Year B – Easter 7 May 20, 2012 - Acts 1:15-17, 21-26

ShortStop is dedicated to life's transitions experienced in congregations, personal life, and families.  Transitions and what churches call "interim ministry" are "short stops" on the journey to new beginnings.  The ShortStop Lectionary Blog is one way to help preachers in the transition times to find ideas from the Revised Common Lectionary.  Each text will be considered but the focus each week will be on the text(s) that will be most helpful for preaching during an interim transition time. The preacher will be able to "connect the dots" creatively with themes of the lections.

Year B – Easter 7 May 20, 2012

Acts 1:15-17, 21-26 • 1 John 5:9-13 • John 17:6-19

Acts 1:15-17, 21-26

Here is an interim transition leadership passage if ever there was one!  A new apostolic leader was needed for the early fellowship. Judas was gone and through a process of drawing straws, the lot fell to Matthias. Congregations select new pastors and staff. The also select Elders, Deacons, Vestry and Council members and more.

The preacher may go a variety of directions with this. Preparing for new leadershipe is the focus for the preacher.  The interim transition congregation is preparing for a new relationship with a leader who is yet unknown.  The disciples believed they needed to fill the hole left by Judas. And the Holy Spirit is actively involved. There were no signs and wonders but the Spirit lurks in the background of the pericope.

Theses disciples had one critical qualification – one who had been with the resurrected Jesus.  This qualification leaps out from the page for me – one who met the resurrected Jesus.  The leaders were to be ones who had first hand testimony to the resurrection.  I also suspect this means the leaders were to have a spiritual vitality because of the experience of an encounter with the resurrected Lord Jesus.  One sermon approach may be this focus on how we can nurture our spiritual lives and the practices that draw us close to God. This is a much different approach than looking for a “warm body” who will say, “ye”,  to being an officer in the church.

The selection process belies Roberts Rules of Order. They prayed.  Then drew straws.  The discernment process is probably no more crude than a majority vote. In the end, each method depends on God calling through the people and the activity of the Holy Spirit in their lives. 

-          Bob Anderson, Toledo, OH

 

http://shortstopblog.blogspot.com/ 

www.breakthroughlifecoach.org 

Easter 6, Year B  May 13, 2012

Psalm 98

Sometimes the ideas that come spontaneously can be the most fun (to me, anyway!). This Psalm jumped off the page as a celebration of God’s work in an interim transition congregation’s history.  In my mind I could see the Psalm being a kind of litany with the verses punctuated with a brief sentence describing a celebration of the congregation’s coming to terms with its history. Here’s a sample of what came to me. You can adapt it for your own setting. I won’t use the whole psalm but the repeated refrain is, “O sing to the LORD a new song, for God has done marvelous things”.  In a setting with smaller numbers of people, these might be spontaneous, rather than planned or written.  Or, a group of members could help plan worship and write a liturgy with the celebrations written out.

One:      O sing to the LORD a new song, for God has done marvelous things.

              Someone reads a brief celebration, e.g. “God has been good to us and met our needs for     

              new church school teachers last year!

     

  All:       O sing to the LORD a new song, for God has done marvelous things.

  One:    The LORD has made known God’s victory and has revealed God’s vindication in  the   

               sight of the nations.

               A member then celebrates, e.g.  God has been faithful over our generations and we   

              celebrate the multiple generations who witness to the Good News as we gather to

              worship!

   All:     O sing to the LORD a new song, for God has done marvelous things.

Continue on using all the verses of the Psalm or select the most meaningful for your group. Oh, by the way, loud and joyful reading works best!

Acts 10:44-48

Luke gives hints of what is to come in the ministry to Gentiles.  These are the “outsiders” and the “new people” who didn’t know how things have always been done!  Transitions shift the patterns of congregational life.  The informal communication web of links will break in places.  Members who haven’t been active in years suddenly show up to be nominated to the Pastoral Nominating Committee. Without the pastor’s presence some members will feel abandoned.

At the same time, leadership change tends to open up the congregational system. This is a fruitful time to recruit and train those new leaders who are often on the margins or marginalized. 

A preaching approach could be to put a lens up to our resistance to including new people even though we say we want to include them.  It seems the ministry of the Holy Spirit helps to make these first disciples very intentional in their inclusiveness.

The ministry of the Holy Spirit is evident in seemingly miraculous ways.  I wonder if this is to be the norm rather than the exception?   In any event, I am prompted to think that for congregations in transition there are shifts in power as the system changes.  Luke moves us to the power of the Spirit rather than our human power.  These new Gentiles experienced Jesus “power with” people and not our tendency to have “power over” others.

Bob Anderson

Toledo, OH

Interim Transtitions Lectionary Connections Easter 5B May 6

ShortStop is dedicated to life's transitions experienced in congregations, personal life, and families.  Transitions and what churches call "interim ministry" are "short stops" on the journey to new beginnings.  The ShortStop Lectionary Blog is one way to help preachers in the transition times to find ideas from the Revised Common Lectionary.  Each text will be considered but the focus each week will be on the text(s) that will be most helpful for preaching during an interim transition time. The preacher will be able to "connect the dots" creatively with themes of the lections.

Easter B5, May 6, 2012

Acts 8:26-40

Times of congregational leadership transition are full of turmoil as the familiar ways give way to the shifting sands of change.  Luke creates vivid accounts of the turbulent movements of transition for the early followers of Jesus.  That transition of post resurrection life in Acts 8 has a steady beat of already established spiritual practices that set the stage to hear God's call and the Spirit's promptings.  The Ethiopian is already in the habit of reading scripture and Philip leverages that practice for revelation and teaching. Baptism was not an unfamiliar ritual and Philip quickly utilized that practice.  One movement in preaching and worship leadership might be to emphasize the spiritual practices that nurture the life of the church.  That same thrust could include time to become familiar anew with the rich teaching content of "rituals" such as baptism, the Lord's Supper, membership and ordination promises, etc. These practices and rituals are strong pillars that support the church as it adjusts emotionally and spiritually to the change in pastoral leaders.

John 15:1-8

Transitions are times to say good bye. We say good bye to a pastor, a member who is moving away or even to the “way things have always been”. This transitional dynamic or developmental task is known as  “coming to terms with history”.  Celebration of what has one before is crucial.  But, these words of Jesus indicate that “pruning” is not irrelevant.  

As a congregation prepares for a new future of mission and ministry with a new pastoral leader, “pruning” or “coming to terms of history” cultivates fruitfulness.  One powerful sermon strategy may be to focus on what in us is not fruitful?  What don’t we need anymore?  What belongs to the past and not the future? 

In my interim ministry leadership “startup” retreat, one of the questions I pose to the leadership is, “what baggage do I carry from the time of ministry with _____(name )?”  A time of worship and prayer help us to begin to let go of that which may hold us back.  At times, “letting go” is not as important as creating meaning out of something that caused us to become stuck in the past.  Conversations in the retreat can help to create new meaning that helps one to be “unstuck” and step forward.   

Those sitting in the pews are also coping with various transitions – career, graduations, marriage, a move to a new home, pending retirement, an illness, or any number of challenges.  These questions can be asked of them.  What was good?  What do I need to leave behind that won’t help me on the journey to the future? 

Another theme in this text is “abiding”.  Exegesis will reveal the deep relational nature of “abiding” as Jesus used it.  The shifts of the transition time need the spiritual resources of our faith.  As a transitional pastoral leader, the interim minister has the opportunity to help the congregation draw on those resources (prayer, scripture, fellowship, etc.) in ways that are appropriate to that setting. 

Bob Anderson

http://shortstopblog.blogspot.com/ 

www.breakthroughlifecoach.org