This time of year in the church is easy to gloss over. We've all survived the chaos of Advent and Christmas. We made it through Epiphany. Now most of us are looking toward our Lenten plans. 

And yet, there are a couple of really incredible opportunities that can be missed if we let the recovery from the Advent and Christmas seasons overwhelm our focus. 

This weekend, a couple of things coincided. Many of us celebrated the Baptism of our Lord on Sunday (in an effort to wrestle it from Epiphany's liturgical grasp). And today, we celebrate the legacy of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 

Now for some traditions, this might be an odd pairing, but it shouldn't have been a challenge for my Methodist friends. Our baptismal liturgy is a wealth of theological truth and personal conviction, including around justice issues.

Last year, I led a confirmation class for my church, including a retreat. On that retreat, we went through the vows they would be taking at confirmation, as well as offering opportunities for the students to ask any question they desired, and we would answer it as best we could.

I am blessed to have worked with some pretty incredible and intelligent teenagers in confirmation classes, and this crew did not disappoint. In fact, some of them even asked about the future of the United Methodist Church, especially around the question of how we will include or exclude the LGBTQ community in the future. 

What happened next was a beautiful moment, as I watched leaders in their church remind them that no matter what the church said now, they have the power to change it. They were given encouragement that it was their job to change the world. And you know what? They are going to do it. I am in no way concerned about the future of our world and our church, because I know whose hands it's in. 

Will they need us to help guide them? Absolutely. Will they make some mistakes? You bet they will. Do they still do some dumb teenage things now? Of course! And yet, the future is bright and I can't wait to see how they transform the world.

And one of the ways they do that is embedded right in our baptismal vows:

"Do you accept the freedom and power God gives you to resist evil, injustice and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves?"

I told my confirmands that it was important they take seriously this vow, and that "whatever forms they present themselves" includes when evil, injustice and oppression appears in the church. 

Yesterday, we also celebrated a reaffirmation of baptism, and I loved the way this particular liturgy asked the congregation to reaffirm that vow:

One: Will you let the Spirit use you as prophets to the powers that be?

All: We accept the freedom and power God gives us
To resist evil, injustice, and oppression
In whatever forms they present themselves!

I've seen a number of friends from all over the political spectrum speaking up against racism this week, as our president has given them a significant opportunity to do so. I know many of us have been disheartened as we see Christians defend statements that are unequivocally racist in nature, and represent ideals that are in direct opposition to the teachings of Christ. I, too, am disheartened. 

And yet, I return to my first thought - for the first time in a long time, I have seen friends from many ends of the political and theological spectrum speak out against this particular statement. While it is not all, it is many. And in that, I am heartened. I am optimistic that we might just be able to move past Christianity as us vs. them and realize that, while we do not yet agree on all things, there are things that are decided and done. Let's not forget those things, friends. Dr. King died so that we might not forget those things. 

We are called to resist evil, injustice and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves, and we cannot do that silently. We cannot do that passively. Let us use our voices, empowered by the indwelling of the Spirit, to resist. To transform the world. 

And so, I pray that on this day we remember our baptismal vows, and we submit ourselves to used by the Spirit as prophets to the powers that be, resisting evil, injustice and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves. 

As we enter a new year, many of us take this opportunity to re-evaluate or re-center our lives and our ministries. Ministry leaders, I want to challenge you to take this opportunity seriously. As our churches move into this new era of what church is being and becoming, it's important that we don't get so lost in the day to day struggles that we forget to dream. 

Over the last few days, I want to invite you to look at your church. To look at where it has come from, to look at where it is now, and, most importantly, to dream about what it could be. You can catch the first installment of this series here, the second here, and the third here.

I work a lot with young people discerning calls to ministry, and I see the variety of ways God is calling people to join in Kin-dom work in the world. 

It’s powerful for young people to be in relationship with a variety of people doing a variety of things that God has called them to do. And it’s a powerful reminder that we are all responsible for one another, because we’re all part of the same body, the same community, and what we each bring to the table is important. 

I don’t know a lot of Greek - barely any really - but one word that has become of utmost importance to me lately is koinonia. I’m pretty sure every church I’ve attended has had a Sunday School class with that namesake, but only recently have I dug into its meaning. I knew it was an early Christian term for community, but literally, one of the interpretations of the word is this: gifts jointly contributed. 

Community is literally about a collective contribution of gifts. Gifts coming together to form something amazing, one body, celebrating together, suffering together, living together, serving together … koinonia is a call to community. I certainly don’t want to cross the line too far into the realm of cheesiness … but isn’t there a sense of the word collective in there too? A bringing together of gifts? 

So here’s what I know. The last two years have been tough. Really tough. But I keep coming back to my calling.

For me, returning to my calling means reminding myself that I am called to remind the church of what could be, but I also have to remind myself of what could be. That even when they’re called “opinionated,” “overbearing,” or “unteachable,” my contributions to the community are valid and valuable. I am called to bring my gifts, to bring my contributions, to remind the church of what COULD BE.  

I don’t know about you, but I want to be a part of the church that COULD BE. So that’s where this sermon turns from me to you … will you be the church of what COULD BE? Will you embrace the call to community, that the community’s role is to remind every individual, every person, that it is also a part of the body, no matter age or stage, ability or orientation, sex or gender?

As those with privilege, we offer that reminder and message to those without - which means we have to know them. As adults, we must offer that reminder and that message to children and youth - which means we have to know them. And to know them, and to embrace koinonia community, we have to first hear and listen to them, give them space for their contribution …. legitimate contribution. We have to know them and show them what COULD BE for themselves, and what it looks like to be community, true koinonia community. 

So let’s say you’re on board, let’s say this series of blog posts turned your world upside down, let’s say you are all in for koinonia community … for bringing all the parts of the body in together … what does this church that COULD BE look like? 

Well, for the most part, that’s for you to figure out. It looks different in different places. But actually, we get a little hint of where it all starts as Paul continues his letter to the Corinthians. This chapter closes with a full explanation of the metaphor ….

Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers; then deeds of power, then gifts of healing, forms of assistance, forms of leadership, various kinds of tongues. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak in tongues? Do all interpret? But strive for the greater gifts. 
1 Corinthians 12: 27-31

And then Paul segues beautifully, because he knows they’ll have the same question … HOW? This all sounds great, but things are tough. It’s hard to live in community together.

And I will show you a still more excellent way.
1 Corinthians 12:31

And then Paul shares his how. It's not a curriculum or a 5-step method, but a core value - the most core value. It's the core of what it means to be a community, to follow Jesus. It's the message he has for a competitive, petulant group of folks who really want to be the best they can, but things are tough.

If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.
1 Corinthians 13

The how is love. The church of what could be is grounded in love. Koinonia community is grounded in love. My call is grounded in love. All our calls, every part of the body, the body itself - it’s all grounded in love. The how is love. 

I pray that you will continually seek out God’s call on your life and on this community, the call to be the complete body, to remember what was, to be honest about what is, but to reach - in love - toward becoming the church that COULD BE. 

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Be sure you're subscribed for updates to ensure you don't miss future posts! This series is adapted from a sermon originally preached in May 2017 at Collective in DeLand, FL. 

As we enter a new year, many of us take this opportunity to re-evaluate or re-center our lives and our ministries. Ministry leaders, I want to challenge you to take this opportunity seriously. As our churches move into this new era of what church is being and becoming, it's important that we don't get so lost in the day to day struggles that we forget to dream. 

Over the next few days, I want to invite you to look at your church. To look at where it has come from, to look at where it is now, and, most importantly, to dream about what it could be. You can catch the first installment of this series here and the second here.

I received my calling in my early twenties, and while it has grown and developed in the last decade or so, the call to be a full-time vocational minister has not changed. The thing about that -- and this is where some of that cognitive dissonance of working for an institution that may also work against me at times comes in  -- the thing about being called to ministry in the church as a female is that sometimes, you don’t see a lot of folks who look like you doing what you feel called to do. 

I think much of this is changing - fewer and fewer of my female pastor colleagues are arriving at new churches and being “the first.” And yet, we still have miles to go. 

For me, I have probably had less challenge than many because of the strong and brave women who went before me. And still, there have been and still are challenges.

I have had some incredible mentors of a variety of generations of clergy. They taught me and nurtured me and encouraged me in every way possible. And yet, every direct mentor I have had in ministry, every clergy supervisor or director, has been male. Wonderful men, but men nonetheless. Men who did their best to prepare me for what ministry would look like, but men who did not have to face what my female colleagues have faced. 

Being a woman in ministry is different. And when you’re young, it’s different yet. And when you’re young and look even younger than you are - I felt like I had arrived in the last few years when people started guessing my age in the early 20s instead of the teens - it’s challenging.

There are techniques we take on - I have made sure every name tag I have had for every position has had my title of “Reverend” on it. It transforms conversations - for some young people, and women, it opens their eyes to see someone who looks like them with a title that might have been relegated to a grandfather-figure lookalike previously. And for those who are more the grandfather-figure lookalikes, I am immediately granted a tiny bit more credibility and respect than I would have had before. 

Even then, a name tag can only do so much. Being heard in a sea of older men is not easy. It’s not easy to speak up in a room that feels like a good old boys network that has unwritten rules and a secret handshake no one has yet shared. 

The challenge is, in order to be noticed and heard when your calling is in an area that is historically male-dominated, the behaviors and leadership styles you have to emulate are often those of your male mentors and counterparts. That’s how you get heard and noticed.

Except … those same behaviors and leadership styles, when espoused by a woman, end up earning you different titles. I’ve been spared some of the worst and nastiest, but “overbearing,” “opinionated,” and “unteachable,” have been thrown my way over time.

And it’s not just issues of sexism and ageism I encounter. My specific call and the work I do brings up a whole other issue. 

The past few years, I’ve found my call in advocating and equipping for intergenerational faith communities. Although intergenerational ministry is not just about children, much of my work has centered around supporting families in doing faith together, both at church and at home. Often my teaching, though focused specifically on faith formation, begins to toe the line of discussing parenting techniques and choices, and sometimes crosses over.

Well, the big surprise reveal is … I’m not a parent. I do not have children in my nuclear family. I’m also an only child, married to an only child. I don’t have a lot of first-hand, or even second-hand experience, raising children in a home. So even in a place where I am knowledgeable, educated, experienced, and yes, called - even then, my credibility is questioned because of my family’s choice to not have children of our own. 

So often, even those of us with the most open minds and the best of intentions create singular images for what kind of person can fill a specific role. This is what a pastor looks like, this is what someone looks like who can inform how I raise my children, this is what a Christian looks like … 

And this is why the intergenerational community is so essential - THIS is what Paul is talking about in 1 Corinthians 12. Community is about being sure that all parts of the body - hands, feet, and even those less often seen or celebrated - community is about bringing those parts of the body together, first because we are better when we’re together, when we’re working together and supporting each other in our individual callings. But also because when the body works together, the whole body, the younger parts can see how the more experienced parts are living out their callings - all of them.

The final installment in this series is coming Monday. 

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Be sure you're subscribed for updates to ensure you don't miss future installments! This series is adapted from a sermon originally preached in May 2017 at Collective in DeLand, FL. 

As we enter a new year, many of us take this opportunity to re-evaluate or re-center our lives and our ministries. Ministry leaders, I want to challenge you to take this opportunity seriously. As our churches move into this new era of what church is being and becoming, it's important that we don't get so lost in the day to day struggles that we forget to dream. 

Over the next few days, I want to invite you to look at your church. To look at where it has come from, to look at where it is now, and, most importantly, to dream about what it could be. You can catch the first installment of this series here.

In the first post in this series, I talked about the importance of reconnecting with our call. If i’m going to look at my call, I have to go back to camp.

Most of my formation in life and ministry happened at camp - Caitlin was there for some pretty significant moments in that. At camp we encountered God in the woods, on boats, walking through water in creeks, and looking up at the stars, through worship and community and scripture. 

And because I’m a good lifelong Methodist, I couldn’t tell you where many things are specifically in the Bible, but one passage that has stuck with me for nearly 2 decades now is 1 Corinthians 12. It’s a passage that we focused on at camp often, because what 1 Corinthians as a whole book is about, and specifically this passage today, is what it means to be community. 

Now, one of the things that’s important to do when reading any of scripture, but particularly Paul’s letters - 1 Corinthians was written by a guy named Paul, as were a lot of the other letters we find in the New Testament - for Paul’s letters it’s important to know what context in which he was writing, because, I’ll just say it - he’s nicer in some places than others. 

1 Corinthians, while having some of many people’s favorite passages in it, like this one, also contains a lot of admonishment and some problematic passages. This is a community Paul knows well. He’s spent time with them, he’s broken bread with them, he’s connected with them. Then, after leaving the community to go connect with others, he gets word that this community is not living up to the ideals he knows they espouse. 

He’s heard there’s been some competition, infighting, and power grabs happening in this community - nothing like anything we ever see in the modern church, of course - and this letter is his way of reminding them of what COULD BE. 

So this part of the passage is really about the importance of working together and recognizing what everyone brings to the table, and compares the community to a human body, 

Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot would say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear would say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many members, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and those members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect; whereas our more respectable members do not need this. But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. 1 Corinthians 12:14-26 (NRSV)

I find that this is Paul’s way of, when things are getting tough for this community, bringing them back to their call. Paul is reminding them of what it means to be community, and specifically a community following the way of Jesus. 

This particular passage, and this reminder of call to community, is also closely connected with my call, and not just because it’s my “camp scripture,” and not just in the way that it describes what COULD BE in a general sense, but more specifically. 

Most of my work over the last 6 years or so has been studying and researching everything related to intergenerational ministry. As a result of that work, the concept and core practice of intergenerational community has become a huge part of what I have been called to remind churches of. 

As I look at what was, and what is, this idea of a community that not only welcomes all and includes all, but connects all to the work God is inviting them to in the world -  I think that’s the community that could be, and that’s the community that lives up to the ideals of what the church is really supposed to embody.

We hear it here as Paul reminds the Corinthians that all parts of the community are important, and the ones that we often hide away, the ones we often shield from the world, the ones that appear to be the least important now, might be the most important, the most vital. 

The idea of marginalized communities in the church is not new, and in many churches, the most marginalized are children. Are they honored? Absolutely! Are they acknowledged? Often! But over there, in their wing, in their space.

Too often, children are welcomed into a community, only to be relegated to a separate space, a church within a church. When in reality, they not only have something to contribute to the community, but also need the other members of the community to live into their own call, their own flourishing. 

Young people ask some pretty deep questions, and the key questions of adolescence especially are of identity, purpose and belonging:

"Who am I?" "What should I do?" "Where do I belong?"

Unsurprisingly, we each continue to ask these questions throughout life, and who better to help young people wrestle with these questions than those of us who have experience wrestling with them, and who continue to wrestle alongside of them?

How does a young person know what COULD BE if they don’t see it in the broader community?

The next installment of this series will post Friday, and I'll explore the answer to the question of how we help young people find their place in our church bodies.

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Be sure you're subscribed for updates to ensure you don't miss future installments! This series is adapted from a sermon originally preached in May 2017 at Collective in DeLand, FL. 

As we enter a new year, many of us take this opportunity to re-evaluate or re-center our lives and our ministries. Ministry leaders, I want to challenge you to take this opportunity seriously. As our churches move into this new era of what church is being and becoming, it's important that we don't get so lost in the day to day struggles that we forget to dream. 

Over the next few days, I want to invite you to look at your church. To look at where it has come from, to look at where it is now, and, most importantly, to dream about what it could be. 

I have to tell you, the last few years of my life have been tough. You’d think that when I start with that, that I’m going to tell you stories about all the tough times I’ve faced over the last few years, but I’m not. 

I wish I was going to share with you more about those tough times, but those stories won’t be told for many years, when there’s been enough time and enough emotional memory loss for them to be enlightening and not exploitive. And really, it’s OK - I’m not looking for sympathy either. I still have a good life, even with tough stuff intermingled.

But really, the reason I tell you that the last few years have been tough is to tell you what I find myself doing when I encounter parts of my life that are challenging, and to offer this to you, and to whatever community you find yourself in, because in community, there’s always someone facing something tough, and at times, the community itself will face such things. 

The most significant thing I do, when it gets really hard, when things look really rough, when I go to a place of anger or despair or hopelessness - when that begins to happen, I return to my call. 

Now if the word “call” doesn't connect with you, or you think, “Oh, that’s just for pastors,” I have to disagree. One of the most wonderful things about connecting with the divine in a personal and communal way is that I know that God is calling each of us, and God is calling us collectively. 

Calls are experienced along a broad range, too - it’s not always a huge, booming voice from the sky (I know a few people who have actually had such an experience … but only a few) … so it’s very seldom a huge, booming voice from the sky.

And sometimes, a call can be for a time - to be called to meet someone in a specific time in their life, or for a particular instance. And sometimes, a call can be on a macro level, a call to a vocation, or a life devoted to a cause or ministry. 

The question is never if you are called, but how you are called. God is always calling us to participate in God’s work in the world. I find that to be one of the most exciting truths in my life. 

Discovering my own call has been a lifelong process - I had a stint where my call seemed to be in journalism, and I worked in newspapers and media. (I cannot tell you how thrilled I have been in the last couple of years that I am NO longer called to the field of journalism.)

There was a point at which God revealed to me - actually through two middle school girls - that my call was specifically to the church.

Most of the time, people think that being called to ministry is simple - you follow the ordination process, the steps are clear, and then you love people and create meaningful spiritual space for them. And many days, it does look like that. 

At the same time, working for the church can be a constant act of cognitive dissonance … the thing you believe in and support is also, at times, the thing that goes against the thing you believe in and support. 

There’s a quote often attributed to St. Augustine, but more accurately may be Dorothy Day. “The church is a whore, but she’s your mother.” 

Day’s direct quote is this: “As to the Church, where else shall we go, except to the Bride of Christ, one flesh with Christ? Though she is a harlot at times, she is our Mother.”

This fact, and a call to love and work within the church, create a couple of possible roads, both legitimate, and both potentially productive. One road, which many of my friends have taken, is to take the cynical and pessimistic route and turn away from the church, rejecting its hypocrisy outright, and speaking from outside the church about the harm the church has done. I have all the respect in the world for this approach, and some days I envy it.

I, however, have been called to take a different road. It’s not a higher or more admirable road, just a different one. My call has developed significantly over the last decade, as any call does, and as I’ve listened, I’ve realized that my call is to still stand alongside and within the church. 

And while much of my work in the church is looking back, and examining our history to see what WAS; and while it’s also looking at research and statistics and trends to see what IS; at my core, my calling is about looking forward, and helping remind the church what COULD BE. 

I'll continue to explore this idea in Wednesday's post, so stay tuned!

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Be sure you're subscribed for updates to ensure you don't miss future installments! This series is adapted from a sermon originally preached in May 2017 at Collective in DeLand, FL.