Credo ↔ Oratio

Tonight was my first time presiding over a Classis meeting. It went well, I think!

Here’s a copy of what I said in my “report”:

October 20, 2009
Zeeland Classis Fall Meeting

I stand before you this evening with an uncertain mixture of both excitement – at the privilege of leading us through our business today, and terror, as I recognize that our gathering has the potential to be heavily influenced by a handful of restless elephants in the room. It seems to me, that there are a half-a-dozen or so topics that threaten to hijack us not only this evening but in the coming years. Each with the potential to quietly, but undeniably, trample us into corners of defensiveness, narcissism, and disunity. So I wanted to begin this evening by simply naming the reality that, like any other creature, us humans – when we feel cornered – often act out in ways that look very different from the priorities of God’s kingdom that we claim to uphold. Part of our responsibility as Christians is to resist that temptation, as natural as it may be.

We gather this evening as Elders, Deacons, and Ministers to do the business of God’s church and become, increasingly, the people of God. We gather, not merely to represent our constituencies or simply to get our own particular pet-projects through the system, but rather, that through what we do here, the world around us may see what it’s like when God’s people work together – even in the midst of difficulty…. even when we disagree.

Zeeland Classis is not the same Classis it was when I came into it 9 ½ years ago….

There are reasons for all of these things – good reasons, even. Historic reasons… economic reasons… psychological reasons… even, of course, spiritual reasons. Some of which are far easier to discern than others. The world, after all has also changed. Politics, today, are immensely more polarized than they were 10 years ago. The economy is, even after whatever recovery we may have experienced lately, still uncertain. The world, to many of our congregations – as you well know – has changed from a place of relative comfort, to a place of danger.

We no longer trust that when we turn on our TV’s or log into our blog readers, we’ll find something good or encouraging… instead, we fear – reasonably – that we’ll hear of another terror attack or school shooting or pandemic outbreak.

All of this, of course, means that Christians can no longer pretend that the world is our oyster – even here in Zeeland Classis. We can no longer imagine ourselves as part of a global Christendom. Children no longer grow up knowing the basics of the faith. Many of them – even here in Southwest Michigan – don’t know the difference between Abraham and Paul… or between the Gospels and the Psalms. God’s kingdom has not yet come in all of it’s fullness and we do not yet experience it fully here on earth as it is, even now, in heaven. We live today, perhaps more than any time in the past century, in a world increasingly like that of the scriptures.

And yet, as new as this reality may be to us, it is nothing new to Christianity. The Christian faith has often grown and flourished in cultures like the one ours is becoming. History has shown over and over that hardship almost-universally forces us to figure out what’s important and to work together collegially, even, perhaps especially, when it’s difficult…. or we will not survive.

Today, the words of the scriptures ring a bit more loudly in our Classis than they once did:

…you are [chosen], a royal priesthood, [holy], God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people;
Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Beloved, (the author so powerfully writes) I urge you as aliens and exiles to abstain from the desires of the flesh that wage war against the soul. Conduct yourselves honorably among the Gentiles, so that though they malign you as evildoers, they may see your honorable deeds and glorify God when he come to judge. 1 Peter 2:9-12 (NRSV)

Imagine, if Zeeland Classis could somehow become known as an entity that was so honorable in what we do and how we do what we do, that those around us would see us as an outpost of God’s kingdom.

Imagine, if Zeeland Classis would somehow live into our calling so fully that, even the world around us would find itself driven, eventually, to Glorify God.

Finally, all of you, (the author of 1st Peter continues a chapter later) have unity of spirit, sympathy, love for one another, a tender heart, and a humble mind. Do not repay evil for evil or abuse for abuse; but on the contrary, repay with a blessing. It is for this that you were called…. 1 Peter 3:8-9 (NRSV)

Let us pray.