By Greg Yee, Superintendent, PacNWC
“TOGETHER” has never ever looked like this! It’s amazing that in less than a month since our last issue, how much our work, family, church, finances, relationships, shopping,…everything has changed. It’s been a disruption of expansive proportions. But is it just a disruption?
Some have framed this as a perfectly timed forced world-wide Lenten fast. Others have described this with two-dimensional graphs with curves that peak and flatten but eventually land solidly back on the x-axis labeled time.
Will this be just a season for us to return to the familiar normal rhythms we’re used to? It was a good fast, and it will be good to break fast as things are back to normal. Will we finally be able to rid ourselves of these curves and be back to baseline?
Fellow superintendent Howard Burgoyne sent all the supes an article from March’s The Praxis Journal entitled, “Leading Beyond the Blizzard: Why Every Organization Is Now a Startup.” The authors challenge that this current global pandemic is not just a weeks-long “blizzard,”not even just a months-long “winter,” but something closer to the beginning of a 12–18 month “ice age” in which many assumptions and approaches must change for good.
You futurist among us eat this kind of stuff up and love pushing the necessity of difficult radical shifts. Everything everywhere must change!
You standard bearers saw the title and didn’t even check the link because you’re tired. There’s too much hype. You push us to concentrate on staying with fundamentals.
Sidebar – I am reminded in this moment that There are different kinds of gifts. But they are all given to believers by the same Spirit. There are different ways to serve. But they all come from the same Lord. There are different ways the Spirit works. But the same God is working in all these ways and in all people. The Holy Spirit is given to each of us in a special way. That is for the good of all.(1 Cor 12:4-7). We really need each other in all of our diverse personalities and approaches as we continue to walk through this unprecedented time and figure things out together, don’t we?
Back to the article – it then focuses on how we need to completely throw out what we’ve depended on in the past and figure out what God is unfolding today. It’s an opportunity for the church to be reinvigorated and revived as the Holy Spirit blows new winds of life into and through us.
I certainly see some of this happening as I’ve heard pastors holding regular online prayer times and saying they won’t stop even after Stay at Home is lifted. We’ve used our solitary walks to pray and pray with people more on the phone. Wow, praying more is so good!
It seems that inviting people to an online service has been easier than to an in-person one. Churches are reporting higher numbers online than they normally have on a Sunday morning. I was shocked to hear after preaching at Evergreen’s first Sunday online that friends from around the country, a mom in our carpool, and our neighbors all watched the service!
I’ve also heard about more conversations with neighbors happening. With everybody at home, there have been more opportunities to see neighbors on walks and in front of houses. Wow, getting closer to people, being the presence of Christ, serving neighbors, is so good.
We’ve been forced to explore new approaches to stay connected and to care for others. I’ve loved hearing about church directories being divided up and nobody being left behind. I love hearing about serving high risk folks to make sure they are cared for and safe. I love seeing how previously disconnected people are now connecting. Wow, growing our span of care is so good.
Suddenly we’re realizing the importance of Sunday morning more clearly that ever. Or perhaps more pointedly, we’re realizing that Sunday morning should not be as important as it currently is. What’s most important is the overall discipleship focus of our churches. Who are we when Sunday is taken away or diminished? Jesus didn’t say go and produce great Sunday services. He said go and make disciples. Yes, we do that partly through Sundays, but now that they have been reduced, do we see just how well we’re actually focused on discipleship? We must put more attention and time into helping people follow Jesus in small groups and in one-on-one relationships.
We’ve been forced out of our four walls to truly understand that the church is us and not our location. Facilities certainly facilitate, but we must get our belief about church straight first. We, the people, are the church. I’ve loved hearing about how you are discovering this anew. I feel like we’ve been an alcoholic in need of an intervention to break the cycle of addiction. Maybe this addiction is all these things that we’ve counted on, defined ourselves by as the church, but we’ve been off. Maybe COVID-19 is helping us break this cycle of those parts of “church” that we are wrongly spending too much time and resources on. Maybe the scarcity of this moment is truly bringing greater clarity.
Love the Lord your God with your entire being – nothing held back.
Love your neighbors radically and wholly.
Go and make disciples – focus on evangelism, train people, and join God in his kingdom building, shalom bringing, redemptive work in the world.
The theme for our online annual meeting this year is TOGETHER. It is taken from Jesus’ Upper Room Prayer in John 17. I believe we are living into the answer to Jesus’ prayer in this moment. More than ever, we’ve been forced to see what is real, what is most important, and what church and life should be about. Jesus prayed for us, I pray that they will all be one…so that the world will believe [in me].
I don’t know if this will be just a blizzard, or a winter, or an ice age. I do know that we can’t just return to baseline. I know that we can’t just return to normal. Maybe normal isn’t good. I believe we need a new normal and God is shaping that among us in this moment of isolation.
My prayer is that you will be experiencing TOGETHER greater than ever before. And I know that TOGETHER will be even sweeter when you can physically be connected again. In that, I pray that God would give you anointed space to do good church soul searching. What needs to stay the same? What needs to change? What do we need to let go?
As we approach Holy Week and Easter, may the reality of Jesus’ resurrection power and renewing work be deeply known in you. We continue to keep our churches in prayer. Grace, health, and peace, dear friends.
Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
Phil 3:13-14