Today in the Mission Yearbook - We’ll understand it better by and by

For now, Festival of Homiletics preacher says, we must be visionary people ‘more moved by our possibilities than our present realities’

November 3, 2021

The Rev. Dr. Neichelle Guidry

The Rev. Dr. Neichelle Guidry opened a recent Festival of Homiletics worship service by singing a hymn she’s returned to often during the pandemic, “We’ll Understand It Better By and By”:

“When the morning comes/All the saints of God are gathered home/We’ll tell the story how we’ve overcome/For we’ll understand it better by and by.”

“I think of this song, and it’s hard to divorce the lyrics from the memory of mass choirs decked out in robes, rocking from side to side and singing those powerful words,” said Guidry, the dean of Sisters Chapel and director of the Women in Spiritual Discernment of Ministry (WISDOM) Center at Spelman College in Atlanta.

“We the saints of God will gather in our eschatological home and we will tell the story of how we got there. It will be clear to us how we persevered and made it home to glory, how we endured trials and tribulations and made it over to eternal life on the other side, and why we were born at this time,” Guidry said. “The song talks about hope for the future, and it also speaks to a hope that can hold us in the present.”

Those lyrics make her think of her grandmother. “When I was confused about anything, she always said this: ‘You’ll understand it better by and by. Just keep on living.’”

Paul says something similar in the text Guidry selected for her sermon, “A Visionary People,” heard by more than 800 people during the final day of the online festival. In 1 Cor. 13:12–13, Paul writes: “For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.”

“We don’t see everything as we ought to, but we will,” Guidry said. “We will understand it better by and by.”

In the verses of 1 Cor. 13 preceding verse 12, “Paul laid out the case for love. He says we won’t understand it fully until completion comes,” Guidry said. “We need to live in a state of not knowing,” much like we have for the past months, living in multiple pandemics. “For some time, we’ve become accustomed to ambiguity and confusion,” Guidry said, and our vision “is often obscured” by police violence, poverty and hunger, “continuous mass shootings with no legislative intervention in sight,” migrant families “held captive,” misogyny, patriarchy and domestic violence, among others.

“These are but some of our domestic narratives,” Guidry said. “They threaten our ability to hope and see and pray for a different future.”

“How are we supposed to hope,” Guidry asked, “if right here and right now some of us are literally choking on hopelessness?”

The tools of God “aren’t given to us merely to exist,” Guidry said. “These days are ours to claim, to create. It’s time to become visionary people more moved by our possibilities than by our present realities.”

It’s time “to become visionary people who can speak our dreams into existence and subvert the apathy that has become our norm,” Guidry said. “This text provides a roadmap to becoming a visionary people.”

The first step is to renew our faith, because “it gets hard to keep our vision when it’s obscured by bad news and hatred,” Guidry said. “We can’t get to a future if all this turmoil is the only thing we see.”

That renewal includes refreshing one’s spiritual sources, also known in Guidry’s tradition as the “spirit of Sankofa,” the symbol taken up by the Co-Moderators of the 224th General Assembly, the Rev. Gregory Bentley and Ruling Elder Elona Street-Stewart. “You may feel the world is crashing down around you, but it isn’t the first time,” Guidry said. “What happened back then did not break us or stop us from pressing through to the present. We are proof that God is not done yet.”

“Every now and then,” Guidry advised, “remind yourself that this is precisely when God does God’s best work. God is still doing new things. Can we not perceive it?”

 Mike Ferguson, Editor, Presbyterian News Service

Let us join in prayer for:

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
César Carhuachîn, Mission co-worker serving in Colombia, Presbyterian Mission Agency
Olanda Carr, Senior Ministry Relations Officer, Presbyterian Foundation

Let us pray

O God, may the saving power of your Holy Word and Holy Spirit continue to bring us out of darkness and into your wonderful light. In the name of Jesus, our Savior, we pray. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - ‘No one comes to this table because they deserve to’

Adoption story illustrates communion table grace at the Festival of Homiletics

October 27, 2021

The Rev. Dr. Craig Barnes

One night when the Rev. Dr. Craig Barnes was a boy, his father woke him up and introduced him to his new brother, Roger.

Barnes’ father was the pastor of a church in a poor community, and Roger came to services with his mother. The pastor had talked to the family and tried to help the mother and father with their addictions, to no avail.

One night, Roger couldn’t wake his parents up, and when the police arrived, they confirmed the mother and father had died of heroin overdoses. Rev. Barnes volunteered to take the boy home for the night, having no other family to go to.

“Somewhere on the drive from the projects, my father decided that he was going to adopt Roger,” Barnes recalled to nearly 1,000 people in the audience for the recent virtual Festival of Homiletics.

Barnes, president and professor of Pastoral Ministry at Princeton Theological Seminary, was lecturing on “Preaching with Bread and Wine,” and for him, his father’s willingness to bring Roger into their family was emblematic of the communion table.

“That night, Roger became my father’s heir and my joint heir,” Barnes said. “He didn’t earn that. He didn’t even ask for it. I’m not even sure he wanted it.

“But it was a grace that was given to him.”

It wasn’t quite as easy as it sounds, though, Barnes said. His parents believed in old-school piety and “loved rules,” Barnes said. Meanwhile, raised by heroin addicts, Roger was unaccustomed to rules and came to hear the phrase, “Roger, we don’t do that here,” mainly from his mother, particularly at the dinner table.

Slowly, Barnes said, his brother’s life was transformed, just like our lives are transformed each time we come to the communion table.

Barnes talked about a moment that passes between pastors and members of the congregation as they come forward to receive communion.

“Throughout the week, the pastor is constantly encountering ‘why?’ questions,” Barnes said. “’Why did my child die?’ ‘Why do evil people prosper?’ ‘Why didn’t God help me when I prayed? And I prayed.’ The question has to be asked, even though the pastor knows it’s never going to be satisfactorily answered, not with an answer that can stand up to that question: ‘Why? Why?’”

Then, in worship, the pastor stands at the front of the church.

“People come one after another,” Barnes said. “There is a very tender moment that is known only, really, to clergy. And that’s that moment when the next person comes up and looks at the pastor. And just for a moment, we glimpse into each other’s eyes, and we remember the husband who has cancer, remember the child who’s in jail, remember the other child who’s in Afghanistan, remember the wife that was just buried a couple of months ago, remember the devastating diagnosis of Alzheimer’s. One after another, it just keeps coming. And all I can say is, ‘The body of Christ. The cup of salvation.’ It’s all it needs to be said at that moment, because it’s their moment of communion.”

It is a moment where the truth of their lives and the holy are blended.

“This table clearly proclaims that grace precedes faith,” Barnes said. “No one comes to this table because they deserve to. We come because we need to. We bring all that stuff I was talking about, because we need to commune with a savior.”

At the height of the Vietnam War, Roger enlisted in the Army and was sent into combat.

One day, the family received a telegram that Roger had been killed in combat. Later they learned that Roger died in an act of heroism that saved other lives, and his mother asked, how did the frightened boy they brought into their family become a hero?

“Mama, I know the answer to that,” Barnes recalled telling her. “It was all of those table lessons, because he was paying attention to the grace that he had received.’

“If we attend to the grace of this table, to the grace that is always offered when the word is proclaimed, lives are being converted.”

 Rich Copley, Communications Strategist, Presbyterian Mission Agency

Let us join in prayer for:

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
Kendra Bright, Operations & Accounting Associate, Presbyterian Publishing Corporation
Christian Brooks, Representative for Domestic Poverty & Environmental Issues, Office of Public Witness, Presbyterian Mission Agency

Let us pray

Gracious God, thank you for the mission and ministry of congregations. By your Spirit, guide all your people, that your love and grace may abound as we faithfully follow where you lead. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - Is the church really dying? Or is it dying to change?

University of Pennsylvania Religious Studies professor talks prophetic preaching during the Festival of Homiletics’ opening day

October 22, 2021

Dr. Anthea Butler

Like great Black preachers from previous generations, including Dr. James Cone and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., modern-day prophetic preachers have two main jobs, Dr. Anthea Butler said during the first day of the online Festival of Homiletics: bringing solace to people in the pews in times of trouble and speaking truth to power.

“The gospel can bring news that confronts and challenges us and demands a hearing,” said Butler, the chair of Religious Studies and Associate Professor of Religious Studies and Africana Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. “In a time when people won’t get their vaccines, there are hard messages that need to be said,” even to congregations that haven’t worshiped in person together in more than a year. “We have to measure what we say.”

Butler’s talk was titled “Preaching the Tough Positions: Persuasive, Prophetic Preaching for a New Age.”

“Is the church really dying? Or is it dying to change,” organizers ask on the festival homepage. “How can the church recapture what it was in the first century — a distinctive, confessional community, willing to stand against the status quo, to speak up against the empire and to stand for the gospel — in a 21st century context?”

As a historian, Butler looks at “the times people had hard messages to say,” occasions when they “had to confront something awful.” When speaking with the congregation about “strident” issues including, for example, getting vaccinated or reopening schools, “approach it directly with truth,” Butler advised the preachers, part of the crowd of more than 1,400 viewers.

Instead, what Butler often hears from the pulpit is anecdotal stories about the preachers themselves. “If you begin to talk about facts, people will focus on what you are saying,” Butler said.

“Your job is not just giving the message,” Butler told the preachers. “People want to trust you and trust one another. It that trust is broken, you are not just wounding yourself. You’re wounding them.”

Ask yourself this, Butler suggested: “Do I want to make a political statement rather than making a statement from the gospel? We have people [in our congregations] who want to fight for certain political activity. What are truthful ways to give people voices? How we deal with our congregations is an important part of truth-telling and prophetic witness in this particular age we are in.”

Parishioners now have plenty of voices they can hear via social media, “but [preachers] are there only once or twice a week. … It’s important for you to think about how you will talk to your parishioners. What are you watching? Who is influencing you now?”

Worshipers of all ages can take in online worship services from anywhere in the world. Butler’s mother, a woman in her 80s, “looks at masses from all over the world, and she tells me about them.”

Contrast that with biblical times, when “prophets would walk to and fro, but they didn’t have much competition,” Butler said.

“Is you message uplifting or challenging? Is it something you took from someone else?” Butler asked the preachers. “How do you use what you are given to have impact in a world with a cacophony of messages?”

Take care of yourselves, Butler urged preachers. Many pastors are thinking about retiring or leaving ministry because the pandemic has made their work so difficult. “How is that affecting you? You are tired and weary. You’re worn out, and the circumstances of the pandemic have taken a lot from you too,” including congregants who died during the pandemic, declining membership and dwindling contributions.

Like the preachers who served before the current generation — say, those called to preach during the Civil War— “your relationship to God is going to fuel the prophetic preaching that you have.” Take time to be silent, meditate and “think about the ways your life has been impacted and how your preaching has changed,” Butler said. “The call of God on your life may not now be as strong as it was.”

“That’s when prophetic preaching is the strongest — when we take the time to rest and to contemplate, reflect and renew,” Butler said. “I ask you today to consider that.”

Mike Ferguson, Editor, Presbyterian News Service

Let us join in prayer for:

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
Ricky Blade, Customer Service Consultant, Communications Ministry, Presbyterian Mission Agency
Michele Blum, Managing Director of Editorial, Presbyterian Publishing Corporation

Let us pray

Precious Creator, we thank you for faithful witness. Bless them and guide them by your Holy Spirit. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - The only thing that counts is when our faith expresses itself through love

Atmospheric scientist Katharine Hayhoe helps kick off Festival of Homiletics

October 10, 2020

Dr. Katharine Hayhoe

Beginning in Genesis, the Bible assigns humankind responsibility to care for every living thing — not just plants and animals, but one another.

But many of us are shirking our duty, contributing to pollution levels that are largely unseen and helping to worsen global warming, which has given planet Earth at least a low-grade fever.

Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, an atmospheric scientist at Texas Tech University and co-author of “A Climate for Change: Global Warming Facts for Faith-Based Decisions,” spoke during the opening day of May’s Festival of Homiletics, which was held online this year. This year’s theme was “Preaching a New Earth: Climate and Creation.”

Each year, global warming is putting more and more people at risk to poverty and hunger, political instability and health problems, she said. Droughts are occurring in West Texas, where Hayhoe lives, and in far-off locations including Syria. It’s now “a big straw on the camel’s back,” she said. Climate change has widened the gap between rich and poor worldwide by 25%.

Hayhoe used a military term, “threat multiplier,” to describe the effects of climate change. “It’s like a bucket with a hole in it,” she said. “The hole is getting bigger over time.”

What to do? Fortunately for believers, the Bible is specific about what our attitude and actions should be, Hayhoe said.

God hasn’t given us the spirit of fear, she said. Fear is behind the denial of basic science and climate change. Many say they also fear excess government control, “somebody telling me what to do.” What spirit has God given us?

It’s right there in 2 Timothy 1:7, Hayhoe pointed out. She likes the New King James Version: “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”

“A sound mind,” she said. “I have to love that as a scientist.”

There’s no one magic solution, but there are dozens of proactive ways Christians can collectively work to mitigate global warming’s disastrous consequences.

“As Christians, we are not lone rangers,” Hayhoe said. “We are part of a body, and we are called to act in community.” One organization people can join online, she said, is Climate Caretakers, which among other services sends subscribers a monthly email with ideas on what they can do together.

“We can act individually, too,” she said, by consuming more locally grown food, eating lower on the food chain and considering the installation of solar panels to help power our homes.

“But most important is to use our voice to tell people why climate change matters,” she said. “Share the good news of the solutions that already exist.”

In addition, “we can join an organization that amplifies our voice” by working in tandem with other like-minded people: birders, skiers, people who fish, mothers. “There’s an organization for everyone,” she said.

The bottom line: “For us as Christians, caring for God’s Creation is a genuine expression of our faith, a true expression of God’s love,” Hayhoe said. “The only thing that counts is when our faith expresses itself through love.”

“It’s about loving our global neighbor,” she said.

 Mike Ferguson, Editor, Presbyterian News Service

Let us join in prayer for: 

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
Robert Ratcliff, Presbyterian Publishing Corporation
Vaughn Ratliff, Administrative Services Group (A Corp)

Let us pray:

We thank you, Lord, for the new thing you are doing among us. We pray for the mission and ministry of the congregations, who are envisioning and acting on a new way to be your people in a changed and changing world. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.