WORTHY OF CALLING (31 OF 49)
Scripture: Ephesians 4:1-16
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Worthy of Calling (31 of 49)
Lectionary, Year B, Proper 13
Christopher B. Harbin
Ephesians 4:1-16
Anyone who knows me well considers that I am not big on concerns of administration. I do not like to think about budgets, committees, maintenance, facilities, traditions, structures, routines, policies, and rules. Those are things I must attend to, but they do not get me going in the morning. I may know how to plan, budget, and organize, but I would much rather simply get on with ministry without needing to worry about such things as our Book of Discipline, policies, and the administrative processes required by law, convention, or oversight bodies. I am driven by mission. When we do as we ought, all those other aspects of church life flow from that same sense of mission. Though I like to treat them as lesser distractions, when they are carried out appropriately, they drive, challenge, and enable us to live up to our call. At issue is whether we allow that calling to drive all aspects of our organized life in this community we call the church.
To be honest, I have a history with legalistic organizational policies. I grew up on the mission field where policies were enacted by a board sitting in Richmond, VA, and handed to communities of missionaries scattered across 120 plus countries. What sounded reasonable in Richmond did not always translate to the lived realities of missionaries spread across the globe. Missionary work in Brazil after a century looked very different than where missionaries were making first contacts in other nations. Too often, however, policy was enforced with no understanding of the reality on the ground. I saw policy wielded seemingly for the sake of policy with no concern for the harm it might cause or the distraction it might impose on the mission we were responsible to carry forward.
I still carry that tendency to look harshly at policy as a limiting force throwing up barriers that inhibit what we are called to do and be as the ...
Lectionary, Year B, Proper 13
Christopher B. Harbin
Ephesians 4:1-16
Anyone who knows me well considers that I am not big on concerns of administration. I do not like to think about budgets, committees, maintenance, facilities, traditions, structures, routines, policies, and rules. Those are things I must attend to, but they do not get me going in the morning. I may know how to plan, budget, and organize, but I would much rather simply get on with ministry without needing to worry about such things as our Book of Discipline, policies, and the administrative processes required by law, convention, or oversight bodies. I am driven by mission. When we do as we ought, all those other aspects of church life flow from that same sense of mission. Though I like to treat them as lesser distractions, when they are carried out appropriately, they drive, challenge, and enable us to live up to our call. At issue is whether we allow that calling to drive all aspects of our organized life in this community we call the church.
To be honest, I have a history with legalistic organizational policies. I grew up on the mission field where policies were enacted by a board sitting in Richmond, VA, and handed to communities of missionaries scattered across 120 plus countries. What sounded reasonable in Richmond did not always translate to the lived realities of missionaries spread across the globe. Missionary work in Brazil after a century looked very different than where missionaries were making first contacts in other nations. Too often, however, policy was enforced with no understanding of the reality on the ground. I saw policy wielded seemingly for the sake of policy with no concern for the harm it might cause or the distraction it might impose on the mission we were responsible to carry forward.
I still carry that tendency to look harshly at policy as a limiting force throwing up barriers that inhibit what we are called to do and be as the ...
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