Edwards: Breaking the darkness

Jonathan Edward’s account of the revival that broke out in Northampton, Mass., in the 1730s is an interesting and careful account of the variety of ways that the Holy Spirit worked conversions in his community. He is a great antidote for anyone who argues that there is only one way for a person to be converted to God. That is not the book’s only virtue by far, but it is one that struck me while reading it recently.

Here is one passage that I particularly liked in which he described the way saving grace breaks through the darkness.

In some, converting light is like a glorious brightness suddenly shining upon a person, and all around him: they are in a remarkable manner brought out of darkness into marvelous light. In many others it has been like the dawning of the day, when at first but a little light appears, and it may be presently hid with a cloud; and then it appears again, and shines a little brighter, and gradually increases, with intervening darkness, till at length it breaks forth more clearly from behind the clouds.

‘Now it’s time’

Stephen Rankin marks his 25th year in ordained ministry with a post calling the United Methodist Church to repentance and renewal.

Now it’s time to do some hard theological and moral work.  We must figure out what, if anything, unifies us United Methodists.  Unity for the sake of unity means nothing.  It is a waste of time.  Unity for the sake of faithfulness to the Triune God and the missio Dei: that is why unity matters.

Read his thoughts here.

Clergy effectiveness in N. Illinois

We’ve had some conversation about what we mean by the term “clergy effectiveness.” More than one person has pointed out that without a clear statement of what we mean by those words, it is hard to do anything productive with the concept.

Here is a statement North Illinois adopted in 2010 to explain what it means to be an effective clergy member.

I don’t want to prejudice your reading of the document, but it did not strike me as all that helpful. It is a very long list and full of vague terms that are open to broad interpretation. As a member of that conference, I would not have a good sense of how well I measured up. Part of the value of explicit standards is that people know when they are meeting them.

If your conference has an explicit statement somewhere, send me the link. I’ll collect them on a page here.

If we die, we die

Too often I get the sense that we do what we do in the United Methodist Church because it has consequences for us, the church.

We talk a good game, but when it comes down to it our proposals and plans are all about saving the church or avoiding divisions that would hurt the church. At General Conference Adam Hamilton tried to stir us to action by pointing out that the church was on a slide toward death. At the South Central Jurisdictional Conference Bishop Schnase talked of unsustainable patterns. Those who advocate rewriting our doctrine regarding sexual ethics warn that if we do not do so we will scare away young people.

Again and again the subtext — or the actual text — of what we say and do is all about shoring up what we have and what we are. With salaries and health care benefits and retirement plans on the line, I understand why this is. But it could not be more distant from the impulses that gave rise to Methodism in the first place.

Methodism arose because a bunch of men and women were intent on extending the benefits of scriptural Christianity to others. They did not focus on the consequences their actions had for themselves, but on the consequences their action or inaction had for a world that needed the gospel, even if it did not know it.

We are living in an Esther moment. Our church has lived too much concerned with its own safety for too long. The time is upon us. Do we take bold action even if it means institutional death? Do we follow God come what may? Do we say as Esther did when she at last resolved to enter the king’s presence in violation of the law: “If I die, I die.”

The question is not “How do we save United Methodism?” The question is “How do we spread the gospel?” How do we jettison everything that gets in the way of doing that? How do we move forward heedless of institutional death?

These seem like questions worthy of the church.

Number 5 strikes a chord with me

Allan Bevere posted a list of five signs that a church is in trouble. Copied directly from his blog, they are:

By Ircel Harrison at Ethics Daily:

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1) “A new pastor will fix all our problems.” One could wish that it were that simple. Seldom are church issues tied to one person; most often they are systemic.

2)”We need to go back to the good old days.” Short of someone inventing a time machine, don’t count on this happening.

3) “They are keeping us from moving forward.” When a congregation comes to the point of a division between “us” and “them,” the church has become extremely unhealthy.

4) “We need to get more tithers in the church so that we can meet the budget.” I can’t remember Jesus ever suggesting that balancing the budget was a worthy basis for evangelism.

5) “We are at the mercy of (some outside force).” When a congregation feels that it is no longer operating under the Lordship of Christ but is beholden to some outside entity – the denomination, the culture, the economy – it has lost its will to function.

___

More details can be read here.

Number 5 makes me think of our rather common defense of our denominational declines. “Everyone, even the Baptists, are losing members. If it weren’t for immigration, so would the Catholics.” And I hear it among the small churches I serve. “There aren’t many people around here who aren’t in church. There aren’t many people around here at all.”

I understand all these comments, but they do sound in my ears like throwing up our hands. It lets me off the hook if I can avoid saying, “I have not worked faithfully enough or creatively enough to spread the gospel.” Instead, I can say, “Hey, everyone is struggling.”

I understand the sentiment, but there is nothing about them that has anything to do with our Methodist ethos.

John Wesley did not stand at the church door, shrug, and say, “If God wants those colliers in church, he will bring them on Sunday morning.” No. He believed he had something — the gospel — of such great value that it had to be taken to people and offered to them every place they could be found. He never used these terms, but I think he would approved of the saying “the best defense is a good offense.”

For me, I need to be left on the hook on such things. I am basically a bookish introvert. If I can blame the decline of the church on things beyond my control, my natural instincts are to stay behind my computer screen and with my books and let the world go on its way. I need John Wesley reminding me that Christians do not believe that letting the world go on its way is God’s plan.

‘A messianic pilgrim people of God’

UMC Bishop Timothy Whitaker wrote at United Theological Seminary’s Church Renewal blog about what he believes is most needed for renewal in the UMC: A biblical understanding of the church.

What does that mean? Here is how the bishop puts it:

What is this biblical understanding of the church that is needed today? There are several images of the church in the New Testament and in the tradition of Christendom. I think there is warrant for choosing as the most comprehensive image (which is inclusive of both Testaments and perhaps most of the other images of the church in the New Testament), “the messianic pilgrim people of God” (for more on this, see George Lindbeck, “The Church”, in Keeping the Faith by Geoffrey Wainwright, ed., Fortress Press and Pickwick Publications, 1988, Pp. 179-208).

The understanding of the church as the messianic pilgrim people of God does not view the church as the religion of the culture, or even as a religion, but as a distinctive people in all of the nations of the world. Such an understanding views the church as a missionary community that witnesses to the world by word and deed. Because it sees the church as a people on a pilgrimage through history, it enables the church to be liberated from its captivity to a settled place in society and to adapt to change. It is centered in Jesus Christ as the crucified and risen Messiah of Israel declared by God to be the Lord of the world by the power of the Holy Spirit. Christ is known as the climax of the story of Israel which continues in the form of the church for all the families, tribes, and nations of the world. It is not individualistic, but it is a corporate understanding of the church in which all members are joined together in the on-going story of the people of the Messiah. It learns from the experiences of this people in the past, beginning with Israel in the Old Testament, but it is also oriented toward the future God intends for all creation.

How to judge episcopal effectiveness?

The news about Bishop Bledsoe in North Texas has me thinking about our much vaunted systems of accountability.

We have bishops being told to step aside because they are deemed ineffective, but we do not have public declarations about what those criteria of judgement are. Or do we have that and I am just ignorant of them (a distinct possibility)?

What are the standards for judging whether a bishop is effective or not?

Water in the thirsty places

The UM Reporter shares a stirring sermon preached at the North Texas Annual Conference by the Rev. Mike Baughman.