Boundaries experienced and overcome

Today I sat down to lunch with a guest lecturer at our school. There were 4 students present including myself and 3 members of our faculty as well as our president. The conversation initially centered around the lecturer's thoughts on a particular program at our school in which I am enrolled. After this conversation ended, several folks left including myself. There was another meeting scheduled that I wanted to attend but something pulled me back to the convversation with the lecturer. As I was deciding what to do, one of the other students encouraged me to return to the conversation. We were the only students in the room.
The conversation continued turning to the subject of another program at our school in which both of us participate as students. I listened with interest to the lecturers response to questions about both fields of study. Then the lecturer proceeded to show a distinct and personal interest in the other student. When I say personal, I mean that he took an interest in her studies and her professional development. I sat beside her, listening with interest to their conversation, which he at time extended to include us all. I found myself wondering if he would then turn to me and show a similar interest in my studies and professional development. He did not. Upon finishing his remarks to her, he quickly brought the discussion to a close and we left.
I remark upon this because of the dynamics which were involved. You see, when I returned to that conversation, I was the only white person in a room full of African-Americans. It changed the dynamics for me. There was a different feel to the room and the conversation. In addition, I was the only person not working in an urban environment. I had a sense that, though I was there, I was set aside. I choose these words carefully. I was not ignored, nor was I overlooked--at 6 feet 300 pounds, I'm impossible to overlook in a group of only 6 people. No, I was set aside in the way that items of business are set aside in committee meetings because they do not merit consideration at the time. I felt dismissed, neither accepted nor rejected, just outside the conversation the way a fan in the bleachers is outside the game being played on the basketball court. It's an uncomfortable feeling, one that I have experienced before as a white person living in predominantly African-American and Latino neighborhoods.
I found myself wondering why I felt set aside, so to speak. Was I just imagining things? I can't see it that way. When two chldren are left on the playground, and one is chosen to play and the other is not, it is easy to say that the one not chosen is "making a big deal out of nothing" when she expresses her disappointment. The truth is a judgment was made and there were reasons. Was it simply a matter of my race? Was it the fact that I currently work in a suburban setting and the lecturer did not know of my residence in and passion for the urban core.? Was it my gender? Something else about myself or my situation? I do not and cannot know for certain. However, I am prepared to say that race played at least some role in the lecturer's decision to show interest in my fellow student and not myself. In part, I base this judgment on past experience and in part because race plays into so many of our interactions, particularly those which cross racial boundaries.
I then thought about a conversation I had the previous day regarding Moses' experience as described in Exodus 2. Moses is an Egyptian prince, having been adopted by Pharaoh's daughter. He is of Hebrew descent, however, and was raised in part by his Hebrew birth mother. In this passage Moses intervenes on behalf of a Hebrew slave, killing the Egyptian slave master who was beating him or her. Most certainly, his Hebrew heritage had a part in his decision to intervene. Moses then tries to mediate a dispute between two Hebrews. The Hebrews want nothing to do with Moses. They dismiss him and his offer of assistance.
Again, there are a variety of dynamics in play. Moses is a member of the Egyptian royal family and I am sure the Hebrew slaves thought little enough of them in both senses of the phrase. So, social status is a factor in this incident. Possibly religion played a role and perhaps family relationships were involved between the two Hebrews. And race. One might argue that the Hebrews would have known Moses was of Hebrew descent, but this is not necessarily true since the Hebrews were quite numerous. The only previous knowledge we are told these two Hebrews had of Moses is that he killed the Egyptian slave master. This in and of itself begs the question, Why did they reject Moses when they knew he had intervened to help one of their own? Did their hatred and mistrust of Egyptians run so deep as to cause them to reject one who had come to their aid? It appears so.
This doesn't necesarily apply to the encounter I had this afternoon, but it does remind me that cross-racial ministries and relationships are very difficult. Healthy, honest, open relationships are hard even when race isn't involved. Moses' story reminds me that I will face rejection even from those I am trying to help. This rejection can happen even when race is not a factor, but it is more likely to happen when race is involved. This is an uncomfortable reality. Moses' story continues as he flees Egypt and again intervenes on behalf of those different from, one could even say foreign to, himself. This time his help is gratefully received and he later marries one of the women he helped. Moses inpsires me to continue reaching out even after experiencing rejection.
My encounter also leads me to think about Galatians 3:26-29 which says that our unity in Christ supercedes all boundaries of race, class, and gender. We are called as Christians to choose unity in Christ over divisions based on the color of our skin, the balance in our bank account, or our biological make up. We are called to a ministry of reconciliation as the ones whom Christ has called out of and sent into our broken world.

Here's to you Mrs. Robinson

Ok, so this is totally off my usual blog trajectory. Anyway, I was telling a friend about my plans to rewrite the lyrics to "Mrs. Robinson"as a gag for someone who's retiring.
My friend told me this might not be a good idea because she heard the song was about sex. I was curious so I jumped on the web and here's what I learned:
Contrary to popular and my own uninformed opinion, Mrs. Robinson was written and first recorded by Paul Simon of Simon and Garfunkel and not the Beatles. (An interesting side note, I learned that Lennon and co. did several covers.)
Anyway, back to the topic at hand which is, "Was Paul hooking up (or hoping to) with Mrs. Robinson?" The answer: NO!
The lyrics really don't fit that scenario, despite the mysterious reference to a cupcake, and several sources discredit that story.
The most interesting theory about the lyrics, though not straight from the horse's mouth, (no offense, Paul) is that the lyrics were about Eleanor Roosevelt but Simon sometimes sang Robinson instead. The source (at http://freespace.virgin.net/r.kent/quotes.html) said that their producer told him to stick with Robinson so as not to create controversy.
So, the end result is, I still don't have an answer to my question, but the journey so far has been fun. Kind of like faith. I think I'll keep looking. --Jeff

Hi, my name is Martha...

My wife has been steadily reminding me of late that I take myself too seriously. And she's right. I'm a Martha, you know, the Martha from the Bible story who gets told off by Jesus for being too uptight about her agenda. That's me. Every so often I get so caught up in doing that I don't leave myself any time to be. I have learned one cure however--laughter. That's right, usually, when I'm getting too uptight, God comes through with something that makes me laugh my head off. This morning it was my friend Joel's blog. I was blog surfing and I read his post about his class last spring. Hilarious! You can read the post here: On The Other Side Of The Window: How can I apply this in my classroom?
Laugh a little, it helps a alot.

Building a church

On August 5th I had the privilege (I think) of being part of a presentation to pastors attending a conference on congregational development. It was a privilege, but it was a lot of work to prepare in the middle of a challenging time for our church. We're building a building, and it is demanding extra attention from all of those on our church's staff. I took the bunt of it in the 2 months leading up to the presentation as I was filling in for our pastor while he was away. The presentation gave us the opportunity to tell our story as a 7 year old church meeting in a school to pastors and other leaders considering planting a new church. I learned a lot about our church from this presentation. I've only been there a year and this filled in a lot of blanks for me. At the end of the presentation a gentleman asked if we had planted or intended to plant any other churches. I listened as our pastor responded by saying, "No, that's not really our vision. We have this land(26 acres) and were going to build on it someday. There is a huge difference between the man's question and the response he received; but both might be referred to as building a church(es). What does it mean to build a church? I honestly think people get confused sometimes. Some think it refers to a construction project such as the one we're in the midst of now--that is to say an actual, physical building like the temple in the Hebrew scriptures. Others would counter (sometimes vehemently) by saying the church isn't a building, it's the people--a la 1 Peter which uses a building as a metaphor for the church with people are the building blocks. Reminds me of the children's Sunday school rhyme, "Here's the church and here's the steeple. Open the doors and there's all the people." My reflections have led me to the conclusion that there is another way of understanding this idea of building the church. The third way is to think of the structures of the church as distinct from a structure called a church. What in the world am I talking about? Think of it this way: The church is an organism, a living body composed of individual people; and it is an organization which has structures to organize and help it function effectively. I'll be honest, I think our church's land is just a piece of dirt and i could care less if we ever build a building there. On the other hand I love the people in our church. Ok, sometimes I don't want to, but Jesus is helping me to love them. Anyway, as I continued to think about this I realized that it's easy for us to focus on a construction project because it's a concrete representation of our efforts, our gifts, and our presence. Too, the idea of the church as people receives a lot of focus, especially from those of us, like myself, who are trained/being trained for vocational ministry in the church. What about the third idea? In over 80 hours of seminary education, I have never had a class that talked about the importance of building the church in organizational terms. I've had classes about a particular structural system in use by my denomination which is broad, at times contradictory, and confusing, and really doesn't provide that much guidance for the local congregation. At this point, I'm sure some of you are asking what's the big deal? Well, there's a story that will answer your question. It all started one day when food was being distributed from the food pantry at First (insert your denomination or lack thereof here) Church. Among those receiving the food, there were some who thought they were getting the short end of the loaf, so to speak. So they went to the pastor, a harassed and harried person, with too much to worry about already. Sounds familiar, doesn't it? The pastor was fretting about making a decision when his friend and mentor Hal E. Spirit dropped in for a chat. Hal immediately saw that his friend the pastor was about to lose it and leave the church to become a (insert an appropriately bad career, location or denomination here). Hal took charge and said, "Pick some others like say, Stephen, and put them in charge of making sure the food is distributed fairly." By now you've figured out that this is the story of the first "deacons" being chosen in Acts 6. The point is this; there need to be structures and systems in place to ensure that the resources of the church are being used in appropriate effective and balanced ways. Most churches have basic structures in place having to do with finances, property, worship, and Christian education. However, as a church grows so does it's need for more structures as the work of ministry multiplies. I don't believe there is a magic number that tells us when we need to add more structures in our church. Rather, I think it's a continuous process of listening and being aware of what is happening in the life of the church. When several people start saying something isn't right or when our leaders start to feel bogged down in too many responsibilities; it may be time to add ore structure to address these issues. Yet, many of us continue to try to do things the same way and we wonder why we aren't building the church in terms of people. We get bogged down in the details and wonder where our passion went. Or the details just don't get communicated and more time has to be spent on catching people up. We're struggling with this in our church right now. People have become comfortable with a structure in which only a few people needed to know what was going on, and they just kind of passed the information on informally. Now, however, more people are in the mix and there are more things going on. The old method of communication by osmosis won't work. We need to build our church by adding more structure in regard to communicating with each other. That's just one example. In the context of a new church, this idea of building church structures takes on a great deal of significance because you are starting from scratch. Here are some observations I've made from my experience in three different church plants:
Simple is good.
Think ahead. Lay a structural foundation that will help you as you grow.
Read about other congregation's structures and then do what's right for your congregation. There is no one right structure. No church is doing what's right for everyone.
Learn from others and your own mistakes. I'll never forget the lesson I learned from a previous church about trying to plant a new church at the wrong time. Even better I'll never forget my own attempts to do too much which ended in a major flameout.
Ask for help. Look around you. Is there a local church that's doing well? Maybe your denomination or organization provides help. Hire a consultant. There are a lot of ways to get some help and very few excuses for not doing so.
Don't think you or your congregation can do everything and don't think you can do everything you have to do in house. We're all human. We'll all have strengths, weaknesses and limitations. You need a web site. If you don't have a professional web designer in your church, trust me, hiring one will pay for itself because you won't keep redoing your ugly website, or wishing you could. Same goes for letter head, logos, decor, etc.
Even if you can't or don't need to engage in a particular ministry now--i.e. youth or seniors ministry in a new congregation--maintain a file of ideas and pray for God to send people to lead these ministries, whatever they are. The number one mistake I've seen new congregations make is failing to prepare to minister to those they are trying to reach and bring into the church. Don't be the football coach who recruited a team but had not playbook. Your recruits won't stick around if you're not ready for them.
Finally. Pray, pray, keep praying and never stop praying. The other day I watched Finding Nemo and I learned a lesson from the forgetful fish, Dory. Throughout the movie she keeps repeating, "Just keep swimming." Sounds crazy. Fish swim all the time, don't they? That's the point. Fish swim all the time because they live in water. Christians pray all the time, because we are surrounded at all times by God.
~