Association Summit

Readers of The Shiloh Insider will recall that there has been some tension in the relationship between the Ohio Conference and its five Associations. The ground of the tension is certainly important for the local churches of the Ohio Conference.

 

You may remember that a proposal of the Conference Board of Directors was to take control of staffing configurations and OCWM giving that had previously been under the control of each of the five Associations. The move would "save" over $500,000 per year, and is sold as being more responsible stewardship.

 

Instead of arguing the points of the proposal, let me just say that four out of the five Associations have officially rejected the Conference Board's proposal as the course that each Associations finds most favorable for Ohio UCC churches. In order to air the concerns of the Associations, and in order to begin the work of drafting an alternative joint proposal, a summit meeting of leadership from each of the five Ohio Associations was held this past weekend.

 

The discussion was initiated by the Southwest Ohio Northern Kentucky Association. The summit meeting took place on Saturday, May 25,  in Mansfield. We were hosted by St. John's UCC. The hospitality, the food, and the kindness of the staff and volunteers was much appreciated.

 

As Church meetings go, the summit meeting of the Ohio Association leadership contained a wealth of "Whereas" but absolutely no "Therefore." There was consensus on many issues. Most agreed, for instance, that the process of making and communicating this proposal was extremely poor. The methodology failed to include conversation with Associations and local churches. It was a top-down, hub-and-spoke process. It was divisive and exclusionary. It was arrogant and authoritative.

 

Most also agreed that a centralization of control of staffing and OCWM dollars seemed contrary to the basic polity of the United Church of Christ, where the primary unit of ministry and mission rests with the local setting. Most thought that the proposal was isolating to congregations and authorized ministries and ministers. Local support would have to be sought from a centralized Conference instead of a more regional Association.

 

There was additional consensus, though it must be said that one of the Associations, Central Southeast, seemed more supportive of the proposal than did the other represented Associations.

 

Another summit meeting of Association leadership is scheduled for Thursday, April 20, at which time, we might hope, the summit is led to configure some "Therefore." What concrete proposal might the Associations recommend to remain faithful to God's calling and, at the same time, be more responsible with OCWM dollars? Can we reduce redundancy and come out of a process of structural renewal that better serves the church in the local setting?

 

Stay tuned for more information.  

Bible @ Boston's

Shiloh's Bible @ Boston's program continues to be a curious oddity for many of our church partners and local community members. How can a church do bible study in a bar? Isn't there a disconnect between the two audiences? Does doing so not demean the sacredness of the Bible?

 

Accessibility is the issue, I think, and application is its aim. Let me explain...

 

So many in the communities around the church feel unequipped to engage the Bible. (So, by the way, do many within the church community.) They find the dense language and the difficult phraseology difficult to understand. They think the the repetitiveness of scripture too tedious to manage. They have not been informed about the cultural and historical factors that lead authors to write in distinct periods of matters that simply do not apply, or that apply differently, today. They think that the Bible is irrelevant to everyday life.

 

The opposite mindset is true as well. Some people in the community are convinced about what they have been told that the Bible says. (Again, so have many in the Church.) They are so convinced of what they have been told that the Bible says that political and cultural positions are shaped around those beliefs, even when those beliefs fail to genuinely reflect the intent of scripture. 

 

Bible @ Boston's utilizes a distinct form of scriptural study. In order to make scripture accessible, both to those within and those around our church communities, Shiloh's program adopts an approach known as Historical/Critical Methodology. In Historical/Critical Methodology, we acknowledge that every author writes from a particular context, to a particular community (or audience), for a particular purpose. If one can comprehend the intent of the author, and the circumstances of the community to whom that author writes, then one can more easily imagine the intended meaning of the text. The intended meaning of the text can then be applied - or not - to the contemporary setting.

 

Historical/Critical Method:  

   1. Define authorship: Who wrote, when, from where and why?

   2. To what community is this author writing? What is the historical and cultural setting?

   3. Derive the meaning of the text from the context of the audience and the intent of the author.

   4. Make contemporary application of the intended purpose.

 

The methodology is fairly sophisticated. It can seem pedantic or academic. It can feel as though it is out of reach for persons in the pews, let alone those who have not sat in pews for decades, if ever.

 

Shiloh is committed to the idea that Bible study makes the Word of God accessible and applicable. It is true, of course, that the Historical/Critical Method increases the pressure on people to actually work at the process of serious scriptural study. It requires us to use the native intelligence and inquisitiveness that God gives us in discerning in scripture what may or may not be God's Word. The end product certainly enhances one's understanding of God's Word, scripture, and any difference that may exist between the two. It renders the Bible directly applicable.

 

The current curriculum runs through the next seven weeks. It is an examination of the systematic theology of the distinct streams that flow through New Testament literature. Come and join us, every Wednesday evening, 6:00-7:00 p.m. at Boston's Bistro and Pub, located at the corner of North Main Street (48) and Westbroook Rd. (Dogleg) in Harrison Township. Shiloh engages in serious Biblical study in a secular setting. Maybe we can learn to take our faith more boldly into our secular lives. 

 

What is the Goal?

Sunday's texts provided an interesting opportunity for me to verbalize an element of the Emergent Church movement that I have often mentally and emotionally considered, but had never before said. That element is the different goal/aim of the Emergent Church, when compared to the traditional, institutional model of the modern age.

 

It seems to me to be quite clear that the Christian faith began in its infancy to be something entirely different from the bulk of its historical identity. That is, the ethic of Jesus - and maybe even Paul -differs significantly from the institutional developments that take place in the Church within the next several hundred years. The theology changes. The practices develop. Orthodoxy replaces the ethic of Jesus. Institutional adherence displaces spiritual energy. Within several hundred years of Jesus, the burgeoning institution that bears his name became an organization with a completely different goal, aim and outcome.

 

The aim of Jesus' ethic was a radically fair and just way of life that embraces every person, bringing peace and joy to every life. The aim of Jesus' ministry is a universally shared ethic of self-sacrifice and mutual concern that results in care for every person. Paul picked up Jesus' theological ball with the suggestion that Christ's Crucifixion and Resurrection might serve as archetype for those who would follow Jesus. The aim and goal of the faith was establishment of God's kingdom on earth. In Paul's age, the urgency of establishing a cultural order that served every crease and crevice of Creation overshadowed the selfishness and myopia of traditional Judaism.

 

Soon, though, a whole new theological component replaced the ethic of Jesus and Paul. Instead of the energy for establishing a new cultural order, the faith's goal and aim soon changed to providing its adherents a means of eternal reward. Hope of Heaven displaced an ethic and urgency for peace and justice. As the institutional Christian Church developed, it offered a clear path to eternity in paradise. This hope was other-worldly, after-life, beyond death. The more it became the aim and goal of the Christian faith, the less the Church embodied the ethic of Jesus and Paul. 

 

The cultural changes that began sometime in the late 1960's have highlighted the core hypocrisy of the Christian Church. While the faith began with an ethic of servanthood, equality and radical unity, it quickly became self-serving, ritualistic, divisive and reflective of social order and status. The new culture will not be deceived by the righteous words and dire warnings of eternal damnation. It knows better. Christian faith is only Christian faith insofar as its adherents follow its base ethic in Jesus and Paul.

 

The Emergent Church therefore has as its goal and aim an ethic for human life that reflects the ministry of Jesus Christ and Paul. It offers a rejection of the divisive and exclusionary claims of a theology of Heaven or Hell.

 

So, I have come to see the Emergent Church movement as a further step in the Church's spiritual evolution. It is a re-awakening of the ethic that drove the faith in its infancy. It is recovery of the most ancient attitudes of the faith, those that rested with Jesus and Paul...and maybe others. While the Emergent Church movement calls the contemporary Church to retool, undoing a great deal that the institutions holds sacred, this step forward in the spiritual evolution of the Church is necessary to its relevancy and meaningfulness, as much as it is to its survival.

 

Can we give up a theological aim and goal of eternity in Heaven?