Short Reflection on 44 Years

September 15, 1974,
Grace Moravian Church,
Center Valley, PA

I was ordained into the ministry of the Moravian Church.

Not what would have been expected just slightly more than 13 years earlier when I had my Bar Mitzvah. (God can have an incredible sense of humor.)

For the next 30 years I served four different congregations and then took a leave of absence, then retirement, to move into the world beyond the church. I was already working very part-time as an alcohol and drug counselor, but decided it was time to make that my full-time work. As I said a few years later, I finally heard God calling me into ministry outside the church.

I am still at that ministry of addiction counseling! Back in the 1970s days I used to say that the older pastors should retire when they got to 65. They had earned the rest; they should relax and enjoy life. That kneeling 26-year old in the picture had no idea what he was talking about. I am now 70- and still working. Admittedly it is on an as-needed basis. But for the past four months that has been 40 hours per week. I have no thought of hanging it up. I like what I am doing, although admittedly the 40-hour grind can get a little much. I'm now at 20 hours/week.

But it is always and forever about being there for people. That's what ministry means to me. Over the years I have asked many non-clergy about how they "do ministry" in their daily jobs. Most were not able to answer me because they saw ministry as the work of the clergy. What I do now is not done because I am an ordained pastor (Ret.) Nor is it a job. It is an expression of who I am and what I have received and experienced from God, as I understand God.

It all officially began in that moment pictured above. After 44 years, it is no less exciting. And I still have so much to learn.

One of Those Insights- Finally

They (whoever "they" is) have often said that age brings wisdom. I think I am beginning to believe that, if only in small ways. I had one of those wise "Aha!" moments the other day.

It was in the middle of a general BS session about the church. We were bemoaning the decline of the mainstream church. In my own small denomination, the North American church has declined by between 35% and 40% in the past 40 years.We're small to begin with so that really eats away at a critical mass that can support an ongoing denominational program.

We are not alone. A report to this year's Episcopal General Convention stated that losses exceed gains by about 16,000/year. They pointed out that this is the size of a small diocese.

The "big" religious news recently has been the rise of that group that is being called "The Nones," those who reply "None" to their religious preference. They have grown and continue to expand.

I was waxing sadly to my friend about how it feels to have watched that over the past 40+ years since I was ordained. This has, for all intents and purposes, happened on my generation's "watch." The culture and society of the Western World has shifted so quickly and dramatically- seismically, comes to mind- that the church was unable to keep up. We have seen so many things change- and we have tried to change with them.

All have failed in the long term. Nothing lasts longer than a decade any more. The cycle seems to be moving back toward more traditional worship, for example, after years of the contemporary style. Small group ministries are still around, but they are not the center like they were.

At this moment, I actually have no idea what the big, "In-Thing" is that church growth people are talking about. I know some of the movements that have been happening, but as far as the "experts" and "consultants" go- I have been out of touch and wouldn't even know where to start.

For at least the second or third time in 40+ years a number of church denominations are "restructuring" to be more able to respond to the changing scene around us.

Which brings me to the "Aha!" I had.

It was about this point in the discussion that I sat there and shook my head, resigned, hopeless.

"We tried everything we knew how to do over these years," I said. "The conservatives tried all they knew; the liberals all they knew; the middles tried both. And nothing has worked. We are still at this point today."

I give up! I have no idea what works. I just don't know!

At which point a weight lifted and a light came on in the back sections of my brain. I really don't know. It isn't in my hands, if it ever was. Not because I am now retired and not in any leadership roles; not because I'm stupid or out of touch with the society or culture; not because I am liberal and not conservative.

No, it isn't in my hands because it never was. WE have tried everything we have known how to do on both ends of the theological spectrum and in-between. WE have spent incredible amount of time, energy, and resources and we are still where we are.

Maybe, just maybe we are right where we are supposed to be today!

You mean declining? You mean having lost our central place in the society, the place of setting the rules and directions? That is where we are supposed to be?

Maybe. And the reason I say that is simple- that is where we are. Acceptance is the answer to all my problems today, the Twelve-Step programs tell me. Things are just as they are and who am I to say I know better than God?

 What a wonderful moment that was. I was at least momentarily aware that I don't need to feel guilty or responsible for the problems of the church that I didn't "fix" over the past 40 years. I don't need to make excuses or look for reasons for what has happened. Many wiser and more spiritually in-tune people have tried to figure that out. They have all come up with answers and solutions- and none of them have worked in the long-run.

But of course what is "long-run" to humans (say the past 50 years or so, i.e. most of my lifetime) is but the short-term in God's work. It is still an ongoing event. The church is changing, the church is struggling with our place in the world as the world itself changes.

Maybe it's time to stop looking for the answers or the right program or a scapegoat. (John Hus was burned at the stake as one of those scapegoats.) I am becoming very aware that these don't exist.

What does exist is what is right in front of us-

• the lost and lonely
• the hungry and homeless
• the suffering and struggling
• the hopeless and dying
• you and me

In other words the needs that continue to cry out for a response. They don't cry out for the right words or insights or scripture passage or worship style or even proper theology. They cry out for us to be there with and for them. They cry out to be accepted as children of God- a caring and loving God. This is not about growing the church or pointing fingers at sinners or kicking others out into the street or judging who is doing it right and who is wrong. This is about what we have always been called to do.

Ministry.

That I have done for these past 40 years. That I continue to do in non-institutional church settings where I am now called to work.

Are churches still dying? Are denominations shrinking?

Yes, but those are institutions. It isn't up to us to build them. (Remember- Jesus told Peter that he was the rock on which Jesus himself would build the church!!!) It is up to remain faithful to the call to care with God's love!

And for that all I can do is give thanks that I have been part of it for so many years!!!

Not Just a Job

Being a pastor was never just a job. Far from it. I did what I did because I was called. That word is not about hearing voices or some vision of heaven. It is living at the center of what God has given us the gifts to do.

For thirty years it was almost entirely within the context of a local church and a larger denominational setting. It was exciting, challenging, always new, and never what I expected it to be. I was honored, blessed, and humbled day in and day out with the opportunity to walk with people in their struggles and pilgrimages. I was able to sit in sick rooms, at death's door, in times of deep tragedy. I was also able to sit at weddings and baptisms, confirmations and graduations. I was there in some way or another as myself and as a servant of the church that called me.

At the heart of the call is to trust God. As believers we listen to Jesus' call to live in a faithful way. None of us does that well, which is where grace enters the picture. We all have different ways of doing that. The call- and ALL Christians are called- will change, grow, evolve. My ministry has been outside the institution for 10 years now, working with people who, in many cases have been hurt by the church or were afraid of setting foot inside one. It is no less important than when I was in the parish.

When I was leaving the parish ministry I would speak of "leaving the ministry" since that is often how the church sees it. I never left the ministry. I finally heard God calling me to a "secular-based" ministry. (That takes another couple of pages of description.) There is no difference between the ministry within the church and outside. Ministry is ministry is ministry. We all as followers of Christ are called to do it.

Completely Orthodox

She's a "company person." She gives the free food with no strings attached and then has the prayer service. She is part of the church alive in St. Paul. Here's a report from Religion and Ethics Newsweekly:

Reflecting on Mission

Last Sunday was Mission Festival at a local church. I went to hear what the speaker- a dynamic young man with the Board of World Mission had to say and to worship in support of the ideal of missions. Mission Festivals have been a significant part of the life of the Moravian Church (and others) for a long time. The Moravians were the first Protestant missionaries, sending the first workers to the West Indies in the early 1730s. They went to share the Gospel with the slaves, not a particularly popular thing among the slave owners. The first missionary even went so far as to proclaim that he would become a slave if he had to in order to share the Gospel with them.

When I became a Christian at age 15 it was through a mission-oriented Baptist congregation. There was a mission training facility a few miles up the road and one of the sons of the congregation was a mission worker through them. Every year or so he would come home on furlough and share his work with the congregation which was giving him financial support. In addition we would regularly get letters from him outlining what he was doing. This was out version of the Mission Festival and always was moving and exciting to me.

So it should come as little surprise to anyone (but me, of course) that when I found a denomination that I felt called to be part of and to be ordained in, the Moravian Church, mission pioneers, was where I settled. I have been part of the church now for over 43 years, forty of those as an ordained pastor. Mission work has, of course, changed and, in reality, expanded to something I find even more exciting than I did back in my high school years. Mission has become far more than the sharing of the words and promise of the Gospel. It is now sharing the heart, life, healing, and soul of the Gospel where it needs to be shared.

This, too, was part of the early Moravian mission work and there are many stories about care and concern beyond simply converting the unbelievers. But it has been the changes in world cultures, technology and the self-understanding of the church that has made the biggest impact, taking the basic understanding of mission into more than it ever was.

One of the ways I understood this was to begin with the people at home and introduce them to mission as something THEY do, something they are engaged in. It becomes, at that point, a combined educational and missional experience. I first learned this through a Lutheran Church in Greenwich Village when I was doing an internship in Bethlehem, PA. The church in New York would bring youth from outside the city into the Village for a weekend of what the city was about. They had a mission to runaways and, in those days of the early 70s that was significant. It was quite an experience. When I moved to my first Moravian congregation, I signed up to take a group. Later we went to another Moravian Church on Staten Island to experience the city and its potential for mission.

You see what I learned at Operation Eyeopener was that when you enter New York City you are simply placing a big magnifying glass over the problems and needs. The same problems and needs are to be found in your local community. Once you can begin to see them, you can begin to minister to them. To me that was an essential and basic understanding of what the Christian Church is to be. Without that, we are nothing but a country club. (I do have a way of exaggerating for emphasis.) A few years later I moved to Wisconsin where a “mission trip” movement was beginning at the church I was called to serve. The day I was installed as pastor, one of the members was in Alaska on a mission trip. The point was not lost.

Three years later I arranged a trip of about 15 youth and adults to travel east from Wisconsin to New York City where the denomination had a food program for the homeless and were about to open housing for older people who had been homeless. We raised the money and traveled by train in what may have been one of the first such mission trips from the Western District. Others began to organize trips for adults to Central America and the West Indies. It took off- and hasn’t stopped.

There was some initial push-back from others, though not usually from the congregation itself. Other pastors would periodically say that we shouldn’t be spending the money that way or that it wasn’t really mission. We were simply doing tourism. While there is some truth in that, it is as much educational as it is mission so that when we got home we were more mission-aware. Adults or youth would invariably comment that they were touched, moved, changed by the experiences. Interestingly some of those clergy who raised concerns would later go on their own mission trips and become convinced of the importance and power of the experience.

As a result of some major work in the Southern Province along with a number of lay people from the Western District the whole mission trip experience expanded in the 90s and 2000s to include a number of different opportunities. Some of us even began to also take youth to places like the West Indies, Jamaica, or Native American reservations. Friendships were made, rebuilding work was done, mission was expanded.

I thought of all those things last Sunday listening to the next generation of mission leadership challenging us to keep our vision. The work of the church – what we call “mission”- is alive and well. It is just as essential as it ever has been. No, it is not always bringing people to Jesus. It is often more like taking Jesus to them.

I am excited for the future of the mission of the church. The “church” is at a time of change and uncertainty. Politics and fundamentalism have combined forces in our world to distort the message of Jesus into something I don’t believe Jesus would recognize. It is not a triumphalist attitude that mission work promotes. It is just the opposite. It is like the first Moravian missionary, willing to become a slave in order to share the Gospel.

A 40-Year Memory

I sat in church yesterday before the service started meditating on 40 years. I wondered what I would hear or experience that would fit for this anniversary of my ordination.

Bishop Ed Kortz (r) and District President Thor Harberg (l)

That previous Sunday, September 15, 1974, was a beautiful sunny day in Center Valley, PA. I had been serving the church there, Grace Moravian Church, as a student pastor for a year and was now to be the first full-time pastor at the church in a number of years. Bishop Ed Kortz was the ordaining bishop and Eastern District president, Thor Harberg led the service.

The church was packed. It was a little chapel-sized church that had been a community Sunday School prior to becoming a Moravian Church. With the back door open we managed to have over the 125 that we could seat. Family, church members, college friends, seminary colleagues, clinical co-interns and neighbors made it a day of celebration.

As some of you may remember, I posted back in May on the 50th anniversary of my baptism at age 15. In those 10 years in-between I discovered a great deal about myself and my world. I moved from the small town at the edge of the northern Pennsylvania wilderness to the southeastern PA extended metro area north of Philadelphia in the Lehigh Valley of Bethlehem, Allentown and Easton. I had graduated from college, spent two years working as a conscientious objector, got married, spent a month in Israel and another on a cross-cultural trip to the Navajo reservation with the seminary. Now, 10 years later, I was making my ordination vows as an ordained parish pastor.

I became politically very liberal and was at the early stages of a theological journey that continues to this day. With the trip to Israel in 1973 I began this whole pilgrimage that I now call "postModern". Wikipedia defines pilgrimage as

a journey or search of moral or spiritual significance. Typically, it is a journey to a shrine or other location of importance to a person's beliefs and faith, although sometimes it can be a metaphorical journey into someone's own beliefs.

I am not one who is ever satisfied with where my faith is. Life and events and the world continue to move on around me.I am not the same person I was two weeks ago, let alone 40 years ago. Being a parish pastor helped me in that pilgrimage by continually confronting me with the changes in others, the world we all live in, and myself. I had to work regularly, if not daily, at deciphering the meaning of the faith in that given day and age.

It began earlier than forty years ago today, of course, but September 15, 1974 is one of those major milestones that cannot be overestimated in my life.

As I knelt before Bishop Kortz I knew I was placing myself in a unique relationship to the church. Not to God, mind you. I believed strongly in the ministry of all God's people, the Priesthood of All Believers, but I was being called to a particular type of ministry within the work of the church. My understanding of that has grown, changed, evolved, devolved, morphed and all kinds of things over these past forty years. I am not yet at a place where I am ready to sort all that out. I'm having enough trouble, and fun, doing that with the roots and flow of my life in my roots in the land and water of northern Pennsylvania. When I get done with that, this will probably be my next phase.

Then, 10 years ago I heard- and finally responded to- God's call into ministry beyond the church and its understandings of call and ministry. My second career has led me into even more opportunities that I would never have believed possible in 1974. Some of it strengthened what I thought I knew then; other times it forced me into challenging myself about faith and life and spirituality.

So, going back to yesterday morning in church, what did I discover, hear, or learn? Very simply there were two things. First was a reaffirming of my personal place within the Christian tradition. The Liturgy, the music, the movement of the Spirit within the service all continue to speak to me in ever deeper ways. Sometimes I have to really pull myself back to these basics. Sometimes it happens intuitively. But it does happen if I am willing to let go of my ego and let my God and Savior guide.

This came through most clearly when the pastor made a simple quote from Paul. Sunday was Holy Cross Sunday and at one point all he said was, with Paul,

We preach Christ and him crucified.

I knew I meant it differently that the fundamentalist or evangelical preachers meant it. None of us has the final meaning of such a statement. But I could bow in gratitude and praise to humbly affirm that to the best of my ability I have done that throughout these forty years. For many of those years I used words; now I use words only when absolutely necessary.

Which is the second thing I felt Sunday morning. I reflected on the Christian preaching and the work of the church which was my center of life for most of the past forty years. Even when I left the parish ministry I was still connected. I have preached, I have been a member of churches, my wife continued in her ministry until she retired a couple years ago. The church and its life continues to feed, frustrate and empower me.

But I sat there and knew that my move to a different ministry, and understanding of the place of "not-ordained" ministry was correct. Fifty years ago, following my baptism, I resisted going into "The Ministry." I said that those who are not "ordained" could have a greater impact on their world. Today I would rephrase it in less "either/or" terms, but I know that what I did was respond to God's call to ministry in non-traditional terms. To respond to God to do "ministry" is not a space, location, or theologically-limited vocation. It is the Christian vocation.

So, today I celebrate the ordination that was such a major movement in my journey. I still have a "higher church" understanding of ordination, but higher has nothing to do with importance. It is all for the glory of God. Which maybe the third thing I got from worship yesterday. the Epistle lesson was from Paul's letter to the Philippians. It is wondrous, and deeply moving, no matter how you interpret it within our faith:
Philippians 2...

...have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

Who, being in very nature God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;

rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.

And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death—
        even death on a cross!

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
    and gave him the name that is above every name,

that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
    to the glory of God the Father.

Excellent- But Too Narrow

Here is a video I came across today, made by SALT for the Pension Fund of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). It is powerful and makes its point very well. A great message.





I kept wanting him to go one step further. I know it's to recruit people into the pastoral ministry, which of course keeps the pension fund financed. But I have to strongly and emphatically add a very important point.

Ordained ministry is NOT, I believe, the highest calling.

Ministry is the highest calling....

and ministry isn't just what the ordained clergy alone do.

The ministry we perform when not ordained, the ministry we receive from the non-ordained matters as much. The highest calling is that we are all to be ministers. THAT is what truly matters. Ten years ago I heard the call to change my place of ministry from the institution to beyond it. It was a move from doing the ordination ministry to a non-ordained ministry. Have you ever noticed how difficult it is to say these things? The assumption is that ministry done by or in non-ordained-type settings is less important than what happens in the church. Many years ago this even applied to some type of less-than-traditional ministry. What s shame.

In September it will be 40 years since my ordination and ministry has mattered in and out of the institution in my life. For the past ten years I have done a ministry that does not require ordination. Most people who do the ministry are not ordained. It is not in a "religious" setting. It is a health-care setting and I am not there as a chaplain. It took me a number of years to accept the call from God that I felt. It was taking me out of the church where ministry happens. But it has given me the incredible opportunity of doing "ministry" in the very best and broadest sense of the word with people who we don't often find in the church. Exciting is too narrow a word to describe it.

Yes, I need my pastor(s) but the ministry is not just located in the ordained. The church needs its clergy, I think. But it is not the highest calling. I am just as "called" today as I was 40 years ago.

Take a look at the video again. Listen as he describes ministry.

Then let's go do it- all of us- who dare call ourselves by Jesus Name.

Congratulations on a Milestone!

Daily Times Photo

It was 25 years ago today that my wife was ordained a pastor of the Moravian Church. We spent many of these past 25 years in various forms of joint ministry. They were great times together. We are now both retired from the active pastorate, but today's milestone is one where I give thanks for all we could do together and for her many gifts.

And to think when I was finishing Seminary 40 years ago, there were no women clergy in our denomination. What a period this has been.

So congratulations to my co-pastor and pastor!

One More Week for Now

I am coming to the end of one full quarter (13 weeks) of being at work "full-time" even though I went to a type of "semi-retirement" last December. By this time next week (actually Thursday at 4:30) I will be back as a supplemental employee working one to three days per week, depending on the week. I got back from our month in Alabama back in March to find that I was needed to come back and do some filling-in for a colleague on leave. I said yes for a number of reasons, not the least of which was that it was going back to the position I held for about 4 full years that I loved the most of all that I have done in 20 years as an addictions counselor. It was also still winter around these parts, but that was only a small part of the reasoning. I truly liked the job and was excited to get one last chance to go back and do it one more time.

So, for the past 13 weeks that is what I have done. I have not regretted it for a moment.

Over there on the right sidebar is a quote that for me describes what I have been doing for most of my adult working life.

Some want to live
within the sound
of church or chapel bell;
I want to run
a rescue shop
within a yard of hell.
-- C. T. Studd

As a pastor and substance abuse counselor I have been along one of those front lines where people come to do something unique and different with their lives. Most of the time these amounted to standing with them as they attempted to turn from the "gates of hell" itself. When I first saw that quote about 10 years ago it jumped at me, grabbed me, and I knew it was mine.

It brought to mind an incident back about 22 years or so ago. A member of the church was in a bad situation and was threatening suicide. They showed up at the front door of the parsonage and I spent the next three hours talking with them in my living room, attempting to contact a counselor they had been working with and finally contacting a treatment center in a neighboring community. At the end of those three hours I took them to that center for an evaluation and care.

A few days later I was at my own therapy appointment and was describing the event to my therapist. My counselor looked at me and said that she never thought about those of us who were there on the front line of situations like that. She, as an outpatient, hospital-based counselor only saw people after they were stabilized, "talked-down" so to speak. She commented on how important that front-line work was.

I remembered many other such times. Some were being there with a family as their loved-one died. Sometimes it was sitting in the ICU waiting room as life was artificially upheld long enough to make arrangements for an organ donation. It has also been the young mother who has discovered her husband was abusing their daughter and was shaking with anger and a sense of deep betrayal. Or it was baptizing a baby who may not make it. Once it was being a "shaman-like" presence in a wind-swept cemetery as a few family members, the funeral director and myself paid our last respects to a recently found homeless relative who had died of tuberculosis or AIDS or both.

I could go on and on. There are many I no longer remember in detail but in that spiritual place in my memory where rest the spirit of those souls who were facing the gates of hell. These moments of seeming hopelessness, fear, sadness, panic or just plain numbness at the depth of ones soul need not be faced alone. We humans have known this for millennia. We seek the people who can stand with us and the places where a sense of peace can begin to permeate the emptiness that has suddenly or even slowly taken over our world.

To be a counselor, a presence of hope and healing with those facing the devastation of addiction and alcoholism is to be at the same kind of junction of hope and despair, life and death. No, I don't believe that is too strong. Many people in that position are at the place where life is teetering. They are facing hell- or perhaps realize they have just stepped back from an abyss that can only be described as hell. They do not know if they can make it. They are aware of a sense of powerlessness. To be there with them is at once humbling, scary, and challenging. It is a place where the deepest compassion and acceptance is needed. But they must be tempered with a willingness to speak to the truth of what they are facing, to not sugar-coat it or make it seem less dangerous.

It is to run a rescue station at the gate of hell- their very own personal torment of hell.

So for the past 3 months I have had that privilege one more time as a full-time counselor. It was developing the helping and healing relationship that can hopefully break through denial and uncertainty.

It is a great way to work and I am grateful I had the chance to do it again. I am sure there will be other ways I am called to do that work in the future. But for today, as much as part of me doesn't want to stop, I know it is what I am going to do next that needs my attention.

Back in December I spoke of my move to part-time employment as beginning my Third Career. I have no doubt it will continue as part of my lifelong call to be part of that rescue shop. It may not be as immediate or quite as close to the gates as I have been, but it is where I have been called.

So it's back to semi-retirement. I have lots of music to make, especially over the next two months, lots of genealogical research to do for those ghosts in my family that are nowhere to be found prior to 1940, time with my wife and daughter and her boyfriend, time to write and read and dream of more ways to be what I am called to do next. Yet always to be one who can help bring healing and to continue to build my life in secular ministry- ministry beyond the doors and walls of the institutional church where I am now called to serve.

For the Beginning of the Christmas Season

"I prefer a Church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a Church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security."
-Pope Francis

Membership Has It's Privileges.. Doesn't It?

Our pastor posted this as the theme for an adult forum the other week. It was to get people in our church thinking about what it means to be a member of the church. Needless to say it got me thinking and wandering around my thoughts and feelings about this probably controversial topic.

I didn't get to the forum that Sunday so what I am about to say is entirely of my insight- or lack thereof. It is what has been running through my brain since then.

It was a good starting place. We assume that when we are members of an organization or group that there is some benefit we can get for it. If I join a local theater I get the privilege of cheaper tickets or perhaps backstage tours. If I join the library (get a library card) I can borrow books. To join may or may not cost money, but there is definitely an advantage. That's why we join.

Hence the gist of the question on church membership. What ARE the advantages of joining the church.

Reaction #1: None. I get nothing for it that I couldn't get just by attending the church. Worship is free and open in most churches. Plenty of non-members attend most of the mega-churches. Sure, I might not be able to take communion in some churches, but is that enough reason to join?

Reaction #2: Control of some type. For example, I get to vote for church officers and perhaps have a say in the way the church is run.

Reaction #3: (According to some people)- Salvation. That is not my opinion. I don't believe that being a church member has anything to do with our eternal life in heaven or wherever. I have known plenty of people who do believe that. I have met more than my share of individuals who kept their names on church rolls as an eternal life insurance policy- and would admit to that publicly anytime they were called and asked if they wanted to remain on the church rolls having not attended in years- or even decades.

Reaction #4: Privilege? Wait. Hold on. Privilege. Privilege? What does that mean?

Privilege- honor, treat, pleasure, joy, freedom, license, opportunity, restricted right or benefit, advantage, special treatment.

That's where the trouble comes in, I think. When we believe that membership is about what we get, the advantages, special rights or treatment. I am a member, you owe me this or I deserve that kind of treatment. Hence one of the great complaints about the modern 20th Century Church (where most of us are still living?!) is that it has become more like a country club or just passive entertainment.

Here is where I can begin to get in trouble, hot water, and start all kind of arguments. Perhaps I am too much a follower of the Dietrich Bonhoeffer theological school. There is no greater exposition on the heart of church "membership" than his classic The Cost of Discipleship. From Wikipedia:

Bonhoeffer argues that as Christianity spread, the Church became more "secularised", accommodating the demands of obedience to Jesus to the requirements of society. In this way, "the world was Christianised, and grace became its common property." But the hazard of this was that the gospel was cheapened, and obedience to the living Christ was gradually lost beneath formula and ritual, so that in the end, grace could literally be sold for monetary gain.

"Hold on," some might say. "When did we get into discipleship? We're talking about membership in an institution, an organization, that functions within the society."

All of this really muddies the waters, doesn't it? It depends on which side of the theological discussion you start- with an organization in the society or with following Jesus. Is the church to be a foundational institution in our society as some might argue, or is it something different, something unique, something spiritual?

How is the church different from other organizations in society?

I realize that we have strayed a little from the original question.  But the relevance of the original question depends entirely, completely, totally on where and how we define the church. I would argue as a starting point for discussion that there are no benefits gained from being a church member, unless you are interested in
having a say in the running of the church
aligning yourself publicly with a religious/spiritual position
want the church to continue to be alive in your community.

Beyond that, as a starting point, the membership in the church is a human-devised institution, and a secular one at that.

To be a member of the church in a spiritual sense is anything but that. The language of the New Testament took a Greek word that was used to indicate a part of the human body and applied it to those who joined with Christ. It is a mystical joining, something beyond institution, something beyond privilege. No part of the human body can exist without the body. No part of the human body is any more- or less important, each having it's own place.

Somewhere along the line, though, the word member has come to mean a special relationship, a privilege. Membership has its privilege, right?

Except the only privilege my left arm has for being a member of my body is two-fold
1) to live and
2) to do it's job of being my left arm.

How did we get to this? Aren't we playing word games and a philosophical/theological scrabble?

No, I don't think so. I think we are at the foundation of the problems of the modern church.

Membership in The Church brings along with it no privilege, no special advantage, no promise of anything other than the life-giving body and blood of our Lord, spiritually, mystically flowing through us. To serve Christ is not to clean floors, shovel snow, or provide for the survival of a human institution. (Those may be important in their own ways, but they are not, I believe, in the service of God. More at some other time on that!) That's about the church, not The Church.

The two are not the same; they are no co-equal in spite of what theological discussions have tried to tell us. They may (MAY) overlap at times when the church lives out the call of The Church, but they are not the same. One is a human institution based in and through society; the other is a spiritual union of the followers of Jesus, those who would be humble enough to be willing to call themselves Christian- Christ-followers.

What privilege do I get by being a member of the church? Put most simply, I get the privilege of giving myself to the benefit of others. It is the benefit of sacrifice and discipleship, of being part of The Word alive in the world.

That is downright scary!

No wonder we have made it into a country club.

With that in mind I call you attention to the post right below this. It is a story I have posted before and will post again. It is one of only two non-Biblical stories that I have preached more than once at the same church. It is the Parable of the Lifesaving Station. Read it and you will understand my theology in a nutshell.

Sure, there are nuances and digressions we could take with this discussion, but in keeping it simple, I don't think we could get must more basic than that.

The Parable of the Lifesving Station

On a dangerous seacoast where shipwrecks often occur there was once a crude little lifesaving station. The building was just a hut, and there was only one boat, But the few devoted members kept a constant watch over the sea, and with no thought of themselves went out day and night tirelessly searching for the lost.

Many lives were saved by this wonderful little station so that it became famous. Some of those who were saved, and various others in the surrounding area wanted to become associated with the station and give of their time and money and effort for the support of its work. New boats were bought and new crews trained. The little lifesaving station grew.

Some of the members of the lifesaving station were unhappy that the building was so crude and poorly equipped. They felt that a more comfortable place should be provided as the first refuge of those saved from the sea. So they replaced the emergency cots with beds and put better furniture in the enlarged building. Now the lifesaving station became a popular gathering place for its members, and they decorated it beautifully and furnished it exquisitely, because they used it as a sort of club.

Fewer members were now interested in going to sea on lifesaving missions, so they hired lifeboat crews to do this work. The lifesaving motif still prevailed in this club's decoration, and there was a liturgical lifeboat in the room where the club initiations were held.

About this time a large ship was wrecked off the coast, and the hired crews brought in boatloads of cold, wet, and half-drowned people. They were dirty and sick, and some of them had black skin and some had yellow skin. The beautiful new club was in chaos. So the property committee immediately had a shower house built outside the club where victims of shipwreck could be cleaned up before coming inside.

At the next meeting, there was a split in the club membership. Most of the members wanted to stop the club's lifesaving activities as being unpleasant and a hindrance to the normal social life of the club. Some members insisted upon lifesaving as their primary purpose and pointed out that they were still called a lifesaving station. But they were finally voted down and told that if they wanted to save the lives of all the various kinds of people who were shipwrecked in those waters, they could begin their own lifesaving station down the coast. They did.

As the years went by, the new station experienced the same changes that had occurred in the old. It evolved into a club and yet another lifesaving station was founded. History continued to repeat itself. And if you visit that sea coast today, you will find a number of exclusive clubs along that shore. Shipwrecks are frequent in those waters, but most of the people drown!

Note: This story was the Preface to the classic Introduction to Pastoral Care and Counseling by Howard Clinebell. When I first read it in 1972 I was overwhelmed. It has set the definition for my ministry (though not as well as I would have liked at times.) I would preach it every three years or so, even if they had heard it before. It is that important to me. It speaks today as well as ever.

Who Is That Young Guy?

Yes, the one here on the left.

This picture was taken on this date in 1974. That's 39 years ago.

In the center, the Rt. Rev. Ed Kortz, ordaining Bishop. On the right, Bob Jurgen, member of the Board of Elders.

What an interesting journey it has been.  And in less than 3 months the next phase, or Career Three as I am calling it, will begin to develop.

Amazing. Just amazing.

Self-Confidence as Empowerment- and Vice Versa

Talking to a former pastor the other day I was caught up short by something they were told after they left the parish pastorate. "You have had more self-confidence since you have been away from the parish."

That caused some time of thought on my part. But I understood where it came from.

When one is in the parish ministry they often find themselves constantly looking over their shoulder. Much time is spent second-guessing what was going on in people's thoughts, wondering who might be ready to find something they said as offensive but not say anything about it. What was that look about during the service on Sunday? John Doe wasn't here for two weeks. What's wrong? Even friends can be suspect, especially after one back years ago turned into an antagonist at one board meeting and left the church.

I remember one of the first times I had a performance evaluation after leaving the parish. I was a nervous wreck. My experience had often been quite difficult with performance evaluations in the ministry. In fact, I became quite adept at avoiding them whenever possible. Very seldom were they positive experiences. It was almost like people often felt that performance evaluations were meant to criticize and point out all ones shortcomings.

No wonder the pastor's comment rang a bell. It is hard to maintain a sense of one's being at least "OK" in the midst of that. Self-confidence could turn into a negative quite quickly in what others saw as arrogance. It could be seen easily as not being open to listening to what others had to say. Aloofness, stuck-up, self-centered, uncertain all became adjectives to describe the self-confident pastor.

The result of this is disillusionment, spiritual walls that separate the pastor from the congregation, a lack of self and self-confidence that only the family at home sees. The public persona remains smiling, engaged, even happy. Internally many pastors end up questioning their very faith and calling. They become burned out and barely make it from vacation to vacation, times of renewal.

I found some answers for myself in a couple of ways. One was the process of recovery for myself from chemical dependence. The work of the Twelve Steps opened up a whole new view of myself and the ability to let go of things that were beyond my control. What other people thought of me was one of those things beyond my control. Being part of a 12 Step group where I was just me was refreshing and allowed me to begin to discover who I was - and how God wanted to utilize that in me.

Doing the next right thing, also called doing God's Will, was another. If I was being honest and truthful, open and willing to do the next right thing, most times it would be good enough and often more that that. There was a freedom in that which can't be overstated.

Finally, the long pilgrimage into prayer and meditation became the foundation. It was there that I personally discovered that prayer is not an act of magic or wishful thinking. It was, instead, an act of faith and acceptance of whatever was in front of me. It was in that I also found the freedom to live out the vision empowered in my prayer and meditation.

It wasn't always easy; but it worked to lead me deeper into God's life with me and into a broader understanding of God's will for me and the whole idea of call, vocation, and ministry. I still wrestle with how the church fits into all this. I have a hunch that will never stop. But I know the way of self-confidence can be more than just feeling good about oneself. It is also the way of service and responding to the ways of God and God's ministry around us.

Oh, and by the way, that first performance evaluation and every one since I left the parish was nothing but empowering and hopeful. Much time was spent affirming what was going well and then a dialogue about what areas needed growth, instigated by people who cared. I walked out of my supervisor's office on a cloud and committed to working on new goals for the next year.

Would I Have Had the Courage?

Earlier this week the Minnesota House passed the bill legalizing marriage equality. Probably within a few days the Minnesota Senate will do the same making Minnesota the 12th state to do so. I have been clear of my agreement of the bill and its ideas.

But I wonder if I would have been willing to do that if I were still in the active ministry?

What brough that to mind was that my current pastor at the Episcopal Church where we are now members, was on TV (as he has been before) expressing the acceptance of the bill and advicating marriage equality. He has been clear where he stands from the start last year when Minnesota defeated the anti-equality bill . There he was on TV on Thursday, in public, giving his opinion.

I am sure that I would not have been doing so. I am sure that I would have wanted to talk about it only with people who know my opinion already. I am sure that if someone in my church would have asked me where I stood I would have said my opinion but then hemmed and hawed with some statement about accepting, etc.

Of course, I haven't been in the church in almost 10 years now. Times, on this issue, have changed in our culture. But I was aware of how few pastors might have been making public statements on the issue. You know, we have to be able to minister to everyone and not offend anyone. Even if we believe they are wrong(?) But I am sure that in my desire to be liked and to be able to minister to everyone in my church, I would very likely have been less open than some.

On the same newscast was a pastor from a more conservative church who made it clear that their church was not going to go along with this cultural shift. Since the beginning of their church, he said, they have stuck with the Bible and scriptural values. He was not afraid of his views. He was certain of them and didn't care if people disagreed. He doesn't have the desire to minister to people who disagree with him unless they are willing to be open to changing their opinion. (My interpretation.)

Why is it that when we find that we disagree with what has been a more traditional opinion of theology and scripture that we hem and haw? We bow, if ever so slightly, to the tradition and lose sight of the fact that in many instances, (most instances, perhaps) those long-held interpretations are as culturally-based as the contemporary ones.

I have a sense that what we might be witnessing is similar to what was happening in American theology in the mid-1800s and again in the mid-1900s over issues of race. We missed the fact then that the Hebrew Bible (and therefore the under-pinnings of the Christian Scriptures) are tribal, a variation of the racial arguments. We may have difficulty today seeing how in any way you can justify human slavery and the de-humanizing of whole sections of the world population can be God's will.

I pray that the move we have been seeing in the past several years will prove to be as antiquated and irrational in 50 or 100 years. I pray that these steps can lead us to a deeper and more inclusive vision of who we are as human brothers and sisters. I pray, finally, that God's love can be seen and experienced as grace instead of law.

Echoing Tillich

I don't know when, where or how it happened. I don't know if there is a God-gene that opens people up to an experience of the Holy Other.

I do know that it has never been a doubt. I cannot make myself NOT believe. Somehow or other- and I also echo Jung- I don't believe in God, I know there is a God.

This is not based on knowledge or intellect. It is far richer and deeper than any words I can find. Even as I have left the Church's ministry, I still DO for God.

Ministry.

I still hear the call. I still read and write to explore, wrestle and live more fully in God's grace.

I can't NOT do this.

It is passion. At some level of my soul I am captive.

Gently held, so
No matter what I believe
Today or
What fears or joys I face

Lord I am still here.

A Risky Road to Continue

Christianity Today had a post last week that shouldn't set well with many church leaders. It was written by John Knapp, also the author of a book, How the Church Fails Businesspeople (And What Can Be Done About It). The post had the provocative subtitle:

It's wrong to elevate an ecclesiastical elite over the money-making members of the body of Christ.

While I am not sure I agree with the "money-making" theme of this as opposed to the "ecclesiastical elite" who, by inference, don't make money, there is a truth in this statement. I knew of a young person once who as one point in his life had thought seriously of entering the church's "ministry" as a profession/calling. When later, for many reasons he did not, people were disappointed. It was as if he had betrayed them, and even God. What a waste, some said.

How sad! say I, that the real ministry happens only in the church. Yes, I know, we pay lip service to the idea that people have a ministry wherever they work, but it is usually thought of as a lesser calling. To serve the church is to serve Christ. Anything else is well, inferior.

I have herd pastors say, and I am sure I have said it in one form or another (head hanging in humble contrition),

we need people to shovel the walks this winter, or cut the grass this summer. What a great way to serve your Lord.

I am not sure I believe that anymore. I have discovered that real ministry is done as often in the factory or boardroom, Wal-Mart or classroom. I am convinced that ministry is done when we feed the hungry, visit the sick, clothe the naked. I am certain beyond any shadow of doubt that ministry is done when people care for each other, lend a hand or celebrate a joy.

I spent many years ignoring my own call to do ministry on the front lines, outside the ordained ministry, beyond the ecclesiastical elite. That work is not wasted, of course, but it is not the end of ministry.It is wrong, I agree to elevate the "church-based" ministry elite to any pedestal. We are all, no exceptions, called to ministry.

Maybe someday the Reformation can continue when we realize in fullness the priesthood of ALL believers.

Great Insight

From management guru Seth Godin:

Why jazz is more interesting than bowling

Bowling is all about one number: the final score. And great bowlers come whisker-close to hitting the perfect score regularly. Not enough dimensions for me to be fascinated by, and few people pay money to attend bowling matches.

Jazz is practiced over a thousand or perhaps a million dimensions. It's non-linear and non-predictable, and most of all, it's never perfect.

And yet...

when we get to work, most of us choose to bowl.
--Seth Godin

Which, I believe, is why I love what I do. It is more like jazz than bowling. It is people needing to work together and improvise from our knowledge and experience. It is never dull, sometimes out of tune, but is always a work in progress. It was why I loved parish ministry (until it became too administrative); it is why I get up and go to work today.

I Was Actually Listening Today

I was surprised again in church this morning. I say again because it happens regularly when I'm open to it and listening. I've written posted before about how every time I hear a sermon or discussion of "discipleship" and "following Jesus," I usually connect it to the work of the church. Many times that's because the sermon seems to do that. But after having served in the church as a pastor for 30 years, it seems to always be what we talk about. Discipleship, service, following Jesus- isn't it about church?

As a result I've probably struggled more than I should have, or needed to, with the idea of call to "secular ministry". I've always defined that as doing the work of Jesus in ways absolutely not connected in any way shape or form to the work of the church. I've even said that five years ago or so I finally heard God's call to me to do "ministry" outside the church. As a result I have had absolutely no disagreement about doing "ministry" as a CD counselor in non-church agencies and organizations.

I've also come to new understandings for myself of what church is, why it is, and, overall, what ministry means. I'm still not ready to put that down here in pixel format, but it's kind of been rumbling around.

It must be sinking in. I think I'm actually accepting it.

At one point in her sermon this morning, Pastor-Wife said something like:

sometimes you have to give up your dreams to follow Jesus.

Surprisingly I didn't take that as a call back into the church, giving up my dreams as a CD counselor and so on to go back and do some of the things I've often dreamed of doing in the church, such as church planting.

No, this time I realized that the church-based dreams are the ones that are now past. I am not called into church-based ministry any more than any other member of the church is. I am called to "secular ministry". I wish I could come up with a better term for that. Ministry, in any form or place, is by its very nature

• sacred, 
• holy, 
• set apart.

I think -- no, I'm sure -- that the work of God in Jesus Christ is just as real and just as important even when done outside the walls of the church or the institutional and denominational borders we put up around it. Maybe even more critical at times since the church isn't there.

That's why I was surprised this morning. It truly was the first time I'd heard that in my applying the words of a sermon. I've always said I'm slow when it comes to hearing God's word and calls. I tend to follow before I am actually sure I've heard it. (Or the opposite- not at all.) Today I am grateful that my call to my non-church-based ministry felt reaffirmed.

Considering that my 36th ordination anniversary is coming up in 10 days, I will now have something new to ponder on, pray about, and seek to follow more fully in the coming year.

Humbling Thought

I'm not sure anymore what brought this thought to mind, but I did write it down in my journal....

Most of what we do isn't done "for the ages" or to be remembered forever by future generations. It's done simply for the fact that it needs to be done for those around us today. That becomes much clearer as one gets older. Someone makes a comment about how something you did 20 years earlier touched them and you are suddenly transported back to moments to ministry long forgotten. But not forgotten by someone. Whether they pass that on to someone else is irrelevant. All that matters is that it was done in the first place.

That makes each day and its possible events that much more important and valuable.