Easter 2014

Easter 2014


Christo Anesti. Christo Anesti. He is risen, he is risen.

This is Easter.

The experiences that we are loved, have love, and can love – this is Easter.

We experience (from time to time) redemption… this is Easter.

You and I have resurrection experiences and stories of rebirth and new life. We experience the feelings of discovery and the jubilation of understanding.

We have glimpses of what it feels like to be free.

We dream of a day of peace when swords are beaten into ploughs. That is Easter.

We know what grace is and what it means to be forgiven even though we don’t believe we deserve it.

This is Easter.



In his 2005 commencement address at Kenyon College David Foster Wallace, one of the great literary geniuses of our time, began with what he called the “deployment of a didactic parablish like story” which I will now insert here.

There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, “Morning, boys, how’s the water?” And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, “What … is water?”

The immediate point of the fish story is (he said) that the most obvious, ubiquitous, important realities are often the ones that are the hardest to see and talk about…[i]

This is Easter.



Our resurrection story, our Good News, our Gospel, Easter begins with Mary. It begins with a woman discovering that Jesus’s body is not in the tomb where he was laid and then she reports it. She is the first evangelist, the first messenger of good news, the first one ever oh ever to know, and she tells the disciples this is Easter.

There then is the famous disciple race – who will know next? The beloved disciple loves Jesus the mostest and he arrives at the tomb first before Peter. When he arrives he sees the burial clothes and the lack of the body and he experiences resurrection and he believes that Jesus lives and that he is Lord. He sees, he experiences and he believes. He is the second to know. And he is the next to share with others his Easter experience.

Mary Magdalene then returns to the tomb. There she experiences the risen Christ – the living Jesus - when he appears before her in the garden. She has been searching for him; she sees him but does not immediately know him. In fact she does not know him until he calls her name. “Mary.”

This is the very real experience of Jesus’ own teaching from chapter 10 verse 3: "The sheep hear his voice as he calls by name those that belong to him." "I know my sheep and my sheep know me." He says. Her response is to announce to the disciples that she has "seen the Lord."[ii]

These are different experiences of the risen Christ from two loving followers.

Some years later Paul too will have visions of the risen Christ and believe that Jesus is alive and that he is Lord. Paul becomes a loving follower himself. The bible tells us this is only a few of the many stories of resurrection.

The experience over the generations of the risen Christ is Easter.

Each story gives a sense that the risen Lord is known in many ways and experienced in many ways and is known to many people. While true belief will come with the Holy Spirit, we are given here in John's resurrection story the beginning of the new creation where the Gospel is available to all people.

Victory is won on the cross. The chasm that separated the earth and heaven is now breached. A new order and a new creation is even now rooting itself in the cosmos and in our lives.

Here is the beginning of faith which comes from experiencing the risen Lord – here in these stories we have the beginning of our Easter.

John's Gospel tells us clearly that resurrection is not simply a bodily - this world - experience but it is a resurrection into unity with God. We are reconciled with God and new life is ours – freedom, redemption, resurrection, love, grace, and forgiveness is all ours. It springs forth this most obvious, most ubiquitous, most important of realities.

This is Easter.



David Foster Wallace believed that we are deluded by the lens by which we experience the world – this is part of our problem and it hides the most obvious realities. He wrote, "A huge percentage of the stuff that I tend to be automatically certain of is, it turns out, totally wrong and deluded… [because] everything in my own immediate experience supports my deep belief that I am the absolute center of the universe, the realest, most vivid and important person in existence... Think about it: There is no experience you've had that you were not at the absolute center of. The world as you experience it is right there in front of you, or behind you, to the left or right of you, on your TV, or your monitor, or whatever. Other people's thoughts and feelings have to be communicated to you somehow, but your own are so immediate, urgent, real”[iii] that it is difficult to hear the other voices. Wallace says, "As I'm sure you guys know by now, it is extremely difficult to stay alert and attentive instead of getting hypnotized by the constant monologue inside your own head.”[iv] “In fact some of you are carrying on that conversation right now.”[v]

Easter, the resurrection is a vision altering, relationship altering, and monologue interrupting event for those who experience it.

The living God in Christ Jesus (who bursts forth from the tomb, is not recognized till he calls your name, appears by your side at the road’s edge, sits with his feet below your table and breaks bread with you and shares wine, and he comes to you in the locked room of your darkest night) – this appearing and showing up shorts out the “natural, hard-wired, default-settings [of our] self-centered lens.”[vi]

The resurrection invites us to move beyond abstract arguments. It invites us to wake up in a very real world where Easter happens… look around ourselves and see what is outside of ourselves. The resurrection invites us to choose what we pay attention to and how we interpret our experience and how to interpret meaning from our experience.

Because of the resurrection we may see a sliver of what is offered - an invitation to reject wholesale the notion that the best it will ever be is a comfortable, prosperous, respectable, unconscious, adult life where we are slaves to our egos and end up in a day-in-and-day-out routine of death.[vii]

Because of a Jesus who will appear at any point in our life we are invited to look for him in the world around us and in the people around us. Because of a Jesus who appears alive we are to see the world for the living that is in it. Because Jesus comes to us in a companion along the road side or in the locked upper room we are to look for him in places we least expect to find him.

Because of a God who is obedient to his love for humanity and in so doing breaks death’s strangle hold on us we are able to experience love, grace, freedom, forgiveness, and mercy when we open our psychic tombs to the risen Lord.

We experience these things not from a self-centered way but because we open ourselves up to having our name called out by the other. We risk giving all that we have and all that we are. We are generous. We love. We love regardless of the cost. We love even to death and we love through death and to the other side.

You see Easter is awareness of life lived freed from death. What David Foster Wallace says of awareness in general is what we say of Easter - “It is so real and essential, so hidden in plain sight all around us, that we have to keep reminding ourselves, over and over: “This is water.”[viii]

This is water… this is love… this is life… this is Easter.

This is Easter.

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[i] David Foster Wallace, Water is Communion, Kenyon Commencement Address, 2005

[ii] Raymond Brown,John, vol 2, 1008ff

[iii] Foster.

[iv] Ibid.

[v] Ibid. This is in the recorded version but not the written version.

[vi] Ibid.

[vii] A paraphrase of Foster’s argument.

[viii] Ibid.

Ash Wednesday Meditation

I was little.  Maybe I was 6.  I sat with my mother in the pew at Church of the Good Shepherd. 

My mother held my hand and we went in and found our pew, in the middle, the left hand side, the Gospel side.  My mother knelt…I fidgeted and I slid up and down the pew.

She prayed…I fidgeted and whispered her name over and over again.

She was quiet…I fidgeted and tried to get her attention, I pulled on her dress.

She told me to kneel with her and to pray to God before church began.  I said, “I don’t know what to say to God.” I’m sure I said this with a very loud voice.  She whispered to me that I was to go see my father.

I sulked. I sulked out of my pew. I sulked all the way back to the back of the church to the church doors…past the crucifer…past the torch bearers…I sulked past the lay readers…I sulked up to my father (the priest) standing at the back of the procession.

I looked up with my best sad face, I marshaled the tears, and I blubbered. Mom says to pray to God. I don’t know what I am supposed to say. What do you say to God? Does God even listen? Will God listen to me? Mom says pray. I don’t know how.

My father leaned down to me and said, “Go tell God good morning and hello. Introduce yourself.  That is all you need to do.  Go tell God hello; like you might to an old friend.”

There comes a time in everyone’s life when we pray for the first time.  It doesn’t matter how one grew up. It doesn’t matter the tradition of one’s family.  Somewhere, in some quiet place, in some way, at an important time, everyone utters a prayer to God.

In a moment, then the moment is gone, a word of prayer bridges the gap between heaven and earth; between the creator and the created.

Some of us get mighty good at praying.

Some of us get very good prayer voices.

Some of us are good at making prayer gestures.

But in this season of Lent we are reminded of the importance of simple prayer and a simple conversation with our maker.  We are reminded of our need to go see a good friend…an old friend.  We are reminded to make ourselves known.  We are given an opportunity to again in a small quiet place, in a quiet voice, to say “hello” again to God.

Jesus, in our lesson from Matthew offers a bit of guidance. It is as if he is saying, “Hey…don’t get in people’s faces about your prayer life.”

Allow your prayer life to remind you of the importance of giving…but don’t be all high and mighty about it.

Don’t use that God voice when you pray.  It irritates God and everybody else. 

Being public with your faith is not all it’s cracked up to be. It is a lot better to pray privately and sincerely.  It is better for your life to model the very best of God’s love…then when people ask you about it you can tell them.  Sometimes the obvious is not as good as the subtle.

Remember when you pray that God knows what you need so you don't have to always be telling God out loud with a long list of how you would like life to be...

Please don't look dismal and sad.  Look happy and enjoy your relationship with God.

Remember that what matters is the love of God, the love of neighbor - these are the treasures worth having.  So pray and live for love.

If we opened the bible up and looked at this passage what we would see is that Jesus is teaching his followers to pray, and he offers to them what today we call the Lord’s Prayer.

It is as if Jesus is saying, “This is a good way of doing it. Pray like this.”

Jesus says, say “Our Father”.  Begin this way because we are to seek as intimate a relationship with God as I have.

Pray “Who art in heaven”.  When you do you’ll be reminded of your created nature as a gift from heaven. Life is given to us from God. We also recognize in this short phrase that we are not God.

Say to God “Hallowed be thy name”. In response to the grace of being welcomed into God’s community, bowing humbly and acknowledging our created nature, we recognize the holiness of God. We proclaim that God’s name is hallowed and that we are not holy.

Remember and ask for God’s kingdom to come; “Thy kingdom come”.  The words of Jesus remind us that, like the disciples’ own desires to sit at the right and left hand of Jesus, this is not our kingdom. The reign of God is not what you and I have in mind. We ask God: by your power bring your kingdom into this world. Help us to beat our swords into ploughshares that we might feed the world.

Say, “Thy will be done”. We bend our wills to God’s, following the living example of Jesus Christ. We ask for grace to constantly set aside our desires and take on the love of God’s reign. Let our hands and hearts build not powers and principalities but the rule of love.

“On earth as it is in heaven”.  Ask God to give us eyes to see this kingdom vision, and then ask for courage and power to make heaven a reality in this world. May our homes, our churches, and our communities be a sanctuary for the hurting world to find shelter, to find some small experience of heaven.

Then pray, “Give us this day our daily bread”.  In prayer we come to understand that we are consumers. We need, desire, and just want many things. In Christ, we are reminded that all we need is our daily bread.  And as we surrender our desires, help us to provide daily bread for those who have none today.

Ask God to “forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us”. Sanity and restoration are possible only because God forgives us. Because of that sacrificial forgiveness--made real in the life and death of Jesus--we can see and then share mercy and forgiveness. Help me personally offer sacrificial forgiveness to all those I feel have wronged me. I want to know and see my own fault in those broken relationships. May I be a sacrament of your grace and forgiveness to others.

“Lead us not into temptation”: As Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowledge and replaced God with their own understanding of reality, we need help turning away from our own earthly and political desires and turning toward the wisdom of God in Christ Jesus. So we remind ourselves how we are so tempted to go the easy way, to believe our desires are God’s desires. We have the audacity to assume we can know God’s mind. Show us your way and help us to trust it.

Please God, “deliver us from evil”.  Only God can deliver us from evil. There is darkness in the world around us. We know this darkness feeds on our deepest desire: to be God ourselves. That deceptive voice affirms everything we do and justifies our actions, even when they compromise other people’s dignity. It whispers and tells us we possess God’s truth and no one else does. Deliver us from the evil that inhabits this world, the weakness of our hearts, and the darkness of our lives, that we might walk in light.

“For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen”  I want to remember that I am powerless. Help me give my life up to an higher power and devote my life and love to God and my neighbor.   Help us to see your glory and beauty in the world, this day and every day.

So, in Lent…perhaps as your Lenten discipline, say good morning to God again for the first time; like you might say hello to an old friend.  

Pray simply, maybe just use the Lord’s Prayer every day.  Pray simply.  And let your prayer bridge the gap between heaven and earth.

The Uniqueness of Christ

This was given to the Christian Formation Conference at Camp Allen in September, 2010.  The theme of the conference was the Charter for Lifelong Christian Formation.

Let me begin very clearly with some thoughts about what our work as a Christian Church is… in general.

"The Gospel testifies to the uniqueness of Jesus Christ in God's plan for the salvation of the world.”

“There can be no greater theme - no higher calling for the church to bear witness to salvation in and through Christ." (Sharing the Gospel of Salvation, GS Misc 956, Report to General Synod Church of England, 2010, from forward, SGS)

"...The Christian story is, quite simply, the most attractive account of the world and the human condition.”

“Theology, [how we believe, how we communicate about God] is not an adjunct to the social sciences - on the contrary, Christian theology is the prism through which the social sciences make the most sense.”

“The task of Christians is not to persuade others of the truth of the gospel story through propositional argument (which, John Milbanks - Anglican theologian - claims, always carries undertones of violence) but to "out narrate" other, rival and less attractive narratives.”

“Christians must so live out their faith, in communities which embody the gospel (especially in practices of worship) that others are attracted by the sublime beauty of God reflected in the Church." (SGS, 72)

"The Church...is called to be a "community of character", embodying "the peaceable kingdom."

“It is not called to prop up other social institutions, such as democracy or capitalism, however useful they may be, but to exhibit in its corporate life the radically alternative life of those who follow Christ.”

“Others will wish to join this community, not because they are convinced intellectually of its argument but because they are captivated by its example of virtuous living.”(SGS, 73)

I have taken these opening thoughts, these foundational beliefs about our work from a profound work on Evangelism which was received at the English Annual Synod meeting in 2010.

The Episcopal Church is a missionary society.

We are as our Book of Common Prayer says, "The family of God" and the "Temple of the Holy Spirit."

Every leader and every member has a story to share. Communally and individually we have the very best story of spiritual transformation to share with the world around us.

We are invited and charged with the proclamation of nothing less than the very best story that there is -- the story of Jesus Christ and the salvation of the world.

We are challenged to "out narrate" and to communicate our work of "virtuous" living to the world around us. Specifically we are called to do this work in our given mission context.

We are to be working hand in hand with Jesus Christ to transform the world around us. We are as the Charter for Life Long Formation says:

Carrying out God’s work of reconciliation, love, forgiveness, healing, justice and peace.

Faithfully confronting the tensions in the church and the world as we struggle to live God’s will.

Engage in prophetic action, evangelism, advocacy and collaboration in our contemporary global context.

Lift every voice and reconcile oppressed and oppressor to the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord.

In the area of Christian Formation we are at work helping to form individuals through the sharing of story, knowledge, experience, teachings, tradition, history, and the scriptures imparting from one seeker to another the sacred story of Jesus Christ and the salvation of the world.

The essential work for congregations is to “out narrate” the world around us. And, to provide the solid foundation upon which the individual and the community rests that it may at once live life within the sacred community and make the profane world around it sacred through its virtuous action.

The Uniqueness of Jesus

Central to our work is the uniqueness of Jesus Christ as the prime actor in our sacred narrative.

This uniqueness rests solidly in our faith’s affirmation that God is one.

Deuteronomy 4.35: “To you it was shown so that you would acknowledge that the Lord is God; there is no other besides him.”

Nehemiah 9.6: “And, Ezra said: ‘You are the Lord, you alone; you have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, will all their host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them. To all of them you give life, and the host of heaven worships you.’”

Isaiah 45:5-6: “I am the Lord, and there is no other; besides me there is no God; I arm you, though you do not know me, so that they may know from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the Lord, and there is no other.”

Throughout the narrative of the Old Testament [As Jesus says in Luke’s Gospel: the law and the prophets and the proclamation of John the baptizer] the central theme is that the Lord, the God of Israel, the God of Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Leah is unique because God is the one living and true God.

We proclaim this truth in the first article of the Creed and it is the response to the first question of our baptismal covenant. It is this God who upholds the universe and everything that exists within it and he is the sole sovereign of history. (Adapted SGC, 10)

From the Venerable Bede to Juroslav Pelikan, from Abelard to Justo Gonzales, from Wayne Meeks to N. T. Wright, from Augustine of Hippo to Michael Ramsey, wise men and women, theologians, desert mothers and desert fathers…regardless of who you read Christians have come to believe and proclaim that “in accordance with the promises that God had made to his people, the God of Israel, in the person of Jesus, ‘took Man’s nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin, of her substance’ in order to proclaim God’s kingdom and to bring it in by reconciling the whole universe through his life, death and resurrection.” (SGC 11)

Each one has passed the narrative to us. Over the centuries the proclamation of this Good News of Salvation has out narrated the secular world’s story of hopelessness. Each held “that after his resurrection Jesus ascended into heaven and at the end of the age he will come in glory to judge the living and the dead and to finally and fully manifest the kingly rule of God over all creation…” (SGC, 11)

John 1.14: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, the glory as of the only Son from the Father.”

Colossians 1.19: “For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of the cross.”

Hebrews 1:2-2: “Long ago God spoke to our ancestors in many and various ways by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son, who he appointed heir to all things, through whom he also created the worlds. He is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being, and he sustains all things by his powerful word.”

“On the same grounds they further believed that God exists as the Holy Spirit, the one who had dwelt in Jesus and empowered his mission and whom Jesus had poured out on his followers on the day of Pentecost.” (SGC, 13)

This is the story of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. These are the faith responses of every Christian that has come before us. This is the truth proclaimed in faith responses of the second and third questions of our Baptismal Covenant and are rooted deep in our creed.

This is our story. This is the unique story of our faith. It is profound and it is the rock upon which my faith rests. It is the particular story which gives meaning the world of chaos proclaimed by the powers all around.

You and I are purveyors of a sacred narrative. You are not volunteers. You are not Sunday School teachers. You are not educators. You and I are disciples of the one God.

Like the Blessed Virgin Mary, we are bearers of the sacred truth of God, the Living Word.

We are marked on our foreheads with this sacred story; we are marked as Christ’s own forever. Hands are laid upon us by a bishop that we may be empowered by the same Holy Spirit for a life lived in discovery, a life lived in formation, a life lived out in the world as a missionary of God’s Holy narrative.

Anyone can carry out reconciliation, love, forgiveness, healing, justice and peace. But we understand it is God’s work.

Anyone can confront the tensions in the world. But we do so faithfully trying to live out the life of God’s will and sacred narrative.

Anyone can engage in prophetic action, advocacy and collaboration in our contemporary global context. But only we can engage through the unique prophetic witness of the Good News of Salvation.

Anyone can lift every voice and reconcile oppressed and oppressor. But only we can do the work out of the particular understanding that it is the love expressed through God in Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Uniqueness of Episcopalians

We have a sacred story. We are called to out narrate the world. Yet we must also understand that we undertake this work with a particular and unique perspective within the body of Christ and the catholic or universal witness which is Christianity.

You and I must reclaim our unique Episcopal witness. We must be at work inside and outside of our church helping individuals to understand a very unique narrative. We are Christians but we are specifically and unambiguously Anglicans and more precise still, we are uniquely Episcopalians.

We must be about the business of forming people who are Episcopalians.

Yes, we are interested in formation of Christians. But we are Episcopalians and we have a unique and important version of the Gospel of Jesus Christ that is articulated as our charter says, through scripture, tradition and reason.

This unique Episcopal witness is articulated through the words of our Baptismal Covenant:

• our particular manner of Sacramental ministry

• our understanding of Mission

• our fellowship

• our reading of scripture

• in worship, throughout the day, and at home

• our understanding of the importance of our monastic inheritance and spiritual formation

• our proclamation of the Gospel

• our treatment of every human being

• our particular gift for reconciliation and peace

• our work in social and cultural advocacy and just action

• our understanding of creation and the work of sustainable stewardship

• our understanding of service and virtuous citizenship

These are the themes of our story. These are the chapters of our narrative as Episcopalians.

The work…no the art of story telling…which is Christian Formation is specifically to tell the story, to tell our community’s story, to tell our story, and to teach others to tell their story.

Parker Palmer might offer us this reflection: Formation “is always done at the dangerous intersection of personal and public life.” (Parker Palmer, The Courage to Teach)

He also said, “I now understand what Nelle Morton [Nelle Morton was a 20th century church activist for racial justice, and later a teacher of Christian educators] meant when she said that one of the great tasks in our time is to ‘hear people to speech.’ Behind their fearful silence, our students want to find their voices, speak their voices, have their voices heard. A good teacher is one who can listen to those voices even before they are spoken—so that someday they can speak with truth and confidence. (Parker Palmer, The Courage to Teach)

You and I must reclaim our mission and ministry and tell the story in such a way that when those who retell it and those who hear it reshape the world into the reign of God.

Are we “out narrating” the world?

“Robert Raikes (1735-1811) is remembered as a pioneer of Sunday Schools. He was not; however, the first person to set up a Sunday school, but rather his work pioneered Sunday Schools as a national institution.

“He became aware of the needs of those children whose parents could not provide schooling for them. In 1780 he was dismayed at the sight of children running wild around the city on Sundays and began to consider the possibility of a School. There were other schools being developed by Hannah Ball and Thomas King – all followers like Raikes of the great evangelists George Whitefield and John Wesley.

“In July 1780 a Sunday School was established in the parish of St Mary de Crypt in Gloucester. There were to be two sessions every Sunday and four women were paid to teach children to read and to learn the Prayer Book Catechism. Raikes became actively involved. He visited the children in their homes, examined their progress in reading and gave prizes for good progress.

“While Raikes wanted to provide basic Christian teaching, the first challenge was that of teaching children to read. In 1784, John Wesley noted in his Journal, ‘I find these schools springing up wherever I go. Perhaps God may have some deeper end therein than men are aware of. Who knows but some of them may become nurseries for Christians?’ (Article from Grace online Magazine,

http://www.gracemagazine.org.uk/articles/historical/raikes.htm)


The great Awakening and the Sunday school movement went hand in hand and over the centuries has become exactly what John Wesley thought: a “nursery for Christians.” That is until recently.

The Episcopal Church has reported that in 1965, there were 880,000 children in our Sunday school programs. In 2001, that number had declined to 297,000. Thus in 35 years Sunday school attendance dropped by close to 600,000 students.

Each one of us lives, and ministers, within a particular mission context.

We live in a different world: a world of Sunday sports, busy lives, busy jobs, and all with little time or space for God. We live in a world which is currently out narrating the church. The secular narrative teaches us that more is never enough. The secular narrative says technological relationships are enough. A secular narrative that promises Sabbath some day; maybe if you can afford retirement, if not after you work part-time at Wal-Mart or Starbucks.

We live in a context which largely expects us to do the work of formation as we have done it since the beginning of the Sunday school movement. But the world has changed.

I believe that the Charter’s most challenging words read, “We are to be doing the work Jesus Christ calls us to do… We are to be seeking out diverse and expansive ways to empower prophetic action.”

We have the most transformational message of hope in our culture. Moreover, the Episcopal Church offers a unique and much needed religious life of discipleship to a culture that is seeking spiritual meaning and meaningful action.

The challenge of Christian Formation today is to reinvent the manner in which we engage in the work Jesus has called us to do through entrepreneurial innovation.

I am using the word entrepreneurial to seeing before you, in your missionary context, greenfield potential.

I am using the word innovation to mean making a positive change in our current situation that brings about not only formation of the community and individual but transformation of the world through narration of our particular and sacred story.

We must renew the art of Christian Formation by reinventing, reconstructing, restructuring, restoring, remaking, re-establishing, and rebuilding what is now an outdated missionary system.

In the field of Christian Formation we must tap into our nature as Christian creatives for the health and well-being of our Episcopal Church and our local congregations.

__________________________________

There are six basic stages of innovation and I want to apply them here to the process of reinventing Christian Formation for the Episcopal Church. The stages are: generate new ideas, capture ideas, mission innovation, mission strategy, reflection and improvement, and decline. (From Vision to Reality: The Innovation Process, http://www.bia.ca/articles/inno-vision-to-reality.htm)

Decline

I want to begin with the last stage first: Decline.

The sixth stage of innovation is decline. In time, it often becomes obvious that what was once an innovation no longer fits. I have made this argument already and we have seen the case of the Sunday school movements decline.

Once in the stage of decline it becomes obvious that continuous improvement of the existing process, product, or service is no longer of value. The reality is that the former innovation has now become outdated or outmoded.

In our case it isn’t that the rules have changed. We have always been responsible for the formation of disciples and the telling and retelling of our story. It is our culture that has changed.

In the sixth stage of innovation we see that it is time to let go of the past models and set new goals to start the innovation process once again. It is time for new innovations in response to external missionary context in which we the Episcopal Church find ourselves.

In fact as I travel around I see this innovation beginning to take shape in some of our congregations. In fact, it has been changing for about a decade. Nevertheless, I believe a more innovative and entrepreneurial approach is needed if we are to out narrate the culture in which we find ourselves.


Generate New Ideas

The having clearly reached the last stage first, we begin again. We must generate new ideas.  Always begin with bible study and reflection.  Each stage needs to be bathed in scripture and prayer.

I want to be very clear here. We are not generating a new story or a new narrative. We are not becoming Universalists. We are not becoming Buddhists. We can have a very healthy relationship with our ecumenical brothers and sisters. We can have healthy interreligious dialogs. These are essential in fact in the generation of ideas. However, we are Christians who call ourselves Episcopalians. And, I firmly believe that when a person enters into a relationship with us (either by coming to church or by meeting us out in the world) they want to know who we are. Remember, formation begins with the self-knowledge and understanding of the teacher according to Parker Palmer. We already know our narrative. We are looking to generate ideas that will help us provide a narrative within our churches and out in the world.

Begin by asking people you know, inside and outside the church, the following questions or questions similar to these:

• What has God called us to do? You might look at the Charter for Life Long Christian Formation as one source.

• What is impossible to do in our congregation, or in our formation ministry, today, but if it could be done, would fundamentally change the way in which we engage in the work of formation?

Answers to these questions will help you to see the boundaries of your new mission work.

An example is that I challenged the Examining Chaplains to evaluate our process of testing new priests. Is it working? What is missing? How can we improve it? They have developed a new proposed process that engages in conversation and discernment rather than testing, and takes shape within community and in the midst of prayer.
Capture the Ideas

Stage two is the Capturing of the ideas. There will be a lot of ideas. You will need a creative team of experts and ministers to discuss the possibilities of each idea through brainstorming.

For innovation to be successful in our culture today you are going to have to bring in people who are communicators, of different ages, creative people, strategic thinkers, doers, visionary leaders and followers.

It is good to brainstorm individually, then in smaller groups, and then as a team. Collectively organize and prioritize your results.

Not every congregation is going to have a large group. It can be as few as two and as many as eight. Remember though, the art of Christian Formation is a work that is undertaken within community. This is not the work of one individual and a team of teachers…that is the old model.

You will also need to remember your missionary context. You need to discover and think intentionally about those you are trying to reach. You also must be honest and transparent about what you can accomplish given the financial and human resources available to you and your congregation or team.

A good example of this is the team that has been put together to provide a curriculum to study the Anglican Covenant. It includes skilled individuals who know how to write curriculum. It also includes parish leaders and communicators.
Mission Innovation

The next stage is the actual innovation. Review the entire list of ideas and develop them into a series of clear and meaningful statements. The team will then need to agree on which ones to explore further. Quantify the benefits of each statement and discern through prayer and clarity which ones to pursue.

Be clear about your mandate. Are you working on Formation with adults or children? Are you working on Stewardship as a Formation program? What is your mandate?

Ask yourselves: how does this innovative idea fit with the strategy and mission of your church? Innovation can go wrong here. Good ideas which will not further the mission can take up space from essential ideas that will further the mission of formation.

What are the expected outcomes? How will you measure your success? What are the short term goals? Are they achievable? You are working now on the feasibility of your innovative idea. This is important to the whole process. We might remind ourselves of the story from our Gospels about the man who sets out to build a tower without counting the cost.

A good example here is of the process used by the Episcopal Foundation of Texas and the Quin Foundation to plan and structure the new Strategic Mission Grant process. They had to both figure out how to pool the money, design a process of giving the money away, communicating the application procedures, reviewing the grant requests, covenanting with the recipients, and how to do accountability visits.

Mission Strategy and Implementation

Mission strategy and implementation begins in the fourth stage. It usually means a re-think of an existing process and ministry. Once you have settled on the major innovation and even a basic strategy you must work with all those who will be involved in the change and figure out the details.

This is not the same as looking at an existing process and improving it. We don’t need a better Sunday school program. It is describing what a future process will look like and virtually walking it through to its conclusion.

The team will first develop this "picture of the future." You might begin by making a list of the basic assumptions about the way things are done now and begin to see how things will be different. This is the part where most innovative concepts die. They either get launched without fully thinking through this piece or the innovation looks too difficult and so is abandoned and a decision is made to simply repaint the rooms and add new carpet.

Writing or drawing a flow chart or using some other illustrations will enable your team you have to get a look at the entire "future process."

This part of the process is exemplified in the Executive Board’s Mission Subcommittee which reviewed and worked with me on the staff structure and development of the new office of Life Long Christian Formation. Their work with me looked at all the potential areas of conflict, overlap, budgeting, scope of the ministry, and in the end helped me with developing a process for searching for the new Canon.
Reflection and Improvement

Once the missionary innovation is in motion, it is necessary to continuously examine it for possible improvements.

I think a process of review and reflection needs to be in place before the roll out of the initiative. If it is not clear what the matrix of success is, who will evaluate, and when determinations about ongoing work and there is no clear time line given the innovation will have problems.

One of two problems will arise. The innovation will fail because it was not adaptive to either the changing process of delivery or the changing context within the setting. Or the process will go on forever with the assumption that it is still needed and necessary for the survival of the organization.

What are the gaps? What is missing? Where are we misfiring? What are the barriers and blockages that are making the innovation less effective? Are there changing benefits, costs, risks necessary to improve and refine the missionary innovation?

Then the team must recommend and apply the improvements.

A good example of this is the innovation of mission congregation reports. It was important during the nineteenth and most of the twentieth century for the bishop to know what was going on in the mission congregations. Therefore, they were required to give reports on their ministry. The report was written and sent to the bishop on a semi-annual basis. This report evolved into a form and the form was required on a monthly basis. The process seemed to be improving, except that the form required too much information, was not turned in electronically and consequently wasn’t being used by most of the mission congregations. Moreover, the bishop and the staff knew what was going on because of new oversight responsibilities by the Canon for Congregational Development. When a new staff organization was developed in 2005, they weren’t being done at all. Today the diocese receives a brief email report with only a few questions from mission congregations receiving money from the diocese for their ministry. The process was reworked and improved based upon the changing nature of the context.

Conclusions

The Gospel testifies to the uniqueness of Jesus Christ in God's plan for the salvation of the world.

You and I as Christians are challenged to "out narrate" and to communicate our work of "virtuous" living to the world around us. Specifically, we are called to do this work in our given mission context.

We are to be working hand in hand with Jesus Christ to transform the world around us.

You and I, as uniquely created Episcopalians, must reclaim our mission and ministry and tell the story in such a way that when those who retell it and those who hear it reshape the world into the reign of God.

The challenge of Christian Formation within the Episcopal Church today is to reinvent the manner in which we engage in the work Jesus has called us to do through entrepreneurial innovation.

I pray that God, who has given you the will to do these things, will give you both the grace, and the power to perform them in his name. Amen.

The Mystery of Intercession

Jesus Christ is our great High Priest. Jesus Christ makes the great and eternal intercession for our lives and our world. Christ makes his prayer of intercession to the merciful Father "through the prayer of all the faithful who are baptized into his body. His voice does not appeal to God separately from theirs." Father Benson, the first brother in the Society of St. John the Evangelist wrote the following. "They are…so many mouths to Himself; and as they pray…His voice fills their utterance with the authority and claim belonging to Himself."



When we pray, God hears the voice of his Son in our prayers and accepts them as Christ's own. We reflect to God the beauty of his Son's sacrificial offering, we reflect the glorious resurrection that offers transformation. When we pray we bring those for whom we pray into the loving arms of the merciful Father. When Christians pray the merciful Father hears the beautiful words of Jesus Christ whispered into his heart. When those who are not Christians pray, God hears them too. God hears them and he hears Jesus whispering into his heart those words, those ancient words, those yearning words of Jesus, "How long have I wished to gather you in my arms, as a hen gathers her young."



It is God's Holy Spirit that invites us to join Christ in the "offering our love in intercessory prayer and action, to be used by God for healing and transformation." God delights in the work of prayer. God makes us partners in the restoration of the world. We are "fellow-workers" with Christ. It is through our intercession that we bring all things and all people to Christ. 


The work of intercessory prayer is an ancient tradition for those who followed Christ. We may read in diaries, fragments, and ancient stories how important the work of prayer was for those first Christians. Perpetua prays for her fellow martyrs, her family, her persecutors. In praying Perpetua declares her Christian faith.



Perhaps since the very apostles prayed at the foot of the cross of Christ, Christians have been called to the edge of culture so as to be poised to hear, with ears open, the "deepest cries of humanity" (SSJE, Rule 24). Again, I quote Father Benson: "In praying for others we learn really and truly to love them. As we approach God on their behalf we carry the thought of them into the very being of eternal love and as we go to him who is eternal love, so we learn to love whatever we take with us there" (SSJE, Rule 25)



We discover in our intercessions a deep and abiding kinship. I pray for my family, my friends, my coworkers, my clergy, parishioners. People give me their names and their causes because they know I pray for them. I pray for them by name and I imagine their faces. I believe God is at work in these prayers, and that my voice is part of Christ's voice raising each person to God, my father, who is in heaven. As we live in the divine community, dwelling with Christ, we discover that God welcomes all our work, our struggles, our afflictions, and our daily lives to bless and uphold the world (SSJE, Rule 25).

A Survey of Scriptural Posts tagged #Prayer and #Jesus

Scripture is the first place for us to begin our journey of reflection on this topic of work that is prayer and flows from prayer. Jesus teaches those who follow him about prayer. One can almost understand that Jesus believes that we have, as God's creatures, a need to pray (Luke 18.1). Those who follow Jesus are to pray for others, and pray for those for who are your enemies (Matt 5.44). The Gospel of Luke records Jesus instructing that his followers are to pray for those who abuse you (Luke 6.28). And we are to pray for deliverance (Lk 22.40).



He instructs those who follow him to pray privately (Matt 6). He instructs his followers to pray in desert places (Luke 5.16). We are not to pray out in the open for fear of being like those who lord and show off their prayer in front of others.


Perhaps one of the greatest human sins is the sin of pride. And we like to take pride in our prayers, especially those spoken aloud. This is the beauty of the Book of Common Prayer which keeps our egos out of the work of prayer by praying ancient and holy prayers. It is the beauty of solitude and prayer through meditation, which humbles us before the throne and community of God. We are to seek out deserted places and private places in which we are to have intimate prayer with God.


In these intimate moments we are, as Jesus prescribes in the Gospel of Matthew, to pray out of our faith for what we need of God (Matt 21.22). In Luke's Gospel, Jesus connects fasting and prayer (Luke l5.33). I believe Jesus told us to fast and pray in order to help us understand his sacred solidarity with the poor and our overdependence upon the things of this world. He goes away to pray himself. He goes to the mountain and prays (Matt 19.13). He prays in the garden before he is arrested. And, he invites his followers to pray with him (Matt 26.36). He prayed in his anguish (Lk 22.44). We also know that Jesus prayed the psalms.


Over all, what we see is that Jesus prayed and instructed us to pray for what was needed. He thought it best to pray privately as if in conversation with our Father. If we looked at each of these passages in context we would find that they are connected with action. 


Jesus teaches the need of persistent prayer, the widow and unjust judge just before the healing of children in Luke 18. After Jesus teaches prayer for those who abuse you, he heals the beloved slave of the Centurion (Luke 7). Throughout the Gospel of Mark we see repeatedly prayer followed by healings and teachings. Jesus also seems to instruct his disciples that prayer was a daily need for those who followed him, a type of daily spiritual food. Moreover, Jesus seems to understand the importance of prayer in one's life, especially in times of trial or trouble.


Perhaps these themes and passages are not new to you, but they somewhat shape and form my beginning place in this conversation. These are the pieces that got me going and thinking, drawing myself deeper into a conversation with God about Prayer, the work that is prayer, and the work that originates in prayer. Jesus modeled a life of prayer and offers it to us as part of our Christian journey and vocation. Indeed we reflect and acknowledge its centrality in our own commitment to God when we say, "I will with God's help continue in the Apostle's prayers" (BCP 304).


Coming up next: A Daily Prayer Shaping Our Daily Work

We Have Testamints To Make and a Sacred Heart Auto Club to Join

Consuming the World

The world in which we live has changed and is changing at a remarkable rate. Our culture--what we might call the Western Way--has spread touching and impacting every culture and society. Many people are no longer isolated and "indigenous societies" are in deplorable circumstances. If not in "terminal phases" of acculturation; many have in fact died out and are lost to future generations.3 Indigenous peoples and the known third world countries exist in detrimental poverty compared to their American and Western counterparts. Transnational corporations hold or employ many of their natural or human resources. The entire world has been undergoing rapid, dramatic culture change over the last century. We have a global economy knit together and forever (using the metaphor of Thomas L. Friedman) "flattened." Regional economic independence and self-determination no longer exist. 

In the year 2000, 51 of the 100 biggest economies in the world were corporations. More than 20 million Americans now work for major transnational corporations, often in other countries.5 The rate of globalization has been accelerating over the last decade. Contributing factors in making the world a smaller place have been the spread of Internet and e-mail access as well as massive levels of international travel. Meanwhile most people in underdeveloped nations do not travel and only 1% of people in the Middle East and Africa have internet. I once wrote in my diary these words from Murray Sheard, whose essay is now lost to me but whose words are perhaps profoundly important to us today, "Religion has declined whenever consumerism gets hold of a nation. Religion is also seen as a barrier to consumption. It's something people are committed to above their own appetites."

American Pop Culture 

Americans have appetites. We hunger to eat, drink and own. As many of you know Americans consume 25% of the global resources and are 5% of the population. If everyone on the planet consumed as we do, we would need four other planets for the waste.6 We twitter and tweet. We Facebook and MySpace. We EBay and Craig's list. We blog and epublish. We Ifun, ITune, IPod and IPhone. We Wii and XBox. One million, thirty-nine thousand and thirty one people subscribe to the New York Times, while TV Guide has 9,072,609 subscribers and battles it out with Better Homes and Gardens who has 7,602,575 subscribers.7

Some of our cultural core values according to George Barna in his book Boiling Point are: 

convenience, options for expression, time maximization, belonging, comfort, experiences, happiness, independence, flexibility, authenticity, education options, entertainment, diversity, customization, participation, gender equality, technology, instant gratification, meaning, skepticism, image, control, relevance, impact/influence, personal empowerment, relationships, self-image, simplicity, compassion, teamwork, integrity, youth care, family cohesion, humor tolerance, volunteerism, reciprocity, generosity, networking, spiritual depth, risk taking, change, wealth, physical health, and achievement.

I can take my whole music collection, the first season of the television show the "Big Bang Theory," a selection of my favorite movies, and the latest news from my top podcasts from NPR to Wall Street Journal everywhere I go on my telephone, which I can use to update my social networks, figure out my global position, level a picture or call a friend.

As Jack in "Fight Club" wondered in 1996:

"The Klipske personal office unit, the Hovertrekke home exer-bike. Or the Johannshamnh sofa with the Strinne green stripe pattern...Even the Rislampa wire lamps of environmentally-friendly unbleached paper. I would flip through catalogs and wonder 'what kind of dining set defines me as a person?' I had it all. Even the glass dishes with tiny bubbles and imperfections, proof they were crafted by the honest, simple, hard working people of...wherever. We used to read pornography. Now it was the Horchow Collection. 

 Video clip: Who do you say that I am? 

Jesus Talk: Having Testamints in your Pocket or Rediscovering the Art of Discipleship

 

Dan Kimball, author and pastor at Vintage Faith church in Santa Cruz, California, wrote:

Jesus is everywhere. I recently walked into a gas station to pay for some gas and saw some Jesus bobble-heads for sale on a shelf. I was kind of surprised to see Jesus in the gas station, but there he was, three or four of him standing in a row. As I waited to pay for the fifteen gallons I had pumped into my rusty 1966 Ford Mustang, the Jesus bobble-heads silently stared at me, all politely smiling and nodding in unison.

Not too long afterward, I visited a major clothing chain store. Near the entry was a display for the Jesus Action Figure. Probably a dozen or more Jesuses hung in nice plastic packaging that declared, “With pose-able arms and gliding action!” While I stood there looking at them, a woman in her early twenties grabbed one from the rack. She enthusiastically said to her companion, “I love these!” and off she ran to the cash register with Jesus under her arm.”

I love Jesus and I love all things Jesus. But it really is amazing how many people love Jesus but don’t love the church. If we are going to reclaim the art of discipleship we are going to have to reclaim it in the midst of our world and our culture in America. We are going to have to reclaim discipleship from a dying Protestant Christianity as it exists today. We are going to have to reclaim discipleship from the Anglican Communion and the Episcopal Church. We are going to have reclaim discipleship even though there are theological and practical stumbling blocks.

I am a missionary and I want to work within a missionary church alive within a growing missionary field, in relationship with disciples who wish to follow the way of Jesus. I believe that Christianity, particularly Anglicanism through the lens of the Episcopal Church, has something fundamentally unique to offer those who are seeking to follow Jesus. I believe and am committed to an Episcopal Church and an Episcopal Diocese in Texas that is actively making the world a better place tomorrow than it is today. I believe that our church and our people, you and I, are called to be partners with Jesus Christ restoring the world around us.

I have invited several friends to visit with us about their views and their experience and so we will hear stories from the mission front about God, Jesus, Christians and communities. We will look to the past through the lens of our Gospel (Mark, Luke, and John specifically). And, we will think about methods and models for our future. Tonight I want us to begin to reclaim the art of discipleship, by: understanding the world and culture in which we are living; understanding the challenge organized religion faces in this culture; and, understanding the stumbling blocks that lie before us as Episcopalians. Many of us here have been having these conversations about emerging topics of interest. We have been listening and engaging in a conversation of “generous orthodoxy,” “off road disciplines” and the “renewing of our heart.” But it is time to bring it home to the Episcopal Church.

(intro to “The Art and Method of Discipleship,”The Blandy Lectures, SSW, 2009)

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