You never are together [simply] to be together, you’re together because you have something you want to do, work that [needs to be done]. — Stanley Hauerwas

In my prior post, I shared Robert Lupton’s challenge to the church to move away from charity that breeds dependency and toward activities that create economic opportunities in distressed neighborhoods.  Christopher Smith, in his book “The Virtue of Dialogue”, tells the story of Englewood Christian Church, located in Englewood neighborhood on the near eastside of Indianapolis, who successfully made this transition.  Smith writes,

“Although Englewood was once a prestigious church, the pride of our fellowship of churches, and once a mega-church, we were now neither large nor influential. Rather, we were a church that had plunged toward destruction with the abandonment of our neighborhood. In this era, very few church members lived in our neighborhood, and in many ways we had become more like a center for urban ministry.

 

One of our first responses was to launch a number of “pantry” ministries typical of many urban churches and para-church groups: a food pantry, a clothing pantry, and even a furniture pantry. These pantries ran for about a decade, from the early 1980s to the early 1990s. As the years progressed, however, we found that we were helping to transfer a lot of goods—much of which came from our sister churches in suburbia – but were not connecting with the people to whom the goods were given.

 

This work was not only failing to nurture friendships with our neighbors, it was also creating destructive dynamics of need and dependency, and for these reasons, we eventually shut it down.   It was in this context that we came—or perhaps more accurately, stumbled—into the practice of conversation.

 

By sitting down together every Sunday night in that circle, we began the long, slow process of learning how to converse; we built trust, hammered out the foundations of a shared language, and deepened our commitments to one another. In these new conversations, we were called deeper into the transforming work that God is doing in our urban neighborhood.

 

Our journey toward becoming a conversational people has also drawn us deeply into conversations with our neighbors. Since early in the history of the Sunday night conversation, we have been actively involved in a number of neighborhood groups in our immediate Englewood neighborhood and across the larger Near Eastside neighborhood.

 

As our life together has become more deeply rooted in our Sunday night conversation, we have found ourselves being drawn into a conversational way of life that was not simply passive discussion but rather full of life and of careful activity that is one contributing factor in our neighborhood’s process of beginning to change and flourish. We believe that conversation is essential to the sort of abundant life together into which we have been called in Christ Jesus.

 

In the last verses of chapter 14, Paul instructs the Corinthians that when they gather, everyone should come prepared to share out of the gifts given to each member. If it is the Holy Spirit who unites us and gives particular gifts to each member of the church community (chap. 12), then as we gather together, we should make room for these gifts to interact.”

It was in the context of these conversations that God led Englewood into creating economic opportunities in the neighborhood.

“Our businesses allow us to initiate and sustain conversations with neighbors and others throughout the city about the efforts in which we all are collaborators. Not only does working together give our church an opportunity to know and converse with one another in a broader range of contexts, it also gives us the opportunity to reflect theologically together and make discernments about how we as a community that embodies Christ in our particular neighborhood, should do the work to which we are called. The work that we have chosen to do is real work that we believe God has called us into as God transforms our neighborhood and causes it to flourish.

 

One of our most successful businesses has focused on providing affordable housing in our neighborhood. The mass exodus from our neighborhood in the last decades of the twentieth century provided a prime opportunity for us to acquire homes cheaply, then fix them up and rent them.

 

We have had a number of other businesses that originated in the gifts and skills of church members and neighbors. We have a landscaping business that has provided summer work for many young men, and a handful of book-related businesses including a small bookstore. After the closing of the local grocery stores, our neighbors were increasingly interested in creating a cooperative grocery store that would provide good, local food, but also be sensitive to our lower income neighbors.”

Smith gives this advice to congregations who are seeking to rediscover a conversational way of being the church.

“First, our conversations must be Eucharistic, by which I mean not that they should be directly connected to our practice of this sacrament, but that we enter into conversation with the sort of radical self-denial that defined the life and death of Jesus and that we remember in the celebration of the Eucharist. It must be the Holy Spirit who speaks in our midst and guides our conversations. If we speak (or listen) out of our sinful nature, passions will be ignited and division will ensue. If we allow our selfish agendas to dominate our conversations (and particularly the “what’s in it for me?” mentality), we are setting ourselves up for power struggles and many other kinds of trouble.

 

Second, conversation should be open; anyone and everyone should be allowed to contribute. Open conversation in the church is rooted in the convictions that God has assembled us together in this place and that everyone that God has assembled is a gift given for the maturing of Christ’s body.

 

In nurturing public conversations that are open and that focus more on the common than on selfish desires, we have found that we participate in the healing, reconciling, and transforming work of Christ in our neighborhood.

 

Our job as churches is to learn to talk together again and to allow our conversation to spill out of our churches and into our neighborhoods, a stream of hope scented with the rich fragrance of the reconciliation, the shalom that God desires for all creation.   May we abide faithfully in this calling!”

While my short sketch here may make it sound like this transition from charity to justice based ministries and the conversations that led to this shift were easy, Smith is honest about the challenge of reclaiming conversation in our culture.  We are a nation driven by efficiency and effectiveness.  We have also put a tremendous amount of emphasis on building bigger church which makes dialogue more difficult.  We avoid conflict and the combination has led us to hierarchical structures that remove the need for conversation.

The transformation of Englewood church and the surrounding community spanned decades and required a level of perseverance that few congregations could sustain.  However, Englewood provides us with not only a success story but a vehicle that can carry any congregation toward a healthier relationship with those in need – the gift of dialogue.  In community development terms, we call these intentional conversations, “listening meetings”, because our goal is enter into the conversation with no agenda other than to discern where God is at work in our neighbors and our collective community.

I love Smith’s emphasis on how it is through dialogue that our gifts can be discovered, interact and then become manifest in our work together.  There are so many gifts, talents and abilities in our congregations and in our communities.  I have no doubt that if we create space for those gifts to be shared, we will find ways of sparking neighborhood based economic opportunities for our urban friends who so desperately desire dignity found only through work.

What from Englewood’s story resonated with you?

What experiences have you had to engage in the types of dialogue in the church that Smith describes?

Do you think these kinds of conversations are possible in your church?

What impact do you think we as a collective body of Christ could have if we engaged in more dialogue with our urban neighbors?

There are three basic approaches to poverty; relief, individual betterment and community development.

Relief programs are focused on “giving a fish.”  Lupton warns us of the down side saying,

“Loading an area down with poverty programs and human services can virtually ruin its chances of economic rebirth.”

Individual betterment programs (tutoring, mentoring, training) are focused on “teaching people to fish.” Lupton writes,

“Betterment programs do make a difference. Yet, as important as these services may be (essential, some would say), serving people is distinctly different from developing people.”

Community development is focused on improving the “condition of the pond.”  Many of our urban communities have become so toxic that no amount of relief or betterment programming is effective because everyone is swimming in polluted waters, often made worse by undisciplined giving.

A healthy pond requires “ownership by the community of their community.”  For a community to assume ownership of its own future, residents have to care enough to get involved.   The goal of the  community developer is discovering the unrealized hopes and dreams of the neighbors.  For the past three years, that is what we have been listening for in the Hillside Community where Embrace Richmond has been engaged.  We have found these words from Lupton to be true,

“The dreamers are seldom connected to the resources that provide nutrients to give those dreams life—that is, until by chance or by providence, someone in the village meets a connected person with a heart, a person who has time to listen, a person with both imagination and resources.

Hope, smothered dim under years of survival pressures, begins to flicker once again. In time, after the trustworthiness of the connecting person can be tested, after the opportunity is subjected to ample reality testing, hope can have free rein. It is a dangerous, fragile, exhilarating moment when the poor cast off their restraints and begin to believe. And this transformative moment, more than any other moment, is what the community developer lives for and what the community thirsts for.”

I have been blessed to have witnessed this beautiful reclaiming of hope and faith many times, but in each case it took years of listening, dreaming, encouraging, and investing.  We now have a handful of individuals that we call our “street saints.” These individuals have come from difficult circumstances and they want to help others in their neighborhood thrive.

1. Charles’s dream is to expand access to affordable housing and employment for those with barriers
2. Patrice’s dream is to strengthen families by strengthening the sense of community
3. Rudy’s dream is to reach older youth and help them avoid the dangers of the streets
4. Denise has a gift for hospitality and cooking and dreams of breaking down the walls of isolation
5. John’s passion is making sure no one goes hungry in his neighborhood especially the elderly
6. Joseph’s hope is to help residents increase their economic opportunities
7. Johnny would like to see people living healthier lifestyles through gardening and exercise

All of these individuals have dreams that they cared enough about to invest in.  They are committed to doing what they can with what they have and are inviting others from their neighborhood to join them in making these dreams for their community a reality.

However, simply engaging people in shaping the future of their community is not enough.  Lupton asks this question,

“Will the proposed activity be wealth-generating or at least self-sustaining for the community?”

This is the question that I have been asking myself a lot lately.  In six months, Embrace Richmond will let go of our AmeriCorps funding which currently provides 75% of the funds that support our community development efforts.  The majority of these funds have been used to provide stipends for the dreamers named above.  I have watched each one of these individuals find new hope, meaning and purpose through the work they have done in the Hillside Community.  Our goal now is to figure out how to help them turn these hopes and dreams into “wealth-generating” or at-least “self-sustaining” initiatives.  As difficult as it was to build this amazing team, I suspect this next step is going to be even more challenging.

However, I strongly agree with Robert Lupton that creating sustainable employment opportunities is one of the most important elements in caring for the spirit and soul of people.  Lupton writes,

“One of the surest ways to destroy self-worth is subsidizing the idleness of able-bodied people. Made in the image of God, we are created with intrinsic worth. And anything that erodes a rightful sense of pride and self-respect diminishes that image.  Life offers no fulfillment without work. Work is a gift, a calling, a human responsibility. And the creation of productive, meaningful employment fulfills one of the Creator’s highest designs. Because of that, it should be a central goal to our service. LITTLE AFFIRMS HUMAN DIGNITY more than honest work.”

Lupton tells a story in an earlier book titled, “Compassion, Justice, and the Christian Life”, about a church that started a clothing closet where everything was free and over time that clothing closet became a thrift store that ultimately created jobs.  He also tells the story of a church that took its benevolence fund to start a jobs bank and how a food pantry became a food coop. It is this kind of “social enterprise” thinking that we all need to engage in more.  Making money is not an evil thing.  Creating jobs for our friends is far more compassionate than expecting them to stand in lines with their hands out for the rest of their lives.

To go beyond charity and really get to the core issue underlying poverty, we have to create economic opportunities in low-income neighborhoods.  There is no other way to create a sustainable healthy neighborhood.  How many jobs could be created by churches if they used the funds that are supporting “relief” ministries to create social enterprise opportunities?

I know first-hand that it is far harder to develop neighborhood leaders, create sustainable employment and change a community than it is to simply give handouts.  I pray more Christians will awaken to the fact that one-way giving approaches are harmful but also recognize that they can be restructured in a way that could be life giving to the community if they were turned into community owned social enterprise opportunities.

What relief programs is your church involved in?

How open is your church to restructuring its one-way giving activities?

How could your current relief program become a social enterprise in a struggling neighborhood?

As I sat in New Orleans, I was so thankful to FTE for reminding me that I too am on a journey.  I spend so much time guiding and nurturing others along in their journey, I had stopped listening to the genuine in myself.

Over the past few months, I have had several Kairos moments – moments where I could feel the eternal God breaking into my finite little world.   In those moments, I heard an “echo” of the genuine in me.  Each time it was a powerful moment but at the same time the sound was so faint, all I knew was I needed to pay attention.

Our lives are so busy, so rushed, so scheduled.  We rarely make time and space both physical space and internal space to pay attention to that still small voice that is breaking through in our loud, noisy lives.

Last Sunday, I decided to take the morning off – off from work, off from church, off from family obligations. I decided to listen intently to the “sound of the genuine” in me.  God brought back to my mind several events from the past few months where I was called to pay attention:

• My online debate with David Fitch was the first event I began to wrestle with.  I began asking myself, “Why did I find his words so frustrating?”  I realized as I prayed over this that he made me feel dismissed.  It was really not David the person but more David the representative of the established Church structure that so easily dismisses those outside the establishment.  While I hold a Masters in Divinity and have spent the past 18 years of my life working in and for churches, all he saw was my role as an Executive Director of a non-profit that does Asset-Based Community Development and therefore I was not qualified to speak into the shaping of the future of the church.  I don’t blame David.  I actually like what he is trying to do and I think if we ever met, we would likely find we are a lot alike.  I actually want to thank him.  He made me realize that the genuine in me is that of a Missionary, Pastor and Minister.  I never wanted to be an Executive Director of a non-profit.  My desire was to mobilize the church – to help the church live more authentically in the world.  David simply reminded me of the genuine in me and helped me recognize my current title and role are not the fullness of who I am or who God called me to be.

• My debate with my mentor Jay Van Groningen also came to mind.  When Jay told me that it was nearly impossible for a church to be the driving force in community development work, I set out to prove him wrong.  Two months later, I am willing to accept defeat.  Churches are living organisms.  Living organisms consist of DNA – internal scripts that direct their functioning.  Churches planted with an attractional – our mission is to grow a strong church script, cannot change that DNA to a missional- our mission is to join our neighbors in transforming this community script.   Why was it so important for me to prove Jay wrong?  Because deep down, I want to be a part of a recognized truly missional church.  I believe the missional church movement when undertaken with solid Christian community development practices, holds the key to the renewal of the church and the ushering in of God’s kingdom now.  For me to give up on the inherited church was to give up on the future of the church universal and I could not do that.  I now realize there is a third way.  The way Jay tried to show me – church as asset to the community and blessing instead of driving force.

• Insights into nurturing Christian Vocation.  As I sat in the FTE training on VocationCARE in Atlanta, I realized that the heart of a missional expression of the church is that it releases Jesus followers into the world as change agents on mission with God.  It is not that Christians don’t want to live like Jesus; it is more that they don’t know how or aren’t released and at the same time encouraged to do so.  They have not been taught to listen for the sound of the genuine in themselves and those that have heard that still small voice calling them into a new way of living, often do not find the support they need in the church to live fully into that call.  Years ago, I heard the sound of the genuine revealing to me that my call was to be a “dream releaser.”  In Atlanta, I reconnected with that piece of my call and reclaimed it.  There are dreamers in our urban context and there are dreamers in our suburban context.  Some are in churches, some are not in churches.  I began to dream of a way of being the body that would connect these dreamers and unleash their full potential.

• Weaving it all together through Church of the Savior.  So with all these unconnected pieces rolling around in my head, I climbed aboard the bus and headed to Washington D.C. to visit Church of the Savior. At the time, I thought I was there to help one of my church partners envision a more missional way of being, which is still partly true.  However, God had something far bigger to show me.  It was in DC that all the threads came together.  Church of the Savior is structured as follows:

1. Mission Groups organized around a specific mission in a specific neighborhood.  They are remarkably similar to our “Dream Teams.”
2. The Mission Groups support community development programs like affordable housing, employment services, and youth leadership development, most of which are independent 501c3 corporations.  These programs are remarkably similar to the “initiatives” supported by our teams – family strengthening, vocational development and community building.
3. There is a strong emphasis on helping people discern their Christian call or vocation.  That sense of call is nurtured and respected throughout the organization through a commitment to the inward and outward journey of each person and mission group.  The practices bore a striking resemblance to the practices outlined by FTE’s VocationCARE approach with the same goal as our Dream Circles and Dream Academy workshops.
4. The Mission Groups have formed 9 worshiping communities, or churches.  These churches have no paid staff but are run by the mission groups.  Each church consists of one to five mission groups who come together simply to worship.  Some of these churches are less than 10 people with the largest church expression being 50.  This flat, simple, light weight church structure struck me as not only doable but sustainable.  While not currently an intentional part of Embrace’s design, I found the COS way of doing worship refreshingly simple.

The epiphany:

• I am called to be a Pastor not solely an ED of a Non-profit.
• I am called to be a part of a missional church.
• Embrace Richmond is more like a missional church than it is a non-profit.

I am not sure where this epiphany will lead me, but I have to pay attention to the sound of the genuine in me.

Are you listening to the sound of the genuine in you?

What tapestry is God weaving together in your life?

“There is in every person something that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in herself (or himself)…there is in you something that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in yourself.  Nobody like you has ever been born and no one like you will ever be born again – you are the only one.

 

If you cannot hear the sound of the genuine within you, you will never find whatever it is for which you are searching and if you hear it and then do not follow it, it was better that you had never been born.  You are the only you that has ever lived; your idiom is the only idiom of its kind in all the existences, and if you cannot hear the sound of the genuine in you, you will all of your life spend your days on the ends of strings that somebody else pulls.

 

So the burden of what I have to say to you is, “What is your name – who are you – and can you find a way to hear the sound of the genuine in yourself?”  There are so many (voices and) noises going on inside of you, so many echoes of all sorts, so many internalizing of the rumble and the traffic going on in your minds, the confusions, the disorders by which your environment is peopled that I wonder if you can get still enough – not quiet enough – still enough to hear rumbling up from your unique and essential idiom the sound of the genuine in you.  I don’t know if you can. But this is your assignment.

 

The sound of the genuine is flowing through you.  Don’t be deceived and thrown off by all the noises that are a part even of your dreams (and) your ambitions that you don’t hear the sound of the genuine in you.  Because that is the only true guide you will ever have and if you don’t have that you don’t have a thing.  Cultivate the discipline of listening to the sound of the genuine in yourself.”

I think the most important role of any minister is to help people cultivate the discipline of listening to the sound of the genuine in themselves.  I don’t believe any external voice holds the power to do what the spirit within can do.

I know my primary call is to be a “Dream Releaser” – to free people from the cages that are stifling their deepest dreams and desires.  I used to think my role was to unlock those cages but I have learned that the cages are locked from the inside and we all hold the key to our own cages.  “The key” is hearing the sound of the genuine within and finding the courage to follow it.  Our role as Christ followers is to help others find freedom by cultivating space where people can hear the sound of the genuine in themselves and remind them they were born to fly.

What from Thurman’s the “Sound of the Genuine” stood out for you?

How does this reflective piece make you feel about the “sound of the genuine” in you?

Why do you think it is important for the church to cultivate space for people to hear “the sound of the genuine?”

When you listen for the sound of the genuine in you, what do you hear?

We have been operating mission centered small groups in Hillside Court for the past year.  Our family support team, which is led by Hillside resident Patrice Shelton, began meeting regularly over the summer and has attracted a number of strong resident leaders who are helping to shape a strong community vision around family strengthening.

In the past few years, I have been approached by a growing number of churches who want to engage in community development but who simply don’t know how.  This is particularly true of suburban congregations who lack proximity to materially challenged communities.  However both urban and suburban congregations are often paralyzed by the overwhelming needs and recognize they lack the expertise in doing this kind of work.

Thus we have reached the appropriate season in our community development efforts to find ways of bringing these two worlds of the church and the neighborhoods together.  Over the past year, I have been traveling all over the country looking at best practices and studying different models that could help inform our work.  What we have discerned is that whatever we do, it will be done from a posture of mutuality. 

A posture of mutuality recognizes the gifts of both communities.  It is not a one-sided, church doing all the giving and the community just receiving.  Nor does a posture of mutuality see the community as needy and the church as the one with all the answers.  As Robert Lupton points out in his excellent book called “Toxic Charity”, these unhealthy ways of entering into relationships with our sisters and brothers who are experiencing poverty only erodes the dignity of people and destroys a communities sense of ownership and power.  I agree with Lupton that in some ways the church is unintentionally making things worse for under-resourced  individuals and I want to do everything in my power not to harm those I care about.

Below is a sketch of how we are seeking to move forward in integrating congregations into our future work.

• Twinning – Our first step will be to build “sister” teams in the congregational context that have a desire to support the work of the neighborhood leaders.  These “sister” teams will seek to unleash the gifts, talents and dreams of its own team members around the mission of the urban team.  It will become a fully functioning “Dream Team” and will mirror the structure of the urban expression.

 

• Grounding – Our next step will be to ground each team in the biblical foundations of Christian community development and in the vision, mission, values of Embrace as well as educating both teams about Embrace Richmond’s unique asset-based approach to community development.

 

• Friending – Before these teams can dream together, they have to trust one another.  So our early gatherings will be high in the fun and fellowship category and will be designed to breakdown fear on both sides of the relationship as we build a safe space for sharing life together.

 

• Visioning – After we develop a sense of shared community, our urban leaders will share their “preferred future” and “present reality” and the combined group will select one to four projects or initiatives to work on together for the coming season.  Only projects with neighborhood leadership will be considered.

 

• Circling Up – Once a month, members of each of the two teams will come together to celebrate what God is doing and to dream together about what God might be calling them to do together in the coming month.

 

• Dreaming – During these monthly circle meetings, the team will break into smaller project groups.  These sub-groups will help the neighborhood leader with any challenges they are facing and will provide support, encouragement and prayer for the neighborhood leader.

 

• Tasking – At the end of each monthly meeting, each of the sub-groups will present its goals for the month to the full circle and will invite others to join them in both prayer and if they feel led also in service.

 

• Celebrating – Quarterly we are hoping to bring all the teams from across the city together for a service of celebration giving credit to God and reminding us all that it is the spirit of Christ moving through our teams that gives us the power to do all God is calling us to do.

As with all things Embrace, we tend to build it as we go. So, I am sure this will morph and change over the next few months.  However, as of today, this is what I think this will look like.

If this sounds like something you would like to be a part of, let me know via email at wendy@embracerichmond.org.  We are launching the first team around Family Strengthening at Brandermill Church in Chesterfield this month.  We are hoping to launch our second team around food security at Salisbury Presbyterian Church next month. We anticipate a Vocational Development focused team sometime in April and are hoping to do that through Brandermill Church as well.  We are also in conversation with a number of other churches across the city who are also considering launching teams this year.

If you would like to get involved in one of our emerging teams or you want to know more about starting a team in your community or congregation, please email me at wendy@embracerichmond.org.

Below are just a few excerpts from Lupton’s book that capture the heart of what he sees as the problem with our current approaches to poverty alleviation:

When we do for those in need what they have the capacity to do for themselves, we disempower them.

 

For all our efforts to eliminate poverty—our entitlements, our programs, our charities—we have succeeded only in creating a permanent underclass, dismantling their family structures, and eroding their ethic of work. And our poor continue to become poorer.

 

And religiously motivated charity is often the most irresponsible. Our free food and clothing distribution encourages ever-growing handout lines, diminishing the dignity of the poor while increasing their dependency.

 

Giving to those in need what they could be gaining from their own initiative may well be the kindest way to destroy people.

 

Why do we miss this crucial aspect in evaluating our charitable work? Because,as compassionate people, we have been evaluating our charity by the rewards we receive through service, rather than the benefits received by the served. We have failed to adequately calculate the effects of our service on the lives of those reduced to objects of our pity and patronage.

 

We respond with immediacy to desperate circumstances but often are unable to shift from crisis relief to the more complex work of long-term development.  When relief does not transition to development in a timely way, compassion becomes toxic.

 

Most work done by volunteers could be better done by locals in less time and with better results.

 

As a country, we understand that welfare creates unhealthy dependency, that it erodes the work ethic, that it cannot elevate people out of poverty.

 

Again and again we are finding that when it comes to global needs in organizational development and human development, the granting of money creates dependence and conflict, not independence and respect.

 

Wherever there was sustained one-way giving, unwholesome dynamics and pathologies festered under the cover of kindheartedness.

 

Doing “for” rather than doing “with” those in need is the norm. Add to it the combination of patronizing pity and unintended superiority, and charity becomes toxic.

 

The challenge for those of us in service work is to redirect traditional methods of charity into systems of genuine exchange.

 

Mercy without justice degenerates into dependency and entitlement, preserving the power of the giver over the recipient. Justice without mercy is cold and impersonal, more concerned about rights than relationships. Relationships built on need are seldom healthy.

 

When a church makes decisions about serving others, are the ones being served the urban poor or the church?

 

Someone needs to raise the question, Is the church enabling missionaries to minister, or are the missionaries serving the needs of the church?

Top-down charity seldom works.

Lupton gives these suggestions to those seeking to empower people and not create dependence:

Don’t subsidize poverty.

• Reinforce productive work.

• Create producers, not beggars.

• Invest in self-sufficiency.

Lupton acknowledges that, ” The hard part is rethinking the entrenched giveaway mentality and restructuring an established one-way charity system.”  He suggests churches and non-profits ask these questions:

Are recipients assuming greater levels of control over their own lives or do they show up, year after year, with their hands out?

• Is leadership emerging among the served?

• Are their aspirations on the rise?

• Is there a positive trajectory?

This is by far one of the best books I have ever read on the subject of ending poverty.  I highly recommend anyone who is working with individuals who are experiencing material poverty read this book.  I also think it is a great book for anyone interested in getting our country back on track without hurting the poor and vulnerable in the process.  Irregardless of your political leanings, Lupton’s approach should appeal to individuals on both sides of the aisle.

So what stood out to you from Lupton’s insights?

How do you feel about the idea that one-way giving is actually hurting people?

Why do you think it is important for the church to evaluate its charitable giving programs?

How might the church transition giving programs to empowerment programs?

That post marked the beginning of my search for missional structures which has continued for the past three years.  (Maintaining Balance, Finding Your One Thing, Open Source Christianity, Something More  , Smashing the God Box, Kingdom Outposts, Dream Teams, Opposing Forces, Following the Leader,  and many others)

I have once again been drawn to Church of the Savior as the best model for building what I described in 2009 as “organizational structures that foster creativity and unleash the missional imagination of people seeking to follow Christ in tangible ways in our community.”  In 2009, all I had was books and websites to glean from – yesterday I was invited to experience more fully the essence of Church of the Savior as we toured their ministries in Washington DC and we basked in the presence of founder Gordon Cosby who is now 94 years old.

While my gleanings from our trip are similar to what I learned from my earlier research, I am finding new ways of naming and connecting the work of Church of the Savior with other work being done across the country related to missional structures.

• Significant attention is given to discernment of individual call or Christian vocation

“In time [founder Gordon Cosby] was to believe even more deeply in ordinary persons who, in turn, were to believe more deeply in themselves.”

“If the church is a sent people, where was Christ sending each of us?  The call was to move out-to discover where we were to lay down our lives-to take up the stance of the suffering servant, and make witness to the power of Jesus Christ’s work in us.”  O’Connor

• A commitment to authentic Christian community

“The call of God was a call to create a new kind of community that would be distinguished by its humanness. It would be so human that those in it would do whatever was needed so that everyone in the world might be free.” O’Connor

As we spoke with leaders, I was struck by the fact that every decision and the work of every missional expression and every church expression was governed by a small group of committed Christians who were in a covenant relationship with one another.  There was no one central governing body calling all the shots – decisions were made through shared discernment of where the spirit was leading the group and all shared responsibility for funding and making that call a reality.

• A commitment to maintaining a balance between the inward and outward journey

“As we grew in our understanding of silence, we gave more emphasis to the contemplative life. There is no true creativity apart from contemplation.”

“If the church was to find servant structures, the small groups had to be formed around focused and defined missions with each mission also committed to an inward journey of prayer, worship and study.”  O’Connor

It is these “missions” teams that are the heartbeat and the building blocks of the church.

• Shared leadership that equips and releases people to follow the call of Christ

“Gordon Cosby still feels that the churches, in their quest for structures that nurture life in people, must know that they are venturing into new territory, and that the resources for their exploration rest in the tremendous untapped potential of their own people. The difficulty is that we so often lack confidence in ourselves and in our companions and search for the answers in some other place.” O’Connor

• Fluid structures that are continually open to the leading of the Spirit

Every year, every member is asked to discern if they feel called to continue as a member of the mission team.  Every mission team is asked this question annually, “Is where we are the best we can dream for the coming year?”  Throughout the day we heard story after story of things the mission teams were in the process of letting go of as well as their dreams for the future.

“A time comes in the life of every group when it loses sight of its goals and must choose them again. Your job will be to sound again the call, to be the bearer of the vision-articulating it in your own life and helping others to see it.”  Gordon Cosby (taken from O’Connor)

“If you are not changing something is wrong.  The goal is to never lose your essence.”  Gordon Cosby

As Gordon Cosby spoke about his role of helping mission teams discern the essence of the original call to each particular missional expression, I was so impressed with his willingness to let things die.  It was obvious that his desire for each group was that they continue to be open to the leading of the Spirit and to new life.

• Shared communal identity maintained through disciplines

“What we did at that important juncture in our life was to face the importance of structurally implementing a description of “Who we are.”” [as defined by their disciplines]  O’Connor

As we spoke with Gordon he stressed that these shared disciplines are the key to maintaining the essence of Church of the Savior.  We felt the pain as he spoke these words about our present reality.

“The church today has been assimilated into the dominate culture of our time – culture has taken over the church.”  Gordon Cosby

• A willingness to address the underlying systems and structures that produce and perpetuate poverty

Being in Gordon Cosby’s presence and listening to him share his years of experience was an indescribable experience.  At one point he shared that he had been asked, “If you were twenty again and knew what you know now, what would you do differently?”  I was shocked by his answer,

“I would spend more time with the wealthy.”

Throughout the day we heard leaders speak about the brokenness of the wealthy and how our current culture of upward mobility (the drive for more and more and more), is eroding the spiritual life of the wealthy as it fuels economic injustice around the world.  This wise sage reminded us that we cannot end poverty without addressing the excesses of the wealth and the toxic culture leading to the current economic injustices of this nation.

Over the past three years I have learned a lot about missional structures from many different sources but Church of the Savior has been practicing these principals since 1947.  This trip confirmed the following core principals for me:

1. Creativity and life emerge out of a commitment to the inward journey – the continual discernment of the leading of the Spirit both individually and corporately.
2. To be truly missional you have to be committed to the outward journey and have shared mission as the organizing principal of every form of community within the church – small groups, worship experiences, leadership structures.
3. Fluid structures have to have small groups as its central building block and authority and accountability reside at that level.
4. To overcome mission drift and cultural assimilation, there has to be a commitment to the essence of the community as defined in its commitment to disciplines and practices of the faith that are continually revisited with a regular call to re-commitment.
5. Any serious commitment to alleviating poverty has to bridge the gap between communities of material wealth and communities of material poverty.  Poverty is a symptom of our shared brokenness and it is only through shared healing that we will bring health to all.

I feel like the above gleanings are the culmination of my three year search for missional structures. I hope these principals will serve as a blueprint for the mission groups that are emerging out of the ministry of Embrace Richmond and will help us define our essence as we dream anew about our future.  However, in the spirit of Church of the Savior, I expect that the spirit will continue to guide me into a deeper understanding of these core principals and will continually reveal to me new truths.

For those of you who are engaged in missional churches, is there anything you would add or remove from this list?

For those of you dreaming of building missional structures, was there anything in this list that you would remove or anything that you would add?

For those of you who have tried to practice these principals, what advise would you give to those seeking to move in that direction?

“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” 

Howard Thurman

This week I spent three days in New Orleans with the wonderful folks from The Fund for Theological Education (FTE) at their VocationCARE training.  I had no idea what to expect from this training but I was pleasantly surprised how much I got out of this particular experience.

I used to think “vocation” was equivalent to career.  However, over the past eight years as I have walked with folks who may never move into what we would call “employment”, my definition of vocation has changed, expanded and grown.  Recently a disabled chronically unemployed man came to one of our conversations and said, “I just want to know my purposes.  Why I am even on this earth?”  He touched on a richer, fuller understanding of vocation.  For me vocation has come to mean purpose, call, reason for existence.  However, it is deeper than our common “purpose” as humans or our “call” as Christians; it is deeply personal and unique to each individual.  When we discover our “vocation” we discover our life – we come alive.  We become more fully who we were created to be.  In a sense, we discover ourselves.

Through this conference the folks at FTE are training pastors and Christian leaders in practices that aid people in vocational discovery.  While the conference was developed to help Christian leaders guide young people in unlocking their vocational call, I truly believe discovery of our vocational call is an on-going process.

Reverend D is a 70+ year old lively soul who was one of our co-participants in this training.  She was a continual reminder that we are to follow God by taking the next faithful step but the ultimate destination is never fully revealed this side of heaven.  If we are breathing, God is still writing our story. The journey and the destination are one.

There were many revelations that came during the three days of largely inner work.  The first came through a young man who asked me, “What cages have you been set free from?”  I was actually speechless at first.  I spend so much time thinking of myself as someone who opens the cages of others, I have never taken the time to think about the cages I myself have had to break free of.

As I reflected on this question, I wrote these reflections in my journal:

• As a young girl growing up outside the church in the heart of the Bible belt, I was told that only church people could go to heaven.  I remember being told that my uncle, who had committed suicide, would burn in hell.  It all made me feel “less than” – rejected. I felt cut off from the creator – held in bondage by bad theology.  Judged and not at all loved by those who called themselves Christians.
• I thought of the fact that I am a female called to vocational ministry and the barriers that I face that my male counter parts do not face.  Again seen as “less than” – cut off from opportunities. Judged and not fully accepted.
• I reflected on my call and how God has called me to create alternative ways of being the body of Christ that honor and give voice to all – especially those who have felt cut off from the Christian tradition by those who claim to love like Christ.
• I thought of the young man who was asking me this question – a young gay man who senses a call to vocational ministry and is creating space for others who feel cut off from the church.  I had a revelation that I was participating in the construction of his cage through my silence and complacency with the way our tradition has treated our gay and lesbian sisters and brothers.
• While I have known for a while that an essential part of my vocational call involves writing, I realized in that moment that the call to write is not about words – it is about voice.  It is about giving voice to those who have little or no voice in our existing church structures.  It is about exposing the invisible cages we as the church are constructing.  Cages that are keeping people from becoming fully who they were created to be.  A part of my vocational call involves creating more room at the table for those who have been told they don’t belong.  It involves resisting attitudes of judgment that wound and sever parts of the body. It involves embracing all, even when it could mean that I will experience the same judgment as those I seek to bring to the table.

I expected to come and learn how to help others be more fully who they are called to be.  I left having found the boldness to be more fully who God called me to be.  What a beautiful gift.   No one preached at me.  No one told me which way I was to go.   They simply provided a safe place for me to explore what the spirit was already doing in my life.

VocationCARE practices are summed up by Dori Baker in her book “Greenhouses of Hope” this way:

C – Create hospitable space to explore Christian vocation

A – Ask self-awakening questions

R – Reflect theologically on self and community

E – Explore, enact and establish ministry opportunities

Over the past few months, my Embrace Richmond team has been asking the question, “How do we help people grow?”  We all know that true transformative growth happens at the core of our being.  It is an inner work that is facilitated and advanced through the work of the Holy Spirit as we come into contact with the Christ spirit that dwells in us.  This kind of inner work requires intentionality, safe space and stillness.

I was reminded of Margret Gunther’s book “Holy Listening.”  Gunther compares our work as ministers to that of “mid-wives” who simply help people bring forth what has been conceived within them.  It is a delicate process that requires immense patience and a respect for God’s timing.

I pray God uses me and Embrace Richmond to pass this gift of vocational discovery along to others.  I am very thankful to FTE for the work they are doing and for the hospitality they extended us all.

So when was the last time you felt fully alive?

What practices have helped you connect to the inner work of the Spirit?

What role has Christian community played in helping you discover your vocational call?

Her new found interest in politics was sparked by a Rick Perry ad with this quote:

She asked me,

“Why does Rick Perry hate gays and why is he making such a big deal out of them serving in the army? Why is he so concerned about prayer in school when the real issue is people being beaten and picked on because people think they are gay?  They don’t even have to be really gay, if they just look a little gay, people pick on them and he is just going to make it worse for kids. Why does he make it sound like being Christian is about hating gays and pushing Christianity on non-Christians?  If I was going to run for office, I would focus on making America a place where no one is picked on – a place where people can just be who they are; gay or straight, Christian or non-Christian, black, white, Hispanic, or Asian.   That is what people my age care about!  We want a country that treats everyone equally.”

I asked my budding politician if she wanted to someday be president and she said, “No, I want to be a congresswoman because they have the real power.” She is one smart little cookie.

I know Governor Perry is a politician who is playing to the Christian right.  Perhaps he would see my daughter’s dream as naïve and political suicide.   I am sure his campaign manager has little interest in the dreams of a 13-year-old red-head from Virginia.  However, it is the dreams of that little red-head and young people just like her who give me hope for this country.

So, if you are a pollster trying to figure out how I will vote – my vote is for Caroline and future generations.  May we all listen to our children and embrace their dreams of a more loving society.

Today the Embrace Richmond team celebrated MLK Day in the Hillside community and Qasarah Bey, our program director, did a dramatic reading of Dr. King’s “I have a Dream Speech.” Dr. King’s dream and that of my daughter don’t really sound all that different to me.  They sound surprisingly like the dreams of our founding fathers who envisioned a country that affirmed that all men (yes, not only blacks but also gays) were created equal.

So as the rhetoric and politicking continue, and as our politicians crawl into the gutter and sling mud at one another, I pray we will not get swept up in the ugliness that tends to only polarize and divide us as a nation.  I pray instead we cling to a dream, a dream that will lead to freedom, equality and the pursuit of happiness for all our nation’s citizens.

One of my favorite quotes from my book, “From the Sanctuary to the Streets”, was from an interview I did with a case manager named Martha who is helping homeless women break out of poverty. Martha said,

“With a dream comes hope, hope in a future that is better than today’s reality.  A dream is a powerful motivator.”

Today in Hillside Court, one of Richmond’s most distressed communities, we took the time to dream together.  We gave the children from the community a large banner and asked them to draw their dreams.  The children drew pictures of people caring for one another, of a more beautiful neighborhood complete with an apple tree, but the overarching theme was one of peace and mutual respect.  It was amazing how that same theme of love for our fellow man dominated not only the drawings of the children but also of the four adult groups who drew their own dream banners. It was the hope of a more loving society that inspired our dreams today.

Hope in a better future – it is the beginning of every dream.  When our dreams grow out of God’s desires, our dreams have the power to change the world. Have you ever noticed that dreams are contagious?  Dr. King’s dream ignited a hope that spread across this nation and changed our society.  Today in Hillside, I saw people rediscovering hope for their neighborhood and the power of unity to bring it to life.  My daughter’s dream gave me hope in our future generation of leaders and inspired me to write this post.  Want to start a revolution of hope?  Start sharing your dreams!

What are your dreams for this community and this country?

What are the dreams of your children?

Do we dare dream of a society defined by its love?

This post is a part of a synchroblog. Below is a list of all the posts and participants in this month’s synchroblog:

The Trouble With Hope: John Ptacek

Hope = Possibility x Imagination: Wayne Rumsby

Little Reminders: Mike Victorino

Where Is My Hope: Jonathan Brink

Hope for Hypocrites: Jeremy Myers

Now These Three Remain: Sonny Lemmons

Perplexed, But Still Hopeful: Carol Kuniholm

A Hope that Lives: Amy Mitchell

Generations Come and Generations Go: Adam Gonnerman

Demystifying Hope: Glenn Hager

God in the Dark: On Hope: Renee Ronika Klug

Keeping Hope Alive: Maurice Broaddus

Are We Afraid to Hope?: Christine Sine

On Wobbly Wheels, Split Churches and Fear: Laura Droege

Adopting Hope: Travis Klassen

Hope is Held Between Us: Ellen Haroutunian

Hope: In the Hands of the Creatively Maladjusted: Mihee Kim-Kort

Paradox, Hope and Revival: City Safari

Good Theology Saves: Reverend Robyn

Linear: Never Was, Never Will Be: Kathy Escobar

Better Than Hope: Liz Dyer

Caroline for Congress: Hope for the Future: Wendy McCaig

Fumbling the Ball on Hope: KW Leslie

Content to Hope: Alise Wright

Hope: Oh, the Humanity!: Deanna Ogle

“Serving in a seeker sensitive church provides challenges to my understanding of the gospel, which tends to look more like the island of misfit toys. How do we form communities of authenticity and reality within the confines of seeker church? Is it possible? I see glimpses, but too often, protectors arise and defame what is actually gospel incarnate. At its best, it is a glimpse of heaven. At it’s worst, well…Lord, help us, and more, help us receive your help, your vision, your love!”

I am making an assumption here that from Karen’s vision of an island of misfit toys, that she is envisioning a church that is willing to embrace those in the margins – something more missional in nature.  Seeker churches are generally very attractional in nature so for me the question is “Can you be “attractional – come us us” and “missional – go to them” at the same time?”  Karen’s question reminded me of a question I asked Kathy Escobar recently after reading her book “Down We Go”.

Dear Kathy,

You wrote – “When we started The Refuge, we tried to mix the attractional model (come to us) with the missional model (go to others). We wanted people to come to our wider gatherings so we figured out a way to make sure that we included music, teaching and a fairly good vibe…Most of our life together didn’t happen in that main gathering. Instead, it happened in eye-to-eye and heart-to heart encounters throughout the week…After about a year muddling around trying to find ourselves, it became clear that we were mixing models that can’t be mixed.”

Would you mind sharing a bit more on this? I am working with a church that is trying to basically “restart” the church and they want to move toward a missional model and to become a ” missional community-focused” church in a distressed community near their church. But, they are trying to carry the Saddleback seeker-sensitive structure into this new way of being.  I have expressed my concerns to the pastor that I feel like they are mixing models that do not mix. He said to me “show me something better.”

Can you give me a bit more clarity on how you guys structured the church that kept it from being attractional and fostered a missional culture?

Kathy and I had a wonderful conversation and my take away from her was that you can’t move in two directions at the same time.  However, I do believe it is possible to plant a missional expression of a church alongside an attractional model if they are seen as complementary and not one serving the needs of the other.  I have not done it yet, but I hope to get a chance to experiment with a few things in the near future.

Here are a few things I don’t think work:

• Planting missional communities with the real goal of growing your church attendance so in other works “community outreach as as a way of growing the church.”
• Trying to take a church built on an attractional model and transitioning it to a missional model.  I have seen too many church splits form from this kind of radical change.
• Treating missional engagement as just a technique to “attract” people and then call yourself missional.  This looks like a church that does a bunch of service activities as a part of their attractional structure but mission is not central to the way of being church.  It is simply another activity people are invited to participate in.

What might work in theory (I will tell you in a few months if the theory holds any water):

• Allowing a missional expression to form outside the control of the attractional church with no expectation that it will “grow the church” or that the people will “join the church” but with the understanding that missional engagement is a legitimate way of “being the church.”  These missional communities form around shared mission with mission being the central organizing principal.  We currently have several of these expressions in our Hillside community – one around vocational development, one around family support, and one around hospitality and food.
• Forming “mission centered” small groups that support the work of missional ministries similar to the vision I shared regarding “Dream Teams.” We are launching several over the next few months.  These are small groups formed in communities of resource that are formed with the goal of supporting our neighborhood based groups.  Mission is core to the group but this group will likely support the mission through encouragement, prayer and sharing of resources more than direct engagement in the mission context.  So we are building suburban groups to support our urban groups (vocation, family, hospitality) – twinning leaders with proximity and passion with Christians who share their passion but lack proximity to the neighborhood.

My dream is that Embrace will be able to develop a way of being missional that congregations who are attractional will be able to birth alongside their existing structures – the answer my pastor friend is seeking.  If we can develop new models, my prayer is that someday, churches will see that releasing their members to plant “missional expressions” of the church is actually what Jesus told us to do when he said, “Go, therefore into the world…”.

Churches exist to give themselves away – their members, their resources and their authority.  Missional is an outward movement away from the church instead of an inward movement trying to draw more and more into the church.  Jesus told us, “Unless a seed falls to the ground and dies, it cannot produce new life.”

How many churches are willing to die to themselves and their own needs in order to bring forth new life?

What do you think?  How would you answer the question, can attractional be missional?