Closing Ceremony

This is my last newsletter article as your pastor which means that it’s also … AWARDS TIME! Yes, it’s that time in which I look back and reflect on the best (and worst) moments of my pastoral appointment at Kessler Park UMC.

Before we begin, let me say that it has been sheer joy to serve as your pastor. It’s truly been a great appointment, and I have appreciated every moment of it. Thank you for your generosity, your kindness, and your patience.

But now to the awards …

Best Worship Moment: I have a multitude of specific memories from our worship together, including all the special services for Holy Week and Christmas, as well as funerals, weddings, and other times. But our best moments together were when we were at Holy Communion. There is no moment more sacred for a pastor than to serve the elements to each of his members, one by one. Over time, I knew what to expect from each of you — how some of you like to have the bread placed in your hand, others reach for it, some clasp my hand as I give it, some make the sign of the cross before receiving. I learned that Susan Baxley, Paige Bell, and Margot and Sylvie Tomerlin needed the gluten-free bread. I loved giving bread to small children and saying, “This bread shows you that God loves you!” There is nothing like the act of serving communion; thank you for receiving the sacrament from me these past five years!

Worst Creative Worship Idea: There are a lot of candidates in this category, I’ll admit. For example, I dressed up as Captain Bluetastic for a Children’s Time, brought a huge Jenga set onto the chancel, did an improv sermon with my comedy coach, and used all sorts of props. Some things worked, others didn’t. At least I tried to liven things up, right?! But probably the worst idea I tried — the one I cringe at when I bring it to mind — was a Christmas Eve children’s service a couple of years ago when I dressed up as a tour guide for Tony’s Holy Land Tours and led kids around the sanctuary visiting various scenes from the birth of Jesus. Probably the worst thing about it was my obnoxious faux Italian accent.

Favorite Children’s Time Moment: When Paige Bell was our Children’s Minister, she made the mistake of teaching the Hand Prayer to the children in worship. This is a method which involves a different kind of prayer corresponding to each different finger on one’s hand. From the moment she started, we all knew that disaster loomed … and sure enough, Grey Mecca was the one who proudly showed us all his middle finger!

Favorite Special Music: I loved hearing church members use their musical talents outside of the traditional music ministry. Some of my favorite memories include: Mattie Jette singing solo, a cappella, without a microphone because if she did, the roof would be blown off the building!; Nathaniel Ogren playing guitar and singing original compositions; Rob Ballard singing, “Give Me Jesus”; Jim Shoecraft singing “The Old Rugged Cross”; Hannah Price playing every time she was home from college; and every time any one of our children has ever sung, played piano, played violin, or performed in a musical. Honorable mention: even though this didn’t occur in a Sunday morning worship service, I was blown away by the woman who “played bowls” during Jeff Chandler’s memorial service. The music she made was intensely peaceful and calming.

Best Potluck Dishes: This is a dangerous topic because I am likely to leave out someone’s mother’s beloved casserole, but I’ll go out on a limb anyway. I will miss Oscar Brown’s BBQ meatballs which he brought in a crockpot. There were always leftovers which I managed to sneak home to the parsonage. I will also miss Mary Ann Climer’s gumbo and paella which also often happened to make it to the parsonage. Anything baked by Phyllis Smith is worth paying attention to; she often brought fresh-baked warm banana or pumpkin bread to staff meetings, for which I am eternally grateful. And by the way, Eugenia Williams always brought food, even if she never made it herself. She gets brownie points nonetheless.

Best Outdoor Event: Every chance I get, I remind y’all that your property is a blessing, one of the biggest assets that the church has for ministry and mission. I loved the various ways in which the church uses the campus for creating community, from movie nights to community picnics, from Stations of the Cross to Easter egg hunts. But my favorite outdoor event has to be the Palm Sunday service. I recall having the idea of bringing a live donkey to my first Palm Sunday service on the front lawn; the last two years, we’ve had a blues service on the east lawn. I hope you continue the tradition of outdoor worship at least once a year; it’s a beautiful way to take the church outside its own doors.

Finally, the category you’ve all been waiting for … Best Church Member! And the winner is …

You! Congratulations!!

What Churches Can Learn From Dying Newspapers

I’ve finally done something I was determined not to do, something that sounded so outrageous as to be almost blasphemous. I thought I would never change my principles, but everything came crashing down in my world a few weeks ago —

I cancelled my subscription to the Dallas Morning News.

Before you pick up that stone, please give me a chance to explain myself. I am a child of print journalism. I helped start the newspaper at Allen High School years ago, then I worked summers at the local rag, Allen American. For a period during college, I was the sports editor for that twice-weekly publication.

I chose to study broadcast journalism in college, which eventually morphed into an interest in film production, but I have never lost my appreciation and passion for the newspaper. In fact, during seminary, I was a regular contributor to the DMN’s Religion section, which was a weekly section of 6-8 pages once upon a time.

Furthermore, I, too, am someone who likes to read the paper in the morning with a cup of coffee. But those days are long gone. Lately, I’m lucky if it takes me half a cup of joe to get through the whole thing. Face it — the paper is pretty thin these days.

It started a good number of years ago, when I began to notice that many of the stories on the front page were written by the legendary reporter, “From Wire Reports.” Less and less of the copy was written by people with names who live and work in Dallas.

Then I started to recognize much of the paper’s content because I had read it the day before, online from another source! For the first time, the day’s paper started to feel like old news.

Not to mention the fact that I found the DMN to have far too little coverage of film, TV and music, and far too many recipes, gardening tips, and health-related info-ads. Unfortunately, I’ve never been interested in the comics page either.

Still, I held on. For one thing, the DMN was the best place to get local news, though maybe not as incisive and investigative as Jim Schutze and the Dallas Observer folks. And you couldn’t beat the Sports page either, unless you listened to The Ticket or The Fan, or kept up with any number of sports blogs or online sites.

The last straw came a few weeks ago, when the paper slashed its staff — again — and then promptly trimmed a few more pages from their daily product — again! The editorial and opinion section, which held down the last two inside pages of the front section, was reduced to one measly page. The only entertainment writer I liked (Chris Vognar) was sent packing, and so was sportswriter Eddie Sefko.

And I decided I was done.

This is not a proud moment for me, but the Morning News has done nothing to keep me around. I would like to support local print journalism, which I think plays a vital role in keeping government accountable, citizens engaged, and communities united. But sadly the paper no longer does those things well.

Print journalism can blame the internet or television or social media, but the truth is that certain journalism outlets have thrived in the new environment. They have adjusted with the times, and adapted to new mediums, new subscription models, and new ways of attracting talent.

I’m just sad that the Dallas Morning News has not been one of them. I still want great journalism, but I get it elsewhere now. That’s the way capitalism works — for better or for worse.

Now, let me challenge you to switch mental gears. Just as there are lots of people now canceling their subscriptions to printed newspapers, there are even more people out there who are no longer going to church. The reasons are similar.

They may have grown up going to church, and appreciating church, and having rich experiences with church. But over time, they noticed that the church was no longer meeting their spiritual and social needs. They wanted to support their local churches, which they think should play a vital role in fostering encounters with God, explaining and interpreting the Bible, and building fellowship. But sadly they have come to the conclusion that the church no longer does those things well.

Over time, people began to sense that there were more authentic ways to experience God, interact with Scripture, and enjoy Christian community. As the modern millennial might put it, “I still want spirituality, but I get Jesus elsewhere now.”

Churches can blame the internet or television or social media, but the truth is that certain congregations have thrived in the new environment. They have adjusted with the times, and adapted to new mediums, new models of ministry, and new ways of paying the bills.

As the special General Conference in St. Louis nears, the question looms large before us: Will the United Methodist Church go the way of the Dallas Morning News and print journalism, or will it find ways to thrive in the new world?

What about Kessler Park UMC?

On Laity Sunday

This Sunday for the first time in a long while (perhaps ever?) we will be celebrating Laity Sunday in our morning worship service.

What does that mean? What is “laity” anyway?

In church lingo, everyone is either clergy or laity — clergy are those who have been ordained by the church and set aside to do the specific work of serving communion, baptizing, teaching and preaching, while laity are … well, everyone else! Laity comes from the Greek word “laos,” which simply means people, crowd, nation, or congregation. When we use the word “laity” now, it generally means not just any random group of people, but God’s people, the new people who have been brought into the community which Jesus Christ formed.

However, there’s a dirty little secret about clergy and laity; there is no Biblical basis for this division! The idea that some people are supposed to do God’s work while everybody else has to get on with living ordinary life is not something that Jesus would have taught. In the early church, everyone had a role to play; everyone participated wholeheartedly in the work of spreading the good news of Jesus.

Of course, as the movement grew it became clear that some people needed to dedicate themselves full-time to the work of leading specific faith communities.

But over time, church leaders became more and more elevated in status over the rest of their congregations. They began to accumulate wealth, take on big titles, and enjoy social and political power. This is especially unfortunate because Jesus would never have approved of the kind of status and privilege that these church leaders enjoyed.

In fact, he is recorded as saying to the disciples, “You know that among the Gentiles the rulers lord it over their subjects, and the great make their authority felt. It shall not be so with you” (Mark 10:42). Another time, he explicitly orders them not to give themselves big titles: “Don't let anyone call you 'Rabbi,' for you have only one teacher, and all of you are equal as brothers and sisters” (Matt. 23:8).

Eventually, ordinary churchgoers began to believe that there were two kinds of Christians — the good Christians, who became priests, monks or nuns, and the ordinary, run-of-the-mill Christians, who had to live ordinary lives in the real world, and thus could be forgiven for living less-than-holy lives. Or to put it another way — clergy and laity.

Fortunately, Martin Luther and the Reformers exposed this thinking to be inconsistent with Jesus’ teaching. They began to introduce “ordinary Christians” to the idea that everyone can be a serious disciple of Christ, and that every one of us has spiritual gifts and talents to use on behalf of the common good.

John Wesley continued this emphasis by encouraging laypersons to preach and teach, as well as perform other tasks usually left to clergy. His teaching on sanctification and Christian perfection clearly implied that laity and clergy alike were called to holiness.

That’s your brief history lesson on the clergy/laity division in the church. Fortunately, we United Methodists have attempted to keep Wesley’s teaching alive. In our Book of Discipline, one of the first sections is titled, “The Ministry of All Christians,” and it includes this critical sentence: “All Christians are called through their baptism to this ministry of servanthood in the world to the glory of God and for human fulfillment.”

Notice the phrase all Christians.

Not just the preacher. Or the children’s minister. All Christians.

That means you.

Lest you think I’m overstating the case, here’s a line from the very next paragraph: “Every layperson is called to carry out the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20); every layperson is called to be missional. The witness of the laity, their Christ-like examples of everyday living as well as the sharing of their own faith experiences of the gospel, is the primary evangelistic ministry through which all people will come to know Christ and The United Methodist Church will fulfill its mission.”

Again, I would point out that this text says that the witness of the laity is the primary evangelistic ministry through which the church will fulfill its mission. Not the pastor’s ministry. Not the staff’s ministry.

But yours. You, the people.

We clergy aren’t here to do all the work. Rather we’re here to assist you in recognizing the work to which you have been called as God’s people.

We clergy aren’t here to do all the evangelism. Rather we’re here to help you tell your faith story so that others might come to know Jesus.

We clergy aren’t here to do all the pastoral care. Rather we’re here to teach you how to care for your neighbors.

We clergy aren’t here to do all the teaching. Rather we’re here to give you the tools you need to teach.

We clergy aren’t here as missionaries. Rather we’re here to teach you how to be missionaries.

How are we doing?