On mission in your home – 1930s and 2016

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by Wayne Schwab

In the 1930s in Cleveland Park in Washington, DC, it was safe to leave the front door unlocked at night.

One night the high school brothers were out late.  Dad heard the front door open and the refrigerator door followed.  He assumed the boys were getting a snack before bedtime.

Then he heard the front door open and close again.  Who was it?

He called out the window, “Who are you?”

“It’s Randy.  I just needed a sandwich before going to bed.”  Things were tight at home for Randy.  The boys’ parents had told all their friends, “You are welcome at any time.”

Randy was taking them up on their offer.

Could your home have such a mission?

Doors have to be locked today – especially, at night.

What might happen if you said to friends of your teens, “You are always welcome.  Just knock.”

It’s a caring home mission.

Who owns ministry?

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by Fletcher Lowe

Recently I was in a meeting where a young man was sharing his Christian journey.  He outlined his childhood closely connected to a Church community, then college where he felt called to the “ministry,” which he pursued through graduate school in music, became a Minister of Music, moved on to Seminary to further pursue that call to “the ministry,” had a not-too-challenging time as an assistant minister before finding his ministry fit as a chaplain in a home for disabled adults.

The more I heard his story, the more I felt uncomfortable with the way he was using the word “ministry.”  It was as if the only real ministry was within the church community.

I had a similar conversation at a dinner party a week ago when I was introduced to another guest: “She is a Presbyterian minister,” my friend said.  I looked back at him and said, “Well you, too, are a Presbyterian minister – it’s just that she has been ordained, but we are all ministers by virtue of our Baptism.”  They both looked as if I was speaking a foreign language.

Part of the current missional revolution is challenging the Church to reclaim the sense of ministry, of calling, of vocation for all the Baptized, not just those who are ordained.  As Byron Rushing, the vice chair of The Episcopal Church’s House of Deputies remarked, reflecting on his calling in the Massachusetts Legislature, “Jesus is in the Legislature where I am called to serve. If he were not there, I should not be there either.”

Each of us is empowered by our baptism for ministry in our daily lives of home, work, and community.  We need to claim that calling – and not let the ordained alone “own it.”

Real ministry happens during real life

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by Demi Prentiss

In a recent review of Radical Sending, Gayle Hunter Hagland offered praise for the book, saying it reminds congregations “that real ministry happens during real life.” What clarity that brings to the difficulties of truly being a follower of Jesus, refusing to settle for being a “Sunday only” Christian.

We don’t need to bring Jesus out into the world. The Living God is already there at work, in the real lives of people. God’s challenge to us is to tune our hearts to see where God’s Spirit is moving, and to partner with whatever the Spirit might be up to. Often that means immersing ourselves in the messiness of real life.

Jesus spent much of his earthly life living on the messy margins, outside the boundaries of acceptability – talking with women, healing lepers, befriending tax collectors, breaking bread with sinners. Hanging out with “the wrong people” didn’t earn him any points with the powerful, rich, and famous. He immersed himself in “real life,” and brought real life – life abundant – to those who chose to walk his way.

Jesus’ entire life was his ministry. May we become living members of “the Jesus Movement,” claiming each moment of our own real lives as opportunities to be “on mission” with Jesus.

Communicating God’s Love in the Workplace

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by Pam Tinsley

I walked into the gym the other day and struck up a conversation with a friend I hadn’t chatted with in quite a while. Eventually, our conversation led to her work as a labor and delivery nurse and her consideration of retirement. She shared with me that, as much as she loves nursing, after 40 years the physical demands of the profession are telling her it’s time to slow down.

My friend’s voice revealed how conflicted she was about this major transition in her life. Nursing was what God put her on earth to do, she told me.  Even as a small child she and her family recognized her vocation because of the care she showed toward others.

She went on to describe nursing as her spiritual calling. She expressed it as life-giving – not only because of the new lives she helps moms deliver, but because of the people she comes in contact with, from colleagues to patients and their families. The relationships she forges with others, even for a short time in the hospital, are life-giving and life-changing.

“Ah,” I responded, “you’re living out your baptism. Nursing is your baptismal ministry.” No further explanation was needed. Instead, she told me about helping a woman in labor who spoke no English. With the aid of an interpreter, she communicated maintaining eye contact with the woman throughout the conversation – thus respecting her dignity. She then posed a last question through the interpreter: Do you have any questions for me? To which the woman responded, again through the interpreter, “I just wanted to tell you that I see God’s love in your eyes.”

My friend found the common language of God’s love to communicate with her patient. Sharing Christ’s love with another in need, even if only through her eyes, is one of the many ways she lives into her baptism through her spiritual calling as a labor and delivery nurse.

Have you had an experience in your daily life – at work, in the community, in the local supermarket – where your actions were shaped by your belief in a loving God and a commitment to your baptismal promises? How might another person’s life have been touched by that experience? How was your life changed?

Markings for the Baptismal Journey

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by Edward L. Lee, Jr.

Here are several pertinent quotations for the journey of baptismal ministry in daily life.

“I believe that hope is awakened and revived, nourished by millions of solitary individuals whose deeds and works every day negate frontiers and the crudest implications of history. Each and every person, on the foundations of their own sufferings and joys, builds for all.” Albert Camus

To the question, What Does Love Mean?, come these responses by children:

“When someone loves you the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth.” Billy, age 4

“If you want to learn to love better, you should start with a friend who you hate.” Nikka, age 6

“You really shouldn’t say ‘I love you’ unless you mean it. But if you mean it you should say it a lot. People forget.” Jessica, age 8

“The role I see for Christianity is not that we’re to make all the world Christians. We are to serve the whole world, to bring it into brotherhood and sisterhood. Action on behalf of social transformation is such an essential part of being a disciple. It’s so essential that if it’s not there, we run the risk of religion declining into religiosity. What should be dynamite can become opium.” Fr. Niall O’Brien

“True liberation is freeing people from the bonds that have prevented them from giving their gifts to others.” Henri Nouwen

And finally:

“The Christian’s task is to so enjoy the Word in the world as to attest the veracity of the Word of God for all people in any and every event.” William Stringfellow

Ninth grade justice

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by Wayne Schwab

This blog entry is from a podcast by Wayne Schwab of the Member Mission Network.  We help people to live better every day.  This time a unique story of justice.  It’s unique because it’s justice lived by two ninth graders, Diana and Laurie!

Diana and Laurie were with friends at lunch time.

Boys at the table next to them were throwing trash into a nearby container.  They didn’t want to bother with walking over to drop their trash in the container.

As you’d expect, one boy’s throw missed the container and splattered its contents across the floor.

A Chinese friend of Diana and Laurie said, “Pick it up.”

The thrower mocked her, saying, “I don’t speak Chinese.”

Diana and Laurie caught the insult and its bit of racism.  They objected loudly.

The boy turned and ran.

Diana and Laurie chased him.  Laurie, the bigger of the two, cornered the boy in a stair case.

They both insisted he apologize to the girl.

He did.

For the rest of the day, their Chinese friend thanked Diana and Laurie almost every time she saw them.

Diana told me the story – a neat story of advocacy.  Advocacy is defending people who need help.  That’s the promise made in her name at her baptism and affirmed by Diana herself in confirmation.  That promise is “to strive for justice” and to “respect the dignity of every human being.”

I said, “Hooray.  How good to hear you defend someone who had been insulted!”

That’s today’s adventure in justice.

For more such stories go to our website at membermission.org.

Thanks for listening.

I’m Goin’ Fishing

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by Fletcher Lowe

Peter-FishingIn John’s Gospel (21:1-14) there is a rather mundane, but, when we dig a little deeper, a quite profound Christian truth. After Jesus’ death and resurrection, some of the disciples are at the Sea of Galilee, and one of them, Peter, says, “I’m goin’ fishing.” As I said, it’s not very erudite, but it is profound: “I’m goin’ fishing.” He didn’t mean it in the same way that folks around a lake might suggest. They’re going fishing as a sport, as recreation, as a leisure activity. But for Peter, as you remember, it was his job, his work, his business; he was a fisherman by trade. So off he goes — to work. After a frustrating night of catching nothing, Jesus joins him and things change.

This is one of the times that Jesus appeared to his disciples after the resurrection. Remember two others? One was with those two discouraged disciples traveling on the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus. Jesus meets them along the way, and things change. The third was in a room where several of the disciples had been meeting, anxious and fearful about their future. Again, Jesus comes into their midst with the words, “Peace be with you.” And things changed.

It’s just like Jesus to be with people on their job, while they’re traveling, or when they’re meeting — in short, in the midst of the activities of their daily lives. That may seem all too obvious to you, but we don’t always make that connection between Christ and our daily lives. More often than not, there’s a gap, a gulf. So, for you, reader, what is the connection between Sunday and Monday, between your faith and your daily life?

We have those post resurrection appearances: Peter at work, two disciples traveling, several disciples meeting; examples for us of where Christ meets us in whatever occupies our daily life and work. And that is where each of us is called — to discover in our daily lives our particular calling and ministry. For that is where Sunday connects with Monday and where liturgy comes to life.

Ministry in the ‘None Zone’

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by Pam Tinsley

A number of years ago I began a ministry at my workplace, where I was an executive at an insurance company. I didn’t call it a ministry at the time. I didn’t realize that it was a ministry. And, to be quite honest, I didn’t intend to start anything!

My mother became seriously ill, and I was frequently and uncharacteristically absent for long-weekend trips to visit and care for her. After she died co-workers began to seek me out – not to talk about my grief, but to share their own struggles with aging and seriously-ill parents.  We never talked about Jesus or God or faith. Living in the “None Zone,” where our residents mark “none” when asked about religious affiliation, most probably weren’t aware that I was active in my church. Instead, they simply shared what was happening in their lives and with their parents, and I listened. We conversed about a sacred part of our lives with an openness that transcended the typical business transaction-type conversation. As a matter of fact, one person who sought me out was a senior vice president whose personal life was so private that others referred to his vacations as “CIA missions”!

It quickly became apparent just how healing these conversations were. I noticed a level of mutual care that had previously been lacking in my workplace, and I believe they did, as well. By being intentionally Christ-centered in the care for my mother and my openness to others, the interactions I had with co-workers had been transformed from simple workplace conversations into baptismal ministry.

This is just one example of how I’ve experienced that being mindful of our baptismal vows can transform what we are already doing in our lives.  Not only was I changed, but others were, as well.

How might you live into your baptismal vocation, be it at work, in your community, at school, or at home with family?

The Missional Church Movement and The Episcopal Church

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by Peyton G. Craighill

In America, congregations generally assume that their success is measured in terms of how many members they are able to attract. They also assume that their power to attract and hold members depends on their ability to produce programs that meet the spiritual and social needs of their members. The most successful congregations are those with the most attractive power. The problem with these assumptions is that they ignore why God created – and continues to create – congregations.

The Church came into being when God sent his Son into the world to live, die, and rise again for that world, and to commission his followers to spread the Good News of God’s love and justice through word and action into all that world. The Church exists, not primarily, to attract people into congregations, but to send people out to share with Christ in his mission in all areas of daily life. When we were baptized into Christ, he commissioned us all of us to participate with him in his mission, Monday through Sunday.

The paradigm shift from an attractional to a sending model of congregational ministry calls for a major reconsideration of every aspect of church life – worship, formation, community, and service. Mission is no longer on the periphery of church life. The mission of Christ is why the Church and all of its congregations exists! Parish programs need to be rethought in terms, not only of the corporate life of congregations, but also in terms of how they inspire, guide, and support each member in her or his missions in all areas of daily life – home, work, leisure, community, church, and the wider world.

In regard to the missional church movement in the Episcopal Church, what sets our approach apart from other Churches is our emphasis on baptism and the baptismal covenant. As Christ’s mission began with his baptism, so too our mission, shared with Christ, begins with our baptism. In particular, the nine commitments (Book of Common Prayer, pp. 292-4) we make in our Baptismal Covenant provide us with invaluable inspiration and guidance for our missions in and through Christ.

We recognize of course, that, in mission-oriented congregations, attraction remains an important part of our ministry. Unless congregations attract members in, there will be no missionaries to send out. But attraction is subordinated to sending. Indeed, the best way to attract people into congregations is when those congregations inspire and support all their members to live out their faith in their everyday lives.

Disenfranchising the Baptized

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by Edward L. Lee, Jr.

This past Saturday, March 12, the Diocese of Pennsylvania elected a new bishop from a slate of five nominees all of whom were well vetted and qualified. It took four ballots but from the outset the bishop-elect led in all of them. He clearly was the choice of the clergy and the lay delegates who in such elections must vote separately “by orders.” And to be elected the nominee must garner a majority of votes in both orders (clergy and laity) on the same ballot.

So what’s the problem? Certainly not the outcome nor the process. No, it is the voting math as prescribed by Pennsylvania’s peculiar diocesan canon which defines the lay vote as one vote per parish, not one vote per delegate. In this diocese all parishes, small and large, have two delegates, a kind of institutional egalitarianism that seems appropriate for Christian community. But is it in this case?

Let’s do the math. Remember all duly qualified clergy are entitled to vote and on the final ballot this meant 194 individual votes were cast. However, on the same ballot the lay votes totaled only 126. Why? Because that was the number of parishes present, not the total number of delegates. If multiplied by two, there were in fact around 252 baptized lay persons on hand but each had only a half vote with which to negotiate a choice for their parish’s preference. How egalitarian is that!

Truth be told it’s canonical clericalism. It values ordination over baptism. It disenfranchises the laity rather than empowering them. It’s like the early Constitution of our country: women, no vote; slaves, defined as three-fifths of a person. In the Episcopal Church whose membership is about ninety-nine percent laity this discrepancy in power and entitlement is unacceptable. Nothing in the Gospel can justify it.

If the first order of ministers in the church is the baptized laity, and not the ordained  clergy, then let that be consistently evident in its polity, practice and privileges. To be baptized is not a second class status in God’s commonwealth and Christ’s blessed community of disciples. Never.