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TO: BEN RICHMOND AND OTHERS
FROM: FINBARR LISMORE
RE: SHORT REFLECTION ON THE CONFERENCE, 9/19/03--9/21/03
I am grateful that I was invited to participate in the "Emerging Leaders Conference: A Christ-centered Witness", in Richmond, Indiana, September 19-21, 2003. I thank Ben Richmond, Director of North American Ministries, Friends United Meeting, for inviting me to this event at the Quaker Hill Conference Center. I thank Retha McCutchen, General Secretary, Friends United Meeting, who presence at the conference was a witness to Christ and the Holy Spirit. I thank Karole Cox, who did so much of the detail work to organize the conference. There were staff people who took care of our housing and dining needs, and I thank them also for being doers of the Lord's work.
I am a member of a Silent Meeting for Worship, in Westbury, Long Island, New York. My Meeting is rich in the Silence, where the presence of the Holy Spirit is strong and grace-filled. The Inward Light moves through our Meeting, and many find there a wonderful strength and perseverance, in witnessing to peace and justice with a loyalty and a faithfulness to the presence of God in their lives. At the same time, I was pleased to spend the weekend with Friends whose lives are centered on the presence of Christ in their hearts and in the world.
For me, the theme of the conference was evangelization, and John Muhanji, the evangelical preacher from Kenya, was a sign of the love of God in our lives, and the presence of Christ around the world. Here is a Friend from Africa, where there is a strong Quaker presence, and he revived our faith in Jesus with his preaching and his friendship. Eric Woods, from North Carolina Yearly Meeting, preached a wonderful sermon on Friday night, reviving in us the memory of our first love, Jesus Christ. Our confidence to take the love of God out into the world comes most surely from a revival of the enthusiasm of our first encounter with the saving power of Christ, and Eric reminded us of that.
A second theme of the conference for me was the promise of our young people. Many young adult Friends were there in Richmond, listening for what God is calling them to do, and considering how they might obey that call. I was pleased to meet some of them and to feel the power of their growing faith in Jesus, and the strength of their emerging sense of leadership and ministry. There is a great hope for the future of Quakerism in these fine young people.
Retha McCutchen has spent many years of her blessed life working in the vineyard, in Friends Churches in the Far West, then in Ramallah, Palestine, and now in Richmond. She spoke to us of some of the trials and wonderful quiet joys which she has experienced serving God and Friends. Her story was for me perhaps the most eloquent witness over the weekend, to a life lived in service to the Lord. God bless her ministry and her leadership in the life of Friends. She was a wonderful model of leadership for those of us who were privileged to attend the conference.
There was much more in the conference which was beneficial to me, including the leadership of Ben Richmond, our worship sharing groups, our workshops, our fellowship and, especially, our worship together. I learned a lot and I am renewed in my faith in Christ. Thank you, Friends.
TO: BEN RICHMOND AND OTHERS
FROM: FINBARR LISMORE
RE: LONGER REPORT/RECORD OF REFLECTIONS ON THE CONFERENCE, 9/19/03--9/21/03.
On Friday night, Ben Richmond welcomed us to Quaker Hill Conference Center and to the sanctuary of First Friends Meeting, especially welcoming all the young people in the assembly. Ben set the tone for the conference, by reminding us that whatever we might do for the Church, we are dependent upon God for the grace and strength to do it. We are called to listen to the living word of God in Jesus Christ and we are called to obey that Word. The Christian message is a truly countercultural message, in a world mired in materialism, inordinate sexuality and violence. We are called to proclaim a vision of that counterculture, which is the true culture God intended at the creation.
Our modern culture is a mobile one. Ben reflected that young people, especially, will live in this mobile society, and they must be able to go anywhere, perhaps where there are no Meetings and, yet, where there are people of God in need of ministry and servant leadership. As leaders in the Church, we must all be willing go anywhere, to become seedbeds for the gospel.
After Ben spoke on Friday night, Jesse Vore, a leader in Christian Education in Western (Indiana) Yearly Meeting lead us in some group exercises and activities which encouraged us to get to know one another a little bit. He asked us to consider the importance of a humble character in the work of Christian ministry.
Pat Byers, a young Christian leader also from Indiana Yearly Meeting, lead us in singing hymns, as he did all weekend. "Then sings my soul my saving God to Thee. How great Thou art". Through these hymns we lived some of the great themes in Christian history. We are redeemed in Christ and we rely on the grace of Jesus in all we do. He came to pay our debts and we must come to Christ for purification: "Give is clean hearts". Because Christ was forsaken, we are forgiven; because He died, we rise.
Eric Woods, a pastor in North Carolina Yearly Meeting, was our preacher on Friday night. Eric came to Indiana with his wife, Marsha, who is also a leader in North Carolina, and who co-lead one of the four study tracks on Saturday. She is a leader who encourages people to consider new and different ministries and supports them in the planting of new trees in the name of Christ. The theme of Eric's message was our need to get back to our first love, the love of Jesus. The Creator of the universe has placed us here to love Him. At some time in our lives, perhaps in one vivid moment, perhaps quietly over time, we have experienced ourselves deeply loved by God, and have felt a true and deep love for Christ. But we all move away from that first love, and our commitment to God the Father diminishes. We must open ourselves again to the love of God in Jesus. If we are to lead in the Church, we must be re-formed in the love of God, or nobody else will be changed and renewed. We must return to our first love and to the overwhelming peace and joy of the Holy Spirit.
Eric finished his witness to us by reminding us of the cycles of our lives, from the intensity of our first love to the coolness of our hearts as the initial enthusiasm wears off. When we are in a period of coolness, or confusion, we must remember what the apostle Paul told us. Nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus. This was a wonderful way for us to conclude this first night of our conference, and Friends left, some to return to our dormitories, some to enjoy more fellowship at a Richmond coffee house.
Saturday morning began with breakfast at the Quaker Hill Conference Center. All of our meals were excellent and nutritious, with vegetarian options, prepared with care and affection by the staff. As we would be reminded by Retha McCutchen that evening, there are many ministries and many opportunities for servant leadership, some of them not as visible as active preaching and other forms of leadership. The service of feeding and housing the participants at this conference was done efficiently, with care and with a smile.
After breakfast, we met in groups of seven or eight for worship sharing. The group I was in was lead by a young Quaker man from North Carolina, Darrin Allen. Recently graduated from Campbell College, Darrin is enrolled in Houston Evangelical Seminary's branch campus in High Point, NC. He is working in the field for North Carolina Yearly Meeting, ploughing new furrows for Christ, as he supports young people trying out internships in ministry. The question which Darrin posed to us was: How are we experiencing God's promptings in us, now, and in the past? What is God saying to me? In the manner of worship sharing, after silent, prayerful consideration of the question, each of us responded to it by sharing some of our own searching for God's plan for us. One theme of the discussion was that obedience to God's call is not an easy thing.
Later Saturday morning, we all met together again in worship. Pat Byers lead us once more in the singing of hymns, including "Amazing Grace". Our preacher was John Muhanji. John is a Friend from Kenya. Over one hundred years ago, a few Friends from the United States went to Kenya as missionaries. As John told me later, there was a great movement of the Holy Spirit among Friends in Kenya in the 1920s, and many African Friends came to Jesus. John's father was an evangelist, and John went to a Quaker high school which has 800 boys. There is also a Quaker girls' school with as many students. John now works in human resource management for the Central Bank of Kenya, and he is an active Friends missionary evangelist in Kenya. The Bank is supportive of John's work, at the Bank and in the world, as John preaches the Good News of Christ.
John began by reflecting on the differences and the similarities between Friends in the United States and in Africa. In the end, we were all gathered there in Richmond, Indiana, to "listen to the word of God". One of John's themes centered on the image of "infection". We are all leaders in the Church of God. All of us, no matter our daily tasks, are missionaries and evangelists for the Lord. We have become "infected" with the word of God, and we must pass on this glorious infection to all we meet.
Just as in the United States, Friends and other Christians have gone through cycles of "great awakenings", quietism and witherings away of the faith. John has heard other preachers in Africa tell gatherings of Quakers that we have such a great history, in Fox and others, and yet we have fallen away from our original faith. Other Christians are calling us back to our original faith, or, as Eric said the night before, our first love.
John told us that there have been movements of great spiritual awakening and commitment to Christ in Africa, and then periods of the loss of faith. One cause of this corruption of the faith can be found in the great men who have preached with evangelical zeal over the decades and have brought many to that first love of Christ. With great preaching and many converts come popularity and the desire to travel everywhere, for Christ, but also for personal gain. Many preachers have fallen prey to sex, money and power, and they have often left behind their own families. John reminded us that our first obligation is to our immediate families. It is there that we all have ongoing and innumerable opportunities for ministry and servant leadership. We must not forget our families and the presence of Christ in our loved ones.
Another powerful image used by John Muhanji was the "running of the good and faithful race", as this image was developed by Paul in Second Corinthians and in Galatians. John told a personal story, which was at once both funny and illuminative of several Christian truths. His high school track team met with about twenty-five others, to compete in a large stadium with thousands of people watching. John's team was obligated to compete in a long steeple chase race, but their star runner became sick the night before. John's coach came to John, bearing down upon him to run the race, for the sake of the team. John told us that he was a good athlete, but not great, and not prepared to run that race. John was forced to humble himself, and to run the race, facing the laughter of the thousands who watched. John told of his exploits with humor and with much good grace.
John said to us that in whatever ways we should choose to become ministers of Christ, we will, all of us, come upon trials and tribulations. We will experience sin and selfishness, in ourselves and in those around us. Our faith will be tested everyday. John said, "Christ Himself was God", and yet his days were spent in being tested. Jesus asked us to carry on for him, and our lives will be one of great testing. It is to God that we must turn. We must practice humility and obedience, in the power of the Holy Spirit. We must run the race, long and hard, and we must finish it faithfully, with the grace of Christ.
As John finished, Ben Richmond rose and asked John to pray for us all, in this matter of faithful perseverance. There followed a long period of fruitful silence, filled with much gracious beseeching of our Lord and Savior.
After worship on Saturday morning, the larger group broke up into four smaller ones, focused on "evangelism", "new ministries", "youth ministries", or "worship leadership". I participated in the workshop on evangelism, lead by John and Ben. We met for an hour in the morning, and then again in the afternoon, after lunch.
Ben began by saying that evangelization, or spreading the good news of Christ, is the most basic expression of ministry and leadership. He read from George Fox's diary, a dramatic and moving statement, of dramatic spiritual rejuvenation and its manifestation the love of neighbor, or the social gospel. We must share with others our personal relationship with Christ as Lord, and we must work for ways to manifest this personal love for God in the social struggle for peace and justice. Another reading from Fox mentioned the deep moving of the Spirit of God, taking Fox up into paradise, in a vision of the power and life before Adam fell. He suggested a wonderful exercise that we all might try in our home Churches and Meetings. People can work through together, in groups, the early chapters in Genesis which describe the human condition before and after the fall. This is a blueprint for social justice, and its foundation is a personal and communal relationship with Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Through the power of Christ, we must seek to share this love with all we meet. When we succeed, and when people come to Christ and begin to see what Fox saw so clearly, we must always be aware that it is not we who bring people to Christ. Rather, it is the power of God acting through us, which overcomes the hardness of hearts and reveals the love which is in Christ.
In the afternoon, John spoke to our group. Over and over, in many ways both humorous and poignant, John took us through many experiences of leadership and ministry in evangelism. Two images stay with me. First, it is possible for all of us to simply approach all whom we meet and ask, "Have you met Jesus Christ? Let me tell you about Him". Second, if we are to evangelize as a community, there is much preparation to be done. We must develop a vision. We must be clear about our goals and our strategies. We must enlist other leaders and others concerned in our plans for evangelization. All of this must be done with a faith in God and the Spirit, and the enthusiasm which comes from a personal faith in Jesus Christ. We must be "born again", and we must share this new life with others. Quakers are born again Christians, even though we do not practice water baptism.
There was time on Saturday afternoon to return to our rooms to rest, or to go for a walk in the woods on a glorious early fall day, or to make new friends, renew old acquaintances and share more insights about the day's messages. Later, at dinner I had the chance to talk with two couples who worked family farms. Learning about rural Indiana and the human trials and rewards of farm life was a blessing to me which I appreciate. God gave me the chance to learn more about other Friends, and I am grateful for that.
Saturday night, we moved again from Quaker Hill Conference Center to the sanctuary of First Friends Meeting, where Pat again lead us in the signing of hymns in praise to God, with the helpful use of powerpoint technology. Our preacher was Retha McCutchen.
Retha is currently General Secretary for Friends United Ministries. She began in minsitry and servant leadership many years ago as an office secretary in a Friends Church in the Far West of the United States. Her first clear message to us was that the glory of God can often be found in the details. The small daily tasks are true tests of our faith, and sometimes the "large" and the "small" come together.
Retha told the story of Grady Wilson and Billy Graham. Grady Wilson was a gifted and grace-filled preacher and he could have had a prominent evangelistic ministry of his own. When Billy Graham become more powerful and popular as a messenger for Christ, he realized that the temptations of the flesh might be an issue for himself and for others. He was humble enough, and deeply enough convicted of human sin, to realize that he might be tempted, and that others might be too. To protect himself, other people and his ministry from scandal, he asked Grady Wilson to travel with him wherever he went, and to share his room with him, when Billy traveled without his wife. Grady Wilson agreed, and he gave up his own personal ministry, for the sake of spreading the word of God and the saving work of Jesus Christ. Retha has always been deeply impressed with these acts of humility and attention to the details.
Retha began as a single woman with two small children, working in a church office, typing addresses on mailings. While still working and taking care of her family, she went to college and then to seminary. She moved with great perseverance into other, more challenging and prominent ministries, at the local church level and at the level of yearly meetings. She taught at and lead Friends School in Ramallah, Palestine. She sent off a recent graduate of George Fox College, Jakob Kuntz, as a new teacher in Ramallah, while also being part of the conference. She is now working as a General Secretary.
At every step along the way, Retha was tested in her ministry. In many ways, she doubted her own gifts and her own potential for leadership in the ministry. She advised all of us, and especially the young people, to develop a trust in ourselves, and in what we can contribute in terms of leadership. She was tested by those around her, who questioned her calling. For several years in one Friends Meeting, some Friends could not get past the fact that Retha was a divorced woman in ministry. She was tested greatly, and a steady perseverance in running the race won the day, to the glory of God.
Retha spoke again of the attention to detail as a true charism. Ben Richmond and others did a great service to Friends by announcing and publicizing this conference, and then leading it. At the same time, Karole Cox, his assistant, worked with all the details of the conference. Hers is a wonderful ministry and a great service to Friends, as great as others. Retha thanked Karole for helping to make our conference a success.
Retha finished by reflecting on the history of her ministry and her leadership. In a sense, she is "at the top" now. She feels fulfilled, and yet she felt just as fulfilled when she began as an office assistant. She encountered some who doubted her ministry and who tested her. But she also lived and worked with many Friends who supported her and her desire to share her gifts with Friends. She thanked God for her many opportunities to lead, and she encouraged all of us to search ourselves for God's promptings in us, and to have confidence in ourselves, as we each work out our own ministries.
A couple of times in the course of the conference, Ben Richmond acknowledged his gratitude to God, that Retha McCuthen is his boss. It is generally agreed that Retha has a genius and a charism for organization and administration. Retha is able to acknowledge this, too, and she thanks God for it.
Saturday night was a time for many to gather at a local Richmond coffee house. I had the chance to meet and get to know several Friends there, and I am grateful for that.
Sunday morning I was again in a worship sharing group lead by Darrin Allen. The question for us to ask ourselves then was: What has God been saying to me this weekend? More generally, What is my calling as a leader in ministry? After a rich and fruitful silence, everyone had an opportunity to share. Then Darrin asked us if there were specific people and conditions for which we asked God's grace. He then lead us in prayer, asking Christ to be our source of comfort and healing, and asking us to be aware of His grace in our special concerns.
Later Sunday morning, Darlene Pittman, from Youth Ministries, North Carolina Yearly Meeting, spoke to us out of her own experience, and lead us into a worship service which officially ended our conference. A self-described "cheerleader", Darlene spoke with practical experience and advice to all of us, and especially to the young people, about gaining confidence in our growing sense of ministry and leadership. With great good cheer, she encouraged us to be passionate about our response in obedience to God's call for us and for our neighbors. She said, for herself, "I have one life to live, and I am going to give it!"
Darlene spoke from her own personal experience and told us how valuable the practice of journalling had been for her. Over the years, she has been able to pour her heart out to God in her journals, and this has helped her clarify what it is that God is asking of her. She asked us a series of questions throughout her time leading us, and she gave us some short time to write down the questions and to "journal" about them. We did not have enough time to do a lot with this, but her aim was to model an activity which we can practice on our own. The questions were: i.) "Today, God is...", or, Who is God for me today? Savior, Friend, Stranger? ii.) "Today, God is teaching me...", or, What am I learning from the presence of God in my life, today? iii.) "What is my passion for ministry?" She hoped this would be a model for us, in our journalling in the future.
Darlene remarked that often particular words we use can cause confusion and offense to other people. She asked us to be careful about the words we use, and to be sure to express the positive passion for God which underlies our words. She asked us to listen for her passion, and, if she said anything which put us off, please, we should substitute words which worked for us, and find the passion for God in ourselves. It is that passion which will guide us in our ministries and in the ways we lead.
Darlene spoke about the damage caused by gossip. She acknowledged herself to be a "Chatty Cathy". She said this was something she was always working on, asking Jesus for help and guidance. She encouraged us all to consider how damaging negative gossiping can be in our local church communities. Darlene remarked that Jesus had an "inner circle" in his ministry. He spent his life in service to humankind, and yet he could not accomplish everything. He demanded of his inner circle, "OK, now what will you do to show your love for me"? That is the question for us, too, and, as weak as we many be, like Peter, still, we must ask: Do we love Jesus, and will we really go out and show our love for God and for our neighbors?
Know when to fight, that is, to stand, and when to walk away. Darlene said that we must always be thinking about this. We will always be coming upon difficult situations, and we will always consider whether or not we should take a stand in these situations. But we must learn to pick our battles. Darlene recognized that her language might be seem to be at odds with Friends peace testimony, but she hoped that we understood her. We must always ask, If I make my stand here, who will be hurt in the process, and by how much? As leaders, we must be able to assess the damage in advance. Sometimes, it is better to shut up and let it go.
Darlene spoke about the need for each Christian leader to have an "accountability team". These are people each of us can go to, people we trust, who will be frank with us, and who will hold us accountable in our ministry. Jesus would often go off with Peter, James and John. Inevitably, this caused some jealousy within the larger group of disciples. But that was not Jesus' intent. His aim was to have a group of people he trusted, with whom he could speak frankly and receive frank feedback. Leadership in the church can be difficult, and we can lose our perspective. We should find people who will hold us accountable. People who know us, and love us, and who can say hard things to us when it is necessary.
We must be a light that shines. People should see a difference in us because of our faith, and know that the love of God lives and works in our lives. The work of God in our lives is not an easy thing. To live out our passion for God will often cause our hearts to break for the pain and suffering we see in our neighbors in our broken world. We must call upon the love of God in Christ, to become true leaders in Christ's ministry. We must realize that, in the end, it is God's power which works through us. We are small and broken vessels. It is the power of God in Christ which, finally, is the grace which heals and brings joy.
Darlene finished by playing for us a popular song which encouraged us to see the presence of God in the world, and which emphasized one of Darlene's themes, of trying, of making the effort, of taking a chance: We should get out on the floor and dance. It was a good way for Darlene to finish. It showed clearly the enthusiasm, the love and the care which Darlene has for people, through her faith in Christ.
Pat Byers lead us once more in singing hymns. That was followed by a long period of fruitful silence. Some folks prayed for particular concerns and they were held in the Light, and we asked God to care for those people and their concerns. Then quietly, people ended the worship and the conference by greeting each other, in the peace of Christ.