My Wishes For My Church, Part One of Two
As most of you know, Glenwood Presbyterian is in a time of transition as we look for a new pastor. Part of the process of finding this new leader is a time of self-evaluation as a church (which you can read about here.) A fellow member and I exchanged several lengthy emails recently about what our church could look like and be in the future. Some of our ideas were way out there, but it was a good exercise to really think seriously about what I would like to see in the future for my church. Here are my particular thoughts, which are in no particular order except for the first one, which I believe is crucial and the starting point for everything else…
A Church That Glorifies Christ Above All Else
I believe that Jesus’ words to the crowd in John 12:32, “But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself,”(NIV) are still relevant to the church’s purposes today. If we are a congregation that truly glorifies Christ and lifts Him up above all else, then people will be drawn to that. It is this glorification, or worship, which distinguishes us from the rotary club or other service organizations and makes us something that people want to be a part of. I want that to be the cornerstone of our church.
A Church That Is Unified
A while back I posted a couple of links to a series on church politics. I don’t think you ever get rid of this kind of thing entirely, but wouldn’t it be a great thing if we could simply do those things that everybody agrees with and can get behind? I have been told that Glenwood had at least one pastor in the past that did not let the church take any action that was not agreed upon by everyone on the Session, our governing body. That would be a scary system for me, knowing that one person could halt all progress by not agreeing with the majority, but there seems to be a lot of plus side to this idea, especially in a small church like ours. If you only do those things which everyone agrees with, you never have portions of the church that feel like they are on the outside looking in. Coming back to this principle would, I believe, make us a more unified body in the future, although we would also need to address those areas that have caused hurt in the past so that we might all be reconciled to one another.
A “Neighborhood” Church
The Glenwood Neighborhood, as you have seen a little from articles I have linked to on this blog, is undergoing a renaissance of sorts. I believe that Glenwood Presbyterian Church has stood on the sidelines of this effort for far too long. We have a vested interest in the betterment of our community, but since most of our members live outside the neighborhood, we can too easily drive into Glenwood, attend church, and drive back out again with our heads down. I would love for our church to do everything we can to support the revitalization efforts currently underway. I envision a large number of our members attending a neighborhood association meeting and saying, “Okay – we’re here. Where do you need us to help?” We need to be a church that serves this community so that we can minister to the community so that we can reach people in the community for Christ.
A Church That Dreams Big
Being a small church sometimes causes us to fall into the trap of saying, “Well, we don’t have the resources or the people to do that.” Or, even worse, we stop dreaming at all and become a congregation that simply “survives” week to week, doing the very same things in the same way, until the building crumbles around us or the money dries up. I want to be part of a church that dreams of Christ doing things through us that are much, much bigger than we are capable of alone. Challenges generate excitement and demand faith. Success in the face of long odds glorifies God and builds faith. We need more dreamers in our church. Part of these dreams for Glenwood is going to have to include a “modernization” of our church facilities. But that’s a hot button topic that I won’t go into right now.
I’ll save the rest for later, but for those of you at Glenwood Presbyterian that read this blog, I invite you to really sit down and write out some of the dreams and ideas you have about our church looking into the future. You may even want to post them here as comments, but the main thing is to dream big!
