With new vistas come new opportunities

As I write this I am on my way to the School of Theology at Sewanee, TN to visit with a couple of our seminarians.  From there I will travel on to Chicago for a visit with the President, staff, and faculty of Bexley-Seabury Seminary to explore new modalities of theological education.  Thinking about this trip I am becoming aware that both visits have to do with how we will move into the theological formation of clergy for a new and emerging era. 

As many people are proclaiming, this new era of ministry delivery and congregation forming may be so new to us that few have any idea of what to expect.  From where I stand, it appears to be an era of opportunity.  Yet, we’ll only be able to see the opportunities when we learn to look in the right places. Next Saturday (5/11/19) as clergy and lay leaders, we will gather at Redeemer Church in Midlothian to have conversations with Tod Bolsinger to explore how we might begin to shift our vision so that we can see our new possibilities.

Many people such as Tod Bolsinger are engaged in Christian leadership training and developing mission planning strategies for the future.  Across the board these folk are making us aware that our contemporary ways of being the body of Christ may not be effective for us as we move into the future.  In fact, these leadership trainers and mission planners are challenging us to look at some new ways to not only build mission strategy but also to learn what new skills we may need to have to be able to implant the new mission strategies. 

This year I will commemorate the 73^rd year of my baptism and 43^rd year of ordained ministry.  During my life we have experienced some remarkable social, cultural and religious shifts.  When I was born we were using the Hymnal 1940, the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, and the altar was attached to the wall.  When we talked about “the Church” the use of the phrase had every bit as much to do with a building as it had to do with the people who worshipped in that building. In the late 1940s and in the 1950s by and large people in the United States were outwardly very religious with a strong lean toward Christianity.

Today, the situation has changed remarkably.  The number of people who have no connection with the Christian faith is growing each year.  In many families a twenty-something man for woman may be as far removed as two complete generations from a time when there was there was routine Christian worship in the family.  I think you get the gist of what I am telling you.

Because of all the dynamic changes we have experienced I am excited about what we are going to be talking about with Tod Bolsinger on Saturday.  As I envision things, this is our first big step toward doing some reflection about how our leadership paradigms may need to change in order to build up the spiritual blood count so we can face the inevitable spiritual challenges of this millennium.  No one of us has “the answer,” but together we can come together to begin to determine what it will take to retool our pastoral and evangelical work for the Kingdom of God.  That is the opportunity in front of us.  It will be our decision about whether or not we will seize the opportunity.