Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Sheep feed your shepherds!

This last week I went to the Pacific Northwest Annual Conference for the United Methodist church. It was a great time with lots of fun, faith, and rock band. I loved getting to meet with more pastors and chatting about church with them. Far and away the high point for me was getting to see my good friend (and mentor) get ordained.

The whole ceremony was a wonderful celebration. It was one of the few times I got to sit down and actually pay attention to a sermon. A bishop named, Roddy White, spoke and did a wonderful job. His message centered on Jesus talking with Peter about feeding his sheep (John 21: 15-19).

Jesus Reinstates Peter
15When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, "Simon son of John, do you truly love me more than these?"
"Yes, Lord," he said, "you know that I love you."
Jesus said, "Feed my lambs."

16Again Jesus said, "Simon son of John, do you truly love me?"
He answered, "Yes, Lord, you know that I love you."
Jesus said, "Take care of my sheep."

17 The third time he said to him, "Simon son of John, do you love me?"
Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, "Do you love me?" He said, "Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you."

Jesus said, "Feed my sheep. 18 I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." 19Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, "Follow me!"



This passage makes a lot of sense in an ordination as a bishop is reminding those who are entering the pastorate that they must feed the sheep that Jesus has entrusted to them. They are now becoming a shepherd to take care of all those at their churches and in the communities around.

What struck me was that the bishop shifted and told a story of visiting a woman, Mrs. Quinn. In his first church he found out Mrs. Quinn expected him to visit each week. He was nervous going over there the first day. As his time with her ended he prayed for her. He was ready to leave, but Mrs. Quinn stopped him and prayed for him. He told us how amazed and lifted up he was by this prayer. He made sure to visit her every week because she fed him. She fed the shepherd.

We often forget taking care of our shepherds. We have pastors, mentors, ministers, leaders, and teachers that all give so much to all of us. The pour out into our cups and we soak in their wisdom, guidance, and care as much as we can. In the end though who pours back into the servants cups?

Bishop White spent double the time talking to the "sheep" about feeding their "shepherds". It was fascinating to see this stress to the laity to take care of these shepherds. All I could think was "amen" to this line of thought.

As I have worked in youth ministry for three years now I resonate completely with this sentiment. While I worked at Mary, Queen of Peace there were very few there helping to feed me. My shepherds there did not reach out to support or encourage faith. My personal faith was not something of concern. If I knew the right prayers, did all the motions then I must be ok. The stress was program not ministry.

The families there were wonderful, and tried. The stress in the Catholic church is much more on how the leaders are to teach and lead the laity. The laity ends up not seeing themselves as ministers. We are all ministers! We are all theologians!

When I worked with Dj, he constantly taught and told his kids how they were theologians and ministers. He broke down that boundary for the students and had them pursue and grow in leadership. They intern were able to take up the mantel and grow. The families there continue to encourage and feed me even though I was only there for two summer internships.

This is the response we all need to have for our shepherds. I am racking my brain now to think of the other ways I can support my shepherd. She has supported me and ministered to me. I want to make sure I do what I can to represent God to her and help her grow. If that means making it possible for her to leave on a vacation and know that everything is taken care of then that is what needs to happen. If it means taking one of the responsibilities off of her list then we all need to step up and do that for our ministers.

There is an analogy I have heard used many times. It is that ministers come to God to get their cup filled. Then they must pour out their cup into others. Simply put this is how we burn out pastors. It implies that when ever I am low they need to step up and feed me. It takes all the responsibility off of the "sheep".

Instead we should all pull close to God, the living water, so that all of our cups can overflow into one an other's. This allows us to all become full, and for the living water with us to flow back into our pastor's cup.

Feed your Parents!
Feed your Mentors!
Feed your Teachers!
Feed your Shepherd!

Monday, June 15, 2009

To plan or not to plan?

I have been on both sides. I have been the volunteer. Relying on the leader to supply the materials, planning, updates, and organization. I also have been the coordinator that brings those things to sessions, meetings, gatherings, and trainings. Just recently I was reminded of how some volunteers feel towards planning.

It was a few days ago that I received an email giving me the advice to "wing it" with scheduling leaders and planning for Sunday School. This had happened to me in my first week at my church. At then I took it as the individual was used to this style from the previous directors. Now at the end of the year, this new "wing it" suggestion let me know that the vision is not going through. We are stuck in the previous mind set.

I had hoped that after a year the leaders would start to get the idea that we will be planning ahead. There was a training at the beginning of the year letting them know why we needed the correct ratios, background checks, and training for all our leaders with youth. This is for the safety of the children, adults, and the comfortableness in roles in the classroom. I have never had a volunteer express that too much info, planning, leadership by the director made them uncomfortable. It always seems easier to have a plan and move from that as needed.

After my initial frustration with the volunteer, I realize now that I need to keep working at communicating the vision with the parents, leaders, and volunteers. Until the community gets the standard and the expectation we have for students and leaders they are going to continue to resort to the old way, the comfortable way.

Here's to the long journey and constant communication...cheers.

Friday, June 5, 2009

"Love all, Worship one!"

As promised I am going to write a few thoughts about the high school youth retreat theme. The subject for the retreat centered on exploring the monotheistic religions (Islam, Christianity, Judaism). The theme, "Love all, Worship One," ends up leading to a tension between steering others to a new faith or developing a better understanding of God through the experiences of others.

At the basic level the theme is about unity and tolerance. Methodists have the classic saying of "Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors." In the spirit of this motto the theme fits very well.
By listening and talking with others we begin to break down the fear of the "other". This allows us to understand the human experience around the world and by extension God too.

Probably the most difficult talk given at the retreat was the discussion on Christianity. The majority of the group are Christians and so the speaker is "preaching to the choir." The speaker tried to balance this with presenting questions and how in our own faith we have lots of diversity. Unfortunately, this then leads to the impression that we have no basics in our faith where the other two have something they believe in.

We ended up exploring other faiths tenets, practices, and understandings to engage in a interfaith dialogue. The problem with this though is what one of my friends pointed out when I told them about the topic of the retreat. They pointed out that in interfaith dialogues it is important to be grounded and secure in what you believe before discussing with others. I am not sure how many High School students are secure and solid in their own faith to have that discussion. Case in point: I heard from one of the other ministers afterward that the girls from their church now want to be Jewish. This does not sound like a group that was secure in their faith and ready to learn from others, but several students who were fascinated with the aspects of Judaism they were exposed to.

The other thing that needs to be present to have an interfaith dialogue is being aware of one's own biases. After we know our faith then we know what biases and premises we bring to an interfaith dialogue. If we do not know our biases then we will often ask many questions that are either offensive, aggressive, or based on our own assumptions. This was very obvious from the questions that were asked of the Islamic speaker. There were questions about terrorists and angry Muslims (which come from our cultural bias- media).

This ends up begging the question of if at high school age students are ready for an interfaith dialogue. My assessment would be no for most. There were some rare students there who have had deep conversations about their faith and what it means for the last 3-6 years. These students are ready to engage in a meaningful way into this dialogue. As I explained in my post about attitudes in ministry, this was the minority there. Most groups did not have a solid, trusting, safe foundation with their faith and ministers to be able to go there yet.

Even though there is the obvious difficulty of this theme for the group the weekend ended up being very good. The group balanced the tensions of the topic very well. I did not expect it to be pulled off so well. There were difficulties with the age group, their foundation, and the question of if this really helped them in their faith, but all in all it was done very well.

Thursday, June 4, 2009

How do you see Church?

This week I got an interesting glimpse into how others might see church. It happened on Monday morning. A family dropped in that had left a few things at church. I caught the mother and daughter as they were looking through the sanctuary.

I let the mom know that there were some things turned into me that probably belonged to their family. As we walked to my office the mother quizzed me about what was left. She did not care about the clip boards and books, but wanted to know if there was a few hand drawn sheets. I told her I had not seen any with the group.

When we grabbed the materials she quickly went through them and found this "priceless" thing that she was hoping for. What it was was a small comic book that her daughter had made. The comic book was titled "Church". She pulled it out and had her daughter explain and show me this twenty page masterpiece.

As I flipped through the pages, I realized just how priceless the comic book was. This was a rare look into how a young child sees church. There were pages that we would expect to see like "Sunday School" and "Kid's Club". What I did not expect to see was the detailed drawings of Cathy, our pastor, preaching. There was pictures of our choir director, Jeremy, leading the choir in singing. Our little artist captured other scenes like "Coffee hour", "Communion", and service projects like "Tent City".

She had noticed more of the different components that make up church than most adults would see. There were details that she included that most adults do not see like in the preaching picture she had even the letters "IHS" that hang from the cloth on the podium. These letters stand for "Jesus" in early greek (or "Jesus Savior of Men"). How many would pick this up this?

Our church has had many discussions since I have been there about what is going on in church. We have asked the adults about the programs when trying to decide on our mission statement. I asked our confirmation class and mentors about the activities in church that we live out our faith. During a "Enrichment hour" I asked the older generation in our church how does the church offer/support intentional faith development. Most of these discussions had the groups struggle to get past two or three programs. Even in that they focus on what they participate in. Then I see a five year old girl understand the many different ways of intentional faith development offered in the church. Not only that, but she pulls out the details and relationships within the different activities.

After discovering this amazing comic it left me with the question of how I see church. There are many different things that I get wrapped up in because I work there, yet I wonder how well I see God. My little student was able to pick up on so many little things and articulate through a comic that church was an important joyful place for her. Could I say the same? Do I notice the efforts, relationships, and little miracles that are present there? Do I understand how important church is for my life and relationship with God?

There is a passage that comes directly to mind right now:

Matthew 18:2-4 (New International Version)

2He called a little child and had him stand among them. 3And he said: "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 4Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

With all these simple questions that I could try and rationalize and explain in difficult ways, this passage reminds me to just come before God. There are so many lessons that we could take away from my little five year old student. Now though I believe we need to keep it simple. To humbly acknowledge our reliance on God and His community at church. To slow down and enjoy the little joys and miracles that the LORD presents us.