8/18/14- National Gathering report.
The National Gathering in Dallas is simply amazing, encouraging and inspiring.
LAUNCHING OF FELLOWSHIP COMMUNITY- ECO and The Fellowship are now two separate deals. The Fellowship Community is for PCUSA folk called to stay in the PCUSA and minister. That would be LMPC. Heard Linda Valentine- executive director of the PCUSA Presbyt3erian Mission Agency (in effect the chief executive officer of the PCUSA) speak to us about partnering together to make the church better. She challenged us to do more for international missions and 1001 worshiping communities. We were encouraged to not be shy about working with other churches in and outside of our denomination- including ECO. Dana Allen thanked the fellowship for helping them and said we want to continue to do the Lord's mission work together. We were encouraged to do Mission Affinity Groups and Pastor Accountability Groups to help us sharpen each other's mission for Christ. Mark Brewer is the new president of The Fellowship Community. This is different from PFR. Fellowship Community is not an exit ramp or waiting room for ECO but for those who wish to do purposefully do mission in PCUSA. Paul Detterman said that several presbytery and synod execs approached him to help them with their churches once they felt that Paul and the Fellowship folk were not trying to lead people out. Paul has been contacted by United Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopalians and UCC folk who all wanted to partner together with Presbyterians who were staying in the mainline.
This is out of sequence but this was a Pre-Gathering event I went to- Normally this conference has avoided this topic- and it is not the main or even a single issue here.
This is what I heard. Debra Hirsch (Alan Hirsh's wife- who helped write "Untamed" and is writing a new book "Unleashing Sexuality" was amazing. Debra is from Australia. She was in a bad place- had been abused sexually as a young girl and had gone into the drug scene and was living with another woman as a lesbian and saw nothing wrong. She has been a Christian and married to Alan (a great theologian and church consultant) for 22 years now. Many of her friends became Christians through the ministry of her former drug addict who reached out to them all after his own conversion.
Here are a couple of nuggets: "If you are not offended by something in the gospel- you are not reading it clearly" (Tim Keller). Some people have disgust for different sins- a visceral response. But in order to reach people who are caught in sexual confusion and brokenness we need to treat them not with condemnation but with love as Jesus did in John 8. Surveys by young non-church urban folk indicate that they judge us by saying we are "anti-gay" when we really need to be reaching out to all people with the love of Christ. If we are not reaching out then we are failing to be the church. G.K. Chesteron said that a man knocking on the door of a brothel is in fact looking for Jesus. Debra said that women often condemn men for pornography but then hide behind the soft porn of celebrity worship and gossip which arouse some crazy things. It was an interesting take on some of these things. I agreed with so much and was inspired to do more- especially in AIDS ministry.
MONDAY NI\GHT WORSHIP-
Highland Park Presbyterian brought in their 100 person choir and led us in singing about five hymns and then they sang about three anthems- with the organ and the piano. It was just amazing music! Just amazing classical anthems and hymns. I got into that. Not as much contemporary worship songs here at this point- that is okay with me for my tastes, though I can appreciate a little of that too.
But the talk this night was simply earth-shaking- you could almost feel the Spirit vibrating the room. It was by Carol Kaminski (prof. of Hebrew at Gordon Conwell- also from Australia). Her main theme was Genesis 12:1-3. This is, the key mission text, the beginning of mission (besides be fruitful and multiply). It was given in a context of barrenness. God often uses bad/sad circumstances to bring about real missions- Sara was barren (Gen 18:11; 11:30). It was in the midst of this that God showed Abraham the stars and said, "Look at the stars you will be more numerous." It was in the slavery of Egypt that the numbers of the Israelites grew to fulfill the command to be fruitful and multiply. It was in Gideon (least person of the smallest tribes) who was told he had too many- to show that it was God who did it. Jehoshaphat marched out against a vast host calling on God to show Himself- He did. Naomi went to Ruth because there was a famine in the land. God takes the most difficult circumstances- our brokenness and brings mission out of that. So encouraging in our situation in the PCUSA.
All of this was just inspiring.
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