Rainbow Church
Image from Flickr user Edward Musiak. Used under Creative Commons License. Cropped from Original.
Back in March of 2013 my friend Wes Magruder wrote the following in a post on Rethink Bishop:
I would like to propose that we impose a moratorium on legislation and change at
General Conference 2016, and decide to do nothing but pray together, worship
together, eat together, and get to know each other. That’s it. Nothing else.
You can read more of his thoughts and proposal here. At the time I thought he was on to something, but in the months that have unfolded since he wrote it I have become even more convinced that we absolutely should do what he proposed.
We need to admit our relationships as brothers and sisters in Christ are broken. We have been great at talking “at” one another. We have been great at talking about our issues. What we haven’t been good at is emphasizing and recognizing those things that bind us.
As brothers and sisters in Christ we all are trying to walk in the way of Christ. I have yet to encounter someone who has said: “I don’t care what Christ said we need to do x or y.” We all are trying to walk faithfully and humbly with our God.
Maybe our real issue is we are so focused on ourselves and we have lost focus on the One who has called us together as a Methodist family. Maybe we need to lay down all of our issues and grab hands across the aisle to pray with one another. Maybe in focusing on ourselves we have failed to see how Christ is alive in the “other.” Maybe we need to grab our plates and hear the life and faith stories of those we have been writing open letters to.
Maybe we need to just all sit together and listen. Listen to one another but more importantly listen for the the voice of God speaking in worship, prayer, and the common meal. What if we opened this time up to all Methodists across the connection to join at their places of worship during the day to join in this national movement to listen?
You can discuss all the practical reasons why we shouldn’t or couldn’t do something like this, but really it is the one way I see we could allow the Holy Spirit to move amongst us and draw us together. We must lose ourselves in a movement to find ourselves in Christ.
Justin Halbersma is an ordained United Methodist Elder serving Wesley United Methodist Church in Winona, MN. This article is reprinted with permission from UMC Lead. You can see other writings of his over on Methodist Justin