I believe that all church newsletters carry a drop of grace within them. We who work in the church often bemoan their deadlines and complain about the necessity of writing a column and preparing articles and fitting all the pieces together. But there is something beautiful in the way a church newsletter can gather the flotsam and jetsam of our life together in community.
Today I went to my mailbox and found that my copy of "The Sower" had arrived. "The Sower" is the newsletter from my home church, and to me, it's like getting a letter from an old friend. My heart still catches a little when I see on the back cover my own name with "Rev." in front of it. That title is used for me often, but there is something more powerful about being recognized as a pastor by the people who raised me and taught me to love the church.
"The Sower" is an ordinary church newsletter. It announces upcoming meetings and chronicles the events in the lives of church members. It includes wedding announcements and reports from the trustees, thank you notes and schedules of events. It even gives a list of members' birthdays for the month. But in each of those things, I see grace. The announcements and birthday lists invite all who read it to be a part of this common life, to share their joys and burdens and to care for one another. The finance and trustees reports show what we can do when we work together. Between lines of ordinary text, I read, "There is love here: love for each other and love for God. This is the love that we share lived out."
Perhaps I see that most especially in "The Sower" because it reflects the life of my home congregation. It records the ongoing adventures of a community that is dear to my heart. These are, after all, the people who embraced me from my childhood. This newsletter tells a tiny bit of the stories of the people who taught me The Lord's Prayer and sang along as I stumbled my way through hymns on the piano. These are the people who asked me, week in and week out, about how school was going, who checked in on me when I went away, who sent cookies to me every one of my seven years of higher education. So when I read the church newsletter, I see their faces, I celebrate with their joys, and I mourn with their losses.
Theirs is not a perfect church. There is no such thing as a perfect church. Churches are, after all, made up of ordinary, broken people. But there is a beauty and a grace in this and every church as God draws diverse and imperfect people together and weaves us into one body. There is a power in people loving God, loving one another, and reaching out in love to a hurting world. That is what the church is. And in this newsletter, I glimpse the church.
I don't always see that. Usually when I look at church newsletters, I see them with a critical eye. I am used to going over the newsletter of the church I serve with an editor's eye and a red pen. Perhaps that is why this particular newsletter spoke to my heart so deeply. You see, this June issue of "The Sower" contains the last column by our current pastor, Wayne. And his column was powerful for me, not just because of his beautiful words, but because of the person I know who wrote them.
I remember when Wayne first arrived in our congregation. I had really liked his predecessor, and, as a grumpy junionr high student, I was not ready to welcome someone new. I resented him before he even opened his mouth to preach his first sermon at our church. But Wayne disarmed me with his warm smile and subtle humor. His sermons told stories, wove poetry, and drew together the stories of our community with the events of the world and the narratives of Scripture. I got to know him better over mud and hammers on mission trips. Moreover, Wayne's notes of encouragement mailed to my home, words of wisdom over coffee, and engagement in the life of our small town taught me to understand the intersection of faith and life in new ways. When I came home from college and told Wayne that I had discerned a call to ministry, he responded with joy and an offer of guidance. For all the years after, Wayne and his wife, Fern, lived out that offer. They helped me get connected with the larger church and introduced me to the idea of Annual Conference. They followed up with me to see how the long journey through "the process" was going. They offered suggestions for books to read and courses to take. And when I shared with them my struggles with my home conference and my call to move to a different conference, they supported my decision wholeheartedly.
But the greatest gift Wayne and Fern gave me was their example of ministry with grace, passion, and longevity. They loved the church and community and showed their love through relationships with people and engagement in our structures. They encouraged small, incremental changes in the life of the church that, over more than a decade, yielded powerful new ministries and greater inclusivity. They are not perfect, but for a decade they have loved and striven to show the presence of Christ to our little community. I hope that through my years of ministry I may do the same. I hope that, forty years from now, I will be able to have the same joy and gratitude for the privilege of ministry and the beauty of the church that they show now as they retire.
I rejoiced in the example Wayne and Fern have provided and in the beauty of the church as I read "The Sower" this morning, and particularly as these beautiful words from Wayne's column sank into my heart:
"The gretest rewards of life have been to have been trusted with the vulnerability of persons' lives. You have blessed me with participation in your births and baptisms, your weddings, your divorces, your grievings, your graduations, your retirements; your confessions and your daily mundane lives. At their best, these have been a rehearsal of the trust persons had with wounded lives as they met Jesus. I have been rewarded in seeing the joy you took in the joy and well-being of others; and in seeing your sharing a journey in the valley of the shadows of life. I have been rewarded to see you persist with graceful spirit and effort in stressful, even hostile, situations. This is a sign of Christ's resurrection in you."
Wayne's words remind me, church newsletters remind me: In the church we journey together in grace toward the glory of God. Soli Deo Gloria indeed!