the hospital and then jail.  Kim and I along with our daughter and son-in-law and a helpful officer cleaned up the mess.  We prayed to claim God's peace in our home and tried to sleep.  I took Kim into my arms and we looked into each others' watery eyes.  I said, "We are not immune from the world's brokenness entering our home.  We are going to be okay.  God is our Rock."  It is true.  We are okay and do not appear to suffer any of the effects of this trauma.

So now it is time for some theologizing.  I shudder to think that if I had a loaded gun in my hand when he was entering our home I could have shot and killed him and been justified in the eyes of the law.  What is a Christian response to such an incident?  Where was God in these seconds of terror?  What about the millions of people, especially children who live under a constant threat of danger?  Where is our sense of security?

I suppose the point is that our views on the hot button topics of our day are often argued in a vacuum.  When you are forced out of the vacuum and feel the rush of blowing air slamming into your face it gives you a new perspective.  My perspective is one of gratitude to God that my family is safe.  I pray for families who are subjected to danger.  And I pray that our solutions to violence will have more to do with God than guns.

Grace Always,
Dave

Christmas and Vulnerability

Christmas is for me always about the vulnerability of God.  God choosing to be bound by the same limitations all humans experience, which begins at birth as fragile, vulnerable babies.

Father Richard Rohr writes about this in one of his daily meditations found at www.cac.org.  
For the Christian, spiritual power is always hidden inside of powerlessness, just as God was hidden and yet revealed in a defenseless baby. If God is ever to be loved and shared, God had to risk both human embodiment and human vulnerability. This is the only thing that enchants and evokes the human heart. We do not properly fall in love with concepts or theological ideas (although some do try); persons fall in love with other persons.  In a weak little child, God is both perfectly hidden and perfectly revealed—and fully lovable.

Our Christmas challenge is to push beyond the Christmas card scenes and sentimentalism to this notion that our spiritual power as Christians is found in the powerlessness of the Christ child.  Our spiritual strength begins here, and in our own confession that we cannot control our lives, and that we need God.  This makes Christmas more than a season, but a way of life.

Grace Always,

Dave

Mandela's Legacy

I am not a political commentator.  But I am an observer of the natural and human world.  On this day when the world bids farewell to Nelson Mandela and celebrates his legacy I am thinking about the moment when he realized that hating his white oppressors would not be helpful for him or his cause.  I think about that moment of transformation when forgiveness seemed to him a better path.  It makes me wonder about his years at a Methodist boarding school and the ministry of the chaplain at Robben Island prison.  Were these influences part of Mandela's inner transformation?

We United Methodists have a mission of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.  The forgiveness Mandela chose to offer his captors replacing the hate in his heart was truly a God moment.  It was a God moment that changed history and offered real hope of liberation to people enslaved by oppressive regimes.

This was not simply an idea.  It was a very real, personal transformation in the soul of Nelson Mandela.  And this personal transformation led to a political one in South Africa.  Mandela's legacy is certainly about his rise to the presidency of South Africa.  But I like his legacy of forgiveness...his personal salvation...his soul transformation.  As a person of faith this is always the starting point of any revolution, personal or political, where the kingdom of God breaks forth into our world.

Grace and Forgiveness,

Dave

To read about Peter Storey's reflection on serving as Mandela's prison chaplain and their friendship click on this link.  https://divinity.duke.edu/news-media/news/mandela?nopaging=1