Tag Archives: Leadership and the Church

I Saw What I Saw

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Yesterday I received a text from my husband. Attached was a picture of a child. Today I received another text, saying great program and great stories.

Not that rare, but these texts were different. You see Eric is traveling in Ethiopia with a group from Compassion International. This is not his first trip to Africa, but that doesn’t matter much. The pictures spoke volumes. Trips like this have the potential to change us. You see Eric and I have been sponsoring children through Compassion International for over 20 years. And we’ve been lucky and had the chance to meet all three of our children, now all out of the program. So today’s experiences are added into a whole array of other meaningful moments connected to how Compassion International is making a difference in the lives of young people around the world.

While Eric was in Africa, I was working in St. Paul, MN, preparing for graduation this weekend. Tomorrow and Sunday I will have the opportunity to witness over 120 ministry leaders receive their diplomas marking the final step in their journey at Luther Seminary. Students assembled will be from all sorts of places like Minnesota, Ohio, California, and Florida, and sent to similar places. A significant number, however, have come further than that. These students, mostly sent by their home churches, crossed continents and oceans to get here. They left families and supporting communities to follow their call. And now, after years of being separated from the ones they love, will be sent out to change the world. Some will return to their home countries immediately, others will make some stops along the way. But all of them will make a difference in one way of another.

As I hear the names of these student read and watch them walk forward, tears will come to my eyes. My heart will be filled to brim, and I will be without words. You see these leaders in ministry have changed me. They have brought the world to me – both it’s pains and it’s joys. And I see their communities, their families and friends, through them. And, like Eric, I will have traveled a long distance and been changed.

There is no way our family can thank these ministry leaders, near and far, for making an impact in our lives and ministry. You have changed our family and our calls. And we cannot see the world the same any more. Thank you!

Sara Groves song, sums it up best.

Social Media and You

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I don’t think social media is dangerous. I think we are dangerous.

Social media is here to stay, just like telephones and computers. Yes, there are unhealthy ways to interact with social media. But there are also healthy ways to engage social media. For those of us seeking to be public about our faith, social media is one place to engage public conversation – be it about social issues or our personal lives. I, for one, have appreciated having social media tools available to me as I stay connected in meaningful ways with various people within my social sphere. Sometimes it’s with people down the street, other times it’s with people halfway around the world. Sometimes it’s sharing information, other times it’s lamenting the loss of my favorite sports team. Regardless, I want us, everyday people, to wonder how faith and social media might intersect in a constructive way. Check out this great, simple article on ways social media can be a healthy way for humans to live within community.

How Social Media Made me a Better Person

A Look Inside the Seminary

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James Wind honestly names a key tension in the church – seminary!

“Although congregational members are served by people who are powerfully shaped by these institutions, most congregational members spend little time on a seminary campus. While they will be quick to notice if a pastor has poor preaching skills, lacks administrative ability, or provides weak pastoral care—and may blame the seminary for doing an inadequate job of preparing their pastor—the schools that shape their clergy often remain distant, mysterious places.”

Read more from
alban institute

April 2013 report says…

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78% of teens now have a cell phone, and almost half (47%) of them own smartphones. That translates into 37% of all teens who have smartphones, up from just 23% in 2011.
23% of teens have a tablet computer, a level comparable to the general adult population.
95% of teens use the internet.
93% of teens have a computer or have access to one at home. Seven in ten (71%) teens with home computer access say the laptop or desktop they use most often is one they share with other family members.
For more see the Teens and Technology Report Pew Report 2013

What does this mean?

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What a great weekend. My head is overflowing with ideas, my extraverted self exercised all it’s capacities reconnecting with and meeting new colleagues, and my passion for teaching and learning has been renewed. All in all, my three days at the Academy of Religious Leadership were fulfilling.

Yet, I sit here wondering. Wondering about teaching and learning religious leadership in relation to…
– attending to learning environments
– participating in inter-religious community
– thinking about transformational moments in life
– asking hard questions about inclusion, exclusion, and connectedness
– reflecting on how the everyday life of public Christian leaders form and shape our spiritual lives
– imagining “the more” of leadership – leadership beyond knowledge and practices
– engaging in personal and communal practices which attend to noticing and expanding our personal windows of the world
– expanding faith community’s decision-making processes to include moral reasoning and discernment practices.
I wonder about them individually, and I wondering about them collectively. And I wonder how they inform my own leading and teaching, how they shape my imagination around the spiritual side of leadership, and where they are pointing as we, as I, struggle with leading people of faith in the 21st century.

Religious leadership and leading spiritually are not the same. Our academy is centered on the teaching and learning of religious leadership, but this gathering was centered on attending to the spiritual aspect of such leadership. Yes, they overlap, but spiritual leadership asks more of me, as it also has a component beyond me. And it’s one thing to attend to my leading spiritually, it’s another to draw others into such attending.

As we, teachers of religious leaders, were dwelling in these questions, the city of Boston was in a lockdown. One of our colleagues was unable to be with us because of the events which had taken place in the days previous. We were both present with each other, as we were also aware of her absence and current situation. Throughout the day, our conversations became a bit melancholy and named the heaviness in our hearts, as we continued to explore our topic. Yes, we are educators, but we are more than educators. What does this mean?

As I turn in my receipts tomorrow, I face a cross-road: return to my work as usually or keep wondering, pondering, and wrestling. What does it mean to be people of faith and lead in today’s world?

Terri

On the Road

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Read Luke 24:13-35.

I have a confession to make. I think the church today is broken.

Don’t get me wrong, I am a Christian and believe with my whole heart Christians should gather with other Christians, sharing life, reading GOD’s Word together, serving and worshiping.

But here’s why I think church is broken….while I rarely doubt the presence of God in my life and the world, I often struggle with figuring out what it is to LIVE a Christian way of life. And I think I’m not alone. You see saying I’m a Christian and living as one are two different things.

Let me give you an example to make it clear. I’m from MN…and I love baseball, and am a MN Twins baseball fan. Not only do I enjoy watching baseball, but I love getting to know the stories of the players and following their progress throughout the year. That’s all good, especially when the year is going well. But if you’ve followed baseball these past few years….the MN Twins haven’t had a very good run. And losing 100 games a season means watching lots of games when ‘your’ team comes up short. And believe me, the Twins have figured out all kinds of ways to lose – they can lose close games, be out of the game from the start…and everything in between. And, as the team tries to regroup, things get tough – your favorite players are traded, injured or sent back to the farm team. And all these changes make it hard to stay connected and invested.

Throughout the season I’m given the choice – stay faithful to being a fan or hang it up. So far, with the help of family members, other Twins fans at work or in my community, and continuing to show up and support the team…I’ve found a way to stay a Twins fan in the good moments as well as the bad.

Now I’m passionate about baseball, but baseball…when the day is done…is just a game. But this ‘game’ wants me as a fan…they know I follow them on Twitter, buy tickets to their games on StubHub and buy Twins gear from their store. And through all kinds of ways, both targeted at me personally and within the greater Twin Cities area, they encourage me…inform me…invite me to join both the Twins community and the greater Major League Baseball community.

Now I’m sad to say my church, the Christian church, has not done the same. You see, living a Christian way of life is hard most days, perhaps like being a fan of a struggle sports team. Why? Because being a Christian is complicated today. While many of my neighbors and friends say they are Christian…or at least note a connection to a Christian faith community…many of us don’t know what it means when it comes to living it out in our daily life. Things like parenting our teenagers and college kids, making choices about how we will spend our money, or what impact our faith has on our daily work. And in fact, when we do talk about, our ideas vary and we often don’t know how to find our way forward. This leaves us hiding behind denominational issues or ecclesial practices we might not even understand, so we drop the subject. And church, the weekly worship gatherings and small groups, talk about churchy things, or at least use churchy words, which often remain disconnected from my daily issues. And when I’m gone, or going through a tough spell, they don’t know…don’t connect…or know what to do and It’s easy for me to fall away from the very community that might help me figure these things out.

And, at times, I wish…like my being a baseball fan…I could just walk away and believe it doesn’t matter. But here the deal…I know it does.

Christians around the world just walked through the season of Lent…a season not confined to a religious calendar…but a season which highlights what all humans know and experience – life is frail and broken.  My season of Lent started the day after Christmas as I met a friend and his family at the hospital as their 17 year old son was admitted to the ICU. Three days later he died. I cried. We cried. Asked questions. Challenged God. Prayed. And in a very real way, these days marked the beginning of MY season of lent. And for the past 4 months, grief and loss and disappointment have been very real in all areas of my life. It’s been, or me, a season of Lent.

But, people of God, Lent is not the end. The cross does not have the final word. The tomb is empty, we are Easter people, people who live on the other side, people who have another story to tell.

Walking outside of Jerusalem, to a nearby village, the people who had been following Jesus were talking. They were talking about the events that had taken place…the crazy events of Holy Week and now the discovery that the tomb Jesus was laid in was empty…and they encountered a man on the road. This man, Jesus, joined in, asking questions and listening, and they continued on their journey.

The time for supper came, and the travelers stopped, gathered around a table for a meal and did what came natural…they prayed, gave thanks, and broke bread. And when they did…their eyes were opened. Jesus, God incarnate, was in their midst.

You see post-resurrection, the story changed. Jesus joins us in the breaking of bread, yes. The meal is a reminder that Jesus is alive and GOD’s promises are true. But that’s not all. Jesus is also present with us on the road…in our daily life. And on the road, Jesus didn’t offer them answers or tell them what to do. Rather he reminded them of the Importance of accompanying each other on the journey, of talking about the events of our lives and trying to make sense of them.

People of God, …and you do have the promise of abundant life. Yes, the journey is real, it’s hard, it mysterious, and it’s complicated. Don’t worry so much about the answers, but join each other on the journey and help each other hold on to hope, not the hope of a winning baseball season, but the hope which can only be found in the empty tomb.

Amen

Do we have eyes to see?

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Yes, I’ll serve…but where am I needed? And what is needed?

After listening to numerous people, inside and outside the church, I’m convinced one of the reasons serving collapses into service projects or mission trips is because most of us don’t know enough about the real circumstances of our context. And without an understanding, our vision is limited – and we are blind to the needs of people on the streets we drive each and every day.

Now, there are many ways to discover what the real circumstances are in our communities, but at the core are two things – education and vision.

Education

I’m a geek…I like numbers, not for numbers sake, but because numbers provide a picture of what’s happening. When new census numbers come out – I get excited and I like to look them over, talk with others about them, and share what I think they mean with those around me. Numbers aren’t bias and don’t offer solutions – but numbers report what is and invite us to see the world in particular ways. Looking at numbers can awaken us, and our communities, to the realities and the changes taking place in our midst. Said differently, looking at the “numbers” for one’s community is a way to education us about what’s real.

For example – People in my area don’t think there is much poverty. And in some ways they are right. With regard to poverty, my county is below average at 6% versus the 11% in MN and 14.3% in the US. http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/27000.html.) So they are right, right? Yet a deeper look reveals a startling reality. That 6% represents families with children under 18. And for families with children until 5, the number goes up to 7.1%. Stop there and one might think that’s the average across all family units. However, that’s not true. For single parents, the number is higher. For families with a female as the head of household, poverty is 15.4%.  And for those same households with children under 18 it’s 21.2% – for those with children under 5 it’s 34.8%. That’s over 1/3 of households of single mothers with small children. (http://factfinder2.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml?pid=ACS_11_5YR_DP03) The numbers present a sad reality. Is that OK? What if people in my congregation knew this important, what would they think? What would they do?

(To check out what’s real in your context – see American Fact Finder on the census website – http://factfinder2.census.gov/faces/nav/jsf/pages/index.xhtml.)

Vision

My experience also reminds me, numbers (or education) rarely are enough to motivate changes in behavior. So there’s got to be something else. Right? That something else is eyes to see – or vision.

Let me explain. My daughter’s elementary school was fortunate enough to have a part-time social worker. In our suburban context, in which many did not believe poverty existed, she was a gift to the school, to students, and the community. The social worker’s role was to come along side students and make their learning experience the most it could be. This included interpersonal issues, personal care plans, and getting students resources they needed. She was there to serve all students, not just some students. One of the needs she discovered was the need for food. So the whole school system went about attending to this issue in many ways. This included involving the students and their families in process. Suddenly the numbers had faces, and the people in my neighborhood had eyes to see! The people going hungry were our neighbors and in our classes, with particular stories and situations.

As we, ministry leaders, seek to ignite service in our communities, let’s embrace our role as educators and vision casters. Let’s help people discover the realities in our midst and the ways it impacts the lives of people in their community.