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I deeply appreciate the opportunity to continue our Supportive Ministries conversation focused on building the beloved community. (Please note that because of the New Year's holiday, this month’s conversations at will take place on Zoom at noon or 7 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 8.)
In last month’s Supportive Ministries article, Sandra Graham encouraged us to explore ways that our congregations can enter into relationships with the neighborhood around us and the people who live there. Sandy also challenged us, as members of the United Church of Christ “to keep working and striving to be a Beloved Community, dedicated to love and justice in sanctuary, neighborhood and world.”
As followers of Jesus Christ, we are called not merely to build beloved community inside the church with the people who are “members” but – and more important – to build that beloved community in partnership with our neighbors in the world around us, no matter who they are or where they are on life’s journey.
In his book “Basic Steps Toward Community Ministry,” Carl Dudley of the Alban Institute writes that in order to build a solid foundation for your community ministry, your group needs to address three interdependent topics:
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Your social context: the place and people around the church.
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Your congregational identity: that unique character of the faith, history, and personality of the church that shape your church and guide its response to the challenges of change.
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Organization: leaders and resources that give your ministry the capacity to act – to respond to your context in ways consistent with your identity.
In last month’s article, Sandy encouraged us to explore ways to address our social context by growing in understanding of the neighborhood around us, both its challenges and its assets. With that in mind, I commend the following.
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Books by Carl Dudley and those associated with the Alban Institute now woven into Duke Divinity School.
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Books and articles by John McKnight and others associated with the Asset Based Community Development Institute, including books by Peter Block, co-author of “The Abundant Community” and “Community: the Structure of Belonging," and Luther Snow, author of “The Power of Asset Mapping.”
- I also have become aware recently of the work of Dwight J. Zcheile at Luther Seminary in St. Paul and his books “The Starter’s Way: Leading New Contextual Christian Communities” and “Cultivating Sent Communities: Missional Spiritual Formation.”
Dudley challenges us to clarify the congregational identity that shapes our response to the “challenges of change” as we develop a community-based ministry. In my experience, our congregational response to the needs of the community is most effective when we have a clear understanding of who we are as a faith community, the gifts our people bring, our core mission, and an articulated vision that guide us.
At Bethel-Bethany UCC in Milwaukee, where I served for over 30 years, we used Kennon Callahan’s “Twelve Keys to an Effective Church” in the late 1980s to assist us in developing a culture of planning that leads to vision. At that critical moment, when our urban neighborhood and Bethel-Bethany were going through changes, we needed to clarify our identity. Motivated by that need, we gathered to do a self-study that led to the development of a shared approach to mission and a congregational vision that was an ongoing call to the church to “celebrate and share God’s Love as an inclusive Christian Church serving in the urban and global community.”
Inspired by God’s Vision for our congregations and our belief in the “ministry of all believers,” I’m convinced that a central mission of the church is to support people as they discover their calling in the world and to empower gifted people to go out into the world to become builders of the beloved community.
Encouraging the development of community builders, Callahan and others have sought to inspire faith communities to develop a concrete well-defined mission that leads us beyond ourselves.” According to Callahan, “whenever a local congregation is effectively engaged in missional outreach, that congregation is a group of people living beyond their preoccupation with themselves. Precisely because they live beyond themselves, their strengths are commensurately developed, their vision is substantially lifted, and their energies are vitalized to new levels of living.”
So how do we organize ourselves to help people live beyond themselves developing their strengths to live into their vision?
Through the years, pastors, leaders, and teachers have encouraged people to discover their gifts for ministry in a variety of ways and to help them connect with ministry opportunities both inside the church and, more important, in the world beyond the church through streamlined organizational structure, preaching, spiritual guidance and practice, coaching (both formal and informal) and volunteer development.
According to John McKnight and Peter Block in their book “The Abundant Community: Awakening the Power of Families and Neighborhoods,” partnering with neighbors to build community “gives voice to the ideal of an abundant – or some call beloved – community. It reminds all of us of our power to create a full and complete life. It assures us that when we join together with our neighbors we are the architects of the future that we want to live within. Such a future is made possible through the untapped abundance of every community especially our own.”
In the past our Conference has utilized a number of programs that have empowered the ministries of all believers including Ron Farr’s “Unwrapping Our Gifts,” a Lay Empowerment Project that was designed to transform local congregations by unleashing the spiritual lives, gifts, and ministries of the laity. Through eight sessions participants were encouraged to value their spiritual journeys, define ministry as more than those who are ordained, “unwrap” our unique gifts, and recognize that ministry happens at home, in the workplace, and in the church and world. Though the program is not presently available, there’s been interest in developing a program with a similar approach. Interested?
At Bethel-Bethany, where we engaged people, younger and older, in “Unwrapping Our Gifts,” we also used “Life Keys” developed by Jane A. G. Kise, David Stark, and Sandra Krebs Hirsh: a guide to uncovering talents, spiritual gifts, passions, values and personality. The program is designed as a tool to help participants discern their mission in life. When we gathered in small groups to work through the program, People found it to be an engaging and empowering way to help them discern the gifts that they offer the world, their personal mission, and how to live out that mission, sharing those gifts with the world. We also used a youth program entitled, “Find Your Fit” in a retreat format.
Other resources that I’ve used to help people discover their gifts for ministry and their vision for life include “Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” and “First Things First” by Steven Covey, “Strengths Finder” from Gallup by Tom Rath, and “Holy Adventures: 41 Days of Audacious Living,” written by process theologian Bruce Epperly.
Connecting with a coach through the Wisconsin Conference Coaching Initiative is an additional opportunity that you can take advantage of, as you and other Conference leaders seek to understand who you are called to be and what you are called to do in life and ministry.
Finally, it’s important to remember the important role that the Lay Academy and the Damascus Project of the Conference have played through the years in helping people hear the call to mission and develop their “capacity to act” as faithful people.
How we help people discover their gifts for ministry and how we empower and support them in their mission is key to the development of our congregations and our Conference, as we connect with the community around us to build the beloved community together.
In January, our Supportive Ministries conversation will focus on “Engagement in Community” with Bonnie Andrews, member of the Supportive Ministries Team and former Director of the Volunteer Center of Greater Milwaukee, who will provide practical tools for engaging.
Hope you can join us for our Supportive Ministries Conversation on Zoom a noon or 7 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 8.
Here are some questions to ponder:
- What program or book has helped you discover your gifts for ministry?
- How has your congregation encouraged and supported you and others in that effort?
- How can the Conference support you in developing your mission in community?
- What programming would you appreciate being offered through the Damascus Project?
- Would you be interested in helping to develop programming to help people discover their gifts for ministry and live into their mission in the church and the community?
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