There is a program within the United Methodist Church to establish and support churches in Russia. It is possible that we will be invited to help with that program. We have been in Bulgaria with Walk To Emmaus and I suspect traveling in Russia would be very much like that. We would be very happy to go.
posted by Dave Senften 6:41 AM
David, What a wonderful gift you have been given in the form of your Russian vistors! Is there a chance you and Connie will have the chance to visit them in Russia?
posted by michelle jacobcik@excite.com 3:49 PM
David, Sounds like you and Connie have had wonderful chance to learn about another country. Is there a chance you will visit your new friends in Russia?
posted by michelle jacobcik@excite.com 3:37 PM
Alright! I think I have this figured out. Connie and I have been just snowed under since we got back from the Academy. We hosted an over-night retreat at our lake house for the members of our church council last Friday and Saturday, and this week we are hosting two clergy from Russia in our home here in St. Peters. Since they only speak a few words of English and we speak absolutely no Russian, it has been a challenge but also a blessing. Connie and I had such a wonderful time at the Academy and we both miss it. I particularly want to thank all of you in the group for helping to make it a specially memorable experience for me. Also, thank you John for setting up this means for us to stay in touch. Hope to hear from you all soon.
posted by Dave Senften 9:56 AM
John e-mailed: I have heard from three of the other six members (where IS everybody, anyway?) and have decided to begin doing SOMETHING. I have set up my blogger to make it interactive for all of our group. You should have received an e-mail regarding that. In the meantime, we will continue on with the tried and true (well, for me, at least) killer app of e-mail. I will also be loading my e-mail stuff on the blogger. Talk to me.
posted by John Harrison 4:31 PM
I don't know if this is going to work, but I am most certainly hoping that it will. However, at present I have heard from only three of the other six. I was assured that everyone had internet access, but maybe not. In the meantime, we will continue on with the four of us. I am hoping that this vehicle may be a learning experience for all of us, and I'll do the best I can to contribute to that. At the moment, I am resting up from a long past four days. (And I had not had a full week to recover from the 5-day academy.) I covered about 800 miles in the last four days, conducted a funeral in western Kansas, conducted three worship services on Sunday morning, and assisted in two workshops yesterday (Sunday) afternoon. More later on the workshops. Although it was a good four days, I'm not as young as I used to be.
posted by John Harrison 3:25 PM
Is there visitation that goes beyond "duty"? Yes, there is. It is the visitation that I think is desired but not requested. It is the visitation to a parishioner who I enjoy being with, who never ASKS that I come, who never EXPECTS me to read his mind, but is never critical when I don't come around, but who is always appreciative and grateful when I do. AND, when I do come to visit, we both have a wonderful time. These are the parishioners who bless our minstries, who help us to believe that what we are doing matters to others. These are visits that make our days better, visits that enhance our spiritual lives. They make us aware of who we are and what we are supposed to be doing.
posted by John Harrison 12:48 AM
Visitation is easy for some pastors. Maybe many pastors. And I suspect that it is easy for them because they don't feel particularly competent doing much else. Is that unkind to say? I think many parishioners want their pastors to be "hanging out" with them, spending time with them, even if their pastors might have other things to do. Like praying. Like preparing sermons. Like preparing worship services. Like studying. It's amazing to me that some parishioners think these chores should be EASY for us. Well, for some of us they are. But they still take TIME. My sense of some congregations is that they want their pastor to be there to hold their hand while they die. End of story. And a selfish end at that.
posted by John Harrison 12:40 AM
My weekly Bible study is dealing with parables. This week we took on the parable of the prodigal son. Or, is it the parable of the older brother of the prodigal son who doesn't want to celebrate the younger son's return? Or is it the parable of the father who is loving and forgiving? It was a great session! I really enjoyed spending that time with my parishioners. And I hope that they got as much out of that meeting as I did. Do we REALLY understand what unconditional love is all about? Do we really understand that God loves us even if we are a bunch of turkeys who don't deserve it or appreciate God's love? I continue to believe that radical "love" is the most misunderstood concept we will ever have to deal with.
posted by John Harrison 12:33 AM
What does one do with the petty annoyances in the parish? I mean, there are many things that seem to drive me nuts, but I learn to live with them. But, there are parishioners who get upset with these minor things, and they make a big deal out of them. I once had a young woman on a pastor-parish relations committee who let them all know that she believed what they were concerned with was "petty crap." God bless her! I am sure that there are always, and will always be, things that bug us. But to some extent, can't we learn to live with them? Does everything need to be a major catastrophe that must be resolved to our satisfaction? I think we all need to go back to the drawing boards on a regular basis to re-examine what "sacrifice" means to us.
posted by John Harrison 12:22 AM
Good heavens, has it been two weeks? How time flies when you're having fun! Or not. I suppose that the filling-out-of-forms is a necessary part of the organized church. But to what end? Is that what our faith journeys are all about? I would hope not. Indeed, I suspect that the silly forms get in the way of what we are to be about. But still, we have these forms. And, they keep changing from year to year. If we have one or two forms, and they remained fairly constant from year to year, they might be useful and helpful. But what is to be gained by the introduction of new forms every year when no one knows what to do with them? I think the organized church gets in its own way, shoots itself in the foot. We dearly love the use of paper. We eliminate forests in the pursuit of.....what? Well, anyway, I am blessed with parishioners who dutifully show up for meetings to be presented with more forms on more pieces of paper. They aren't sure what to do with them, and neither am I. Does this help to make disciples, or does it drive people away? I think we should simplify the forms and simplify the text. The result, I believe, would be a more complex response to the question of what the mission of the church should be. In other words, I think we would gain more by simplifying the tools we are using to gather the data.
posted by John Harrison 12:12 AM
It's been a long time, but I've been away. Pastors involve themselves in "continuing education," and that is what I've been up to. Actually, it's a bit difficult to avoid it. How can one be alive without engaging in continuing education? But for some of us there are requirements. There are recognized continuing education events, and they carry differing values measured in units of CEU's (continuing education units). Now, I suppose this may be necessary. If we were not forced to involve ourselves in formal continuing education, we would grow old and stupid. But, even with the continuing education, we may still grow older and more stupid. I really should not complain. I believe in education. However, what passes for formal education frequently leaves much to be desired. For example, continuing education events for pastors often include guest lecturers. These folks are usually on the faculty of some institution of higher learning--probably a seminary--and likely have published lots of books and articles. Therefore, we assume that they are very smart people and know what they are talking about. But why do these people so frequently act as if they were talking to a wall? I am not impressed with someone who reads to me with very little emotional connection to the text. I especially do not wish to have someone read a chapter from a book that he or she is in the process of writing. I think most people intuitively understand that there is a difference between the "written" word and the "spoken" word. And when speakers read their "written" word to us, they will not connect. Anyway, I have been impressed with very few seminary professors I have heard as guest lecturers. They may write terrific books, but they give lousy lectures. On the other hand, at this most recent event which I attended, there were a number of workshops. These were of your basic how-to variety: how to do this, that, and the other thing in the local church. The folks who presented them were very good. They were enthusiastic about their material and made us feel like our time was well-spent. However, as I became increasingly aware of what was relevant to me and what was irrelevant, it occurred to me that I frequently feel guilty for the wrong reasons. I think that I should be doing all these wonderful things that others in other churches are doing; but I forget that each of us is following his or her own agenda based on his or her assumptions. For example, one workshop presenter would, from time to time, say, "in your church..." She was assuming that each of us had only one congregation with which to work; but I have three! No wonder I can't accomplish all the things I wish I could.
posted by John Harrison 2:45 AM
What does "commitment" mean to the typical Christian? To what do they "commit" themselves? I suppose they might mention marriage. And during the typical wedding ceremony, nobody is paying attention to the vows; they're too caught up in the pageantry of the moment. Who remembers what the couple promises? Church membership vows are not much better. In the United Methodist Church there is a pledge to support the church with "prayers, presence, gifts, and service." But how many members could tell you that they took those vows? My guess is that only a tiny fraction have any recall of that at all. To what are we committed? And how do we understand that commitment?
posted by John Harrison 11:23 PM
It's not an easy text to preach. Upon reflection, I think the lection should have been two sermons, or I should have done a better job of integrating those two. I am intrigued by the relationship between Jesus' question, "Who do you say that I am?" and his requirement that those who follow him should deny themselves. Indeed, the question is a leading one. What I think he is really asking is this: "Do you know what you are getting yourselves into?" He wants to know if we are taking him seriously. We probably think we are, but I'm still suspicious that most of the time we brush aside the whole issue of self-denial. I don't think he's asking us to be martyrs; but I do think he'd like to see some humility.
posted by John Harrison 9:38 PM
The lectionary text for tomorrow, Sunday, September 17, 2000, is as troubling as any in scripture. We hear Jesus say, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me." Can we handle that? I'm not sure that I can. How do I deny myself? How are pastors with salaries three to five times the size of mine denying themselves? Yet, we hear them continually emphasizing the need to "make disciples." Do they really know what they are asking? I suspect that most of us, most of the time, are not in the practice of denying ourselves. In a society with an overwhelming problem of obesity, I don't see a lot of self-denial. Credit card debt in this country is outrageous. So do we blame all of this on non-Christians? No, I suspect that there are huge numbers of so-called Christians who indulge in gluttony and instant gratification--and I do not exclude myself--and would still claim to be followers of Jesus, who has told them to deny themselves. So, what do we say to those who might wish to become Christians? Do we tell them that nothing unusual is required of them? That anyone can be a Christian? I suspect that in the interest of adding names to our membership rolls, we do just that. And what do we say to folks who may happen to have read their Bibles, and really do understand that Jesus puts some demands on us?
posted by John Harrison 12:54 AM
I think it is interesting that in Jesus' parable at the close of his sermon on the mount, the parable of the two foundations, he doesn't have anything to say about the houses that are placed on those foundations. The houses may be identical, or they may be radically different. The house placed on the rock foundation may be small and humble, while the house placed on the sand foundation may be palatial. Jesus doesn't say a thing about those houses, what goes into them, or how inexpensive or expensive they are. All he is concerned with is the foundation upon which they are built. I wonder what he would say about today's local congregations? Would he be impressed with the architecture of megachurches, but find the architecture of small country churches laughable? Would he be impressed with the hundreds and thousands who crowd into huge sanctuaries, but find the dozens--or even handsful--who attend services in rural churches not worth bothering with? If I read that parable correctly, Jesus seems to be looking for deep faith and commitment and could care less about everything else. I believe Jesus sees--and values--what the secular world cannot see and therefore does not value. And where does the organized church fit into all of this? Does it see as Jesus sees, or has it fallen prey to the superficial values of the secular world?
posted by John Harrison 11:49 PM
When we speak of making "disciples," I am assuming we are talking about making "followers." And, of course, we Christians are talking about following Jesus of Nazareth. He was the perfect example. But shouldn't we have examples of followers? I mean, what is it really like to be a follower? My favorite example is John the Baptist. What for me is truly overwhelming about that man was his humility. He stayed away from the cities, so he obviously was not lusting after a lot of good PR. I think he could have cared less about high visibility. He lived simply, dressed in camel's hair and eating locusts and wild honey. Obviously, not a showman. And he didn't mind irritating people if he thought circumstances called for it: "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?" Unfortunately, when he irritated Herod's wife, he succeeded in bringing about his own death. But in the meantime, in prophesying the coming of the Messiah, he proclaimed, "...one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals." Cool. For John, the greatest thing he could imagine in his life was to forecast the coming of another far greater than he. So how many so-called contemporary Christians fit that mold? Certainly, in my opinion, not those who aspire to positions in the top of the hierarchy of organized religion. Nor, again, in my opinion, those who proudly carry titles and degrees to demonstrate their superiority to others. It would seem that if we are to take this discipleship stuff seriously, we will need to take Jesus seriously when he says that the first shall be last and the last shall be first. I suspect that when he asked people to give up everything to follow him, he definitely meant that they should give up their arrogant pride. Is it any wonder that so many folks will have nothing to do with the church? Instead of seeing the humility of John the Baptist, they instead see many clergy behaving like Chief Executive Officers.
posted by John Harrison 3:49 AM
Our worship services--my worship services, anyway--are filled with repetitions. Every Sunday we repeat the Lord's Prayer and the Apostles' Creed. We sing the Doxology and the Gloria Patri. And, I use a formulaic trinitarian benediction. But for me there needs to be a core around which our faith and beliefs are built. Just as without the Bible we could all close up shop and go home. Our communion services are filled with predictable liturgy. But it is that predictability that lends strength to our belief system. It gives us a firm foundation. I have, during Lenten periods, conducted daily communion worship services. That daily redundancy did not detract from the meaning of worship, but added to it.
posted by John Harrison 8:39 PM
One of the cornerstones of the church is ritual. And the essense of ritual is repitition. But what are the limits of repitition? What are the positive and negative elements of repetition? On the largest scale, we repeat ourselves by attending a weekly worship service, and some folks do this daily. For some of us this is such a strong ritual that we will seek out worship services even when we travel. Some of us will seek out alternative times when our usual worship time doesn't work for us. But then, there are those who use travel as an excuse to not worship on the weekend. And, there are also those who use household guests as an excuse to not worship on the weekend. For these folks, who find worship "inconvenient" on those occasions, what does the ritual truly mean for them?
posted by John Harrison 1:07 PM
Yesterday was not a particularly good day, and that raises a recurring question for me. What is it that motivates us? I am told that all motivation is internal, not external. But where did all that internal stuff come from, anyway? Do we not accumulate experiences that we internalize and then respond to? Much of the church is based on ritualistic behavior, and that, in itself, is not a bad thing. But at what point does it become mind-numbing behavior? There are, in every person's life, experiences that are real turn-ons. And if we were to collect and categorize them, we could probably determine that there are patterns to those "turn-ons," and we could discover motivations. In the secular world, this makes perfect sense to me. But does it hold true for our spiritual world? If I understand the word "spirit" correctly, and its relationship to the word "inspired," then there should be a place for motivation in the religious world. But where is it? What is it? Excuse me for saying so, but most worship services I have attended, regardless of how energetic the pastor has seemed to be, have appeared to me to be woefully uninspiring in parishioner response. Maybe we're not supposed to get excited in church. Maybe we're supposed to appear to be dull and boring. Personally, I still maintain that Jesus may have been a party animal.
posted by John Harrison 12:50 AM
I think pastors should always be suspicious of a quiet church. We may think that the fact that nobody is saying anything bad means that everybody likes us. Or, we may think that the fact that nobody is saying anything good means everybody hates us. Is the glass half-full or half-empty? Or, it may be that nobody is saying anything because everybody is so numbed by the habit of attending church that they don't have any genuine feelings one way or another. So which is best or worst: good, bad, or indifferent? Although I prefer that people say good things about me, I would rather they say bad things once in a while than remain indifferent. We pastors can do something in response to criticism. We can deal with it and hopefully improve as pastors.
posted by John Harrison 9:28 PM
My Bible study begins a week from Wednesday. Which is no big deal, except that this time I'm going to try to create a zero-threat atmosphere to see if I can't get more folks to show up. Too often I have had folks not involve themselves with a study because they were afraid of missing out on one or two sessions. Or they didn't think they were up to handling the reading for preparation. Or they were fearful that they might be called upon to contribute, and that scared them off. So, this time I'm just inviting folks to show up whenever they feel like it and just "listen in." I don't know if I'll get any more takers this way, but at least the stress level will be dropped for those who might have that need.
posted by John Harrison 4:34 PM
Labor Day weekend took its toll on worship services. All three congregations had below-average attendance. In one congregation, the pianist asked me if we might change one of the hymn selections, because she suspected that most folks did not know it. It's interesting to me that frequently the hymns that Christians do not know are the ones with words that they would prefer not to sing. For instance, in the hymn "O Young and Fearless Prophet," we read, in the fourth verse, "Stir up in us a protest against our greed for wealth, while others starve and hunger and plead for work and health; where homes with little children cry out for lack of bread, who live their years sore burdened beneath a gloomy dread." Social justice, anybody?
posted by John Harrison 6:43 PM
It's Labor Day weekend. This is one of those three-day weekends when worship attendance takes a bounce, either up or down. The pianist for one of my congregations is already predicting that attendance will be down significantly. And it probably does not help that the temperatures have consistently been running above 100 degrees. (One of my churches is not air-conditioned.) So, as we pile up all our excuses for not attending a worship service, do we ever ask ourselves if personal sacrifice ever enters into our understanding of the Christian faith? Do we only attend public worship as long as it is convenient for us and doesn't put any demands upon us?
posted by John Harrison 9:32 PM
It is the first of September. Where did the summer--most of it--go? Where did my parishioners go? Attendance was boosted a couple notches after last Sunday. Typically, I suspect that August is the worst month of the year in the church. Why is that? Maybe because so many folks are leaving home for vacations. Or for family or class reunions. Anyway, the church seems somehow attuned to the cycles of the school year, with activity picking up in September. But is it possible for the church to be a year-round institution? Or is it just another social gathering, influenced by everything else that is going on in the world, but having very little influence on what is happening?
posted by John Harrison 11:32 AM
For many Christians the requirement for being a disciple, a follower, a believer, is showing up for a worship service for 45 minutes to one hour once a week. Or maybe every other week. Which is roughly the equivalent of believing that walking for 20 minutes every other day will prepare you to run a marathon. But outside of that worship experience, are these followers doing anything else to provide evidence of their discipleship? Are they studying their Bibles? Are they reading their Bibles? Do they even own Bibles?
posted by John Harrison 5:44 PM
Those who are members or pastors of very small churches can pretty much be assured of being ignored by the remainder of Christendom. The bulk of the attention is paid to the very large churches, and many, if not most, pastors long to be serving one of those churches, or at least churches larger than the ones they are in. We copy the world at large, in which bigger is always better. Preaching to three congregations every Sunday morning, in which the average attendance is about 30, I'm not much worried that there are hordes of pastors out there wishing to take away my job. I guess most of us pastors need to have our egos fed by seeing lots of bodies in front of us.
posted by John Harrison 1:46 PM
I think we have a humility problem in the church. At least, some folks in some denominations do. In the United Methodist Church, would we be worse off without bishops and district superintendents? I doubt it. Would churches function with less effectiveness if there were no such thing as "senior" or "executive" pastors? I don't recall Jesus elevating pomposity in the beatitudes. In fact, I do recall him saying something about the first being last and the last being first. So what does that tell us about the way churches are being run today? And, of course, those of us who are better than everybody else can stand in judgment and talk about the "non-growing" churches who are not attracting the "unsaved."
posted by John Harrison 3:38 AM
Why is it that in the era of the mega-church we are so obsessed with numbers, with the quantification of so-called disciples? Why do we seem more concerned with the size of the product than with its quality? Indeed, it would seem to me that considering the demands that Jesus places on us, huge numbers of followers should be difficult to find, not easy. Is discipleship an attractive idea to people? Should it be? And if it is attractive, are there limits to those to whom it is attractive? What percentage of the population can really find joy in taking up their crosses? I'm suspicious that most of the population would just as soon be rid of any crosses they bear.
posted by John Harrison 12:27 PM
I think it is worth admitting that even Jesus had trouble holding on to his disciples. In the sixth chapter of the gospel according to John, "Many of Jesus' disciples heard him and said, 'This is too hard for anyone to understand.'...Because of what Jesus said, many of his disciples turned their backs on him and stopped following him. Jesus then asked his twelve disciples if they were going to leave him." Well, they didn't. But those who did leave seemed to be leaving for rather minor reasons. They couldn't understand--or agree with--Jesus' teaching about "bread from heaven." I'm sure there were other times when his followers left him, and I wonder what precipitated those leavings.
posted by John Harrison 8:49 PM
I keep hearing that we are supposed to "make disciples of/for Jesus Christ," but I keep asking myself, "what does that really MEAN?" What does it mean to FOLLOW him? If we behave as he did, should we expect to be treated as he was? Tortured to death at an early age? Doesn't sound like fun to me. In fact, I suspect that most Christians want a religion of warm fuzzies. If we were to seriously require pain and suffering, how many folks would still be filling the churches? Are so-called Christians really prepared to make themselves UNcomfortable? I think they want a faith in which they can feel cozy, and they're prepared to run and hide--like Jesus' disciples did--when the going gets tough.
posted by John Harrison 1:57 AM
According to Peter Harrington in "10 FAQ's of New Christians," Discipleship Resources, Nashville, 2000, (www.discipleshipresources.org) the number one question is "What is so important about Jesus?" It is a good question, but his answer seems inadequate. Nowhere in the answer is reference ever made to Jesus' death, crucifixion, and resurrection. According to Harrington, that which makes Jesus important is his life. But if this is the case, we reduce Jesus to just another itinerant preacher who wandered the countryside two thousand years ago, and we overlook that which motivated others to kill him.
posted by John Harrison 7:02 AM
And so it begins. This is an effort to put some of the sprawling, chaotic, reactionary theology that pervades my mind into some kind of reasonable sense. I know that much of what I hear and read others profess as meaningful I do not perceive to be so; and this is my attempt to put into words a clarification of where I stand with respect to a meaningful Christian theology. Well, at least meaningful to me. Beyond that, I have no idea what truly qualifies as meaningful to anyone else. I do know that I sense that we seem to have sanitized Christianity in an effort to gain adherents; and somewhere along the line, I think we lost the depth of our faith.
posted by John Harrison 10:32 PM