Photo Courtesy of BethAnn Estock
Simple Things
According to the October 2012 Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life report, “Nones” on the Rise: One-in-Five Adults Have No Religious Affiliation, 1 in 5 adults are religiously unaffiliated. When looking more closely at the generational data, 32 percent of adults under the age of 30 fall within the same category. In 1950, the percentage of persons claiming no religious affiliation was a minuscule two percent.
Imagine Jesus showing up today saying to you and a few of your friends, “You will be my witnesses of God’s love in all of Jerusalem, Samaria and to the ends of the earth.” What would you do? How would you go about sharing that good news that God’s realm is now? How would you go about helping people to be shaped and formed by that love and peace in your neighborhood? Really…. without any pre-concieved notions of church or worship?
I think for many of us in the church we have done a good job of staying in Jerusalem, the denominational mecca where we tend to recycle Christians amongst ourselves. Our church planting strategies have focused around appointing a young handsome pastor to start a worship service with a highly skilled band and worship leader in a growing community. This requires big expenditures of money for staff and building rentals. The timeline for such starts to become sustainable is a mere 3-4 years due to funding constraints on the judicatory level. This strategy assumes that people already know something about church and are interested in learning more.
However, what we are finding out is that in our religiously non-affiliated culture we are setting ourselves up for failure with this model — unless, of course, we intentionally set out to reach folks who already have a religious background.
But what about in Samaria where they think that religious organizations are too concerned with money and power, too focused on rules and too involved in politics? What about those Samaritans who aren’t looking for a religion that would be right for them? How do we move from Jerusalem into Samaria?
If we look at the story of the original apostles in the Book of Acts, the diaspora into Samaria happened through persecution. Folks were forced out of their comfortable worshipping communities into a foreign land after Stephen was stoned by the denominational leaders. Simply put, the early disciples were forced out of their comfort zones for survival reasons. Maybe we could even say, they had to adapt or die.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could move out into Samaria without the threat of death?
One way we could do this is to encourage a few folks who are members of existing churches to be blessed and sent out as missionaries into their respective neighborhoods. This would take courage and trust not only from the folks being sent out, but also by those sending them out since they might just be the church’s most gifted leaders!
Imagine what this would look like in your setting — beginning with prayer and discernment about who those gifted folks might be, to inviting them into that possibility, to releasing them from church committee and teaching work, to blessing them on their way. I could imagine having monthly conversations with them about what they are learning and how the church could support them. I could imagine, just as the apostles reported back to the Jerusalem church, these folks reporting back to their home churches. I could also imagine in the process those same churches being stretched to move further and further into Samaria themselves.
Jesus shows us as he walks to Jerusalem through Samaria in the Gospel of Luke that this ministry is one of meeting people where they are and sharing stories that point to the ways of peace and love. It is a ministry of radical hospitality and inclusiveness where we scatter seeds of kindness and compassion, joy and delight. Simply put, it is about living our lives with Kin-dom hearts 24/7. It is about helping people wake up to the sacrament of life with every breath we take.
We might not see the money rolling into the institutional church with this way of being, but if we listen deeply and trust in the Spirit’s unfolding, we will witness signs even greater than these!
The Rev. BethAnn Estock is a church planter and consultant in Portland, OR.