Well it is the evening of day 2…
the things I have in my PalmPilot for notes is…
We should & could ourselves to death
“Hiper than thou“
inoculation to reality
What does this tell us about ministry…How can we be ministers when we think that everything is works righteousness?
We need to get over our Lutheranness on this. We are saved by grace through faith, apart from anything we have done. Ok, we can do nothing to obtain our salvation. We all know this, we all live this, and we need to accept it and move on. We need to get beyond thinking that we should not do works, because being captivated by the love of God compels us to do things. We just need to understand that the things we do can gain us nothing, except some one might see the love of God, and allow God to work on their lives, yet this is all God’s work. We do things because the love of God compels us to, not because of what we get.
We do not need to worry about being hip, we need to worry about being real, being authentic. Ministry is contextual and relational. Be in relationship with everyone you come in contact with. And in order to do this, you have to know yourself, so you can help the other person know if your congregation is a fit for them. if not then we need to send them some where where they can get into a relationship with God. It is not about the numbers in our congregation or even in the ELCA, or any denomination. It is always about the kingdom, it is always about God. If we can not see where Jesus is, then we need to rethink things, or revision things. Being hip is not what we need to worry about is being real.
We also need to not allow our religion to be an inoculation to reality. We need to embrace our context and the society around us, without being sucked into the society. In and not of, we are citizens of heaven, bought with the blood of Christ, beyond what we have done, yet called to be in the world, and a part of the mission of God. We need to not see our claiming by God as an inoculation to the reality around us, yet claim our acceptance as the call to be the body of Christ and do the mission of God.
aSacredRebel 