Another Year of Grace

I wrote this as a blog post for All Saints Episcopal Church in Worcester. It is shared here on my own blog with some very minor edits. Happy New Year! 

I grew up and learned about the love of God in Jesus Christ as a United Methodist. My parents had grown up in Baptist and Lutheran churches, but in the early 1970s our family joined Elm Park United Methodist Church in Scranton, Pennsylvania. When our family moved (back) to Hawley in 1973, we joined The Hawley United Methodist Church. My mother and brother and one of my sisters continue to worship there to this day. That congregation sponsored me for ordination in the United Methodist Church in June 1988. I remain grateful.

As a United Methodist pastor, my first position was to serve as the Protestant Campus Minister at Central Connecticut State University. Campus Ministry allowed me to be free on Sunday mornings and soon Hathy and I were worshipping at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in New Britain. Although I had been flirting with The Episcopal Church for some time (and even worked in an Episcopal congregation during my senior year of seminary) I made it official in 1993 and have never looked back.

I never once felt that I needed to “renounce” the Methodist Church in that long journey, however. I felt grateful that they had formed and shaped me to a point in time. And then, before my 30^th birthday, I became clear that I would have a better chance to “grow into the full stature of Christ” as an Episcopalian. It helped that both John and Charles Wesley are remembered in the Episcopal Church on March 3, as Anglican priests. Neither of them had never renounced Anglicanism; they were just trying to reform it at a time when it needed some reformation. I felt as if I was “coming home.” It helped that I could bring the spirituality of the Wesley boys with me, since it was already there! To this day, every time I sing a Charles Wesley hymn from The Hymnal 1982 my heart is strangely warmed!

I share this piece of my own spiritual autobiography for a reason. One practice I brought with me into The Episcopal Church was the practice of praying John Wesley's Covenant Renewal Service at the beginning of each new year. I have been doing that for my entire adult life, in two denominations. If you click on that hyperlink you can join me in so doing this year. It won’t turn you into a Methodist – don’t worry! But there is some very good theology there, including this invitation:

Let us gathered here before the Lord now in covenant commit ourselves to Christ as his servants. Let us give ourselves to Him so that we may fully belong to Him. Jesus Christ has left us with many services to be done. Some of these services are easy and honorable, but some are difficult and disgraceful. Some line up with our desires and interests, others are contrary to both. In some we please both Christ and ourselves, but then there are other works where we cannot please Christ except by denying ourselves.

What gets me every year is this reminder that the Church’s one foundation really is Jesus Christ, her Lord. That the words “my ministry” should never cross our lips – whether the ministry to which we are called is ordained or lay. It does not belong to us; ministry is all about God. Each of us possess gifts, given by the same Spirit. Sometimes ministry is really fun and energizing and the Spirit empowers and equips us; as Frederick Buechner once put it, “our deep gladness meets the needs of this broken world.” It’s amazing when that happens. But sometimes we are stretched beyond our abilities and must rely on sheer grace to do what needs to be done, as we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, at the end of our rope. On those difficult days we do well to remember that the ministry which we share in and through Jesus goes by way of Golgatha. Even now, in the midst of the Twelve Days of Christmas, we know that this child we have come to adore will die on a cross. And that he calls upon each of us to take up our own cross.

The ministry does not belong to us; it is God’s work in the world and we are simply entrusted to be stewards of that work. The late Verna Dozier once wrote these words: 

If I believe that there is a loving God, who has created me and wants me to be a part of a people who will carry the good news of the love of that God to the world, what difference does it make when I go to my office at 9 o'clock Monday morning? What difference does it make in my office that I believe there is a loving God, that God loves me, and that God loves all human beings exactly as God loves me? What different kinds of decisions do I make? What am I called to do in that office? [i]

It’s a good reminder that ministry isn’t only (or even mainly) about what we do in our church buildings. It’s not just about the ministries required for liturgy to work well: being in the choir or on the altar guild or serving on the altar or preaching. All of these ministries matter and they may bring us great joy. But in the end, we are sent into the world. All of us. The worship ends and the service begins in the neighborhood, where we are entrusted to be salt, and light, and yeast. The decisions we make in our homes and in our workplaces need to reflect this commitment, this covenant that knits us together as members of the Body of Christ, so that the world will know we are Christians by our love.

Most years there is some sense of ambiguity when the calendar turns to a new year. But this year I suspect we are all ready to be done with 2020. Even so, in any new year there is some amount of reflection and even of resolutions. I’ve never been that into resolutions, but Wesley’s Covenant Renewal Service shapes my reflections and my commitments as I begin each new year. I pray that it may be helpful to you as well as we begin another year of grace, always with God’s help.

[i] Dozier, V. J. (1988). The Calling of the Laity: Verna Dozier's anthology. Washington, DC: The Alban Institute (p. 16).