The second workshop I attended at Baby Pastor School was entitled "Brining Stories of Justice into the Pulpit. This was one of those workshops that talked about two different topics that could have each been their own workshop: biblical storytelling and preaching on social justice issues.
I was really struck by the biblical storytelling ideas. When the Bible is just read straight word for word, often it can come off as boring and things are missed. I think most people have heard a reading done, whether a bible reading or a class lecture, when the text is read word for word with no emotion or emphasis and all pausing is evenly paced. When this is done it is hard to absorb what is important or the emotions that were present. We don't tell stories this way.
As a child, my family would go to Silver Dollar City in Branson, Missouri about once a year. Sliver Dollar City is a theme park where you step back in time 100 years (now I think it is permanently set in the 1890's). The park hires blacksmiths, leather workers, candle makers and other tradespeople who specialize in creating goods in a historic fashion, but one of my favorite trades people were the storytellers. I would sit and listen to their stories multiple times throughout our long weekend visits to the park. And each year I could hear the same story over and over again and then my siblings and I would try and retell the story to each other in that same fashion. The stories were spell binding - you could never leave during the middle of one. The stories were fascinating - you wanted to hear what happened, even if you already knew the ending. These professional story tellers were telling stories in a tradition that had been practiced for thousands of years, by captivating and truly engaging the audience.
Unfortunately this craft has been deteriorating first as more people were literate and therefore able to read the words themselves instead of having to hear stories retold, and more recently due to competition from movies, television, internet and video games.
But this spellbinding story telling is what biblical story telling tries to capture. No one wants to hear words read to them in a monotone fashion. The bible was originally stories that were told orally over and over again. And the storytellers used the tone of their voice, pausing, actions and possibly props to tell these stories.
I normally do try to add some emphasis and pausing while reading the gospel lesson for the week in order to convey more meaning. But now this is something that I want to experiment with, by rehearsing different ways of telling the story and not being so worry about having to stick to the NRSV translation word for word. Who knows, maybe I'll got to Festival Gathering for the Network of Biblical Storytellers for a future continuing education experience.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Living Abundantly in Times of Sacristy
My first workshop at Baby Pastor School was entitled Living Abundantly in Times of Sacristy. The workshop presenter was Scott Schantzenbach who is the stewardship specialist for the New Jersey Synod.
This was one of those workshops that had so much information that we didn't even get to a quarter of it. Scott suggested many different stewardship practices that work in both periods of financial booms and busts. But first what is stewardship?
Stewardship is giving to God what belongs to God. But everything belongs to God. So in a more hands one approach it is more about giving to God (offering, tithe, whatever you want to call it) out of everything that we have and not out of what is left in our checking account at the end of the month after we have paid all of our other bills.
Scott offered twelve practical ideas. I'm not going to list all twelve but instead touch on a few.
* Remain Missional and Enjoy the Moment. It is very easy for the church to become business like and either dwell on the past or have future outlooks, but when we do so we miss the point that the business of the church is to make disciples and preach the gospel. If the church get hung up about the decor, or a social statement that doesn't greatly effect us or an annual event that only a few people attend, then we are not doing the mission of the church and therefor are not being good stewards.
* Conduct Financial Stewardship Programs Three Times This Year Many people aren't sure if they are going to have a job in year, but 4 months is a little more manageable. So instead of pledging a dollar amount for the entire year, pledge what you are going to give within the next four months, then do it again for the next four.
* Asset Mapping Asset Mapping is a process when you look at what you have and the needs of the congregation and community and then you map and match those assets with the needs. Not all needs have assets and not all assets are needed. But by doing so you see how each person's gifts can be used for mission. What needs do you see in the community? How do you have the gifts and skills to address those needs?
* 10-10-80 Ideally each person/family should share 10% of their income with the church and charity, save 10% and live off of the remaining 80%. Don't think you can do it? For a month save every single receipt and put them in three buckets, one for spending, one for saving and one for sharing. The twist? We have a hard time deciding between what we need in order to provide for ourselves and our family and what we want as consumers. At the end of the month dig through that spending bucket. Put things like the mortgage, car payments and basic groceries in the provide category and things like eating out, entertainment, and the daily coffee in the consume category. Then work on spending down your consuming in order to share and save more.
So how do you see stewardship? Do you regularly give to God? If so, do you give from all that you have or from the leftovers? How would you change the talk of stewardship at Bethlehem or at your own church?
I ended up skipping my second workshop because well, let's just say the food wasn't vegetarian friendly and a girl has to eat so the workshop time right after dinner was used for a better good. Tomorrow "Bringing Stories of Justice into the Pulpit."
This was one of those workshops that had so much information that we didn't even get to a quarter of it. Scott suggested many different stewardship practices that work in both periods of financial booms and busts. But first what is stewardship?
Stewardship is giving to God what belongs to God. But everything belongs to God. So in a more hands one approach it is more about giving to God (offering, tithe, whatever you want to call it) out of everything that we have and not out of what is left in our checking account at the end of the month after we have paid all of our other bills.
Scott offered twelve practical ideas. I'm not going to list all twelve but instead touch on a few.
* Remain Missional and Enjoy the Moment. It is very easy for the church to become business like and either dwell on the past or have future outlooks, but when we do so we miss the point that the business of the church is to make disciples and preach the gospel. If the church get hung up about the decor, or a social statement that doesn't greatly effect us or an annual event that only a few people attend, then we are not doing the mission of the church and therefor are not being good stewards.
* Conduct Financial Stewardship Programs Three Times This Year Many people aren't sure if they are going to have a job in year, but 4 months is a little more manageable. So instead of pledging a dollar amount for the entire year, pledge what you are going to give within the next four months, then do it again for the next four.
* Asset Mapping Asset Mapping is a process when you look at what you have and the needs of the congregation and community and then you map and match those assets with the needs. Not all needs have assets and not all assets are needed. But by doing so you see how each person's gifts can be used for mission. What needs do you see in the community? How do you have the gifts and skills to address those needs?
* 10-10-80 Ideally each person/family should share 10% of their income with the church and charity, save 10% and live off of the remaining 80%. Don't think you can do it? For a month save every single receipt and put them in three buckets, one for spending, one for saving and one for sharing. The twist? We have a hard time deciding between what we need in order to provide for ourselves and our family and what we want as consumers. At the end of the month dig through that spending bucket. Put things like the mortgage, car payments and basic groceries in the provide category and things like eating out, entertainment, and the daily coffee in the consume category. Then work on spending down your consuming in order to share and save more.
So how do you see stewardship? Do you regularly give to God? If so, do you give from all that you have or from the leftovers? How would you change the talk of stewardship at Bethlehem or at your own church?
I ended up skipping my second workshop because well, let's just say the food wasn't vegetarian friendly and a girl has to eat so the workshop time right after dinner was used for a better good. Tomorrow "Bringing Stories of Justice into the Pulpit."
Monday, February 1, 2010
Baby Pastor School
This past week I was at the Institute for Congregational Ministry (aka Baby Pastor School). ICM is nicked named Baby Pastor School because it is a required continuing education conference for all pastors, associates in ministries and diaconal ministers in the Northeast in their first three years of ministry post ordination/commissioning/consecration. Yeah it is kinda confusing wording hence the name Baby Pastor School. But shhhh I'm not suppose to call it that.
The conference is and interesting experience because all the hundred or so participates gathered have in common is that they are new to their jobs. There are people from thriving suburban churches who are the second or even third pastor, people in rural communities dividing their time between two or three churches, people in struggling inner-city churches and some who are unique calls developing programs with a specific community. So it is really hard to make workshops and even keynote speakers be relevant to all those gathered.
This year the theme of the conference was "Embodying Hope for an Anxious World." In the midst of economic turmoil, earthquakes, foreclosed homes, high unemployment, sky high health care cost, etc, people are anxious but we as a church are a people of hope. So how in the midst of so much anxiety do we preach, distill, and embody hope?
The keynote speaker, Terry Leib, has many years of experiences as a social worker and counselor. Terry talked quite a bit about the idea of a God image. Basically everyone has an image of God, even non-believers. God could be a loving, grace-filled being; a hateful wrathful God who will turn on you in an instant for doing something wrong; a being who is far, far away and has no relationship with us on earth; or a caring parent-like being who you have a personal relationship with. These are just a few of the many, many God images that people have.
The idea is that we cannot impose our God image onto someone else. If their God image is one of hatefulness and we come with a God image of love, since one God image is so different from the other the new one will be rejected. Instead we must first ask what someone's God image is and get to know that image and work with that image. Often if a person's God image is a negative one, that effects many other aspects of their life. If their God image is one that is never able to be pleased, then they often work to constantly please others or have given up pleasing anyone because there is no use.
So what is your God image? How do you see God? What have been your experiences when someone with an different God image has tried to force their view of God onto you?
I also attended a few workshops at Baby Pastor School that I will talk about in the coming days, so be prepared. And in case you are looking for it, I do not have a sermon from yesterday, since I was gone all week I asked Jack Saarela the pastor of Lutheran Campus Ministries at Yale to preach. This worked out well considering I ended up being extremely sick on Saturday and Sunday morning
Yes I know the Vikings lost the NFC championship. Really the Saints did not win as much as the Vikings lost (5 turnovers!) and yet the Saints didn't win until the stupid NFL sudden death overtime.
The conference is and interesting experience because all the hundred or so participates gathered have in common is that they are new to their jobs. There are people from thriving suburban churches who are the second or even third pastor, people in rural communities dividing their time between two or three churches, people in struggling inner-city churches and some who are unique calls developing programs with a specific community. So it is really hard to make workshops and even keynote speakers be relevant to all those gathered.
This year the theme of the conference was "Embodying Hope for an Anxious World." In the midst of economic turmoil, earthquakes, foreclosed homes, high unemployment, sky high health care cost, etc, people are anxious but we as a church are a people of hope. So how in the midst of so much anxiety do we preach, distill, and embody hope?
The keynote speaker, Terry Leib, has many years of experiences as a social worker and counselor. Terry talked quite a bit about the idea of a God image. Basically everyone has an image of God, even non-believers. God could be a loving, grace-filled being; a hateful wrathful God who will turn on you in an instant for doing something wrong; a being who is far, far away and has no relationship with us on earth; or a caring parent-like being who you have a personal relationship with. These are just a few of the many, many God images that people have.
The idea is that we cannot impose our God image onto someone else. If their God image is one of hatefulness and we come with a God image of love, since one God image is so different from the other the new one will be rejected. Instead we must first ask what someone's God image is and get to know that image and work with that image. Often if a person's God image is a negative one, that effects many other aspects of their life. If their God image is one that is never able to be pleased, then they often work to constantly please others or have given up pleasing anyone because there is no use.
So what is your God image? How do you see God? What have been your experiences when someone with an different God image has tried to force their view of God onto you?
I also attended a few workshops at Baby Pastor School that I will talk about in the coming days, so be prepared. And in case you are looking for it, I do not have a sermon from yesterday, since I was gone all week I asked Jack Saarela the pastor of Lutheran Campus Ministries at Yale to preach. This worked out well considering I ended up being extremely sick on Saturday and Sunday morning
Yes I know the Vikings lost the NFC championship. Really the Saints did not win as much as the Vikings lost (5 turnovers!) and yet the Saints didn't win until the stupid NFL sudden death overtime.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)