A Church for Starving Artists

Congregations often spend valuable time creating Mission Statements. My hunch is that – if you asked members to recite the Mission Statement of your church – 99% of them could not do it.  Most likely your mission is unclear to those who are supposed to be living by it.

On this lovely Friday, I propose that we toss our Mission Statements and have  – instead – a Mission Question.  My favorite is:

Did Jesus die for this?

This question changes everything – at least in terms of our business meetings -because Jesus didn’t die for most of the things we talk about: policies, programs, paint colors.

Jesus did die for: opioid addicts, the migrants at our southern border, the homeless people living under a nearby bridge, the lonely retirees who can’t get to worship anymore, the terrified kid who realizes they are trans, the unemployed banker who is too ashamed to come to church anymore, the couple trying to adopt a child, the depressed college student, the single parent, the refugee family, you, me.

A Mission Question clarifies why we exist as a church.  Some Mission Questions might in fact be:

• How can we get new members?
• How can we bolster our denomination?
• How can we perpetuate our heritage?
• How can we put a new roof on the building?

Actually though, Jesus didn’t die for any of these things: membership, denominations, heritage, buildings.  And yet, we spend most of our efforts on such things.

The thriving congregations I know are aware that Jesus died for people and so people are their focus.

Jesus doesn’t care whether we serve donuts or bagels at the elder breakfast but I’ve been to meetings where this question has been debated for more than five minutes.  Jesus doesn’t care if we allow coffee in the sanctuary or not although I’ve know parishioners who left a church over this issue..

Jesus doesn’t care if we tie back the curtains in the parlor or not.  Jesus doesn’t care if we paint the fellowship hall yellow or blue.  Jesus doesn’t care what size windows we install in the kitchen.

Jesus does care that we use our buildings as tools for ministry to serve the people God loves.

Jesus does care that we welcome all those whom God created.

Jesus does care that we grapple with issues of justice and compassion.

If you could identify the question that determines all decisions your church makes, what would that question be?

Image artist unknown

I am grateful to be part of a denomination that encourages leadership from everyone whom God has called to serve in a particular way – including women, People of Color, and LGBTQA+ human beings.  Nevertheless, many of our congregations find comfort in calling the usual candidates: straight white men.

For the umpteenth time, I’m a fan of straight white men, so please do not misunderstand me. We can support straight white men while also opening up opportunities for those millions of people who are not straight white men.  And The Church has a responsibility to do this for the sake of the Gospel.

I am finding that many of us want credit for opening up opportunities for women, People of Color, and LGBTQA+ individuals.  (And we want triple credit for calling a Brown, Queer woman, for example.)  We want points for:

• Inviting an African American woman to speak at our Women’s Retreat (of White Women.)
• Calling a female Associate Pastor.
• Adding two People of Color to our Pastor Nominating Committee in a predominantly White congregation.
• Electing a Lesbian to the School Board.
• Choosing a Gay Asian man for tenure at our predominantly white high school.
• Finding a White Police Officer guilty of murdering a Black man in his own home.

“We did that once, so we’re good.”

Nope.

Changing a culture is not a one-and-done activity.  Changing a culture involves shifting who we picture in our heads when we imagine The Pastor, The School Board Member, The Mayor, The Doctor, The President of the United States.

I thank Dr. O for treating me to lunch last weekend and sharing this book about a true story of justice in Union County, NC in 1920.  A wealthy White woman and her sister decided to leave their 800 acre farm to a Black man and his daughter who had worked on the farm and “were like family.”  After Miss Maggie died (having outlived her sister) White relatives contested the will. 

What White people would leave their money and property to a Black family in the Jim Crow South?  Maggie and Sally Ross would.  And they did.

To their credit, the Union County jury voted in favor of the Black family who indeed inherited the property.  This is a story of unusual justice in the Jim Crow South.

Yay.

But it doesn’t mean that racism went away.  Yes, somebody deserves credit for doing the right thing?  Or do they?

Before we congratulate ourselves for hiring the Brown woman or calling the Gay Pastor or electing the former refugee from Somalia, we need to remind ourselves that this is a long time coming. At this moment my own Presbytery has an African America female Moderator, an African American female Vice-Moderator, an African American Moderator of Presbytery Council, an African American Moderator of our Ministry Resources Committee.  This makes me feel proud . . . until I remember that for 300 years, the Presbyterians have been led – almost exclusively – by straight White men.  We have some catching up to do in terms of including all the people God includes.

Do we get credit for doing the right thing?  To a point.  But it’s a little embarrassing to pat ourselves on the back for more than a minute for doing what God has always done.

Image of Inherit the Land: Jim Crow Meets Miss Maggie’s Will by Gene Stowe (2006).

I have many friends who tell me they don’t watch, read, or listen to the news anymore.  I understand that the sound of some politicians voices make us tired.  I get that the 24/7 news cycle causes stress and not just for media professionals.

But it’s a peculiar privilege to ignore what’s going on in the world.  It’s easy not to think about people suffering at our southern border or the latest school shooting or health care nightmares.  Many of our neighbors cannot ignore such realities because it’s part of their daily lives.

It’s a little scary to have so many things to get angry about.  I’m still angry that Saudi Arabia was not held accountable for Jamal Khashoggi’s murder.  I’m angry that a guy drove to the El Paso Walmart for the stated desire of shooting brown people.  If I think about it for more than a minute, I am burning inside that we have taken children from their parents at the border causing the kind of childhood trauma that will last for a generation.  I’m angry that – for legal immigrants to this country – it costs about $20,000 to get a green card per family member.

There’s a feeling like the clenching of a fist.  James Taylor wrote that lyric for a song about Dr. King and while there has always been plenty to be righteously angry about, it’s certainly not letting up these days.

How do we find peace in such a troubled world?

• Try to see even our enemies through the eyes of Christ?
• Pray for that peace that passes all understanding?
• Remember that God is bigger than politics and injustice?
• Love people the best we can?
• Practice resurrection in our everyday lives?

Jesus prayed that we would make earth as it is in heaven.  We can’t do that by ignoring the news, the injustices, the people in need around us.  Jesus died for Jamal Khashoggi and the Walmart shooter and the victims of that crime and their families and every single person at the border including the border agents, and the children who have been taken from their parents and now live in foster care in Michigan and Virginia and Idaho far from mom and dad.  Sometimes I have the feeling like the clenching of a fist.  And all I can do is ask God to make it better.

Note: God uses us to make things better.

Image by Benny Andrews is Did a Bear Sit Under a Tree? (1969) The lyric by James Taylor is from the song Shed a Little Light. (1991)

“I imagined that my own quality might someday be recognized.”

I know many Quality People and they tend to be the ones who recognize the quality of other people.  They see the quality of those who serve them in restaurants and teach their children.  They are grateful for those know make their own lives easier: the grocery store cashier, the car mechanic, the construction worker.

There’s talk of a Faith and Values Debate between the Democratic Candidates for President and I wish there would be one for the final candidates of all political parties – not to try to out-pious each other or judge each other, but to ask some basic questions about humanity:

1. Do you believe that people are created in the Image of God?
2. Which people?
3. And how would your answers impact your governance?

This strikes me as the only way to get to a candidate’s most fundamental understanding of human life.  It cuts to the chase for every issue from Pro-Life to Immigration to Gun Control.

It illustrates who is valued in someone’s world and who is less valued or not valued.  I don’t know about you, but I want to be a person of value.  I know I’m valued by God except for those times I don’t feel it.  And I admit that I also want other humans to value me.  I’m profoundly fortunate to feel that most days.

Please read Ta-Nehisi Coates’ new book and first novel The Water Dancer about Hiram – an enslaved man whose parents were an enslaved woman sold “Natchez-way” when he was a child and the owner of the Lockless Plantation.  The setting is pre-Civil War Virginia.

Coates rarely uses the words “enslaved” or “slaveholder.”  He uses “Tasked” and “Quality.”

“I was just then beginning to understand the great valley separating the Quality and the Tasked – that the Tasked hunched low in the fields, carrying the tobacco from hillock to hogshead, led backbreaking lives and that the Quality who lived in the house high above the seat of Lockless, did not.”

The truth is – of course – that the people with deep value, deep quality – were actually the Tasked.  They were the engine that kept Lockless going.  Without them, the Quality could not have survived.

I think about the people I know who are admired in the world for their gracious homes and welcoming hospitality when – actually – there are housekeepers, gardeners, bakers, and others who make the quality of their lives possible.  The worldly qualities I myself possess are a result of generations of helpers in and outside my family.

There are “successful” people everywhere who are selfish and mean-spirited.  They have quality in the eyes of the world and certainly in the eyes of God.  And yet they tend not to recognize the quality in others.  At all.

As I wake up very early on this Monday morning, I see that we still live in a world divided into The Quality and The Tasked.  There are those of us who have and those of us who do not have: homes, food, health care, safe neighborhoods, good schools, citizenship.  Their daily tasks would bring The Quality to our knees.

The world is a hot mess and the beginning of cooling things down and cleaning things up involves understanding who is created in the Image of God.  (And remembering that there is no one who is not created in God’s Image.) May we all be fluent in the language of appreciation this week.

Read Ta-Nehisi Coates’ The Water Dancer.  It is extraordinary. The quotes are both from this novel.

Landon Whitsitt is nothing if not pithy.

He made this statement at an Executive Transitional Ministry Training in 2015 and – although I’ve written about it before – I want to revisit the statement because it has happily altered our Committee on Ministry culture for the better:

You can put a toilet in the kitchen but we’re going to tell you that putting a toilet in your kitchen is a very bad idea.

In Presbyterian Church World, the Committee/Commission on Ministry (COM) is the center of power that assists congregations in calling new pastors, retiring current pastors, ordaining and installing pastors, handling congregational conflicts often involving a pastor, ensuring that pastors have healthy boundary training, etc.  In fact, COM not only assists, we are one of the legs of the “three legged stool” that approves changes in ministry along with the individual pastor and the congregation.  (All three legs have to agree for something to happen.)

In some Presbyteries COM is the bad guy.

COM has the reputation of saying no when a congregation wants to say yes.  And I totally get the frustration when a congregation that knows itself really really well wants to call Cousin Eddie to be their next pastor because they believe that Cousin Eddie would make a fine preacher and it would save them so much time to call him.*

We Presbyterians have certain iron clad requirements (like Cousin Eddie has to have seminary training in the Reformed tradition, proper examinations, a clean background check) but apart from that, we hope to be a permission-giving entity.

Here’s the beauty of Landon’s pithy saying:

• It gives a congregation permission to make a foolish choice. Unless we – the Presbytery – knows that this pastor is an embezzler/sexual predator/serial killer, we are granting permission for a congregation to make a decision they will probably regret, if not today then a year from now.
• It demands that the COM (through liaisons assigned to each congregation) must have a trusting, personal relationship with our congregations so that it’s clear to the congregation that we want you to thrive.
• It moves “the Presbytery” from being the bossy institution to being a partner in ministry.  We know you can have a stronger leader than Cousin Eddie.

Just this week at a COM training, more than one person quoted this saying.  I believe it should be the mantra of each Presbytery because the truth is that the Presbytery (or Conference, Diocese, etc.) exists to strengthen our congregations.  At least that’s why we should exist.

Denominational mid-councils or entities certainly do not exists to perpetuate institutions.  No.  Never.  (Or at least not anymore.)

So, churches – you can pick Cousin Eddie to be your pastor, but we’re going to tell you it’s a bad idea.  You can pick that suave former Lutheran who was removed from ordination for reasons nobody is willing to share.  You can pick that clergywoman who has left her last three congregations under a cloud – but she is available!  You can pick the Pulpit Candy.  But – if it’s a poor choice – we are going to tell you.

And it’s not a poor choice because somebody in the Presbytery doesn’t like they way they wear their hair.  It will be a poor choice because we’ve seen what happens when churches call a pastor who:

• Looks great on paper and even in person, but we’ve learned that the pastor is a bully.
• Seems so charming, but has a history of not-yet-chargeable incidents in previous churches.
• Might be inexpensive to call (eg a retired pastor to whom you don’t have to pay health or retirement benefits) but you get what you pay for.
• Is exactly what you had before (and remember you fired that guy.)

God (and the Presbytery) want your church to thrive and grow and transform the world for good in the name of Jesus Christ.  Let us help you do that.

[*Presbyterians “call” pastors.  We don’t “hire” them.  A pastoral call assumes that the Holy Spirit has moved through the voice of the congregation and others.]

I wrote the other day about our Soothe Me Languages – something like our Love Languages but with more intoxicants.  It feels like (and “feels like” are the operative words here) that many of us are walking around in pain.  There’s the “I’ve been brutally hit” pain.  There’s the “something’s not quite right” pain.  And there’s everything in between.

Pastors may or may not have training in trauma care, but – whether we do or we don’t – we will encounter trauma if we are approachable, trustworthy leaders.  A good pastor is the keeper of other people’s lives: the divorces, the infertility, the heartbreaks, the mental breaks, and – yes – even the addictions.  We try to soothe God’s people with reassurance and presence.  We too need soothing.

All intoxicants are problematic if we go too far – including exercise.  But many of us – people who are pastors and people who need pastors – find that sugar, alcohol, narcotics, and caffeine are easy friends when we need to numb out swiftly.

Recovery Ministries – thank God – have normalized the truth that we are all hot messes.  We are all broken.  This is so refreshing in places where it’s not okay to appear less than perfect. (I’m looking at you Intragram.)

I’m not anti-intoxicant.  Remember that Jesus himself was a wine-drinker and I’m guessing he was also a sucker for Lilies of the Field.  They smell amazing.

And yet we need to take an honest look at our intoxicant intake.  Even too many flowers cause an allergic reaction.

I was talking with a banker yesterday about integrity in everyday life.  He told me that when he was laid off a few years ago, it was tempting to phone it in, in terms of his last week on the job.  But he felt that it was important to work until 5:00 pm even on his last day.

That’s what integrity looks like.

What integrity doesn’t look like:

• Phoning it in.
• Withholding information to maintain power.
• Taking credit for other people’s ideas.
• Blaming other people for the mistake we made.
• Threatening behavior – “I will _____ if you don’t _____.” I will leave the church and take my money with me if you don’t let me run the Personnel Committee.  Bye. Bye.
• Skimming money off of whatever (donations for charity, etc.)
• Gas-lighting those who disagree with us.
• Saying one thing and doing the opposite.
• Expecting behaviors from colleagues that we would never expect from ourselves.

I have met pastors who are integrity-challenged and maybe you have too.  We can do a lot of damage – spiritually and emotionally – if we go about our lives without integrity, especially if we are in ostensibly trustworthy positions: Pastor, Deacon, Elder.

It’s hard for me to love you if you are integrity-challenged, but I’m trying. It’s impossible for me to recommend you to be somebody’s pastor if integrity is not your thing.  (Note: it will also be hard for me to vote for you if integrity is not your thing.)

The Good News:  we can all do better.

The Bad News: the dearth of integrity in the world makes us cynical and exhausted.

But it’s life-giving to shock someone by doing a lavishly generous thing when we don’t have to.  I believe that Jesus lived a life of perfect integrity and I’m trying to be more like Jesus. But it’s a challenge most days.

Image is Jesus of the People by Janet McKenzie (1999)  Jesus perfected תֹּם .

Everything is looking pretty great.  We feel like we are on track.  God seems to be speaking so clearly.  And then . . . boom.

• You’ve reached a point of security and satisfaction in your work, but then a new boss comes along and gaslights you.
• You’ve been told you are “our first choice” but then the job goes to someone else.
• One day your house is your home.  And then water comes creeping through your doors and windows.
• Kids and spouse are healthy.  And then they aren’t.
• Life looks like a fairy tale.  And then it doesn’t.

Kate Bowler helps. But she can’t take away that terrible “I can’t breathe” feeling.

This is where community comes in.

I have often said that there are two signs of true friendship:

1. I can make dying animal sounds all night and you sit with me and never try to Eliphaz me. (Biblical reference here.)
2. I can call you at 2 am and say, ‘There’s a naked dead man on my kitchen floor‘ and you say, ‘I’ll be right over.’

Good community just sits with us when we’ve received a hit.  Really good community knows our most helpful Sooth Me Language (much like love language but with more intoxicants):  fragrant flowers, coffee, ice cream, wine, sunshine, candles, ocean.

Note: Intoxicants soothe only temporarily.  True recovery takes the rest of our lives.  Yes, we want to die.  We feel like we are going to die.  But please don’t die before your time. (I’ve had to repeat this advice to myself too.)

Good community doesn’t always come from the obvious people.  Sometimes the perfect stranger comes along.  And we cannot make ourselves be someone else’s community if they don’t want us in that role.

It’s about having each other’s back.  Have somebody’s back today.

Image source.

What will be the most important thing you will do today?  (We may not know until the day has ended.)

I asked this question at a Meaning of Life class for adults years ago and it was interesting what people said:

• Read my child a bedtime story.
• Cleared out my Inbox.
• Cooked a healthy dinner.
• Negotiated a contract.
• Wrote a bunch of Thank You notes. (Who was that person?)
• Finished planning for a conference.

At the end of the day, I try to name one thing that tranformed me or my Presbytery (where I work.) I’m pretty good at naming the transformations at work.  Not so great at self-transformation, but trying to focus on this a bit more.

The best use of my time at work is culture-shifting work:

• A congregation realized that the Presbytery indeed wants them to thrive.
• Relationships between congregations are bolstered.
• Another pastor gets our new organizational structure.
• Connections were made between people, congregations, community organizations.

I’m trying to shift my personal culture as well:

• Read more novels. (Note: The Testaments is excellent.)
• Write more Thank You notes – not because I have to but because I want to.
• Exercise way more.
• Eat less sugar.  (This would be a huge genetic shift.)
• Stop working so much.

That last one is the trickiest.  With HH still living several states away it’s so tempting to work All The Time.  The truth is that I don’t have to prove myself at this point in my life (although I still try to do that.)  How about you?

I can tell you all day long that you are worthy of relaxation and staring-into-space time.  But many of us work to show how hard we are working – even if our calendars are filled with activities with little impact.

What’s the most important thing you will do today?  I hope it will be transformative and not just for your office/workplace.

Image of one of my favorite places to stare into space.

Do you have 4 minutes?  Watch this. (Password: inlighten)

Remember Nooma?  (This is different.)

Scott Galloway is the Founder and Executive Producer of InLighten Films which warms this Presbyterian’s heart because:

• These short films are based on The Revised Common Lectionary.  (Tip of the hat to Protestant Mainliners.)
• They are indeed short – 3 to 5 minutes long.
• They are professionally produced and fresh.
• They can be used for sermon openings, Sunday School, youth/young adult groups, and Bible studies.

Scott also happens to be a Presbyterian from Davidson, N.C. and he totally gets that without stories it’s very difficult to capture the imagination and hearts of busy 21st Century humans.

Most of our churches – especially our beloved Mainline congregations – need a jolt that reminds us who we are and why we were created.  I believe that these short films might just be that jolt that moves us from tired preaching and teaching to something more spiritually moving. Check them out.

This one is my favorite.

Top image from the InLighten short film Lost and Found based on Luke 15:1-10. Bottom image from the InLighten short film Brunch.