Causing a Commotion

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2011-12-12T13:46:00.000-08:00

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Myth: Mainline churches ‘lose’ young adults

2011-09-27T11:51:00.000-07:00

This blog series will explore the truth about widely held myths about youth and young adults and religious practices based on the findings from the National Study of Youth and Religion as presented in Souls in Transition: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of Emerging Adults by Christian Smith with Patricia Snell.

I can’t visit a church on Sunday morning without hearing someone comment about the decline in young people and young families in the church. Sometimes this is articulated as a simple complaint. Other times, denial. "They’ll come back when they get married/have children,” those folks often say.

The National Study of Youth and Religion’s research on young adults reveals something very interesting about this apparent decline: The mainline church loses many of its own young adults, but gains about the same number of young adults from other (usually more conservative) denominations. About 20 percent of mainline Protestant youth (58 youth surveyed) had left their churches between the ages of 18 and 24, while about 10 percent (79 youth surveyed) of conservative Protestants had joined mainline churches, more than compensating for the loss. “This is noteworthy because it counters so much of the ‘bad news’ that has been continually reported over the last four decades about mainline Protestant decline.” (Souls in Transition, pg. 111)

Researchers suggested that wider cultural influences contribute to this reality. The young people they surveyed largely embraced the conviction that diversity, including religious diversity, should be embraced. “… and to be socially inclusive has the unintended consequence of minimizing the importance of religious particularities and so encouraging emerging adults to conceive of religions as being generically similar. This produces a vision of religion in general that also turns out, we will show, to be not very appealing to most emerging adults.” (Souls in Transition, pg. 81.)

Given this social inclusivity, it is not surprising that mainline Protestant youth are among the most likely to rate their faith as “not very important.” Conservative Protestants are among the most likely to rate their faith as “very or extremely important.” (Souls in Transition, pg. 113.)

Mainline Protestants for years have positioned themselves as more open, less exclusive churches. In an effort to appeal to the non-religious, mainline Protestants tend to tone down their ‘religious’ language. This effort is well-intended; however, people then miss a substantive interpretation of the gospel, a valuing of of the Bible and a coherent set of religious beliefs. After all, young people learn about embracing diversity everywhere – at school, in the community, and in the media. Why do they need one more place to teach them the same thing they are already learning everywhere else? Church simply does not stand out among the chorus of voices singing the exact same song.

The commitment to diversity comes out of religious conviction. Mainline Protestants often interpret Biblical texts as affirming all people, all life, to be a sacred creation of God. All life, therefore, should be included in God’s promises of love, grace and peace. Further, many mainline Protestant believers would affirm that Jesus’ message was one that specifically welcomed the outcast – the ones deemed “unacceptable” by the wider culture.

The mainline Protestant faithful simply need to get better at understanding and articulating what they already believe. They'd probably be better at retaining our own, perhaps even attracting a few more of the “unaffiliated.” Just be more obvious about what the mainline church is – that might be one way to grow.

Myth: College ‘ruins’ faith

2011-09-22T14:19:00.000-07:00

Even if you didn’t grow up at the time, it’s almost impossible to escape the images of young, long-haired hippies protesting against war on college campuses in the 1960s. Research showed that along with many other institutions, Baby Boomers rejected religion and began to do their ‘own thing.’

For years, the research on Baby Boomers was taken as universal truth. People, including those of us in the church, resigned ourselves to the idea that young people will inevitably reject religion during their college years and begin a period of spiritual experimentation.

New research reveals that this generation of young adults does not experience a decline of religiousness during the college years. “While the transition from the teenage to the emerging adults years does entail an overall decline in religious involvement, as we have shown, attending college per se is not an experience that particularly contributes to that decline.” (Souls in Transition, pg. 250) If young people have well-established faith lives in their childhood and teenage years, they will continue them into their young adult life, the research reveals. Only very few young adults do any kind of religious experimentation. The study even found that that young people who attend college are slightly more likely to be religiously involved than young people who do not attend college.

Researchers suggest that this generation of young people is simply less rebellious than previous generations, content to stay in the religious tradition in which they were raised. Researchers also credit institutions of higher learning for providing opportunities for students to practice their faith through on-campus groups and programs.

Many of us probably know that one of the results of the decline of mainline Protestant churches was the downsizing or elimination of campus ministries. When numbers of students and available funds declined, churches and denominations put these things on the chopping block first. Perhaps leaders were even thinking that these young people will simply return anyway when they ‘settle’ down; so, we didn’t really need to do ministry at this time of young adulthood.

I believe it’s clear that eliminating these ministries was (and is) the wrong choice. Though the numbers might be smaller, it is crucial that we continue to reach out to college students. The church, after all, is in a good position to help emerging adults make crucial life choices – about relationships, professions and many other things. Emerging adults are part of the body of Christ. In order to be faithful, we need to continue to be in relationship with them – through both campus ministers and through regular folks in congregations. I bet you know a college student from your church. Go ahead, contact them and see how they are doing. You just might be surprised by their reaction.

Next Myth: The mainline church ‘loses’ great numbers of young adults

Busting the Myth: Youth group, mission trips are best ways to form faith

2011-09-15T13:39:00.000-07:00

This blog series explores the truth about widely held myths about youth and young adults and their religious practices based on the findings from the National Study of Youth and Religion as presented in Souls in Transition: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of Emerging Adults by Christian Smith with Patricia Snell.

In my last call, I served as a chaplain at a treatment facility for young people with mental illnesses and behavioral disorders. During that time, I interviewed about 200 young people who were admitted to that facility. I asked about what their faith meant to them and what kinds of religious programming they’d like to participate in. Almost without fail, they would say that they wanted to do service projects in the community – even the ones who wanted nothing to do with religion otherwise.

This isn’t scientifically sound data I’m presenting here – only my anecdotal observations of a small population of young people. But, I’ve seen their sentiments echoed in local churches when young people come out of nowhere to participate in these kinds of projects.

It was with much surprise and skepticism that I read the portion of Souls in Transition that found that mission trips and youth groups did not have a significant impact on whether or not emerging adults (aged 18 to 24) remained highly religious. Liking their youth group experience was significant indicator of later religious activity for 20 percent of the survey respondents, while participating in mission trips was significant for only 10 percent. (Table A.1, pgs. 301-302)

Given that youth group and youth mission trips have been a centerpiece of Mainline Protestant youth programs for many decades, this information is quite discouraging. Why is it that personal faith practices such as prayer, scripture reading as well as adult relationships were so much more significant?

Researchers, at least at this point, have not ventured a guess at that question. Based again on my unscientific observations, I think the problem is not these programs per se. The problem is that leaders have not done an effective job at connecting these activities with a strong personal faith. Within the church, I rarely find people (regardless of age) who can articulate clearly WHY these activities are integral to our faith.

When I read the gospels in seminary, my mind was blown because it was the first time that I learned that Jesus calls us to live our faith in our lives and in our communities. Jesus healed the sick, advocated for the oppressed, welcomed strangers and sinners, asked the rich to give up their money -- out of deeper convictions of faith. We must strive in our programming to ground young people in practices of faith – prayer, reading scripture through fellowship and mission; not expect that those program will produce faith on its own.

Busting the Myth: They’ll Come Back (to church)

2011-09-01T08:12:00.000-07:00

I was one of those young adults. I came back to the church. Having been raised attending Catholic school and weekly mass, I left with a dissatisfied vengeance as a young adult. I vowed never to return to the Catholic (or any) church as a teenager. I defiantly declared myself “spiritual but not religious.”

But, in my mid-20s I felt a deeper spiritual longing that ultimately led me to find a home in the United Church of Christ. In pretty short order, I felt a call to ministry, went to seminary and was later ordained.

What happened to me almost NEVER happens to young adults.

Research from the National Study of Youth and Religion establishes a few key things about young adult religiosity. Young adults do not remain religious or return to religion if they hadn’t already been connected to it in the first place. Only 15 percent of young adults fall into their most religious category. The remaining 85 percent of young adults range from being marginally connected to religion to being completely irreligious.

The research also delved into what factors created the most religious young adults. Consistent with many other studies, NSYR data demonstrated that one of the main reasons young adults are engaged in religion is because of the relationships they have with their parents and other adults in their church. “Again, … what clearly matters in the teenager’s situation, for shaping the religious outcomes under consideration, is relational ties with religious adults – with both parents and others in one’s religious congregation – importance of one’s faith, and other combinations of one’s religious practices, experiences, and assurance.” (Souls in Transition, pg. 231)

I believe the implications for this part of the research is clear for us in the mainline church – if we want to have teenagers and young adults in the church (and stay there) we have to be willing to invest in relationships with them. They are not going to stay in our churches unless they have some sense of connection to the community, and that connection happens through individuals like you and me. People have to stop thinking of youth ministry as someone else’s job and instead create a culture that values young people enough to be in relationship with them.

Our Next Myth: Youth group and mission trips are key to forming faith.

Busting the Myth: Parents Don’t Matter

2011-08-24T09:56:00.000-07:00

This blog series will explore the truth about widely held myths about youth and young adults and their religious practices based on the findings from the National Study of Youth and Religion as presented in Souls in Transition: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of Emerging Adults by Christian Smith with Patricia Snell.

I don’t know about you, but I wish I had a quarter for every time I’ve heard a parent say, “I’m only making my child finish confirmation and then s/he can decide on their own about going to church.” Such comments are disheartening to me, though I understand them. Parents get weary in those volatile teenage years of having to entice, cajole or even fight about what their child will or will not do. Since there are so many touchy subjects, it would stand to reason that parents would pick their battles.

Religion seems to be one of those battles that are often surrendered, according to the research from the National Study of Youth and Religion. However, this may not be a battle that parents should be so willing to give up.

In Souls in Transition, the NSYR’s book about the religious lives of emerging adults (aged 18 to 24), researchers found that parents matter A LOT in the formation of their teenagers’ religious lives. “Teenagers can become quite absorbed into groups of peers,” author Christian Smith writes. “And, adolescents often do go through phases and have characteristic situations where they do act like they want their parents to ‘butt out.’ But none of that actually means that parents have become irrelevant, that their influence is vanishing, that they no longer matter.” (Souls in Transition, pg. 284)

In fact, in their long-term research of nearly 3,000 teenagers and emerging adults, there are few other factors more influential than a parent’s religiousness on the faith lives of emerging adults. “Of the many teenage-era factors that our study investigated as possible influences on emerging adult religious outcomes, one of the most powerful factors was the religious lives of their parents – how often they attended religious services, how important religious faith was in their own lives, and so on.” (Souls in Transition, pg. 285)

Despite this pretty compelling evidence, church leaders routinely separate children from families and other adults as if children can only learn with other children their age. In fact, this research is telling us that enriching the lives of adults and focusing on helping families live their faith on a daily basis may actually be more effective at creating long-term discipleship than some of the ways we’ve done Christian education and youth ministry in the recent past. Plus, it means that parents may need to become more willing to fight this teenage battle – at least if they want their children to become adults who value and practice their faith.

If we think back to the gospel stories, Jesus didn’t separate out different age groups as he was teaching. He just taught to the whole crowd. If children were present, they would have just absorbed whatever they were able to absorb. Parents and the other adults around them would have then been responsible for modeling this Jesus-led life. Absent formal churches and Sunday school programs, they would have just learned by living a life of faith with their families. Perhaps it’s time to take a cue from modern research AND ancient practices – investing in the living of faith rather than just the knowing about faith.

Our Next Myth: They'll Come Back (to Church)

Busting the Myth: You can have faith ‘on your own’

2011-08-17T14:41:00.000-07:00

Before coming to the Iowa Conference UCC staff, I worked as a chaplain at a treatment facility for young people with mental illness and behavioral disorders. One of my standard practices was to complete an “intake assessment” of the religious needs of each young person as they were admitted to the facility. On many occasions, the young person I was interviewing would tell me that they didn’t want to go to church. They practiced ‘religion’ on their own, they would tell me. As I got to know these young people, we would often have conversations about how they can ‘have faith’ on their own outside a religious community.

These young people had ample reasons to reject communities -- religious or otherwise. Most of them had been abused; people in their faith communities often looked the other way, or in rarer cases, had committed the abuse. Sometimes an abuser’s faith would be used to justify the harm inflicted on these young people. It was understandable that they would struggle alone with their faith. In the end, it often meant they would have little or no significant faith beliefs or practices.

But, the reality of these young people’s “loner” faith reflect a much broader trend: If you participate in religious communities or groups, you also more regularly engage in personal faith practices such as prayer and scripture reading. One rarely happens without the other.

Researchers led by Christian Smith at the National Study of Youth and Religion found that that less than 7 percent of young adults who did not attend religious services or engage in other outward practices of religion felt religion was not important nor did they pray or read scripture on their own. Stated in another way, less than 1 percent of young people who were highly involved in a religious community did not also engage in personal religious practices. (Souls in Transition, pg. 252)

The most highly religious young people, the survey found, exhibited a combination of internal and external religious practices. In other words, if a young person regularly participates in their faith community, it is very likely that they are also praying, reading scripture and engaging religious practices on their own.

For youth workers and church leaders, it may be tempting to get involved in a chicken-or-the-egg conversation about these statistics. Do personal practices inspire more religious service attendance? Or are personal practices the results of participating in a vibrant faith community? Finding answers to these questions would be frustrating, if not impossible.

What we can say is that BOTH external and internal practices of faith are necessary to form highly religious young adults (and all people). In the United Church of Christ, of which I am part, we are really fond of the outward practices – participating in creative, engaging worship, doing service and mission or working on justice issues in our community. But, these things alone do not make your faith particularly well-integrated into your life.

Over the years, I’ve taken many young people on mission trips. Too many times, I’ve let the evening devotion fall to the wayside because we are all too tired or because people just want to ‘hang out.’ No more can we neglect those inward practices in favor of the outward expressions of faith, or vice versa. Faith is something to be lived -- whether we are in large groups or on our own.

Our Next Myth: Parents have little or no influence over the faith lives of teenagers.

Opening to Possibilities

2011-08-09T12:33:00.000-07:00

In a yoga class recently, my teacher invited us to “open to the possibilities.” I always get a little nervous when I get an invitation like this. It often means that you are going to be pushed way beyond your comfort zone. Being physically uncomfortable usually follows.

We stretched and moved into many familiar and some unfamiliar poses. We held these poses much longer than usual. As we grunted and groaned, our tired muscles stretched beyond our perceived limits. When holding poses for so long, you become aware that your mental mantra -- “When is this going to be OVER?”-- is not very helpful. Relaxing, breathing, opening to what might happen is actually the most helpful. If we let go of the “can’t-do attitude,” we often end up doing poses differently, better than we imagined. And, lo and behold, you are even a little more comfortable. You are aware of the positive energy around you: You notice the people joyfully struggling next to you; you gather energy from the room in order to say in another long pose; you open to the gentle direction and challenges of your teacher.

Those of us in the church know something about being in uncomfortable space. In many churches I visit, people are keenly aware of their aging population, worried that young people will never come back and the church doors will close. People worry that they won’t have enough money to pay a pastor or they won’t be able to attract any pastor to lead a small church.

I can almost feel us holding our breath and tightening up as we face these challenges. We close off, going back to doing things the way we have always done them. We deny ourselves the possibilities God may be laying in front of us. Challenges, even ones that seem insurmountable, are always an opportunity – an opportunity to stretch ourselves into something we never imagined. If we just relax a little, breathe and let go of our expectations, perhaps we can allow God to show us the way to something better than we ever thought we could be. Our God is a God of the impossible; a God of the resurrection. Let’s breathe a little and live as if we truly believe it.

Who knows what shape our churches and ministries could take?

Boundaries Expand Ministry

2011-08-03T13:02:00.000-07:00

For people who have taken my workshops, you know that I often use the text from Mark 10 where Jesus welcomes and blesses the little children. Frequently, people will notice that the text says that, “People were bringing little children to him [Jesus] in order that he might touch them;” [emphasis mine] Those people will often then bemoan the fact that it is no longer OK to touch children and other people in the congregation. What they mean by these statements is that they feel their ministry has lost something because of policies and practices related to preventing child abuse, often referred to as “safe church.”

First of all, I don’t think that protecting children means that no one can ever touch a child again. We just need to do it in appropriate ways in public spaces. We need to be aware of how our behavior (including touch) can be perceived even if we don’t intend harm. We have an unflagging responsibility to protect children from people who do intend harm in our midst.

In the text I mentioned earlier, people often don’t realize how radical Jesus’ actions were. Inviting children into his midst (after all, he was a Rabbi, a teacher, someone important) was affirming them as fully human, not just the property of their father (which is what they would have been considered by the wider culture). Jesus clearly took children, and all manner of other outcasts, seriously. He was their protector and advocate as well as nurturer and healer. I think that means that we, too, have a responsibility as people of faith to protect and advocate for young people in our congregations.

I don’t think our ministry loses anything by employing the good boundaries necessary to protect children from sexual and other forms of abuse. In fact, we enhance our ministry by reminding people that we take young people seriously, that we consider them important, even if vulnerable, members of the body of Christ.

So, if you’re in Iowa (or somewhere else nearby) please consider learning more about abuse prevention practices and policies at our upcoming workshop, “Creating Safe Space in your Church” at Mayflower UCC, Sioux City, 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. Aug. 13, 2011. Register online no later than Monday, Aug. 8.

Aspiring to Oneness

2011-07-14T11:19:00.000-07:00

“That They May All Be One” (John 17:21)

This brief bit of scripture is emblazoned proudly on the United Church of Christ logo. We really like oneness – the richness of our diversity coming together in one church. The UCC’s General Synod gathering, which closed about a week ago in Tampa, FL, embodies that idea about as much as anything else we do. (To see more of what happened at the Youth @ General Synod program see our videos.)

One of the most striking things for first-time Synod goers is the incredible diversity of individuals and churches attending this gathering. About 3,000 people converge on a convention center, 900 of whom consider the business of the wider church as voting delegates. Once you get past the exhibit hall and the social gatherings, you see clearly how challenging oneness really is. Diverse people and churches have conflicting opinions; reaching consensus about any issue is difficult or even impossible.

Take the proposal regarding the creation of a unified governance structure at the national setting of the church. Though Synod delegates eventually passed this proposal overwhelmingly, it was hotly debated because this issue touches at the core of who we try to be – a collection of diverse independent churches who are covenanted to do mission and ministry as a whole. This doesn’t come easy. Oneness truly is an aspiration; something to which we as UCCers (and as Christians) are constantly working toward with the help of God’s grace.

I’m hoping that as you make plans for your upcoming ‘program year’ in the church that you consider a couple of things that came up at General Synod. The first is Mission: 1, an initiative that I think we can pretty easily reach consensus about – feeding hungry people. The second is “A Covenant for Church Youth Ministries” -- a resolution that calls upon local churches to covenant with youth workers to take adequate time for rest, renewal, professional development as well as adequate pay.

I pray that we may all be one – not necessarily of the exact same mind on issues – but one in Christian community that calls us to live together through challenging and uncomfortable times.

A Week of Firsts

2011-06-27T11:24:00.000-07:00

I recently recalled the first time I had an airline flight with a layover. My nose was buried in the map of Chicago’s O’Hare airport on the first leg of the flight, completely overwhelmed by the thought of having to go between terminals in less than an hour. It turned out that my gates were literally right next to each other – a gift from God to a neophyte traveler. I’m pretty sure that’s never happened again in all the times I’ve flown through O’Hare or anywhere else.

I reached back into my memory for this 20-year-old experience because I wanted to remember what it was like to get THAT anxious about airline travel. Having flown countless times since that initial experience, I no longer think much of airports and airplanes. I certainly feel the pressure of schedules and the bustling of my frenzied fellow travelers, but I no longer worry much about figuring my way through a new airport. I now know that in most cases it’s pretty easy to follow the signs and get to the place you need to be.

In just two days, a group of 29 young people and their chaperones from Iowa will head out to the Youth at General Synod program in Tampa, Florida. For many this will be a week of firsts – the first time in an airplane, the first time leaving Iowa, the first time seeing the ocean. These things are, at the same time, exhilarating and fearful.

This will also mark the first time many in our group have been exposed to the awesome diversity of the United Church of Christ. For many of us, the church begins and ends with our local church. As wonderful as our local church is, we are also part of something much larger. The United Church of Christ’s logo contains the words, “That they may all be one” (John 17:21). These words reflect our ongoing commitment to be unified, even amidst our diversity.

I remember the first time I attended a United Church of Christ General Synod gathering and was bowled over by the sheer number and diversity of the people around me. It made me excited and proud to be part of a church that could hold together so many different kinds of people under one roof. After going to General Synod a few times, however, the novelty wears off. It becomes easy to take such a wondrous gathering of God’s people for granted.

I ask that you pray for me, our Youth @ General Synod coordinators and participants, our Iowa Conference delegates and the many others who will gather in Tampa for the 28th General Synod of the United Church of Christ later this week. May this indeed be a week of “firsts” whether we’ve attended Synod once or ten times. God always works powerfully when we gather together!

Make sure you check on the happenings of the week through this blog, our new Iowa Conference UCC Facebook page and Twitter feed (@IAConferenceUCC) and through a special report in the July 8 issue of our eNews.

A Caution about Numbers

2011-06-21T11:05:00.000-07:00

My annual report that was distributed at our recent Annual Meeting. I'd love to hear what you think:

When I talk with churches about “successful” youth and young adult ministries, I always caution them not to measure success merely in terms of numbers of participants in worship, Sunday school, youth programs, etc. The real measures for success are only something that can be realized farther into the future. We ultimately want young people, adult leaders and mentors and families who participate in these programs to have a vibrant faith that gets lived in everyday life through spiritual practices, their vocation and in participation in a faith community and the wider church. As I reflect on the growth of youth and young adult ministries this past year, I pray that I can be cautiously optimistic about slight increases in participants in our workshops and events.

Youth leaders and Christian educators have certainly taken advantage of the increasing training opportunities. This year the conference hosted events on intergenerational approaches to youth ministry and on planning quality summer programming. Several churches have invited me to their congregations to do visioning and planning workshops for their youth ministry leadership teams.

Our inaugural Certification School in Progressive Christian Youth Ministry (co-sponsored by the Iowa and Minnesota conferences) drew 13 students from Iowa, Illinois and Minnesota just last month. That group has deepened their understanding of their own leadership practices and ministry philosophy while also gaining core competencies in adolescent development, Bible, theology, spiritual practices and family-based approaches to Christian education and youth ministry. That group will continue to hone their skills and deepen their faith through webinars and a substantial reading list. They will develop a plan for their ministry setting to be presented at our reunion retreat in November.

Despite some strong efforts, only one vibrant Called to Lead group (a covenanted community of youth leaders) has continued this past year in the Southwest Association. Two attempts to start new groups failed due to scheduling conflicts and geography. But, like I tell local churches, I learn from these failures and am attempting to start these groups in a different way. This year I will have the assistance of two energized youth leaders in the Clinton and Waterloo/Cedar Falls areas of the state. They will help me recruit participants ecumenically and apply for funding from Princeton Institute for Youth Ministry that will provide resources for a retreat and a book to read together.

At this Annual Meeting, 22 youth and chaperones have explored what it means to be a peacemaker amidst bullying in their schools and community. In just a few weeks, 29 youth and chaperones will head to Tampa, Florida for the Youth @ General Synod program to explore their call to be leaders in the diverse national setting of the United Church of Christ. In planning the Youth @ General Synod program, I have had the pleasure of exploring Christian Leadership and Hospitality with Janet Jones and Adam Dirks from Urbandale UCC, who are coordinating the event. You may note that Adam, who has just graduated from Urbandale High School, is a nominee to our Conference Board of Directors.

Despite these modest gains in numbers of participants, I still value more the growth in the leadership and faith of the many individuals I’ve had the pleasure of working with this year. I hope and pray that we continue to explore our call to making young people part of the church today and live into our call to proclaim the Gospel in the world.

Leadership in the Lows

2011-05-30T10:22:00.000-07:00

Anxiety was thick in the air as we gathered beneath the 40-foot high ropes course at Camp Emmaus, part of Pathways Outdoor Ministries. With the 40-foot high structure looming in the background, we read Psalm 46 and sang songs reminding us of God’s steady presence in times of great trouble. We breathed deep and headed out to the woods. We stayed low at first, doing crazy challenges with 4x4 boards, cinder blocks and aircraft carrier cables.

After laughing and learning personalities in the inaugural Certification School in Progressive Christian Youth Ministry, we headed to the high ropes. Staring up from the wood-chip covered ground, the obstacles above were daunting, even terrifying. We donned harnesses and learned how we could be connected to the belayer below. We climbed up using the pegs that lined the sides of the telephone poles, breathless we shimmied to the platform and screwed up the courage to walk across the obstacles. At the end we were lowered down with the harness and rope.

In each movement, we confronted ourselves and our own fears, relying on the group to keep encouraging us, keeping us going when we thought our muscles and frayed nerves would fail. The rope and the belayers below held you up, helped you keep your balance. Even though you were moving through the obstacle by yourself, you were never really alone.

The second time I climbed to an obstacle, I had to walk across wooden platforms that were suspended above on aircraft carrier cable. When I stepped off the platform, momentum took me forward faster than I expected and after a few successful steps, I lost my balance and leaned backwards, held up by the rope attached to my harness. I clung to the rope, desperately trying to pull myself back to the ‘solid’ platform below my feet. Finally, it took the voice of one of my peers below directing me to use my knees to pull myself upright. It worked and I took the remaining steps across the platform.

We are never really accomplishing anything alone. There is the rope the holds you up when you lose your balance; there’s a coaching voice telling you to stay focused on your goal; there are people there to tell you that you can make it. God is present in it all. God is the tension in the rope; the inspiration in the encouraging voice; the focus of well-timed instruction.

When we processed our day, our facilitator made certain to remind us that God is not just present in the highs. God is most profoundly present in the lowest point, the times in which we thought we just wouldn’t finish or when we thought we’d fall or quit.

Leadership is not a singular activity. Leaders rely on the gifts of others and of God’s guidance. Leaders require that others are competent in their jobs, helping everyone, including the leader, to accomplish their goals. Maybe everyone should climb up 40 feet in the air to learn this.

Leadership in an Anxious World

2011-05-24T16:57:00.000-07:00

The need for leadership came in sharp relief when the group of 13 youth workers was given a 5/16” tent pole and told that the whole group, without anyone losing contact with the pole, had to get it to the ground. Sounds easy, right? Not so much. With about 13 people talking over one another, the pole went up instead of down. People started bickering. It wasn’t until everyone stopped talking, listening to the lone one voice that emerged, like the Holy Spirit, as a guiding force, did the group successfully get the tent pole to the ground.

The adventure activity turned into a lesson from family systems theorist Edwin Friedman’s book, A Failure of Nerve. Because leaders are now working in a time of chronic anxiety, groups tend to play the blame game and get the exact opposite result of what they are aiming for. It takes courageous and non-anxious leadership to get any forward movement.

These 13 students of the inaugural Certification School in Progressive Christian Youth Ministry are facing just this kind of situation in their ministry. With numbers of young people in mainline churches declining rapidly, these youth workers face constant pressures to get numbers up. The training is probably not what you’d expect you’d learn to rectify this situation. The group is not learning how to play games more effectively (though we are doing adventure course activities) or plan mission trips (though we talk about mission), we’re learning as facilitator Jim LaDoux of Vibrant Faith Ministries says, “to be theologians who just happen to work with young people.”

By the end of the training, which will conclude with a final retreat in November, students will be able to name their philosophy of ministry and talk about their approach to leadership. They will have designed a youth ministry plan for the setting in which they work or volunteer. Today we will get a taste of how we approach leadership and ministry by doing a high ropes course. Needless to say there is lots of anxiety.

The Danger of Low Expectations

2011-05-12T11:25:00.000-07:00

In a recent blog post from author and researcher George Barna, he talks about how The Barna Group’s research has revealed that Christians lack strong commitment to ongoing spiritual growth. Writing from the perspective of Evangelical Christianity, Barna said that the people they surveyed often felt that their faith began and ended with “getting saved.”

Though Mainline Christian churches may not resonate with his more Evangelical language, the reality Barna describes should resonate strongly. How many times do people come to a church in order to get married or baptized without any real interest or commitment to a life of faith beyond that moment in time? How often to church leaders hear “I can’t come to worship because I have a … sporting event, a brunch appointment, a play date, etc.”?

In United Church of Christ churches, I see this dynamic manifest in how church leaders relate to young people, particularly high schoolers. For most of these young people, the ‘obligation’ of confirmation classes and Sunday school has gone away and their exceedingly busy lives take them in a million other directions – most often away from church.

Just as the expectations of sports, theater and arts groups and other clubs increase for these young people, the church most often responds by lowering theirs. In a desperate attempt to ‘keep’ them in the church, we do things like push back registration deadlines, sacrificing the quality of events, because young people want to see if something better comes along. Instead of having a frank, but kind conversation about the nature of Christian commitment, we just bite our tongue when another family says they’ll be missing worship again because of a traveling sports tournament.

Barna writes that Protestants historically and theologically emphasize having faith rather than doing works as the thing that ensures salvation. But, this shouldn’t mean that having faith is a “free ride into Heaven.” He goes onto say that if we have a ‘life-altering’ relationship with God in Jesus Christ, our lives should reflect that transformation in radical ways.

Lowering our expectations only succeeds in communicating that what we do isn’t all that important anyway. We produce ‘disciples’ who don’t know that a faithful life takes work and sacrifice. Living a life of faith is about the most important, difficult and joyful thing that any of us can do. Jesus didn’t lower his expectations and neither should we. Jesus called his disciples over and over again to give up everything and follow him. This call to faith and action is no small order to fill. But, it gives us what we (especially young people) need – a higher purpose that calls us to be greater than ourselves.

Easter Sermon: In Between Fear and Joy

2011-04-25T08:21:00.001-07:00

For those who wanted to read my Easter sermon. Enjoy!

Text: Matthew 28:1-10

For people who have lived through wars or immense natural disasters or extreme poverty, fear is much different from what I’ve ever experienced. Having grown up in a quiet neighborhood in Omaha, about the only fear I knew was of getting in trouble for staying out past dark.

I suppose that’s why one of the first times I experienced real paralyzing fear as an adult was so memorable. It happened during an on-call shift in my Clinical Pastoral Education, at which I served as a chaplain intern at a very busy hospital in Chicago. That afternoon, a man in his 50s was brought in by his cousin. The cousin had found him unresponsive in his home. Attempts to revive him were futile. He had died of a sudden heart attack.

The cousin began to tell the man’s story, as grieving people always do. He told me in his shock and disbelief that the deceased man had actually lost his mother just a few weeks earlier. The man, who suffered from diabetes, had gone on a drinking binge. This cousin had tried to help keep him as safe as possible. He couldn’t do anything to prevent his tragedy. The cousin was sick with sadness and unmerited guilt. Pieces of this story continued to fall into place while we attempted to contact the man’s brother, who would have to sign the paperwork related to his death.

It took several hours for us to reach the man’s brother. By then, several friends and relatives had come to view the man’s body, walking through the first stages of shock and grief. The man’s brother finally arrived at the hospital emergency room and was given the news. He was a towering man who stood at least 10 inches taller than me and was wearing a Harley Davidson T-shirt and a leather vest. I was intimidated. So, when the man became slightly agitated and demanded to see his brother’s body, I acquiesced rather than do what I was trained to do – find a reason to make him wait and calm down before letting him in the viewing room. I unlocked the door, thinking very briefly that I should have taken the emergency call button.

I accompanied the brother and the family friend into the tiny, cinder-block walled viewing room. The hulking man looked upon his brother’s dead body on the gurney, leaned over it, his broad shoulders reaching over to the wall behind the gurney. He began pounding his fists on the cold cement wall shouting, “No! No!”

The man’s enormous body seemed to take over the small space. I’m sure I looked like a clichéd ‘deer in headlights.’ I had absolutely no idea what to do if this man began to turn his fists on something besides the concrete wall. The cousin looked back at me, half apologetic, half terrified, reached his hand out to me and said, “Let’s say a Hail Mary.” More grateful than I ever had been in my life for my Catholic upbringing, I took the men’s hands and said a Hail Mary. The brother, still distraught, calmed down with the prayer and eventually left the viewing room and went back into the family waiting area.

Soon after, the brother’s wife arrived and he became a model of polite and calm. We introduced ourselves formally and he spoke to me by name while we finished up paperwork. Then he left the hospital.

I’m sure we can all remember moments when we’ve felt debilitated by fear. We’re faced with an extreme situation and instead of diving in face first, we cower in a corner, having no idea how to react.

I bet our stories don’t even come close to what was going on that first Easter morning. Most of us have heard this story so many times that it doesn’t even seem remarkable any more. Earthquake? A stone rolling back? An angel white like lightening? Whatever?!?

If we move a little more deliberately through the story, however, we can picture, moment by moment, how incredible, almost unbelievable, this situation really is. The two Marys wake up early after the Sabbath and walk to the tomb to tend to Jesus’ body. The author of Matthew doesn’t reveal the womens’ motivations, but we can guess. On one level, they were just doing what women did – care for buried bodies. I think, however, that they were motivated by more than just obligation. Love for their friend and teacher was probably a factor in their early morning visit to the tomb. But, perhaps (and they probably didn’t admit it even to themselves) but they were hopeful – hopeful that just maybe the things Jesus said about rising on the third day might be true.

Whatever their motivations and feelings that morning, they undoubtedly got more than they ever imagined. A great earthquake shakes the ground, followed by the rolling back of the large, heavy stone that covered the entrance of the tomb. We don’t have to plum the depth of our memory very far to recall the horrific images of the recent Japanese earthquake to know how devastating and terrifying this part of the story alone is. The rumbling ground and moving stone undoubtedly throws everyone to their knees, their world literally turning upside down. The heavy stone, once covering the entrance of the tomb, rolls easily away; perhaps toward the guards or the women who were just arriving at the tomb.

The earthquake should have been enough. Another greeting comes from a lightning strike and an angel sitting on top of the stone that just covered the tomb, clothed in brilliant white robes. The guards probably thought their job was an easy one. How hard is it to guard a dead body? Now, they have definitely gotten more than they bargained for. They are so overwhelmed by fear of the angel that they shook and ‘became like dead men.’

“DO NOT BE AFRAID!” is the angels’ opening line. It’s like the angel is injecting a little comedy into this disaster movie. DO NOT BE AFRAID???? Really? What shouldn’t we be afraid of? The earthquake, the rolling stone or the lightning?

I imagine that the Mary’s eyes were ten times as large as normal. They should have been paralyzed by fear, unable to even understand what was unfolding before them. But they stop and they listen.

“I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified,” The angel says. “He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay.” (Matthew 28: 6, NRSV)

They see the empty tomb, which they know had lain undisturbed before the earthquake and appearance of the angel. The angel then tells the women to go and tell the other disciples that Jesus has risen and that he will meet them in Galilee. Unlike the guards who are still lying on the ground as if dead, the women jump into action.

“So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples.” (Matthew 28: 8, NRSV)

The women’s reaction is absolutely remarkable when you give it a little thought. Not only did they just witness things that should paralyze them with fear; they are women, barred from giving any kind of public testimony. And, now, the angel has entrusted them with witnessing the greatest news they could possibly share. They don’t hesitate or wait. They run down the path ‘with great joy’ to tell the other disciples what they have heard.

What prompts them to move through their fear toward joy?

When I was writing this sermon, I began contemplating what prompts this movement from fear to joy and did a very modern thing and asked my Facebook friends what they thought. Responses were varied … and profound. What I distilled from their responses was that in the paralyzing grip of fear, we most urgently needed both God and each other. We rely most heavily on God’s unfailing love and find in ourselves the ability to see how grace, hope and faith burst forth from that. In those moments, we also need each other as living reminders. Just as I needed that grieving man’s cousin to show that the way to handle that terrifying situation in the hospital viewing room was with prayer and grace.

Perhaps this is why both of the Marys came to the tomb that morning. They may have needed each other to face the despair of the grave, the fear of the earthquake and the joyous revelation that Jesus had indeed returned. Without each other, they may not have been able to run down the path and then encounter the risen Christ himself, who once again reminds them not to be afraid.

Now, I’ve been practicing yoga for years and still fear will get the best of me. Just ask me to try a handstand or some other wild inversion and ripples of fear will go through my body. My mind will then defeat me before I’ve even begun. “I can’t do THAT,” I’ll think.

Sometimes, however, I get the best of fear. What I do is take a deep breath and align my body in the way I’m being instructed. I gather energy from the earth below, ground my legs breathe deeply and think at one time of growing toward the earth and extending toward the sky. I breathe again, lift my arms, tilt back my shoulders bend back and look up, up, up.

To me THIS is joy -- or at least a representation of it. Freedom can be found through grounding in the power of the earth, lifting up with the breath of God and extending. This movement, rooted in the divine, is not fleeting or transient. It is always present, always available, always there. In it we become our greatest selves, the resurrection people God intends us to be.

Fear does not have to be the winner, as the Marys show us in our scripture. Resurrection people do not cower in fear or just do enough to survive. Resurrection people live in the glow of the living God, rooted in the knowledge that Jesus HAS indeed risen again.

We look at the stories of things happening in our world and see them differently. We do not simply look at the despair and sadness and immensity of events like the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown in Japan. We see an opportunity to witness to the risen Christ by offering our assistance, even from a half a world away.

We look around our communities and see who are most neglected and we find a way to welcome those strangers into our midst, whether that is by offering them food or a kind word spoken in a language that is different from our own.

We extend our hand to our enemies, whether they are in our workplace, our homes or our schools, remembering that Christ risen lives in each of their hearts and souls.

We regularly and sincerely ask God for guidance about what our faith communities could be doing to serve God and God’s people. And, if God calls us to do something big or crazy, maybe like starting a day care in our church, we move forward even if the resources don’t seem to be right there. We know that somehow God will provide that ministry with what it needs.

Resurrection people live lives of disciplined hope. The discipline is necessary because we know that we won’t feel hopeful every single day in the face of such overwhelming problems. A discipline of hope helps us live into the resurrection.

We live a disciplined life that does not give into scarcity thinking or cynicism or anger or inertia. We look at even the bleakest situation knowing that God’s love and grace will emerge. Resurrection people know that life always triumphs over death – we live our lives as if every day is our last, because we KNOW the joy and freedom of the resurrection is always coming. Amen. Alleluia!

From Fear to Joy

2011-04-20T10:28:00.000-07:00

What compels us to move through fear toward joy?

While I contemplated this question this week, I did what modern people do when wrangling with life’s more weighty questions -- I asked my Facebook friends what they thought. Answers were varied … and profound. One person said that they would need the extended hand of a trusted friend. Another talked about living each day confronting our own mortality so that may live joyfully in the present moment. Others talked about the roles that love, hope, faith and trust in God play in our joyfulness.

After feeling an earthquake and witnessing the angel’s declaration of Jesus’ resurrection, the two Marys, in Matthew’s account of the resurrection, “left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples.” (NRSV) Most of us have heard this story so many times that we probably gloss over these details. Moving past the fear and into joy was no small feat for two grieving women who have just experienced an earthquake and the sighting of an angel whose “appearance was like lightning.” (NRSV)

In the paralyzing grip of fear, we most urgently needed both God and each other. We rely most heavily on God’s unfailing love and find in ourselves the ability to see how grace, hope and faith burst forth. Perhaps this is why both of the Marys came to the tomb that morning. They may have needed each other to face the despair of the grave, the fear of the earthquake and the joyous revelation that Jesus had indeed returned. Without each other, they may not have been able to run down the path and then encounter the risen Christ himself, who reminds them, just as the angel did, NOT to be afraid.

As resurrection people, we are called to move through fear and into the joy of the risen Christ. This venture is not something we do alone; we do it with our sisters and brothers in Christ.

So, rest assured that staff and all the people of the Iowa Conference UCC and beyond are holding out their hands toward each of you in the face of fear. My brothers and sisters, move into the joy that can only be felt when we are rooted in the unsurpassed love of God.

Happy Easter! Christ is Risen! Christ is Risen Indeed!

'Dying' in Transformation

2011-04-12T12:53:00.000-07:00

I've been telling people that I'm really feeling spring this year. Now, I'm not a winter person, so I always welcome spring -- the warmer air, the new growth on trees and flowers, the cleansing rain. This year, however, I really feel both the hope and promise and the incredible amount of strength, courage and plain old hard work it takes to grow anew.

As many of you know, I've lost both of my parents to pretty long illnesses this past year, my mother passing away only a few weeks ago. These losses are sad and difficult, but it's honestly a relief to leave behind the constant medical emergencies, phone calls with doctors, meetings with social workers and battles with insurance companies. Without the weight of the stress and anxiety associated with these tasks, I think I'm in for some tremendous transformation this spring.

I'm not sure where the road of transformation may lead me. But, I'm confident in the God who leads me there. The practice of Holy Week feels particularly relevant to me. I always appreciate the profound movement from death to life we experience in this holiest of Christian seasons. This year, I'm especially grateful for a faith that tells me that death doesn't have the final word.

Christians are resurrection people -- a people who believe that transformation happens not only despite death, but through death. Through no other situation can God make known so powerfully how much God loves and cares for us -- in this world and the next. This journey from the cross to the tomb to the joy of Easter morning reminds us that we are always 'dying' and being born again.

As we move toward Holy Week and Easter, I encourage you to be mindful of your own little 'deaths,' the parts of yourself that must pass away in order for you to become fully a wondrous creation of the Divine. If we leave those 'deathly' things behind in Lent, we will undoubtedly rise again on Easter morning.

Christ is Risen! Christ is Risen indeed!

Distraction or Asset?

2011-03-23T10:20:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of working with a youth leadership team at one of our Iowa Conference UCC churches. You see, they were facing a leadership challenge to which most of us can relate. They had lost a strong group of leaders in their choir while a large group of new people had arrived. The group didn't have the same strong bond or sense of purpose that it once did.

After exploring the nature of leadership in scripture and through drama activities, we talked about their challenges. I mostly listened; they came up with solutions to their problems. I reflected back what I heard that they wanted to do. Then they ran with their plans. They began texting, emailing and Facebooking people to put their plans in action the following day. A few weeks later, those plans are still being put into place.

I was stunned by what happened. I often facilitate leadership teams through visioning and planning processes. Most of these groups are dominated by adults. I usually invite those groups to do one thing that they've put on their work plan before they leave in order to get the ball rolling. They often resist doing something as simple as leaving someone a voicemail message. Perhaps this is a basic resistance to change; maybe it's burnout; maybe it's just laziness. Regardless, it means that the new plans sit inert on the paper on which they were written.

Adults, including myself, often complain about the impatience and chaos that modern technology breeds. We complain that young people can't focus or be present to the people in the room because they are distracted by the beeps and buzzes from their phones and computers. I certainly can be frustrated by this. But, the young people I worked with taught me that even though the technology can be a distraction, it can also be a huge asset.

The immediacy became urgency for these young people. The problem their group was facing was something they were committed to solving. They knew their group could be a lot better than it was. They wanted to make a difference. They didn't wait for more committee meetings, discussion or processing. Once they had a plan, they simply grabbed their phones and did something about it.

This story demonstrates how young people who feel passionately about something are capable of using their tools to get things done. Their sense of urgency and immediacy was indeed an asset. They took action and, I expect, will begin to make lasting change in their group. Their phones and computers were not a distraction. They were an important tool in putting their plan into action.

It's good for us to see how challenges can actually be an asset to our ministries. Never is something like technology only bad, it can also be used for good. It just depends on the intent or purpose for its use. God wants us to see this complexity. God wants us to see the beauty in what seems ugly. God wants us to see the blessing in what seems to be curse. God wants us to see light where there is darkness. There's always a third way -- just listen to God's voice speak through a young person you know. You just might find it.

The Fine Line Between Good and Wicked

2011-02-17T11:05:00.000-08:00

Those of you who are 'friends' with me on Facebook will not be surprised that I've become obsessed with the musical Wicked. I saw the show on Broadway during a recent vacation and I was blown away. Not only is the production and performances amazing, the story is one that explores how someone might become 'wicked' or 'good.'

The musical (based on the novel by Gregory Maquire) tells the back story of the Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda the Good from The Wizard of Oz fame. We come to understand that Elphaba (The Wicked Witch of the West) is just a misunderstood girl with remarkable magical talents and ... green skin. Glinda (the Good Witch), who unwittingly becomes her roommate at boarding school, is perky, popular and ... blond. From there you see how these unlikely partners become both friends and enemies simultaneously.

Elphaba is born with remarkable magical talent, but is always ostracized because of her unusual 'color.' Glinda is not particularly talented, but she's pretty and popular and almost always gets her way. Elphaba is certainly not all 'wicked.' She shows compassionate toward the downtrodden and cares for her handicapped sister. Glinda is not all 'good.' She plays tricks on Elphaba and lacks the courage to stand up for anyone other than herself. Circumstances, and several manipulative players including the Wizard himself, force them into the roles they later reluctantly occupy.

These compelling characters reminded me of how easy it is for us to demonize or glorify people from afar. Just think of our own Christian story -- to his followers, Jesus was a teacher, healer, prophet and, later, Messiah. To the authorities he challenged, he was a rebel, instigator and even heretic. In my previous call as a chaplain to young people with behavioral disorders and mental illness, I witnessed to this complexity. While the young people I served were capable of the awful things that landed them in an institution; they were also wonderfully talented, caring and sincere.

Perhaps our call as Christians to see "Jesus" in all of our sisters and brothers means that we recognize each person's complexity -- both their sins and their glory -- and love them all. If we look at each other through a lens of compassion and love, we might see the 'good' and 'wicked' in each other and learn to always extend grace. We can only imagine that God, by sending Jesus, was trying to put a mirror up to our own face, to help us embrace the wonder of our own humanity by realizing the divinity within us.

Peacemaking, Not Keeping the Peace

2011-01-31T14:15:00.000-08:00

I've had a lot of conversations about bullying lately. I talked to some young people who told stories of being called names because they are perceived as "different." They've even been pushed into lockers on occasion. They tell stories of witnessing fights between their peers that take place on the street outside the school while cars whiz past them.

I also read an article in The Lutheran about the bullying of clergy -- individuals within congregations who attack their pastors over differences in opinion about the direction a congregation should go. Or, more subtely, I've heard many stories about church battles over new hymnals, adding air conditioning to the building or even something as simple as putting in new carpet.

My heart breaks when I hear these stories. Not only do I think that abusive speech and behavior are unacceptable for people who profess to be Christians, there is much collateral damage from these church fights. Most profoundly, youth and young adults (and other strong church members) get disillusioned by these situations. They begin to wonder if this is ALL church is about. They wonder if ALL Christians talk a good talk, but do not walk the walk. With these questions pressing at the forefront of their mind and soul, the walk away from the church, often never to return. Though I have never read a research study that supports this theory, I believe this dynamic has fueled the decline of the Mainline church.

In The Lutheran article Susan Neinaber, a senior consultant and mediator for the Alban Institute, comments on how she's seen an increase in incivility in churches in the same way it seems to be on the rise in all of our public discourse. One of her most striking comments, at least to me, was, "The healthiest congregations have the lowest tolerance for inappropriate behavior. Unhealthy congregations tolerate the most outrageous behavior."

The way I've observed this playing out in congregations (at least in the Upper Midwest), is that when there's a church fight brewing, too often we want to be "nice" or "keep the peace" at any cost. And, the costs can be enormous if people are allowed to continue their bullying behavior. It's no different from the situation I described earlier among high school students. When these students are called demeaning names or pushed into lockers, they and their peers, brush it off and don't say anything. When a fight erupts on the sidewalk, people simply walk away, fearing what might come to them if they stand up to the abuse.

We may disagree about the meaning of Jesus' teachings, but I think that most people will agree that Jesus was willing to say and do things that didn't always make people happy. He was willing to stand up to religious and governmental authorities in order to profess the vision he had for a world governed by peace, love and hope rather than money, power and greed. If we are to follow Jesus' example for leadership, then we (especially those of us with some power and influence) must stand up to these inappropriate behaviors, regardless of personal cost.

Perhaps this is why Jesus mentions peacemakers in the "Beatitudes" during his Sermon on the Mount. "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called Children of God." (Matthew 5:9, NRSV) To become children of God, we must recognize deeply the humanity of all people. If we are attuned to the inherent dignity of other human beings, we will not be able to as easily sit on our hands when others are being harrassed, even if we risk harrassment ourselves. If we do not tolerate the 'outrageous behavior,' then the behavior will begin to stop.

Need resources for dealing with bullying in schools? Check out UCC resources and the Iowa Conference's next youth event.

Doing the Audacious

2011-01-13T14:40:00.000-08:00

As I listened to the media discussion of divisive political speech following the tragic shootings involving Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, her staffers and bystanders in Tucson, AZ, I kept recalling a small part of an interview I heard on NPR’s Speaking of Faith show more than a year ago. Host Krista Tippett interviewed yoga teacher and activist Seane Corn, who describes her own evolution on and off the yoga mat.

Corn began to think seriously about the energy she (and others) put into the world. She talks about teaching her students about the interconnectedness of the world, the way in which everything is a “manifestation of our collective thoughts.” She then asks people in the class if they want peace and abundance and happiness for all. Everyone in the class raises their hand in agreement. Then, she’ll say, “What about your ex-husband or ex-wife?” The room erupts in laughter. It’s easy enough to want world peace in theory; but putting that into action in everything we do, with everyone we encounter is a much harder thing. “Where am I living an interpersonal war? “Where am I creating some sort of some psychic terrorism between me and another person?” she asked during the interview. “Because if I’m not dealing with that; then I’m part of the problem.”

When I heard that interview, Corn gave words to something I was beginning to understand intuitively – that I couldn’t expect the world to be more peaceful or happier or more abundant if I didn’t at least try to embody it in my own personal relationships. What “violence” am I putting in the world when I say or do angry or hateful things? Even now, living with this intention, I rarely (if ever) live up to it. But, have I managed to be calmer and less defensive when dealing with difficult people and situations? Yes. Do I think that this helps reduce the amount of “violence” in the world in a small way? Yes.

One thing I think Corn has right, which is affirmed by my Christian faith, is the value of community and connection. That place “where two or three are gathered” is holy, even if the two or three gathered are my enemies. And, because of that, I should treat them as if Jesus Christ is sitting right with me at table. I should be able to deal with my own “stuff” enough to put something better into the world, so that more hate and violence is not born. I should be ready to listen, love and serve.

Join me, sisters and brothers, in resisting the individualism and divisiveness of our day and attempt, as Ghandi put it, to “be the change you want to see in the world.” Value our God-given spirits enough to put out there the love and peace that we want to get back.

Do the audacious. Love your neighbor as yourself. I dare you.

Sermon: Unnamed Leaders

2011-01-10T14:13:00.000-08:00

I'm 'retiring' this sermon based on Acts 23: 12-22 I've been using on the road for a little while. Enjoy!

It was a beautiful fall afternoon on the campus of Park University in Parkville, Missouri. A group of adults and youth from several UCC conferences sat around a large table, sometimes staring longingly out the windows at the beautiful fall weather that had settled in this hilly place on the Missouri River. We were beginning to plan the next summer’s Regional Youth Event. At first, nothing we were discussing was out of the ordinary for one of these meetings. We talked about what kinds of workshops we’d have, what the schedule would look like, where people would stay on campus and on and on …

But, one brief conversation really made me sit up and take notice. We were talking about the purpose of these kinds of youth events and I mentioned that the Iowa Conference focuses its programming on leadership development – for youth and adults. After making that statement one young woman at the table was exasperated. She challenged my statement. I don’t remember exactly what she said, but it was something like this: “Everything is about the leaders. At school all they talk is about the leaders. Why does everything have to be about the leaders” She made it clear that she was tired of all this leadership stuff.

Quickly, I figured out that the image she carried of leaders were of people who were out there in front of people – the people who gives speeches and chair committees and coordinate events. I’m sure at her school these leaders tended to be the “over-achiever” types – the ones with the best grades and the most popularity. I tried to explain to her that I don’t just mean those people when I use the word, leader. I told her that I believe that, as people of faith, we are ALL called to be leaders in our own way. Most often that doesn’t mean giving speeches or chairing committees or starting movements.

Although she stopped arguing with me, I’m not sure that I altered her image of leadership very much. The reality is that when we think about leadership – both inside and outside of church – we usually think about the outgoing, charismatic people who inspire others to get behind beliefs and ideas and causes. They are usually politicians, pastors or other kinds of well-known people. Those leaders are often from an elite class of people – the ones with the best educations and the most money.

Our scripture today is centered on one such elite person – Paul. As the primary subject in the book of Acts, Paul has one of those dramatic leadership stories. As a Roman soldier, he starts out as a first-rate persecutor of Jesus followers. Then, in a flash of blinding light, God converts Paul to Christianity on the road to Damascus. Paul then emerges from this conversion as one of the most fervent followers of Jesus and helps found many of the early churches throughout the Roman Empire.

If I had wanted to write this sermon about Paul, I could have consulted countless books and articles that dissect who he is and what effect he had on the early church. We could talk about his public speaking, his theology, his political savvy and his personality. But, I don’t want to talk about Paul today. I want to talk about another character in this story who you probably didn’t think much about when we read the scripture a few moments ago – the unnamed young man.
You didn’t much think about him because this story centers on a plot that is formed to kill Paul. Paul, who is both a Roman citizen and a Jew, is being ushered back and forth between two the Roman and Jewish tribunes. They are questioning him about his religious beliefs and his actions of supporting the formation of the early church. He uses his considerable political savvy to weasel yet again out of the questions. (If you haven’t read the entire book of Acts, this sort of situation is one that Paul finds himself in quite often.) Paul’s weaseling ability infuriates some of the Jewish authorities and they make a solemn pact to fast until they have killed him. They decide that they are going to request that Paul be transferred from the Roman prison back to the Jewish tribune for more questioning; while he is being moved, they are going to kill him.

Now, here comes the character that I find the most interesting in this story. A young man, who happens to be Paul’s nephew, overhears the details of this plot, goes to prison to visit his uncle and tells him what he knows. Paul then tells him to go back to the Roman tribune and inform him of the plot so that he won’t allow Paul to be transferred to the Jewish tribune. The young man does what Paul asks and foils the plot. If he hadn’t done this, what would have happened to Paul? What would have happened to the early church? We can’t be sure, but it wouldn’t have been good.

Despite the important role this young man plays in this story, we don’t even know this name. The only detail we know about him is that he is Paul’s nephew, the son of his sister. Clearly the author of Acts was not trying to draw too much attention to him. But, when you start wondering about him, the questions never end: How could this twenty-something know about this plot to kill Paul? Did he spy regularly for Paul? Or was he just hanging out in the courtyard and heard people talk about it in whispers? What was his relationship to Paul like? Did he also believe in Jesus or was he just looking out for his uncle? All we can do is speculate about the answers.

Even though the author of Acts is concerned with telling Paul’s story, I am going to suggest the radical idea that this unnamed young man is actually as much or more of a leader than Paul is.

Just imagine that you are this young man. You’re a young person who somehow discovers that there is a plot to kill your uncle; your uncle just happens to be one of the most notorious religious radicals out there. What do you do? I bet most of you just thought, “Of course, I’d help him out. He’s my uncle!”

Really, would it be that easy? If you’re a young man who’s clever enough to discover this murder plot; you’d also know that becoming publicly associated with Paul, who is constantly being imprisoned and receiving death threats, would mean that you’d also set yourself up for the same fate. If you stick up for him, you’d risk being imprisoned or threatened with death yourself. You’d probably also know that your youthful age would work against you. People might not even believe what you said about this plot!

This decision is a lot more complicated than we might have originally imagined. Just like any of us, Paul’s young nephew could have easily walked away and done nothing.

But, he does do something. This young man, whose name we don’t even know, demonstrates true leadership in this situation. He risks his own safety and security and comfort in order to do the right thing. I would imagine that this decision had something to do with what he believed about the world and about God. To me, this is the most important kind of leadership – the kind of leadership that connects what we BELIEVE with how we live our lives. We show people, rather than just talk about what we believe.

I don’t know about you, but I can think of many situations in which I fail to be the kind of leader that this young man was in this story. Now, I don’t mean that I often overhear murder plots. But, I do regularly overhear family and friends or even strangers make comments that I know to be racist and do nothing. Now, I believe that all people are created in the image of God; and, because of that, ALL people should be treated with dignity and respect, regardless of race. Still, I often allow these statements to fly by me without making a comment. When I let these things go, I’ve missed an opportunity to let my life lead. If I did these things more often, I would probably have a bigger impact on people than if I preached a sermon or planned an event dealing with racism.

Few of us are going to be Pauls, but ALL of us have the opportunity to be the kind of leader that this young man became in this story. I would even say that the Paul’s in the world only exist in order to create opportunities for ALL people to become faithful leaders. If the Paul’s do not do this, the church becomes irrelevant, full of people who come to church on Sunday, but who do not live their faith in any meaningful way any other day of the week.

I believe that the church only exists in order to raise up young leaders who use their faith to figure out what’s right and wrong and then ACT upon it. These are leaders who do not learn pat answers, but instead ask faithful questions. These leaders are mentored by other faithful leaders in their church, regularly seeing examples of how they live their faith in each and every part of their lives. These leaders are taught from an early age that God is calling them to be and to do something important in the world, and they know that because they have been raised up in leadership positions in the church from very young ages. They have been taught to engage frightening, sometimes even unsafe situations in which their faith is being tested. They know that confronting these difficult and conflictual situations is just part of living this faithful life.

As part of my work for the Iowa Conference, I am often asked to teach Sunday School or short workshops following worship in our churches. During these sessions, I often ask people to remember and describe the best disciple they’ve ever known. Rarely do people name the “Pauls,” instead they tell stories about the unnamed leaders -- the relatives and friends who quietly lived their lives doing the right thing. They named their aunt who adopted dozens of orphans and raised them like they were her own family. They name the Sunday School teacher who always had a kind word for them, even when they didn’t deserve it. They name the regular church folk who welcomed them to church even though they didn’t look like they belonged. Tears often well up in their eyes as they recount the impact these regular people, these unnamed leaders, had on their lives.

Take a moment right now and remember the person you have known that was the best disciple, the person who best LIVED their faith. Picture them in your mind. Thank God for them.

These unnamed leaders are the reasons you stay in church, even when things aren’t so good. THEY are the reason you keep going back to God, even when your lives seem hopeless. THEY are the reason you are inspired to live your own faith in meaningful ways.

Let’s pray now that we ALL become these unnamed leaders – the ones who REALLY have an impact on the church and the world. Amen.

Being Really 'Religulous': Asking Questions

2011-01-03T12:31:00.000-08:00

After avoiding it for more than two years, I finally watched Bill Maher's pseudo-documentary 'Religulous' this weekend. Many of you probably already know that the title of this film is a word coined by Maher combining 'religious' and 'ridiculous.' In the film, he interviews mostly people associated with fringe religious groups in order to 'prove' that religion is indeed ridiculous -- anti-intellectual, ignorant, hypocritical and sometimes hateful and violent.

Of course, I don't agree with his assessment of religion or of many faithful people. That's why I spent so much time avoiding this film. But, have to give Maher some credit -- he asks really good questions. He asks how Jesus is any different from other leaders of his day, given that their stories also included being born of virgins. He asks why we must have the doctrine of original sin which just makes us feel like we are born broken and incomplete. He challenges Christian leaders who wear fancy clothes to reconcile their lifestyles with Jesus' preaching against accumulating wealth. All good questions for which he rarely gets a good answer.

I've heard plenty of stories about people having been thrown out of Sunday school and confirmation classes for lifting up these kinds of questions. That's the kind of church Bill Maher (a self-admitted former Catholic) was exposed to as a child. That's the kind of church many experience.

I'd like to think that the churches I serve in the United Church of Christ would do a better job of answering these questions. Some of them certainly would, but many would not. The reality is that many of us are taught as children that being faithful is the same as being passive and complicit. We are not equipped to answer challenging questions, only recite pat answers. If you stifle the questions, though, I think you miss the really good stuff. Questions help you name the things you don't understand and find ways to make sense of them ... or at least learn to ask better questions.

When I entered seminary, I was pretty sure I was called by God to be there, but I wasn't sure why (or if) I was called to be a Christian. By reading scripture and theology and asking questions, I became a passionate Christian. The incarnation, God becoming flesh in Jesus Christ, is what compelled me (and still does) . I believe in a God that was so loving that God became a human, suffered like me and redeemed this broken and imperfect world through Jesus' death. I know, through my faith, that I am at once sinful, yet also redeemed. I need this grace each and every day, but that doesn't make me ashamed to be human.

Unfortunately, no one said anything like that to Maher in the film. But, I bet if he had asked some different people he would have heard more answers like these. He may not have agreed with the answers, but at least wouldn't have thought all faithful people to be ridiculous.

Just Ask, Listen and Do

2010-12-27T13:09:00.000-08:00

Last week, I drank in the words and images from the Independent Lens episode, The Calling like a person walking through a desert. I'm sure much of my fascination with this show stems from my own overwhelming sense of God's call on my life and the struggle to live into that call each day. I also realize that not many people relate to those experiences and, consequently, they aren't represented in books, TV or movies very often.

Though I relish that producers and directors of Independent Lens took the time to tell the story of religious leaders living their calling, I realize that idea of experiencing a call from God is unusual -- something we think of happening to Biblical characters like Moses or Mary, but not to us right here and right now.

But, it is about us right here and right now. Independent Lens directors interviewed dozens of people ranging from snowboarders to community activists to artists to answer the question: What's your calling? All of these people talk about their calling a little differently. But, all of them have tapped into what they are passionate about, what their gifts are and how they use those parts of themselves to make a difference in the world.

Jennifer Bailey, one of the people featured in this video project, talks about her own calling to advocate for people of Nashville, Tennessee who live in neighborhoods known as "food deserts." Those places are where there is no grocery store within a mile of their homes. She received a fellowship after college to work with Community Food Advocates' Re/Storing Nashville campaign, which works to make quality food more readily available to people in these neighborhoods.

Toward the end of the video clip she says, "I felt convicted by God and by my Christian faith to do this work. And, so if you hear something in your heart and it won't go away. Listen." Time and again, however, young people are told not to listen to those compelling voices or to chase their passions. They are told to be practical, get an education and earn enough money to support themselves and their families. I think if many of adults were honest with themselves they would say that this way of living life isn't really enough. You may have to be practical, but you also have to do those things ignite your passion and use your gifts in order to make a difference in the world.

I agree with Jennifer, I don't think experiencing a calling requires any more of us than asking the question, "God, what do you want me to do?", listening for the answer and then doing something about what God is telling us.

Living the Call: A Foreign Concept?

2010-12-21T12:39:00.000-08:00

After encouraging so many of you to watch The Calling documentary on PBS' Independent Lens last night, I wondered how many people (aside from my clergy friends) were able to relate to it. Being a relatively young person (by church standards anyway) called to be a religious leader, I understood exactly where these people were coming from. But, other people may have thought the situations just plain strange.

We saw how many of the seven young religious leaders struggle to balance their responsibilities to their churches, synagogues and mosques with their family and personal lives. They struggled with their congregations' expectations of how their personal lives should be lived. All of them felt pressure to have a 'perfect' family life -- one that includes a strong marriage and children. Never mind that several of them were still single, one had a child out of wedlock and another one was getting a divorce. They certainly weren't 'perfect' by these external standards, but none of them could be accused of not being faithful to their call. Others were torn between family and community responsibilities and the responsibilities of their new religious communities. Everyone wanted something from them -- their time, their energy, their leadership. They were spread very thin.

At one point in the documentary, a young, energetic Rabbi was criticized for admitting in an interview that he wanted a synagogue's part-time position so that he could devote himself to parenting the child they were expecting. He wanted to be a good parent and to support his wife's career. Trying to these things was thought to be a 'deal-breaker' for most congregations looking to hire him.

Although these particular situations may seem foreign to some of you, I think most people can relate to these struggles. How do you devote yourself to your work or school as well as to family, friends and community? If you add being a person of faith into this mix it gets more complicated. Regardless of your career, school or family situation, your priorities will change if we take seriously how our faith calls us to live. Being faithful may strain relationships with friends and family. It may cause you to take a different path in work, school or other community activities. It may mean abandoning some of those things altogether.

So, tell me, how do you balance all these things? How has your faith influenced the way you live your life both inside and outside of your religious communities?

Keep watching this fascinating documentary tonight on PBS. I know we'll all have more to talk about.

The Complexity of Recieving

2010-12-19T12:07:00.000-08:00

It was the yoga class that wouldn't end.

I did everything. I breathed into poses. I tried to focus on the present moment. I tried all of those things you're supposed to do if I find myself struggling. They usually work for me but not this time. This regular 90-minute class stretched out over the course of an eternity. Each pose confronted me like an enemy. Even my "friends" (i.e. the easier poses) brought little satisfaction or calm.

I felt a little betrayed that the class had been framed as one about "recieving," about opening yourself to the possibilties that were unfolding in our practice. What was I supposed to be recieving? Anger? Frustration? I could have easily thrown myself on the ground and had a full-fledged melt down.

But, I didn't. I stuck with it, tired and sore as I was. I began thinking that perhaps the anger and frustration was just something to which I needed to let go. Maybe those things were blocking what I was really supposed to recieve. After all, how often to we reject "gifts" in our everyday lives? When someone gives us a complement, do we accept it graciously or do we dismiss it as ridiculous? When someone offers unsolicited help, do we experience it with joy or guilt?

Advent is indeed a time for recieving. In this season, we are reminded of the extravagent gift God gave us in his son, Jesus. Chiristian's believe this small child, born to young parents in a barnyard, IS the incarnation of God. This child is evidence that God's hope, joy, peace and love is alive in the world. We have to remember not to let other things get in the way of this tremendous gift, to let go of things that block our ability to recieve it.

I did recieve something after all. Perhaps this complex and painful lesson about letting go is what I was supposed to learn in my yoga class. A hard lesson, to be sure. But, one I'll never forget.

Generations of Faithfulness

2010-12-08T09:26:00.001-08:00

Last week I had the privilege of attending a workshop lead by Diana Butler Bass, a teacher and speaker who puts American Christianity in historical and cultural context. She offered us a paradigmn in which to understand the challenges the church is now facing.

A crisis of legitimacy is what she called this stage of development. This stage is characterized by widespread failure of the systems that were put in place in the previous generations. In the case of the church, the denominational structures that were created following the third great awakening are now struggling to be effective and relevant.

We feel this pain acutely in the dwindling numbers of people who attend church services, Sunday school and youth groups. Our population is aging, with few young people there to take up the work of existing church programs. Many people appropriately grieve for the time when things were thriving. Those times, at least in the form we once knew them, are not to return.

This darkness and grief is not where this story ends. Butler Bass described how people in these stages of change begin to see new shining lights, a new vision of what church could be and then act upon it. After some time, the numbers of people who "get it" will grow. A new thing then emerges.

Sounds a lot like the story of Advent, right? It was in a dark time, a time when the Israelites were living under the rule of another occupying force, that a young woman named Mary became pregnant, bearing the incarnated light of God into the world.

She sings, "His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, lifting up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise made to our ancestors and to his descendants forever." (Luke 1: 50-55, NRSV)

Mary's Magnificat praises God's faithfulness to ALL generations. No matter how cast aside they might have felt in their present situation, God was making good on God's promises in the child she was carrying in her womb. This child would show us a new way, a time in which the powerless and the poor would claim their rightful place in the kingdom.

In this season of the growing light, look for the signs of God's promise to THIS generation. Take a look around you, see the places and people who are bearing the light of Christ in NEW ways and allow yourself to believe that all things are possible with God.

The Ease of Digging in Your Heels

2010-11-11T13:53:00.001-08:00

My stubbornness or competitiveness wasn't really a big surprise -- but I had no idea just how far it could go.

During my last trip to Duke Divinity School's Foundations of Christian Leadership program this week, my colleagues and I played a facinating game (a.k.a. psychological experiment) called "Win All that You Can." We divided into four teams and were asked to choose either an 'x' or a 'y' in each of ten rounds. After the teams chose their letter, the different combinations of x's and y's that were chosen by the group yielded your team money or lost you money. We quickly realized that choosing 'x' was the safest choice because the worst you could lose was only a dollar. In the first few rounds my team stuck with this strategy and happily found ourselves with a solid lead.

Then, in the fifth round, the stakes got higher. Your winnings or losses would be tripled. But, this time, representatives of the four teams were able to discuss possible strategies with one another. Two of the other teams made an impassioned plea for us to change our choice to 'y.' They had deciphered that during each round all of our scores always added up to 'zero.' They contended that to make this more than a zero-sum game, we'd ALL have to choose 'y.'

I went back to my team with this proposal. Without too much thought or debate we decided to stay the course, thinking we could change our minds closer to the end of the game, letting the other teams have some winnings then, if we so chose. During the ensuing five rounds, we heard more impassioned pleas during our allotted negotiations. Our team didn't budge. We won big.

During the game, I served as the negotiator for our team. I was stunned by how easy it was for me to ignore the needs of the other teams, dig in my heels and keep all the winnings for ourselves. I like to think of myself as a pretty generous person, as do my colleagues on my team. Yet, none of us were swayed from our individualistic mindset in order to do something for the good of the whole.

Bear in mind, that there really were no real stakes in this game. No one was really winning or losing any money. Nevertheless, when I was on top, fat and happy with good winnings, I really had no interest in making a change that would be a detriment to my bottom line.

How often do we do this in real life? How often do we dig in our heels and refuse to make change so that we have much while others go with very little? The answer: all the time.

I don't like to think of myself this way. I'd like to think that I am willing to sacrifice my personal wealth or convenience or comfortable ways for the good of the whole. But, that's not always the case.

In this season of harvest and abundance, I encourage you to think about that incredibly counter-cultural call of the Gospel to "love your neighbor as yourself." This means giving something up, whether it is the comfortable way I'm used to worshipping in my local church or giving away a little more money so that my church can better do ministry in the community.

Pull your heels out of the dirt, give something up and move away from your 'easy' place.

Reclaiming Institutions

2010-10-25T09:07:00.000-07:00

“I believe in God. I just don’t like ‘institutional religion’”?

How many times have I heard (and said) the aforementioned phrase? Too many to count. I spent my late teens and early 20s swearing off institutional religion; still, I later found myself yearning for a connection to something beyond myself. Though I spent my growing up years as a Roman Catholic, I stumbled into a United Church of Christ church and found a new home as an adult. God had clearly led me there, because I couldn’t have discerned consciously a more perfect place for myself. I remember reveling in the fact that the UCC is a place that allows so much individual freedom, has so little ‘top-down’ structures of authority and does not espouse a stifling dogma.

More than a decade after finding the UCC, I now find myself called to working for the wider church. Working for a United Church of Christ conference couldn’t be any more representative of ‘institutional religion.’ (I’m sure God is laughing about that one.)

I admit that I now find the UCC's non-dogmatic, nonhierarchical system as great a liability as it is a strength. When we learn about our system of governance, we hear that the basis of our system is two contradictory concepts – autonomy and covenant. This means that our churches covenant to be in ministry together, but at the same time maintain local autonomy. Working in my current position, I see us embrace autonomy far more than we embrace covenant. It’s very easy for churches and individuals not to care what the national church or even the church down the road does because they can just do their own thing.

It's easy to understand why many simply want to go it alone. Institutions and the people within them succumb to inertia or corruption. They are often not living, breathing communities, but rather are vehicles for containing and maintaining power. But, as I’ve lived into my institutional-level work, I’ve become more and more convinced that we in the church, as well as in the wider culture, are in desperate need of vibrant institutions -- but not bureaucracies or organizations. For my Foundations of Christian Leadership program at Duke Divinity School, I've been reading a book by political scientist Hugh Heclo called On Thinking Institutionally. He argues for the need for honest and authentic institutions that are guided by a higher sense of purpose beyond just keeping the doors of the institution open. In the church this would mean grounding ourselves in the message of the gospel in ways that meet the deeper needs of our communities.

Living in covenant is a long-standing practice in the Judeo-Christian tradition. The Israelites entered into covenant with the God that led them out of slavery in Egypt. God entered into a new covenant with people in the life and death of Jesus Christ. Over the nearly two years that I've been looking at things from the vantage point of the wider church, I’ve come to believe in the power of living covenant. Though my work may, on the surface, be about supporting youth and young adult ministries through training, coaching and mentoring (which I do), my call is really to create space for our churches to better live into their covenant with one another.

When I host workshops or create groups of support and accountability for youth leaders, I am helping them live into covenant in the simplest possible way – by getting to know each other. When I work with youth leadership teams in local churches, I ask them to look both internally and externally at needs and resources in the formation of their ministries -- ways that they can be in covenant with each other and their communities. When young people attend wider church events, they are learning about the blessing of the diversity of our wider church that covenant makes possible.

I would like you to think about the ways you've been impacted -- positively and negatively -- by institutions. What would your vibrant institution look like? What would it's guiding principles be?

Doubt in a cheese sandwich

2010-10-11T19:26:00.000-07:00

"Grilled Chesus," the burned afternoon snack turned divine revelation on last week's episode of Glee is now ranking as one of my favorite pop culture Jesus icons along with "Buddy Christ" from the movie Dogma and the "Missionary: Impossible" episode of The Simpsons in which Homer Simpson, who is being compelled against his will to go to Southeast Asia to be a Christian missionary says, "I can't be a missionary. I don't even believe in Jebus."

The opening of this Glee episode features Finn, the well-intentioned, but somewhat dim-witted jock turned Glee club star making a grilled cheese sandwich as an afternoon snack. Removing it from the George Foreman grill, he sees the burned image of ... Christ. He sees it as a personal revelation from God, refuses to eat the half of the sandwich with Jesus' image and begins to pray to it AND begins to get everything he prays for.

Finn takes his new religious fervor back to his glee club friends and asks that the week be devoted to religious songs. Needless to say, arguments ensue among this diverse group of young people. Some are religious, some are unsure of their beliefs and one character, Kurt, professes atheism at least in part because, "church doesn't think much of gay people ... or women."

Soon after this initial conversation, Kurt's father suffers a heart attack and ends up in a coma. (Bear in mind that Kurt's mother died when he was a young boy.) His friends immediately try to comfort him with their religious beliefs and prayers. Kurt's avowed atheism does not waver, perhaps it is even inflamed temporarily because of their efforts.

I admit that watching this episode of Glee, a show I usually watch as pure escapism, felt a bit like a punch in the stomach. I've certainly had these kinds of questioning conversations with young people (and adults) before, but I didn't expect to see it so viscerally and accurately portrayed on my favorite feel-good show. I pride myself on being realistic about how outsiders view Christians, but I didn't like being hit in the face with it.

No one in the church wants to hear these things. We don't want to hear about people's disbelief or their questions about the church's hypocrisy or the struggles with how God does or doesn't answer our prayers. These things are hard because they hit home -- force us to deal with the ways in which the church fails to live out Jesus' message of radical love and our own spiritual struggles with a large and mysterious God.

But, we can learn from what this television show depicts about contemporary American culture. The reality is that most people struggle deeply with their faith and few church fold are equipped to reveal their own misgivings in an honest way or listen without judging the questioner.

If a few more people in church could do that, our youth ministries would be a lot better off. As we know, teenage life is full of questions -- about faith and a lot of other things. If adults don't show young people that the church is a community of the struggling faithful, they will end up as more adults who see church as irrelevant and judgmental.

The reality is that the Judeo-Christian tradition is full of faithful questioners. We are in good company. When God tells Jeremiah that he will be a prophet to the nations, he responds, "Ah, Lord God! Truly I do not know how to speak for I am only a boy." (Jeremiah 1:7, NRSV) When the angel Gabriel reveals to Mary that she will be the mother of God, she asks, "How can this be, since I am a virgin?" (Luke 1:34, NRSV) And, perhaps most famously, when the apostle Thomas is told that Jesus has risen from the dead, he replies, "Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in his side, I will not believe." (Luke 20:25, NRSV) Despite their doubts and questions, these folks become faithful followers who live out God's call on their lives. Perhaps they are even more fervent because of their doubts.

Let us all become these kinds of believers and welcome more of them into our midst.

Teaching Faith?

2010-10-07T08:54:00.000-07:00

In this month's issue of Yoga Journal magazine, several articles discussed the importance of practicing yoga with your children. The cover story, entitled "Teach your Children Well," by Shannon Sexton describes how parents should do their yoga practice out in the open so that children can observe it and join in. She also recommends that parents teach them age-appropriate things like postures and breathing to help them not only develop physically, but emotionally and spiritually.

In a short reflection article by Monette Chilson in the same issue, she tells a powerful story about sharing yoga with her daughter and how it's taking root in her now that she is a teenager. She writes, "Though I had been a dedicated yoga practitioner since long before she [her daughter] was born, I knew that didn't ensure that my way of life would rub off on her."

I was struck by how different her comment is from what I hear from parents about passing along their Christian faith. Even people within Iowa Conference United Church of Christ churches tell me things like, "I want them (their children) to come to it on their own." Or, "They'll come back to the church when they're adults." We'd never say the same thing about teaching our children to read, cook or drive a car.

A lot of recent research in the sociology of religion supports the notion posited by Chilson in that Yoga Journal article. In Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers, researchers from the National Study of Youth and Religion write that they found a very strong corollary between the faith lives of parents and that of their children. In other words, if parents practiced their faith and demonstrated that it was important, their children were far more likely to do the same thing. They write, "For better or worse, most parents in fact still do profoundly influence their adolescents -- often more than do their peers -- their children's apparent resistance and lack of appreciation notwithstanding. This influence often also includes parental influence in adolescents' religious and spiritual lives."

Although somewhere in recent history we seem to have given up this important area of parental influence, I'm encouraged by the traction conversations about parents and faith are gaining in the mainstream media. In particular, the national media attention garnered by Kenda Creasy Dean's article in a recent issue of The Christian Century that outlined the vague and somewhat incoherent faith espoused by many young people (and adults) who consider themselves Christian. Programs like Faith Inkubator's FAITH 5TM practices for the home or ideas and resources created by Vibrant Faith Ministries, provide resources for churches to equip parents to teach faith in their household -- not leave it up to the child and their peers to figure it out on their own.

If families pass along faith practices more effectively, we'll have a new generation of young people on fire for the church. Parents and other significant adults will have healthier relationships (spiritual and otherwise) with young people. More of us will have experiences with children like what Chilson describes in her Yoga Journal reflection: "I felt humbled and honored to sit beside my daughter as our voices joined and resonated with the voices of those around us, articulating divinity in this deep and primal way. In that moment, we shared an understanding of reverence for the Divine that simply wouldn't have been easy to access in a casual mother-daughter conversation."

View from the Balcony

2010-08-25T12:35:00.000-07:00

As some of you might have seen on my Facebook and Twitter posts, I've been away from the office a lot lately. I enjoyed a good vacation seeing friends in Chicago and Boston. Then, I came back to a Iowa for a little while until I headed to Durham, North Carolina for the Foundations of Christian Leadership (FoCL) program at the Leadership Education program at Duke Divinity School.

Truthfully, I'm exhausted from all the travel. Still, the time away has been invaluable. It's given me a lot of time to reflect on my own ministry and leadership. I admit that this hasn't been an easy process. At Duke, I received the results of the Six Domains leadership assessment and a personality assessment. When such a mirror is held up to you, it can sometimes show you things you don't want to know or are tired of knowing. I think it's both funny and frustrating that my tendency to talk a lot has been named in nearly every assessment done of me since I was in preschool. I'm looking forward to the leadership coaching I will receive as part of the FoCL program that will help me integrate this knowledge in the most productive way possible.

Becoming a quality leader requires that we sometimes get away and gain perspective about ourselves and the setting in which we lead. In a book we read for the FoCL program, Leadership on the Line by Ron Heifitz and Martin Linsky, they mentioned that it's critical for leaders to "get on the balcony." In other words, spend some time away from your context to reflect and gain perspective.

This isn't easy. Jesus demonstrated that. When he went away, he prayed, struggled with demons and the acceptance of his own call. We need to do the same thing, even if the process is unpleasant. Taking this time helps us to connect with our own state of sinfulness in order to emerge more aware of the extravagance of God's grace in our lives and ministries.

I encourage you to take this time for yourself. Take a hard look at your ministry and your leadership style. You may not always like what you see, but the process will transform you into the leader God made you to be.

The Church According to RYE

2010-08-11T05:12:00.000-07:00

During the West Central Regional Youth Event, we took a lot of video footage of our activities. In particular, we took a lot of shots of our Iowa Conference UCC group time and the closing worship service we led.

I knew I had some interesting things when I shot the footage, but it wasn't until I edited the small clips into a larger movie did I see some important themes emerge. During our conference group time, we got to know each other and discussed what we saw as challenges in the church. After taking a vote, the issue that was most important was the dwindling numbers of young people in church. Not a big surprise. Our discussion also named some of the underlying problems -- that anyone who brings forth new ideas are not taken seriously and are often dismissed.

We also spent some time "asset-mapping," an exercise created by Luther Snow, to help groups identify their resources and create their own projects with what they already have. Our groups created some wonderful things -- all of them included opportunities to serve, develop faith and create places for adults and young people to work together. They infused humor and an incredible spirit of openness. In the end, we could only pick one of the projects and the group chose to do a mission trip to a Native American reservation in South Dakota. The presentation of that idea is last in our video.

After experiencing these five days with the young people and adult leaders from 10 Iowa Conference Churches, I wondered what the church would look like if this energy was more prominently infused into the church as a whole. What if that spirit of openness and passion to serve really drove our churches? I'm not exactly sure, but I'd really like to find out.

So, please let me know if you want to be part of this next venture, in particular the planning and leading of this mission trip that these RYE attenders dreamed. Or maybe you just want to do some dreaming. Let me know.

Rev. Nicole Havelka
Associate Conference Minister for Youth and Young Adult Ministries
Iowa Conference UCC
My Blog includes day by day updates from RYE, check them out!

Day 4: Soda or Pop?

2010-07-18T05:15:00.000-07:00

We've covered many pressing issues and topics during our time at West Central Regional Youth Event -- racism, illegal immigration, sexism, homophobia, global warming -- but none more important than "are carbonated beverages called soda or pop?

I'm sure it comes as no surprise to you that this conversation should arise among people living in different areas of the United States. For many of our Iowa youth, the name "soda" was largely foreign. Good-natured teasing ensued over the "correct" term to use. This relatively benign example is a great way that young people are expanded by learning to talk and listen to new and different people. Of course, they've also been stretched by hearing others' interpretation of scripture and opinions about the aforementioned issues.

Nevertheless, in our Iowa Conference group gathering, we spent some time celebrating gifts and seeing how we can use them. Ultimately, the group voted to embark on a conference wide service project to a Native American reservation in South Dakota. I'm always amazed at the depth and breadth of the ways in which young people want to share themselves when they are given the opportunity to dream. We plan to present this idea to our Iowa Conference Board of Directors in August.

This morning we will close our time together in worship, which our group is leading. I'll post photos soon of what happens there!

Day 3: Blossoming

2010-07-17T04:59:00.000-07:00

Anyone who has attended youth gatherings knows that the middle day of your event is usually the most intense. Deeper relationships are starting to develop, conversations can get more personal and sometimes conflicts arises.

Yesterday was no exception at the West Central Regional Youth Event, at least for the Iowa Conference group. The initial shyness was definitely wearing off, so more people were willing to talk, make comments and ask questions.

In particular, our second plenary session with Karen Georgia Thompson, minister for racial justice in the national setting of the UCC, was a springboard into conversations about race, weath, education, age and gender privilege. Then, we watched a riveting film, 9500 Liberty, that documented how the illegal immigration ripped apart the community of Prince William county, Virginia. In the subsequent conversations, I was blown away by the insights young people had about the issue and what they felt their faith had to say about it. I couldn't help but wonder what the church would be like if young people held more positions of leadership in the local church.

We then had an amazing discussion in our conference group about the problems and challenges facing churches and communities. They decided that the biggest issues facing the church and communities were not having enough young people/families, having welcoming churches and having better worship and music.

Laura Lof, chair of the Iowa Conference Board of Trustees and Tammi Ebensberger, another board member, both of whom happen to be serving as adult advisers on this trip, encouraged the young people to make a video of their discussions and present it to the board at their next board meeting.

So, we're going to keep working on that today. Stay tuned folks to see how these young people continue to blossom as our churches' leaders today.

Day 2: Immersion

2010-07-16T04:56:00.001-07:00

After only one full day at West Central Regional Youth Event, I can't say enough how much the young people and adults of the Iowa Conference UCC impress me. Not only have they thrown themselves fully into this event, they have allowed programs to help them "color outside the lines," as some in our group are fond of saying.

Yesterday began with short worship and "listening groups." Let me tell you a little about these groups, which, I'm proud to say, were designed by youth and adult leaders in the Iowa Conference. (And, many of them are facilitating the groups as well.) These groups of 13-15 people, are made up of people all from different churches. This means participants probably don't know anyone in your group very well, at least initially. Then, they engage in prayer, scripture reflection and games that help them to listen to each other and to God more effectively. As you know, this is a difficult thing to do with a bunch of strangers. The Iowa Conference and all the groups from around the region, are quickly developing these new relationships.

We did some more listening during our plenary session when Karen Georgia Thompson,
Minister for Racial Justice at the national setting of the United Church of Christ, led us in a discussion of judgment and stereotyping that happens because of race, ethnicity, gender. Though most people admitted that these discussions rarely happen in everyday life, even in our churches, they fully engaged and offered up some amazing insight about their own experiences of stereotyping and being stereotyped. We will delve deeper into this discussion during the next few plenary sessions. I can't wait to hear more of their insights!

During our conference gathering times, we delved deeper into discussion by naming the problems and challenges facing our communities and our churches. In the next few days, we will continue to dream ways in which conference youth and young adult ministries can grow and change in the coming months and years.

Finally, our night was capped off with a wonderful workshop and concert by Iowa-based Sheltered Reality. This youth drumming group with a mission to do good in the world energized us at the end of the day. And, I (and many others) even got to drum on stage with them; this fulfilled my childhood dream of becoming a drummer!

I'm eager to see what happens today! With two more full days left, the possibilities are endless!

Day 1: If you can't take the heat ...

2010-07-15T04:44:00.001-07:00

You know the old saying -- if you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen. On our first day in Kansas City for the West Central Regional Youth Event, we couldn't get out of the kitchen if we tried. The heat index easily soared past 100 degrees yesterday, making our already taxing first day even harder.

I'm impressed with the resilience of the youth and adults who made their way to this hilly campus on the Missouri River. Park University is nestled among the hills that rise out of the river valley. This makes for gorgeous views and really, really long staircases. In the heat and humidity, those staircases are even more daunting.

Yet, God, good food and a lot of water has been sustaining us this first day. Registration happened in the late afternoon. I'm proud to report that nearly every church group from every represented conference had checked in by about 4 p.m., well before the 5 p.m. deadline.

The Iowa Conference group, all 40 of them, gathered in a hot upstairs room to begin the process of building Christian community right before dinner. Despite the heat in the room, we talked and introduced ourselves to new people. We prayed and read scripture together. We even created a "prayer cross," a large structure made of PVC pipe and chicken wire, which the whole RYE group will cover in tissue paper. On the tissue paper, participants will write their prayers throughout the week. (I promise to get a finished picture of it soon.)

Today promises to be a cooler day. The temperatures are only supposed to get to the upper 80s, which will be a relief from yesterday. But, today is a full day -- we have workshops, our first "listening groups," a concert by Sheltered Reality, and, of course, more time for the members of our conference group to develop deeper relationships. I know I'm looking forward to that last part in particular -- several of our churches either haven't been to one of these wider church events in a long time or have NEVER been at all.

Friends, keep praying that we continue to develop deeper relationships with each other and with God -- and to keep beating the heat!

A Simple Request

2010-07-14T05:24:00.000-07:00

My blog this week is short and simple. I hope that you will take a moment to pray for the adults and young people gathering at the West Central Regional Youth Event at Park University, just outside of Kansas City, MO.

These faithful folks come from Minnesota, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, South Dakota and, of course, Iowa. I'm personally excited that we have 40 participants at this event from ten of our Iowa Conference churches:

Community Congregational UCC, Clinton, IA
United Congregational Methodist Church, Lewis, IA
Urbandale UCC, Urbandale, IA
St. Paul UCC, Madrid, IA
Newton UCC, Newton, IA
UCC Congregational, Grinnell, IA
St. John UCC, Melbourne, IA
First Congregational UCC, Eldora, IA
Schleswig UCC, Schleswig, IA
Mayflower UCC, Sioux City, IA

This week our theme is "Agape: God's love for us all." We are going to try to live God's love in a rather simple and profound way: listen to each other and to God. If we do that, I'm sure lots of wonderful and unexpected things will surface. I can't wait to tell you about what happens next week. For now, hold us in prayer as we explore the wonderful and deep ways that God is loving us through his event, and far beyond.

The Blessing of "Failure"

2010-07-06T11:38:00.000-07:00

As many of you know, I had the privilege of hosting the Youth in Ministry Gathering at the Iowa Conference Annual Meeting last month. When I do youth events like this, I'm always blown away by how insightful and energetic young people can be when they are exposed to practices of faith in meaningful ways. This group did not disappoint me.

But, a few weeks before the event, our registration list could have easily been viewed as disappointing. For the longest time, only two people had registered. At the deadline, a few more brave souls came forward. In all, we had five youth and six adults. Even that could have been seen as a "failed" event that would warrant cancellation.

Instead, we moved forward with our small, but wonderful group. In our time together, we prayed, explored scripture, affirmed our baptism and celebrated Communion. We were all empowered to hear God's call on our individual lives and in the wider community of the Iowa Conference. I learned everyone's name and now know some details of their lives. If we'd been a much bigger group, I'm pretty sure that wouldn't have happened in the span of only 24 hours.

After our short time together, the young people and their adult leaders then went off to participate in the meetings, worship and workshops that are part of our regular Annual Meeting. I admit that I was worried at this point that the young people would be terribly bored. But, they astounded me, as always. They spoke their minds in the workshops they attended; participated wholeheartedly in worship; and listened while business was conducted in the conference's plenary sessions.

I don't know about you, but I think this "failed" endeavor was pretty successful.

So, when you feel like the numbers of young participants in your church are dwindling, instead be grateful for the ones who are there and empower them to DO ministry and BE the church. I will guarantee that you will see God do amazing things in their (and your) lives.

Connection and Call

2010-06-23T07:45:00.000-07:00

Below are my reflections on the past year serving as the Iowa Conference UCC associate conference minister for youth and young adult ministries. It was originally distributed at our Annual Meeting, held June 11 & 12, 2010 at Grinnell College. I'd love to hear your comments.

It’s hard to believe that another year has passed since we last gathered as the Iowa Conference United Church of Christ. It’s hard to believe that I have now been serving as your associate conference minister of youth and young adult ministries for a year and a half. Though that seems like a short period of time (and it is) a lot has happened.

The thing that occupies most of the space in my memory is the people that I’ve met. They include the adults who love young people enough to give up their time, energy and sleep, pastors and other lay leaders who are committed to passing along a vibrant faith and the young people themselves, who may be relatively small in number, but who are large in energy and passion for living their faith in the world.

These people are the most valuable resource in the Iowa Conference and they carry out a vital ministry. This ministry, I believe, will not only make a difference in the lives of young people, but will be God’s new thing that transforms our church. That is why I, and the rest of the conference staff, do everything we can to support it. Let me tell you about a few of the ways in which I personally support those ministries.

Since we last gathered, I have done leadership development and discernment workshops with at least a dozen churches. My workshops vary in topic, but a couple key premises form their foundation: Leadership is to be shared through the generations. I always insist that these groups include both adults and young people. These leadership teams are almost always surprised at how dynamic conversation and activities with people of different ages can be. Discernment is a key component of planning and development ministries. When I facilitate a retreat or workshop, I do not believe it is my place to tell you the best ways to do ministry. You will always know your church and your community better than I could. I just help create the space for you to discern that call.

As I mentioned earlier, I’ve had the privilege to meet many adults who are passionate about passing along a vibrant church to future generations. These diverse people are hungry to grow stronger in their own faith and leadership skills. In an attempt to meet that deep hunger, I piloted this year a Southwest Association group I named, “Called to Lead.” Similar to our SAG (Support, Accountability and Growth) groups for clergy, this group is designed for youth leaders to tap into their sense of call to ministry and share resources and connect with colleagues who support and challenge them. This group has grown in deeper relationship with each other and with God in the past year. It will continue into next year and I will be starting at least one more group in the Central Association this coming fall.

I also have been excited to meet the many young people who have made their faith life a priority by participating in their local churches. They already do the work of the church through worship leadership and by occupying positions of leadership. My goal, through events like the one we have had in conjunction with this Annual Meeting, is to help them recognize that they are already using their gifts for ministry and that God is calling them to the larger task of transforming the church and the world.

If I were to name overarching themes for the past year, they would be connection and call. We connected together during events, through Facebook, videoconferencing and blogging. By making those connections with each other, we become more deeply rooted in the call God has on our lives.

I’ll conclude by telling you what I always tell church groups that are new to working with me: I’m making this up as I go along, so I’m sure I’ll make mistakes. Why don’t we make some mistakes together? I know I’ve never learned much of anything by getting it right the first time. By making those mistakes, I am sure that we will continue in this coming year to find better and better ways to stay connected and called; and, ultimately, better and better ways to pass along the Good News of Jesus Christ.

Innovating Tradition

2010-06-21T14:27:00.001-07:00

In mid-May (and again this August) I had the privilege of joining 15 ministry colleagues for the Foundations of Christian Leadership Program through the Leadership Education program at Duke Divinity School. The gathering was wonderful and thought-provoking from beginning to end, but one of the most memorable days was when we toured Cameron Indoor Stadium. For those of you who may not follow Duke University basketball, or even college basketball in general, let me explain: Duke University men's basketball wins a lot. They've made 15 final four appearances and have won four national titles including the 2009-2010 season. Not too shabby for what is a relatively small university.

What is stunning when you tour Cameron Indoor is its architecture and size. The outside of the building is Gothic, like the rest of that older portion of the campus. The inside is small -- it seats a little more than 9,000 people. That's smaller than many high school stadiums used to host state tournaments.

While in that venerated setting, then-Dean of Duke Divinity School L. Gregory Jones, explained to our group that Cameron Indoor has had many upgrades (including the addition of air conditioning only a few years ago) but has never been demolished because of the tradition it carries. When renovations are made, pains (and a lot of money) are taken to preserve the wood and brass fixtures.

So, Duke basketball, and more importantly, the church, he argued must hold tradition and innovation in tension in order to live into new ways of being. Traditioned Innovation, a term coined by the Duke Faith and Leadership folks, is defined this way, "rooted in the story of the Trinity, that invigorates the present and envisions the future by honoring the church’s past."

In other words, we can't move forward without also knowing where we have come from. A recent discussion about youth ministry highlights this very thought. In a recent article in The Christian Century, Kenda Creasy Dean, associate professor of youth, church and culture at Princeton Theological Seminary, argues that because our churches have lost a connection to and knowledge of our past, we have raised young people who are "almost-Christians." This argument is based on extensive research completed several years ago by the National Study of Youth and Religion which found that the majority of young people could not speak coherently about the basic tenets of their faith. She writes more extensively on this topic in her new book, Almost Christian: What the Faith of our Teenagers is Telling the American Church.

So, perhaps what we need to do is to delve into our past in order to go forward, look to where we've been in order envision where we might journey into the future. This doesn't mean just doing what we've always done because we've always done it that way or innovating for the sake of change; rather it calls us into living into God's call in new and exciting ways that honors where we've come from.

The Church at its Best

2010-06-02T13:45:00.000-07:00

I think it's safe to say that most of the time when I blog, I'm writing about something in the church that rubs me the wrong way, something that I see could use a little improvement. Then I challenge you to think and do something about it.

Today I'm going to depart from that routine a bit in order to tell you what you do well. As many of you know, my father passed away last week after a severe stroke. It was his second stroke in the span of only a year. Almost immediately after I got the call from my brother about this most recent stroke, I sent out emails and Facebook status updates about my father's condition. I was showered with messages of concerns and promises of prayer.

During the two weeks that followed, I was almost overwhelmed by the all the phone calls, emails and Facebook messages I received. After my father's passing, friends and colleagues called, emailed, sent flowers and some even attended his funeral and wake. I felt wrapped in "... the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding," (NRSV, Philippians 4:7) Thank you all for that love and support. I will be eternally grateful.

In the midst of all of this, it occurred to me that this is an example of the "church" at its best. Now, not all the people who expressed concern are church goers; some of them are not believers in God. But, I don't think that matters much. I believe (and they don't all have to agree with me) that these many people were being led by the Holy Spirit to show care and concern for me and my family.

This is truly when "church" is at it's best -- when we use our diverse "members" and their gifts to offer love and support to those who are hurting. All I can say is: Do more of this! Extend that same heartfelt support to friends, neighbors and even strangers. In doing this, you are answering God's call to spread the peace that surpasses understanding.

Opening Space for God

2010-05-17T10:57:00.000-07:00

At the beginning of the month, I had the pleasure of traveling with three of my fellow Iowa youth leaders to the LinK (Leaders in Koinonia) event at the national offices of the United Church of Christ in Cleveland. Now, for someone who spends at least two days a week traveling, this hardly seemed like a fun or restful getaway to me. Honestly, it was just one more appointment on my calendar to which I didn't give much thought.

Something unexpected happened at the event with about 65 other adult leaders of youth from across the UCC. I had no official responsibilities. I didn't have to lead worship or a workshop, which is quite unusual for me. Having those responsibilities taken away, I was able to relax, enjoy worship, learn from program presenters and get to know new colleagues.

I admit that I was surprised that this happened. I felt myself be inspired by the creativity of fellow youth leaders and energized to go out and try new things. Though we discussed the challenging realities of doing youth ministry at this time, I felt some of my usual cynicism melt away.

This event reminded me how important it is to set this time aside for communing with friends and colleagues. If I take some time and free myself of those "leadership" responsibilities, I can begin to see things anew and feel rested and more willing to take on the next big thing.

The Greek word, Koinonia means an intimate connection, friendship and fellowship. It was used often to describe relationships between people in the early church. Inherent in that definition, I suspect, is when people are gathered, God is also present. God has an amazing way of transforming us when we take a moment to sit back, relax and let things happen. This makes me think that perhaps this is the point of all ministry -- to open space that makes it easier for people to sit back and experience the presence of God.

So, I encourage you to find that time to open space for God to work. Maybe that takes place by taking a long walk in the morning or by attending a retreat or workshop. I'm sure you'll be amazed by the results.

Changing the Default Setting to "YES!"

2010-05-05T06:34:00.000-07:00

Since coming to the Iowa Conference UCC a little more than a year ago, there's something I noticed that makes me furrow my brow in confusion. When I ask people to serve on a committee, lead a program or otherwise serve in leadership , people almost always say, "No." The response isn't usually, "No, I have something on my calendar that day," or "I just don't have room for another commitment." Those things may be true, but more often I think the default response is just to say, "No," to these things.

A colleague of mine, who has lived in Iowa nearly her entire life, confirmed that my observation is accurate. She explained that this practice is a culture norm for Scandinavian people, many of whom settled the plains of Iowa so many years ago. In that culture, you always say no at least once, possibly even twice, to such a query because you would appear too full of pride if you simply accepted the offer.

So, I have become accustomed to asking people at least three times to serve in a leadership position. I now find it pleasantly surprising if people say yes after I ask the question once.

I'm not trying to negate the importance of humility -- sinful pride causes us to put our own agenda in front of God's. But, I think that whether or not to accept a leadership position is not really a question of pride; it's a question of how we share the God-given talents we have been granted by our Creator.

In 1 Corinthians 12, the Apostle Paul writes, "Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone."

This scripture reminds us that we have been granted a variety of gifts from God. Implicit in this statement, I think, is that we are obligated to use those gifts in the service of God. Often, God calls us to use gifts that we don't even realize that we have.

I wouldn't have expected to be doing youth and young adult ministries in the Iowa Conference, or anywhere for that matter. It took a few people inviting me to apply for youth ministry positions in local churches for me to discover my gifts for working with young people. It took an assignment for a seminary class to help me realize I had gifts for writing curriculum. It took an entire community of people to help me believe in those gifts God had given me.

So, the next time someone asks you to do some new ministry in your church, don't go to your default setting of saying, "No." Actually spend some time in prayer and discern what God's will is for your life and ministry. You just may be surprised by what gifts and resources God gives you along the way.

Giving Witness: Why I love Jesus

2010-04-19T14:01:00.000-07:00

"The Language of God," a new ad from the United Church of Christ went "viral" last Friday, April 16. You won't see it during the commercial breaks of your favorite television shows. Instead, you'll see by clicking on a link in a friend's Facebook status or in an email message.

The minute and a half ad shows numerous images loosely categorized under heading like "Love," Compassion," "Mercy," and "Justice." It reminds us that God speaks those languages every day, not (usually) as a booming voice in the sky, but through regular people like you and me. Passing along this ad is an easy way to pass that message along.

My Iowa Conference colleague, Rev. Jonna Jensen, said in a sermon yesterday at the Southeast Association meeting, that giving witness is the traditional way we pass along these stories. But, those of us in the mainline Protestant church have gotten away from giving witness, even though we have great stories to tell.

I think there are a couple of reasons for this phenomenon. We've just come from a time when it was pretty safe to assume that everyone already knew Jesus' story. Almost everyone went to some church. And, even if you didn't, you were familiar with the Christian story because it was so embedded in our culture. More recently, those of us who espouse a more progressive Christianity have resisted giving witness because we do not want to be confused with some of our more conservative Christian Evangelical brothers and sisters who sometimes use their witness in manipulative and damaging ways.

But, sisters and brothers, the time has come to shed those inhibitions we have about giving witness. God has worked powerfully in our lives and we SHOULD NOT keep that story to ourselves. In an effort to model the giving of witness (behind the relative safety of my computer screen), let me tell you a little today about why I love Jesus:

When I was a deeply cynical young adult, God led me to a UCC church that welcomed me despite my abrasive attitude and told me it was OK to have questions about my faith. God then spoke to me, an angry and frustrated mess, through the 2000-year-old gospel text and called ME to be a minister of that gospel. When I was in seminary, I learned that Jesus' welcomed people in outrageous, even radical, ways: He ate dinner with sinners and healed the sick and was kind to people with whom no one else would even have a conversation. I realized what it means to believe in a God that would become a human just like us to stand beside us. laugh with us, cry with us and suffer with us to death. Jesus transforms me each and every day, calling me to be full of more grace and mercy and hope and love than I could ever muster on my own.

You may have a story like this. If you do, share it and pass along this great ad that the UCC just created. If you don't have such a story, take a moment to listen to other people's stories and try to believe that there are churches out there that want to be tolerant rather than exclusionary, and transforming rather than rigid.

Maybe you even want to try one of our churches some time. I did and look what happened to me!

A Witness to Change

2010-04-05T17:01:00.000-07:00

As my first tour rounded the south and west rims of the Grand Canyon, I could scarcely believe what I was seeing -- a canyon that delves a mile deep and 23 miles around the perimeter of the rim. The Colorado River, enormous at the bottom, looks miniscule (and sometimes not even visible to the naked eye) from above. The thousands of layers of rock that make up the the canyon make both striking and subtle changes in the shifting daylight.

My wonder and awe deepened as tour guides informed us about the natural phenomena that went into creating this massive spectacle. The "basement" levels of rock began forming 5 billion (yes, billion) years ago. Through the shifting of tectonic plates, the Colorado Plateau formed some of the height we see in the canyon today. Then, "only" 5-6 million years ago the Colorado River began moving sediment, carving layer after layer of rock in order to form the canyon walls you see today.

I couldn't help but think, "This is the kind of change that a lot of water and a lot of time can produce."

It's hard not to feel humbled by such knowledge and splendor. Who am I? -- a tiny drop of water that rolls along such a vast rock. Being made to feel so insignificant is healthy, I think. I believe God has called me to try to effect change in the church. Everyday I try to do that the best I can. Many days I don't feel like I do much of anything.

Then, I look at the Grand Canyon, an amazing witness to the power of change and the vast amounts of time it takes to create it. Though I am humbled, I am also inspired because I see tangibly the many forces it takes, working together over long periods of time to create stunning change.

Although this change happened over millions of years, it still evolves in tremendous quantity every day. One tour guide pointed out that 50,000 TONS of sediment are pushed out of the canyon everyday by the Colorado River. All those rain drops and pebbles really add up.

Friends and colleagues in ministry do not be discouraged because you don't seem to be able to effect change RIGHT NOW. Take a lesson from the Grand Canyon: keep applying steady pressure, take advantage of the major shifts and you, too, will be witness to stunning change.

Evidence of spring

2010-03-02T13:53:00.000-08:00

The snow may not have melted here in Iowa, but I see some evidence that spring is near.

I travel to churches throughout the Iowa Conference UCC. I spend most of that time talking with the adult leaders who run Christian education and youth programs. Our conversations tend to focus on the struggles – the lack of time and other resources they have for their ministries.

Because they are immersed in the day-to-day difficulties of running these programs, they don’t see what I see.

These are lay people, often parents, who are so determined that children have a place in church that they resurrect Sunday School and youth groups and plan summer mission trips and local service projects. They give up vacation and free time, and probably sleep, to make sure that lessons are planned, supplies are purchased and snacks are prepared.

These people are not often pastors or paid staff. They are regular people who want to make sure that young people learn to live a life of faith. I’m in awe of their efforts, which happen between full-time jobs, parenting and a variety of other personal and professional obligations.

Although it is often a slow process, these people are successful. They see Sunday school numbers rise from two or three young people to 30. Over time, they begin to hear young people recite back to them something from a lesson they taught. They receive hugs from children as they enter the sanctuary for Sunday worship. They watch these children grow and become teenagers and young adults grounded in their faith.

Why do they do this? The simple answer is because they love God and the church and they want to see that exist for future generations. A leadership team at Immanuel Reformed UCC in Klemme, Iowa articulated a slightly more profound reason this weekend during a workshop I was leading: “Our calling is to pass on a welcoming and open-minded faith through love, words and example so that each generation can make it their own.”

Pretty amazing, huh?

For all you youth leaders out there, I want to say this: Thank you, thank you, thank you for the ways you serve our church and young people each and every day. You are amazing creations of God who are living out your call to serve the church in ways that often go unnoticed. But, I notice you. You help remind me that “spring” is right around the corner.

From the Mountaintop to the Valley

2010-02-19T06:54:00.000-08:00

After spending the weekend thinking about youth and young adult ministry, you’d think I would have wanted a break. But, I sat in worship last Sunday with CYYAM (Council for Youth and Young Adult Ministries) members at Dover Congregational UCC in Westlake, Ohio and the wheels didn’t stop turning during the scripture and sermon.

“Now about eight days after these sayings Jesus^* took with him Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray. ²⁹And while he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white. ³⁰Suddenly they saw two men, Moses and Elijah, talking to him. ³¹They appeared in glory and were speaking of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. ³²Now Peter and his companions were weighed down with sleep; but since they had stayed awake,^* they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him. ³³Just as they were leaving him, Peter said to Jesus, ‘Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings,^* one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah’—not knowing what he said. ³⁴While he was saying this, a cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were terrified as they entered the cloud. ³⁵Then from the cloud came a voice that said, ‘This is my Son, my Chosen;^* listen to him!’ ³⁶When the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silent and in those days told no one any of the things they had seen.” (Luke 9: 28-36, NRSV)

In this story, Jesus’ disciples have this amazing, life-altering experience, and then choose to say nothing when they get down from the mountain. I’d imagine that the valley looked a lot different to the disciples. They had no idea what to do with their new vision.

Immediately, my mind leapt to youth ministry. So many times, well-intentioned adults provide young people with amazing mountaintop experiences – retreats, national events, mission trips and week-long camps. Young people come down from these “highs” and often have no where to go with that energy.

I thought about how often the church forms youth ministry around such mountaintop experiences. Young people and a few adult leaders go off to one of these events. Young people come back, filled with a spiritual fire that inspires them to see new possibilities for ministry in the church. But those ministry efforts falter when they try to implement it. Worse yet, they go back and face opposition from the very people who they thought would support them.

When this happens, adults in the church risk teaching young people that faith only happens on the mountaintop, not in the everyday realities of life. Or adults communicate that the church wants young people "over there" rather than be an integral part of the life of the church.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with going to the mountaintop. We all need to get away and recharge our spiritual batteries and see things from a different perspective. But, we also need to be equipped to live our faith AFTER these life-altering experiences in the valley, which HASN’T been altered.

We shouldn’t be surprised when young people come back from the mountaintop altered and want to do something differently. So, please embrace these new ideas, even if you don’t know exactly what they mean or how they might work. The disciples sure didn’t understand after seeing the transfigured Jesus.

The location of youth ministry?

2010-02-09T14:19:00.000-08:00

Location. Location. Location.

These three words very succinctly named the most important things about real estate. We have no such pithy phrase about youth ministry in the church.

Choices about the location of youth ministry have had an enormous impact on the numbers of young people who remain in mainline churches. In this week’s Theolog (the blog of The Christian Century magazine), Kate Murphy, an interim Presbyterian minister in North Carolina, writes about her fears that the youth ministry we have been doing (and that she had willingly participated in) is actually killing the church.

She explains that the problem with creating a “youth program” is that young people are never really integrated into the life of the church. And, when you see a young person actually participating in the life of the church, it seems terribly odd.

I’ve frequently encountered this location problem when trying to engage recent high school graduates in the life of the church. Because they’ve been “programmed” their entire life, they don’t know how to be part of the regular life of the church when they become adults. Instead, they expect that there be yet another program for them. What else would they think given how they’ve been raised?

I would assert that the location of youth ministry should not be in program, but in relationship. I’m willing to bet that church members are still in church because of a relationship they had with someone who was already there. We remain members in churches because of the relationships we form there.

While I was doing a workshop in Larchwood UCC in the Iowa Conference UCC this past weekend, one Sunday School teacher was bubbling with excitement as she talked about how children from her class would come up to her and give her a hug when they saw her in worship. She yearned for others in the congregation to know the joy of these relationships.

Not only are these relationships the glue that holds us together as humans, but they are the primary way in which we demonstrate God’s love here on earth. Remember that Jesus said, “‘Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.’” (Mark 10: 14)

So, perhaps we should make OUR pithy phrase: Relationship. Relationship. Relationship.

That sounds like a good location for youth ministry to me.

Putting myself out of a job

2010-02-02T11:27:00.000-08:00

Sometime late last summer, I decided to hold an informal retreat for young adults. I thought late December might be a better time because of vacations and school breaks. Despite what I thought would be good timing, not enough people signed up for the event and it was canceled.

I always try to learn from failure, so I sent a Facebook message to some of the young adults I know in the Iowa Conference UCC to see where I might have gone wrong. Of course, timing was named as a possible impediment. (I was not surprised. Not having enough time is always a problem.) Then, I asked those who responded what kinds of things they might want to do if we attempted such an event again. One person suggested that we could hold a service project. That might get more people to attend.

That suggestion really got me thinking. I wondered if the real reason young adults didn’t attend this (and other events) is because there simply isn’t interest in gathering with a bunch of other young adults. After all, young adults can be a lot of really different people – young parents, college students, people just entering the workforce, etc. Just because they are in their 20s doesn’t necessarily mean their lives have much in common.

Perhaps what young adults (and all people) really crave is a deeper sense of purpose and mission – tangible ways to live out their faith in the world. In the gospel, Jesus most often taught by example. He showed us how to reach out to marginalized people. By doing this, he taught us that what we believe has EVERYTHING to do with what we’re doing in our lives. Living faith gives people a sense of significance that few other things can.

Having a gospel-filled sense of purpose is something that ALL people of faith can rally around. You don’t have to be young, old or middle aged to show God’s love through acts of justice, mercy and kindness. Don’t try to gather people by age group – just give them a solid sense of purpose. That transcends age. And, maybe, people will MAKE time to do things infused with this higher purpose.

I know this suggestion might sound a little weird from someone whose job it is to support youth and young adult ministries in the Iowa Conference UCC. But, I’m willing to put myself out of a job if all people in churches are engaged in relevant and transformational mission and ministry. Go do it!

The Mystery of Water (and Ministry)

2010-01-25T14:26:00.000-08:00

As some of you might have seen on my status updates on Facebook lately, I’ve had lots of experiences with water. Namely, my house, purchased only two months ago, has taken water in the basement twice; plus, I’ve had to shovel more snow and ice than I have in my whole life. This makes me more than a bit grumpy.

When I’m dealing with water in its many forms, I mostly spend a lot of time talking with God (in a very sarcastic tone) about how I’d like to have my next call be to a warmer climate. However, in my humbler moments, I manage to contemplate on a slightly higher plane. That’s when I ask, “So, what am I supposed to learn from this?”

Water is a powerful element – it always manages to find its way through impediments of all sorts. Water cleans things more effectively than anything else. All living things require water to survive.

One day I realized that after going down to my basement to mop up water for the billionth time, what do I do when I finish? Go upstairs and get (you guessed it) a glass of water. In that single moment, I experienced both the powerful aspect of water as well as its nourishing and refreshing nature. How amazing!

It’s no wonder that water serves as a central image in Christian practice. When Christians are baptized, water is sprinkled on their forehead or they are dunked in water. Water welcomes us into the community of other believers – perhaps as a reminder of how a relationship with God is challenging, powerful, nourishing, refreshing, mysterious and even sometimes … annoying. I’d say that’s about a perfect symbol for committing to a life of faith.

Recently I was talking to a woman in one of our Iowa Conference UCC churches about the challenge of getting their Christian Education program back up and running. As I listened to what she said, I was reminded of all the water with which I had been dealing. The challenge of managing it seemed overwhelming and even impossible at times, but eventually the work got done, perhaps in ways I didn’t expect. The experience of doing ministry is really no different.

I’d say I’ve learned a few things from all this water about the mystery of God’s presence in this world. Its complicated nature is powerful, yet nourishing; challenging, yet refreshing -- just like living a life of faith.

So, when is my call to one of those desert states going to happen? I’m sure I could learn something really valuable from all that sand!

Including Youth Leadership

2010-01-19T14:45:00.000-08:00

I don’t know about you, but I’ve learned a lot by watching people do what they do. For example, I model a good deal of my approach to dealing with young people based on one high school teacher I had. What magical thing did he do? He asked me how I was doing. Not revolutionary, but I think of him when I make those simple relationship-building things a priority in my ministry.

The reality is that we learn more from what people DO than what people SAY. That is why I try to model another important aspect of youth ministry in all that I do: include young people as leaders in every aspect of ministry. So, I design all of my workshops in a way that can reach both youth and adults.

On paper, this is an easy idea to grasp. But, because our church culture has not operated this way in the past, some people from churches are understandably confused about my insistence on youth leadership. We’re used to adults shuttling off to some room to learn HOW to do youth ministry absent of any young voices in the room.

As some of you know, I regularly lead a workshop in which church leadership teams discern why they do their youth ministry so that they can more effectively carry out their work. It is VERY important to include young people in this particular workshop because the group’s ultimate goal is to design a new program or redesign an existing one so that it is more consistent with the church’s purpose. If young people have nothing to do with this process, then your ministry runs the risk of not being interesting or relevant to them. Plus, you’ve lost the opportunity to have a discussion about the purpose of church and the nature of discipleship with young people and adults in the same room. There’s a great learning moment lost.

So, I encourage you all to think about where young people can be included in the ministries of your church. And, when you sign up for one of my workshops, please know that young people can and SHOULD always be included in them. After all, Jesus didn't just call disciples who were old or young. He called all kinds of people.

A joyful lesson

2010-01-12T07:47:00.000-08:00

When I travel to different churches throughout the Iowa Conference UCC, during worship I usually bring greetings to that church on behalf of the conference. I almost always say that these visits are one of my favorite parts of my job. I get to visit a new church nearly every Sunday and experience the diversity of people who are worshiping God in UCC churches. I’m not kidding -- I really think this is one of the best parts of my job.

This past Sunday I found myself in the pews at Ankeny UCC in Ankeny, Iowa, a suburban area just north of Des Moines. This is a small, but lively congregation that has recently attracted a few younger families. I was delighted to see small children crawling around the sanctuary and adding life to this already lively congregation.

One of the best moments came during communion. In a typical, reverent (and somewhat somber way) people were coming to the table to receive communion. During that rather quiet moment, one of the babies in the sanctuary began to giggle. His giggles kept building upon one another and the sanctuary was filled with that joyful sound. I could have listened to him all day long.

While listening to those giggles during communion, I realized that baby’s attitude is the one we should have during this important ritual. Indeed we are remembering the painful sacrifice that Jesus made in his crucifixion. We are also remembering the salvation and liberation that came out of his death – and, later, resurrection.
I’m pretty sure that Jesus would not want us to treat this important ritual like a sacred funeral. I don’t think he’d find anything wrong with hearing shouts of joy or ecstatic giggling or even upbeat music during communion.

That small child really taught me something last Sunday, even though he was completely unaware of what was happening. This situation wouldn’t have happened if he had been shuttled off into a nursery, far away from the sanctuary. This experience reminded me that we should embrace having young and old present in worship – we learn from each other in all kinds of wonderful and unexpected ways.

So, I encourage you to bring and/or welcome babies and small children to church. The noise they make can become deep spiritual lessons that can only emerge from the innocent.

Forgetting the Former [Church] Things

2010-01-05T14:12:00.000-08:00

Isaiah 43: 18-21 (NRSV)

Do not remember the former things,
or consider the things of old.
¹⁹I am about to do a new thing;
now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?
I will make a way in the wilderness
and rivers in the desert.
²⁰The wild animals will honour me,
the jackals and the ostriches;
for I give water in the wilderness,
rivers in the desert,
to give drink to my chosen people,
²¹ the people whom I formed for myself
so that they might declare my praise.

This passage from the prophet Isaiah is one I’ve spent quite a bit of time with recently. It’s formed the basis of a sermon I’ve preached in quite a few churches in the Iowa Conference. I talk about how God is always calling us to do new things, just like Isaiah was calling the exiled Israelites in this passage. The reality is that we do not always heed that call; we are held back by outdated thinking and, most importantly fear.

Since I am retiring this sermon, I thought I’d share a part of it now with those of you who may not have had a chance to hear it in person. Let me know what you think:

“I’m sure we don’t have to think very hard to see the connections [with the Israelites context] to our current realities. Mainline Christianity, not long ago was the bedrock of society in the United States. Nearly every one of our churches sits in or near downtown areas, within walking distance of county courthouses and city halls. Though our buildings may not have crumbled, our elite status certainly has. At one time not long ago, nothing else happened on Sunday morning because everyone went to church. Now Sunday morning worship competes with club sports, golf games, shopping and even television news shows. No longer do most people consider church their first and most important option on that day or any day.

Even worse, the perception of church for many outsiders is not a positive one – they think of church people as hypocrites – people who SAY they are about love and peace and justice and mercy and then turn around and get embroiled in arguments over what color the new carpet in the sanctuary is going to be. Or even worse yet, those “outsiders” perceive Christians as those who ignore the real problems in their communities or are content to simply throw a little bit of money at it. As hard as it is to admit, these “outsiders” have a point.

I think too often we insulate ourselves, like those Israelite exiles, by clinging to our glory days. Many people in the pews remember the glory days of the 1950s and 60s when churches were bursting at the seams with young families and summer church camps were the place to be. We remember the time when we could afford and had need for two full-time pastors in the church. Too often we cling to the glory days, without acknowledging the problems that probably also existed.

I admit that I am not old enough to remember these glory days. In my memory I only know the church (both Protestant and Catholic) as a dying institution. But, it seems to me that those glory days may have had a quantity of people and activities, but did not necessarily include quality. Based on where we are now, I’m guessing that most people were taught NOT to be passionate disciples of Jesus Christ; but, rather they were groomed to be good committee members who would maintain church buildings and fellowship programs and would write checks toward these endeavors without going very far outside the walls of their own church. Thinking about Isaiah’s words, I’m pretty sure that this is not the best way that we may “declare God’s praise.”

But, how do we forget all of this – the good and bad – as the scripture is commanding? My answer is that I don’t think we can – at least as we think of forgetting as the complete erasure of memory.

I told you earlier that it was a miracle that I am standing before you. I spent most of my young adulthood perfectly content to stay away from the church, harboring my bitterness and pain. But, life had become increasingly uncomfortable in those years, eventually prompting me to have the radical thought of going back to church. When that crazy notion passed through my mind, I immediately thought of my friend and co-worker, Brett, who was not much older than me but who played in his church’s handbell choir and took vacation time to go with junior high students to confirmation camp. It occurred to me that perhaps his church wouldn’t be so bad. He wasn’t that bad after all. Despite years of being mocked for his handbell playing, my friend Brett welcomed me to his church when I asked. I felt led powerfully back into the arms of the church and, though I never played handbells myself, I found myself singing in the choir and chaperoning youth events.

But, the most amazing part came when I was unable to find a new job. I was working as a professional journalist in the Chicago suburbs and was desperate to leave. Because of my newfound faith, I was looking for jobs in public relations for nonprofit organizations. But, I had gotten no offers in 18 months – an unthinkable reality in the late 1990s. Then, I finally asked God, out of anger and desperation and frustration, “God, what do you want me to do?” Immediately, I felt as though God had picked me up by the collar and shaken me to my senses. Give up all of this and follow me into ministry. And, because enough people in my life told me that I wasn’t crazy, I started seminary 10 months later.

As you might imagine, the real work began then. I had to make peace with my history with the church and reclaim the parts of that tradition that were important to my own beliefs and spirituality now – even if they were expressed in radically different ways. The unusual path I took to get to this new place, gives me a decided advantage in our churches today. Because I have spent my own time in the wilderness, pulling apart what is wrong with the church, I am not particularly attached to what the church is or to visions of what it could be. That makes me both your most passionate disciple and your worst critic.

So, it’s rather funny that people should ask me that second question I told you about when I started. What is my vision for youth and young adult ministry? The honest answer is that I am clearer about what the church is NOT than what it is going to be. The visioning is something we must do together in order to perceive God’s new thing. To do that we must detach, not simply forget, the former things and the things of old. We cannot be overly attached to the glory days or to the mounting problems we face or, especially, to the FEAR we have of moving forward.

For many years now, I have been an avid practitioner of yoga. I have learned, and am still learning, that fear and the attachment to that emotion will hold you back from things like headstands and handstands far more than your own strength or flexibility. It is only when you abandon that fear, and take on a more playful attitude that you are able to surpass your own expectations. But, knowing this in your mind is one things, actually letting yourself flip upside down on top of your head is quite another.

I think it is not an accident that this chapter of Isaiah says twice to the Israelites to “Fear Not!” God is not coddling us while we get over our fear, but instead commands us, to get over ourselves. There is no reason to cling to those former things or the things of old because I’ve got your back, God says.

When we abandon this fear, then we can stand on our head or our hands and perceive bits and pieces of God’s new thing. We perceive the world described by this breathtaking piece of prophetic poetry in which the wild animals, the jackals and the ostriches, already give God great praise; we will perceive that God has already made the rivers burst forth in the desert, even though we’ve been wandering barefoot on the burning sand, dying of thirst. Indeed, if we have been formed for the purpose of declaring God’s praise, we will no longer hold onto our fear and stay within the four walls of our church. We will instead welcome with open arms young people and all manner of outcasts into our midst. None of us may know the exact consequences of that decision, I can assure you that the church will not remain the same as it is now or it has been in the past.

If we do perceive that vision – we will not grieve the loss of our “status” in our culture. We would know that we were never meant to have it in the first place. We were meant to be a rag tag bunch of outsiders who need the church home because we are unwelcome in so many other places in this world. We would know that we are meant to sing a transformative song to a suffering world – one that does not address problems comfortably from our pocketbooks or through simple acts of charity, but one that includes the poor, the young, the outcast in creating a new world full of justice and mercy and hope. That may be uncomfortable for those of us who have been in the church for a long time, but ultimately that is the place that more and more people will want to be to live out their passionate faith in Jesus Christ.”

The Year of "I Can"

2009-12-29T10:15:00.000-08:00

As some of you may have seen on my Facebook status about a week ago, I had quite a revelation on my yoga mat. I’ve certainly noticed how my attitude affects what postures I can and can’t do. But, this time I really noticed how much I think, “I can’t do that” while doing my practice. I really do it quite often. When I think the “I can’t" thoughts, I definitely can’t do whatever posture I’m attempting.

I know I’m not the only one with the “I can’t” attitude. I encounter it all the time when I’m working with church leadership teams. Most often, young people and the adults who work with them will dream up wonderful new ideas for making their ministry exciting and new. Almost immediately, the “I can’t” attitude will sink in. Then, I’ll hear: “It’s a great idea BUT we don’t have enough time, money, people, support, etc.” The great idea dies there.

Given that our attitudes can profoundly affect what we do, I wonder how often we defeat ourselves and our churches before we even try something. What are we so afraid of? Failure? Although failure is a painful process, I know from personal experience that you learn the most from it. So, the new ministry idea fails? Try again with much greater knowledge about how something will work. What's the big deal?

Jesus didn’t really seem like the greatest success story at first. The Christian story is all about light emerging from darkness, death bringing life. If we go into our ministries, or our spiritual practices, with a positive intention, perhaps we will learn to succeed beyond our imaginations rather than cutting ourselves off before we have the chance to try.

So, declare with me the year of “I can”! I can’t wait to see what grows!

Christmas’ Identity Crisis

2009-12-22T11:30:00.000-08:00

I'm not one of those people pounding their fist on the table, insisting that we should “put the Christ back in Christmas.” I say, “Happy Holidays” instead of Merry Christmas when I’m talking to a stranger. I send generic season’s greeting cards because I want to be sensitive to the many friends I have that practice different religious traditions.

Still, I have to admit that I’ve been bothered lately about discussions of Christmas traditions that have little or nothing to do with Christmas. People put up Christmas trees, buy gifts and have parties for family or friends. But, in the U.S. at least, people do not really connect these practices with any kind of religious tradition.

This really is too bad. The Advent and Christmas seasons are infused with rich theology that shows the age-old struggle between darkness and light. In her book, Night Visions: Searching the Shadows of Advent and Christmas, Jan. L. Richardson writes and reflects on the dark times of Advent so as to more fully embrace the light that bursts forth at Christmas: “The festival of Christmas offers a winter thaw, an opportunity to ponder new birth when the landscape around us, and perhaps within us, seems lifeless. The celebration of Christ’s birth beckons us to consider what has lain dormant in our own lives, and what new life lies waiting beneath the surface. As women and as men, during this season we share with Mary and Joseph in giving birth to the holy.”

By embracing the fullness of this tradition, we remind ourselves that Advent and Christmas (and nearly all Christian seasons and holidays) are rooted in the deep, human struggle to make sense of our chaotic and sometimes senseless world. For Christians, we are beautifully reminded at this time of year that God became incarnate not as a great and powerful warrior but as a small, vulnerable child -- presumably to offer us a beacon of hope in our struggle.

If we got back to the deeper meaning of this season, we might find ourselves attracting back to church those who struggle with these questions everyday, often alone. That would indeed be a beacon of hope – to provide a safe space for those struggling between the darkness and light in their own right.

So, for at least a few moments, take a break from all of the busy holiday preparations and reflect on what it means for you to have the light break through your own darkness. What does it mean for you to be part of God’s creative, hopeful energy?

Peace and joy to you in this holiday season.

Inconvenient Ministry

2009-12-14T14:30:00.000-08:00

Very frequently, I hear complaints about how it’s so difficult to get young people in church on Sundays. Families are over-scheduled and it’s their only downtime. Young people would rather stay out at night and sleep in the mornings. These are all understandable realities.

But, still, most church leaders seem to ignore what they are hearing. Recently, I asked some young people what they do on Friday evenings in their small town. A young woman responded that young people tended to just walk around town with nowhere to go.

The leadership team with which I was working still found themselves stuck for a moment on the Sunday morning thing. I reminded them that it seemed like their open window of time was in the late evening. Fortunately, this group altered their plans to accommodate this reality. But, many more churches still insist on using the same times and the same programs to do the same thing.

I understand why adults wouldn’t want to be out late in the weekday evenings. I know I would much rather be getting ready for bed than hanging out with young people in the late evening hours. It’s simply not my “high energy” time of the day.

But, doing ministry is not always convenient. If you want to bring Christ’s love to new people, you have to reach them at the times and places where they ARE, not where you WISH they would be.

Christians have been doing this inconvenient ministry for centuries. The Christmas holiday was not set on Dec. 25 because we have any definitive record of when Jesus was actually born. Rather, the holiday was set, at least in part, because it takes place at the Winter Solstice. In Northern Europe, Christians wanted to convert pagans and they borrowed the date and practices of Yule in order to reach them. That is why we hang mistletoe and decorate trees at Christmas – because we adapted to the practices of the people around us.

What we need to do is go back to our roots and do something inconvenient for a change. It just might create something new and wonderful – like Christmas!

Have a wonderful and blessed holiday season!

The Discipline of Opening to Grace

2009-11-17T13:30:00.000-08:00

As some of you may know, I am an avid practitioner of yoga. In the last four or five years, it’s become my primary spiritual practice. Nearly every day, I get up and do some movement and/or meditation to get started. Doing this keeps me sane and centered in positive spiritual energy.

When I moved to Des Moines almost a year ago, one of my first priorities was to find a new studio at which to take yoga classes. I’ve studied several different kinds of yoga; I even completed a yoga teacher training in Kundalini yoga about two years ago.

This time I found a studio that practices Anusara yoga. Though I had heard about this type of yoga, I knew very little about it before taking classes at Shakti Yoga studio in Des Moines.

During one class a few months ago, we were asked to experience “opening to grace,” one of the foundational principles of Anusara. We were asked to do this by focusing a little more attention on our back body. Now, I don’t know about you, but I don’t give much thought to my back body on a daily basis. All of our attention is on the front of our body because that is how we see and interact with other people. But, our back body, our instructor explained, is that place where we can experience grace – precisely because we CAN’T see or feel what is behind us very easily. Our back body reminds us that both the spiritual and the physical universe are very mysterious.
During difficult poses, she invited us to imagine that our back body was supported. The results for me were amazing, but not in the most obvious way. I didn’t suddenly acquire the ability to do challenging poses; but, my feeling in the poses became radically different. I became spiritually aware of the support that is always with me and within me. I tried new things because I trusted that someone/something was there to support me.

Opening to grace is not only fundamental to the practice of Anusara yoga, but to Christianity as well. We are taught to trust that grace is always present – a free flowing gift from God, which we only need to accept, not earn.

Practicing this on my yoga mat made me think about what it would be like to live “open to grace” all the time. If I trusted that God supported me in everything I do and that God gives me everything I need, I’m sure I would be less cautious and take more risks.

I hope that everyone reading this will find a way this week to “open to grace,” and go ahead and take some risks and just see how God supports you.

Ministry of Radical Hospitality

2009-11-05T11:38:00.000-08:00

My colleagues and I wound our way through the darkened corridors before dawn. We looked around for the signs that would lead us to the chapel at the Benedictine Mission House in Schuyler, Nebraska. A silent monk rounded the corner just as we saw the sign leading us to the chapel and entered the bronze doors. Without words opened our prayer and song books to the correct page and motioned for us to sit down.

A few minutes after sitting in silence, the bell rang, everyone kneeled and morning prayer began in the pre-dawn hours. The liturgy felt awkward. I was working pretty hard to keep up, not knowing the order – the times to sit, stand, bow, sing and pray.

But, not once, did I feel unwelcome. Even in the silence, the monks greeted us with smiles and warmth. My spirit was nurtured in this unfamiliar, but wonderful experience.

I walk into a new United Church of Christ church nearly every Sunday in the Iowa Conference. I am most grateful on the Sundays when a member welcomes me with a handshake and give me some directions to where I need to prepare for worship. I am sad to say that this doesn’t happen nearly as often as I would like.

I am entering churches as a scheduled visitor, often the guest preacher. What is the experience of people who come unannounced? What if the visitor was young, from another city, had never visited a church before or was a different race from the majority of people there? I bet that it would be even more awkward and possibly unfriendly experience for them.

Most often when churches think about hospitality, they are trying to boost their membership. But, that is not really the reason we do hospitality. In the Rule of St. Benedict, they say of hospitality, “All guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ, for him himself will say: I was a stranger and you welcomed me (Matt. 25-35).”

If we think of welcoming each stranger as Christ, hospitality becomes a radical practice of faith, not simply a way to bringing in new people to fill the pews. We are not corporate agencies that want more people to patronize their business to leverage a higher profit; we are a community of believers who want to welcome people who are rejected in many places in the world. We do this because that is the way Jesus lives his life.

My Dream for the Church is …

2009-10-26T14:51:00.000-07:00

Finishing the aforementioned phrase is one of the ways that I conclude a workshop that I frequently do with churches in the Iowa Conference UCC. As you might imagine, the ways that people finish that sentence varies from person to person, church to church.

Embedded in all those “dreams” is a certain amount of tension. Often people will finish the phrase with ideal things like having a transformational, safe, fun and relevant church. They talk of dreams of having adults who are all investing in mentoring young people. They speak of a church that values listening to one another and speaking kindly. Mixed in those ideal lists, however, tends to be the practical. People will lift up having a church that is able to meet its budget or will have enough young people for a youth group or will stay open for generations to come.

I certainly understand those realities. The majority of the churches I work with are in small, rural places that have lost a large percentage of their population in just the last few decades. This reality is painful, difficult, even tragic. These small churches compare themselves to churches in growing, urban areas and aspire to be them – even if their population couldn’t possibly support such growth.

When these realities creep into the conversation, so does the fear.

Fear is almost never helpful when you’re in a situation that calls you to change. Fear holds you back from trying something new because you’re afraid you won’t have enough money or people or other resources.

At the Iowa Conference UCC, we talk often about how the Gospel calls individuals and communities to change. In a new brochure we’ll be using soon, we cite Matthew 18: 1-3 in which Jesus was asked, “‘Who will be the greatest in God’s realm?’” Jesus replies, “‘Unless you change … you’ll never even enter God’s realm!’”

Although change is often painful and difficult, it is our higher call. So, I encourage you to dream big and DO something to make it happen. All the great success stories, including Jesus’ life, death and resurrection, begin this way.

Seeing the ‘through line’

2009-10-19T10:05:00.000-07:00

Many years ago, I took a weekend “course” through a local community college on mountain biking. We packed our bikes, camping equipment and everything else we needed and headed to northern Wisconsin.

I had no experience of mountain biking; consequently, I was terrified. When I, or anyone else for that matter, am terrified, I am hypersensitive to all the things in my way. I could only see the rocks, tree roots and fallen branches on the narrow trails we were riding.

After a morning of frustration, our instructors stopped to give us a piece of advice: “Look for the ‘through line,’” they said. “If you fixate on a rock, you’re going to hit the rock.” What tried to do then was fix your eyes on the CLEAR part of the path, rather than on the places where you were sure your tire was going to get caught. Mountain biking gets a lot easier if you do look for the ‘through line.’ But, it’s hard to give up the fear that drives your need to fixate on the problems in front of you.

It’s not a whole lot different in the church. I was at the Southeast Association of the Iowa Conference UCC Fall Meeting yesterday to lead a workshop. As we were gathering, I had a few typical conversations with folks about how frustrated they are about keeping young families, children and youth in their congregations. We began by fixating on the road blocks.

But, I invited them to having conversations that helped think about things in a different way. I asked them to their BEST stories they had about experiencing and/or doing youth ministry. They told their stories of the best Christian disciples they’d ever known. Finally, I asked them to finish the following sentence: “My dream for the church is …”

In these conversations, we certainly encountered the problems we still have, but we primarily celebrated what we did that was GOOD! Many people arrived at the conclusion that you shouldn’t wait for your youth group to be large enough or perfect enough before you do something. You do something with the people and the resources you have NOW.

So, what are your BEST stories of youth ministry? Who was the person who BEST lived out their faith? What is your DREAM for the church? Share them here!

The Power of Story

2009-10-12T12:10:00.001-07:00

Frequently, I am asked to teach Sunday School or a workshop after church services in the Iowa Conference UCC where I serve as associate conference minister for youth and young adult ministries. When I first began to get those requests, I brainstormed ways to make it most effective. I know that I could teach a Bible study or provide some other educational program. But, I wanted to use the time to really help people think differently about youth ministry.

So, I thought of this – Why don’t I invite people to share their best experiences of church in order to think differently about youth ministry? The idea turned out to be a good one and has yielded results that I didn’t even imagine.

When I ask people to tell the story of their best experience of church/youth ministry, most often they don’t talk about the stellar programs that they attended, but rather they talk about the person who went out of their way to get to know them and affirm them. I’m not surprised by this. Looking back at my own life, the people who were most significant in forming my faith were the ones who took the time to get to know me.

But, I learned something recently about inviting people to tell these stories. Instead of the small groups for whom I usually lead these workshops, I lead this discussion for an entire worshipping congregation of about 75 people. I asked that the children be left in the sanctuary during this discussion. Then, I asked them to pair up with an adult and tell their story.

The results were amazing. Not only did children as young as 7 or 8 talk to and share their story with an adult in that congregation, they worked up the courage to take the microphone and share their stories with everyone there. No small feat for a young child to stand up and speak in front of a room full of adults!

I observed many things happening in that moment. Adults were taking seriously what young people had to say about their hopes and dreams for the church. Young people were listening to the stories their elders told of their experiences of church. I can only hope that if we draw out these stories from people of all ages, we wouldn’t have the stark generation gap that appears to grow larger everyday.

What is your experience with intergenerational dialogue in your church? How does it affect relationships of the people who participate?