I asked for topics and questions, and that’s what I got.  Thanks for your suggestions!

For the more theological, spiritual, and Biblical questions, it will take me a while to write a clear and concise response to share with you.

The following item is a little less complicated.  Someone asked: “Have you ever wondered why dress socks are more comfortable than athletic socks?”

Well, no I haven’t, actually.  I tried to find a Biblical reference to socks, but all I came up with were a few items about not being worthy to tie the thongs of the sandals of Jesus’ feet, shaking the dust off your feet at an unbelieving community, and the symbolism of foot washing to servanthood and Christian discipleship.  But now that it’s been brought up I have been paying way too much attention to my socks and how my feet have felt while wearing different kinds of socks.

Here are my musings on socks from this past week:

• Sunday – dress socks, 70-30 blend, a little thin for the weather, but comfortable.
• Monday – casual socks, 100% cotton, thicker than dress socks, and work well with my shoes, very comfortable.
• Tuesday – athletic socks from REI, a blend of high tech fabrics, warm and comfortable
• Wednesday – casual socks, a less expensive pair that I’ve had for a while, too thin in spots, uncomfortable enough to toss.
• Thursday – casual socks, another old pair of socks, reminds me I haven’t bought new socks in a while.
• Friday – yet another old pair of socks, even a little hole by the toe.  Hmm, time for a run to Target.
• Saturday – a warm comfy pair of socks!
• Sunday – wore a pair of dress socks for the 13 hours I was at church, and my feet felt just fine.

My conclusion has to be, whether you are wearing dress socks or athletic socks, wear socks that aren’t old and thin nor socks with holes.  I also was reminded that feet sweat a lot!  According to the website “How Stuff Works” – “With more than 250,000 sweat glands each, your feet are among the most perspiring parts of the body. In one day, each foot can produce more than a pint of sweat!”  Eewww!

Now the reason why I am trying to gross you out with that tidbit of information is to set the stage for a story about learning to be a servant and disciple of Jesus Christ through the aforementioned ritual of washing feet.

It was the final night of our two week church camp counselor training.  We were gathered in a circle in the main lodge for worship and the ritual of foot washing, as a sign of our servant life together as a community of Christian disciples.  We had been tromping around camp all day long wearing our heavy hiking boots (this was at Christikon in the mountains of Montana!).  It had been an exhilarating two weeks of learning, growing, and bonding with new friends.  I was sitting happily on the floor in the circle between two of my new friends, as the wash basin and towel came around.  One by one we knelt at the feet of our friends, took off their shoes or boots, and then washed their feet.  The guitars were playing and people were singing and crying with the powerful spirit of the whole experience, when my buddy leaned over and whispered, “you’ll have to skip me.”

“Wha’?” I mumbled.

“You’ll have to skip me.  If you take off my boots, my bad foot odor will kill you and everyone else in a five mile radius!”  (OK, he didn’t say a “five mile radius” or “kill you” but he was serious.)

Then the wash basin and towel were passed to me.  My friend gave me a look of fear and I hesitated.  But feeling all eyes upon me I started to untie his boots, which took a while, until I slowly started to take the first boot off.  I never knew that smells could hurt!  I jerked away gagging.  The people on either side of us leaned as far away as possible, covering their faces.  My friend just shrugged, as if to say, “I warned you.”

As I tried to control myself (ask my wife about my changing diapers sometime, if you need a good laugh), I then realized I still had to take off his sock!!!

Now at this point I began to realize that what had started out as a touching, powerful experience to complete our training as Christian church camp counselors, had taken on a new, less pleasant, though more deeply spiritual and powerful experience for me.  ”Servanthood,” “discipleship,” “community in Christ,” these are all nice, feel-good phrases and concepts, if you can keep them abstract, sterile, and clean, and away from your nose.  But when a person, and not a concept, is in front of you, and you are called to be their servant, that’s when things get hard, messy, and very, very real.  Truth be told, it is something that we avoid.  Not only don’t we want people to take off those things that hide and cover up the “stinky” parts of our own lives, we don’t want to have to deal with the “stinky”
problems of others either.  So we smile nicely at each other and sweetly reply that everything is going “just fine,” even when it is not.  We all know that isn’t what community in Christ or Christian discipleship is about, but at least it doesn’t smell, or offend us, or challenge us to go beyond our own comfort zone and resources to rely on God for help.

I have to admit that I only washed his one foot.  Partially because of the, well, smell, and because everyone else was waiting for us to finish up (that’s my lame excuse, and I’m sticking with it!).

So, from a question about the comfort of socks, to the discomfort of discipleship and servanthood.  Keep those questions coming, you never know where they will end up.

How do churches grow?  Well, a quick answer is, “Only through Jesus Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit.”  A more nuanced answer is that churches grow in different ways and are at different stages of growth – some numerically, some organically, some in maturity, and others grow by incarnating Jesus’ love for others.  While we may stumble over definitions, strategies, and even priorities, for the Church of Jesus Christ, it is an expectation that we continue growing in all of these different ways.

On Tuesday night I had the staff and committees of the church look at the different ways churches grow, and give me their perspective.  Here is a sampling of responses on the area of Numerical Growth:

Positive Growth -

• Participation in our ministries is up, including non-members
• The number of ministries is up
• The number of kids in the new youth choir is up
• The number of youth involved is up
• The number of people being served and impacted through our ministries, especially our service/outreach ministries is way up

Negative Growth (also known as stagnation or decline) -

• Worship attendance has slipped down again, to under 250 per Sunday (back where things were 11 years ago)
• Number of pledges and budget is down
• Slight growth in membership
• Decline in visitors

What does all this mean?  Overall we are not growing numerically.

Historically, Christus Victor has gone through a number of cycles of church membership growth and decline.  The highest point was in the mid-1980’s when worship attendance hit an average of 450 a Sunday, and then, for a number of reasons, dropped the next year to 250.  In 1998 the average attendance was 270.  It grew to 330 for a few years in 2004 and 2005, and then started to slip a little each year, back to the 1998 level in 2009.

There are both internal and external issues at work, effecting church growth and decline.  One book that has greatly informed and challenged my thinking is “Transforming Congregational Culture” by Anthony Robinson.  In the first chapters, Robinson addresses the many cultural changes that have occured in our country, and how those changes are speeding up.  Yet, I find it too easy to point the finger outside the church, and so does Robinson.  We need to be asking some serious questions, even basic questions of ourselves.  The first question we need to ask and answer is the PURPOSE question:  “What is our purpose/mission?”  and “How is it going?”

We are starting to ask these questions, to find out how it is going, but more importantly to listen where God may be calling us to change for the sake of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  I hope you will share your insights, questions, and ideas in the weeks and months ahead as we seek to be faithful to God’s call and command to grow – in faith, hope, and love of God and our neighbors.

I’ve been rereading a great book from the Alban Institute called, “More than numbers: the ways churches grow.”

Author, Loren Mead, lays out four different ways churches grow, or don’t grow, as the case may be.  Those ways are:

• Numerical Growth – membership, attendance, participation, financial support, and budgets
• Maturational Growth – spiritual growth in maturity of faith and living as disciples of Jesus Christ
• Organic Growth – organizational growth, the structures, discipleship and leadership processes, and even facilities meeting missional needs
• Incarnational Growth – missional growth in serving the needs of people in the community and around the world (this includes Evangelism, which is also connected to Maturational Growth).

While numbers, or the bottom line, are the things we focus on the most, as we have been taught by our culture, that is only one indicator of growth, or even health in a church.  All four aspects of church health and growth are needed for a truly growing and vibrant congregation.

The information and discussion questions in Mead’s book line up nicely with the research and the international ministry of Natural Church Development .  They take a holistic and principle based approach to church growth and health.  Churches need to look honestly at all aspects of their ministry, identifying both their strengths and weaknesses.  Then they can address steps to improve and strengthen those areas that are hindering the whole ministry of the church.

In preparing for and reviewing the accomplishments and goals of the many committees of the church, looking at the church budget and our stewardship trends, reflecting on the faithful work of those council members stepping down, and on the new council members stepping up as servant leaders of our church, I am struck by the fact that we are a work in progress at Christus Victor.  God has done, and continues to do, wonderful things through the ministries of our church and in the faith and life of members and those we serve in our community and around the world.  And yet, we are called to follow Jesus, which means being open to change and being changed for the sake of the Gospel and the Kingdom of God.  One of my goals this coming year is to take stock of where we are and where we need to grow, change, and improve for the sake of the whole ministry of the church, that we may listen to God and follow where the Spirit leads.

Did I get your attention?  Good.

It is a dangerous thing when we open the Bible and begin to read, for in and through these words, written and translated by many different people throughout the ages, God in fact speaks to us and does something to and with us.  This book, this Word of God, both kills us and gives us life.  Hence the whole “danger” thing.

Which makes me so glad that there are five adult small groups, risking the “dangers” of the Bible, gathering together each month for Bible study.  They are learning about different characters and stories of the Bible, or looking deeply at one book of the Bible, or learning more about a particular theme that runs throughout the Bible.  All of which, I hope, is helping them grow in their understanding of what God is trying to tell them and do to them, both as individuals and as a group.  And not only in their understanding of what God has said and done in the past, but more importantly what God is saying and doing today to draw people into a faith relationship with Jesus Christ.

On Sunday, Dec. 6, we began the first of our series on “How Lutherans Interpret the Bible,” as part of our church’s process to study and discuss the Biblical texts at the center of the controversy over the ELCA resolutions.  And I am grateful that so many people attended the first session, and hopefully will follow through on all of the rest.   Or, if people are not able to attend on Sundays, that they sign up to attend the Thursday classes starting in mid-January (sign up at the info desk!).

It is hard work, and risky, when we gather together to discuss both how different people approach and understand the Bible.  It becomes even more challenging and risky, when we have clarified in our own mind and heart, to then begin to share how we approach and understand the Bible.  The ante goes up further when we listen and hear other Christians who have a different approach and understanding of the Bible, which leads them to interpret things differently from ourselves.  As if that doesn’t cause people to faint with trepidation, God promises to show up in our dialog and discussion, to say to us exactly what God wants to say to all of us, and, as often happens, transform all of our understandings to bring us closer to God’s will and heart.  As Mark Allen Powell reminds us, the Bible gives us Jesus Christ, the Living Word of God!

For those who wish to go a little deeper in pondering questions related to our interpretations and approaches to the Bible I strongly recommend this article by Prof. Walter Brueggemann on Biblical Authority and the Church.  It is well worth the slow, careful read.

The follow-up Study and Discussion Sessions on the Biblical and Theological issues surrounding the ELCA resolutions regarding same-sex relationships and homosexual clergy will be starting up in December!  There will be two sessions offered, one on Sunday mornings starting on December 6 for the Adult Forum at 9:45am, and one on Thursday evenings starting on January 14 at 7:00pm.  *PLEASE SIGN UP AT THE INFORMATION DESK – or – email me at pastor.kent@christusvictor.org.

We will be using Mark Allen Powell’s series “How Lutherans Interpret the Bible” to give us a foundation to work from as we begin to address the Biblical texts in question.  The seven sessions will cover:

• The Word of God
• What Lutherans Say About the Bible
• Where the Bible Comes From
• Interpreting the Bible in Context
• Determining Right from Wrong
• The Many Meanings of the Bible
• Devotional Bible Reading

Sunday Forum Schedule: Dec. 6, Dec. 13, Jan. 10, (Jan. 17 – Committee Fair; Jan. 24 – Annual Meeting), Jan. 31, Feb. 7, Feb. 14.

Thursday Evening Schedule: Jan. 14, Jan. 21, Jan. 28, Feb. 4, Feb. 11, Feb. 18, Mar. 4

Please contact me if you have any questions about this series. 

It is my deep hope and prayer that a large number of Christus Victor members and all interested people will take the opportunity to learn more about the Bible and our Lutheran Theology, to help guide and shape our discussions and discernment when we confront any disagreement over the intrepretation and application of the Scriptures in our individual and communal lives of faith as disciples of Jesus Christ.

After two informational meetings regarding the ELCA CWA resolutions, I am struck by how hard it is to listen to each other, especially to try and understand a different point of view, interpretation, or belief from our own.  Part of the challenge is internal as we mull over our own views, beliefs, etc. in an attempt to come up with a rebuttal, and some clarity in our own minds about what we believe and why.  In any case listening is hard work, and it is not something we do very well.

I am also struck by the parallels in our difficulties listening to those that are right in front of us, speaking in a language we can understand, about ideas and information that are not totally beyond our comprehension, with our difficulties listening to God.  Listening to God is complicated by the fact that God, though with us, is not literally in front of us, nor speaking a language we can understand (and no I am not referring to the original languages of the Bible, nor necessarily the Bible itself – but prayer and listening to the “still small voice” of God), added to the fact that God is beyond our comprehension and understanding (seriously, who fully comprehends and understands the divine mystery that is the Trinity, the Incarnation, let alone the Resurrection, without faith?).  Yet that is one of the central statements of the Bible and of the Christian faith:  God is constantly communicating with us and we can “listen” and respond.

In the midst of our congregations conflict over the ELCA resolutions (not the first conflict nor the last), a significant number of people from both informational meetings want to gather together to study and discuss the Biblical and Theological issues underlying our differences.  This desire to learn, discuss, and struggle with these serious issues of faith and our common life, gives me great hope for our church.  And while I am working on a number of opportunities for people to study and learn, it is also clear to me that we need to learn together to listen to God.  If Christ is at the center of our church (and I know He is), and the Holy Spirit continues to lead and guide us (because Jesus promised), then we had best learn how to listen to God to find our way through these challenges into the future God is calling us into.  Therefore I am looking for a group of people that will commit to meeting with me for six months, starting in January, as part of an international, ecumenical journey of discovery in listening to God.  If you’d like some more information of what this might entail, please check out the materials on John Ackerman’s website.  He is my spiritual director and will be leading and facilitating this discovery process.  This group will be separate from the study groups that I will be offering.  If you are interested, please contact me at church so we can talk more about this opportunity to grow in faith through listening to God.

I’m reading a book called, “Transforming Congregational Culture,” by Anthony Robinson.  It was recommended to me after reading and discussing a few other books on church ministry and addressing the changing culture while on my sabbatical.  So the learning and growing goes on.  As I read through this book, I will be posting some thoughts, reflections, and questions to ponder as we continue to address the need to change and be changed by God for the sake of our souls and of the world.

We don’t need anyone to tell us that the mainline churches in America are facing many challenges and changes from without and from within.  This shouldn’t be new or surprising to folks, although how these changes and challenges are manifesting themselves may be new and surprising, if not disconcerting.  Nor should it be surprising that there continues to be steady change in how Americans think and behave where religion is concerned.  This is not just a mainline issue! 

In times such as these, and we are not alone in the story of God’s people on earth of having “times such as these,” I am reminded of the church camp song, “The Rock!”  The words come right out of Psalm 18: 46 - The Lord Lives!  Blessed be my ROCK, and exalted be the God of my salvation!”  I need a rock to stand on, a firm foundation when life is so shakey and uncertain.  If it feels like you are on ever shifting sands, perhaps what you are relying on for stability is not God, but something else that has become a substitute for God.  Power, possessions, and prestige in one form or another often are the substitutes we go to instead of seeking God.  God wants to take away any and all substitutes that we have put in place of God, so that God can be our Rock, our center, our very life.

Change is actually the point.  God wants to change us, save us, and transform our lives.  So, I end with the beginning of Robinson’s book on transforming congregations, it begins with a question: what is our God given purpose?  Who is God calling us and changing us to be, and from that, what is God calling us to do?  This is not a one time question, but the guiding question for us as Christians in community, keeping us focused on God our Rock!

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.  Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12: -13

(Rev. Williams’ text for her sermon on the occasion of the 2nd Anniversary of Lilly of the Valley AME.)

As I sat in the Fellowship Hall on Sunday night, my soul and mind being moved by the grace and power filled words of Pastor Denita, the congregation responding with “amen” and “hallelujah” and claps of approval, I wondered about the connection and disconnection between “running our own race” as a church, and, “running our own race” as individual followers of Jesus Christ.  

Whether we are consciously aware of it or not, we at Christus Victor are caught in the comparison game with the other Lutheran churches surrounding us.  Easter in Eagan, Shepherd of the Valley in Apple Valley, Prince of Peace in Burnsville, and Hosanna in Lakeville, not to mention Grace and Community of Hope as well, and settled in the middle of our massive siblings is little old Christus Victor.  Funny thing is, when compared with all of the churches across the ELCA, little old CV isn’t so small after all.  We’re in the top 97% in terms of worship attendance and membership!!!  We are not small!  

Yet when we take our eyes off of following Jesus, running our own race of faith set for us by God, we get “thrown off” the course.  Instead of focusing on the people and the ministry at hand, whether that be teaching Faith Trek, singing in a choir, serving on a committee, doing our part for Joyful Servants on Sunday mornings, or whatever the situation may be, we c0mpare ourselves to the other churches and worry about what we are not doing or can’t do that they are doing.

Take the garage sale as an example.  Literally hundreds of people donated items and helped make the CV garage sale a great success!  Over $16,300 was raised!!!  Yippee, Hallelujah, and Praise the Lord!!!  Right?

Well… A number of CV people and neighbors of CV just had to get into the comparison game.  “Pastor, did you hear that Prince of Peace raised over $160,000 with their garage sale?”  Yeah, of course I knew.  And they had better make 10 times what CV made, because they are over 10 times larger than we are.  If they didn’t they’re doing something wrong.

The point is we need to run our own race.  What is God doing here at CV, do we have any reason to give thanks and praise to the Lord?  Are our struggles God’s Call for us to change and grow instead of giving up and giving in?  Where is the Spirit of God blowing us, and are we opening our souls and our sails to go where God wants us to go, what God wants us to do, and who God wants us to become? 

Since Jesus Christ is the author and perfector of our faith, wouldn’t it be a good idea then, to keep our eyes, ears, minds, and hearts focused on Jesus instead of comparing ourselves and worrying about everybody else?   Do other churches have things to teach us?  Absolutely!  Do we have a lot yet to learn, more to grow, and not only be open to change, but seek to be changed by God and with God’s help?  Yep!

The issue for the church and for each of us as individuals is to identify both what is hindering and entangling us/you from keeping fixed on Jesus, then ask for help in dealing with that (yes, folks, that means prayer and the support of other Christians!).  And then, do those things we know we need to do to help us stay fixed on Jesus, and continue to run our race of faith.

You know what I’m talking about: worship (coming with a worshipful attitude), daily prayer, daily devotions, lifelong education/learning, serving others, giving financially and growing in giving,  inviting people to church/telling others about your faith (especially your family!), getting to know new people and welcoming them, use your gifts to help others.  If any of this is new or strange to you, please let me know, I’d love to talk with you more, because I want to help you run your race of faith in Jesus Christ.