PRESBYTERIES SHOULD PUSH BACK
I’ll say it again. Presbyteries should stop letting themselves be pushed around. They should PUSH back. Let’s make that an acronym. Presbyteries United Show Hope. I’ve written a series of blogs on a strategy for presbyteries to implement to counter the toxic myth that our hierarchy is fading away. Anyone who sends me a receipt that shows they have purchased one or more of the books in the Healthy Clergy Make Healthy Congregations series, I will send them a PDF blend of the ideas in those blogs. I would also do that if you send me ten dollars but that is bad stewardship because the books don’t cost that much more. My goal is that you will have the resources to PUSH back.
PUNCTURE THE MYTH
A popular myth that is destroying our culture and has infected the church is the myth of perfectionism. The myth feeds on the food of anxiety that plagues our culture. The underlying assumption of the myth is that only perfection can save us. We are quick to judge any person or institution that isn’t perfect. Christians should know better.
Reread the biblical story. From the beginning with Adam and Eve to the evolution of the family of faith with Abraham and Sarah, to the first disciples and the members of the early church, the repeated story of faith is that God always began with imperfect people. God didn’t depend on perfection from the beginning and forgiveness not judgement was what empowered God’s chosen people.
The issue for the church is NEVER ” are you good enough, pure enough, faithful enough for me to be a part of you.” That path leads us to idolatry based on the standard of truth that we finite beings assume we understand. Look at all the attempts at reformation of the church that have occurred in history. Has anyone of them prevented the further fracture of the One Body of Christ. We may not be able to go back and start over again, but we can surely confess and humbly move forward as “ambassadors of reconciliation.”
WE HAVE A STORY TO TELL
Presbyteries need to develop strategies for how to tell the story of a faith that is realistic in its anthropology. We know that humans and institutions will always be imperfect. The Good News that we have to proclaim is that not only is God not defeated by the dark side of our nature but God is fully capable of enabling us, finite as we are, to be incubators of grace.
No one of us and no individual church can be everywhere and do everything. Working together, however, we can spread hope and healing. The world desperately needs examples of how to work across dividing lines and be enhanced by listening to those who are different from us.
PUSH
Shaping healthy churches to receive new pastors.
