This evening is the annual Commission Workshop.  This is when new and returning commission members, over 30 people, get together for a meal, get oriented to leadership and logistics, and have their first meeting of the commission year.  CMC commissions are Christian Ed, Community Life, Facilities, Shepherding, Worship, plus Leadership Team and the SHARE team – formerly Mission Coordinator.    The lame ducks, as outgoing congregational chair Dan Halterman has referred to himself, have now completed their work and get a much-deserved rest.  Our commissions are the steadily paddling feet under the water of congregational life that keep us gracefully floating along.  Many, many thanks to everyone rotating off a commission.  Because of the time and creativity you gave, we didn’t just float, we flew!  *extended metaphor over    Also annually, Leadership Team creates a Vision for Ministry to guide commissions in their work.  The previous three included the phrase

Wednesday evening I got back from a three-day symposium titled “Jews and Mennonites: Reading the Bible After the Holocaust.” Much of the credit for this gathering goes to John Kampen who some of you know as the former Academic Dean of Bluffton University and Methodist Theological School in Ohio.  John’s longtime scholarship and relationship building within American Judaism made this long-overdue conversation possible and brought in remarkable Jewish leaders like New Testament scholar (Yes, there are Jewish New Testament scholars) Amy-Jill Levine, and the current and former chairs of the International Jewish Committee for Interreligious Consultations – David Sandmel and Noam Marans.  There were eight Jews in total, representing the Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox traditions.  There were 15 Mennonites, mostly professors.  As you can imagine from the title, the symposium was rich, intense, necessary, and, at times, difficult.  My head is still spinning a bit from all that was covered. 

In the most recent Lamplighter, Dan Lehman submitted an article on behalf of the Shepherding Commission that talked about all the different things that commission does. Before going to print, he ran it by the commission for any edits, and I offered one small change. In the section about how the commission assists people experiencing conflict and crisis, Dan wrote that Joel and I “offer counseling services any time and are specifically trained to do so.” While that is technically true, I suggested he change it to “pastoral counseling.”  My suggestion came from the thought that when people hear “counseling services” they most likely think of mental health counseling. We have a number of licensed counselors in our congregation who are specifically trained to work with issues related to mental health in ways that neither Joel nor I are equipped to do. I make this differentiation not to denigrate pastoral

Last evening around 60 CMCers joined 1600+ folks at the BREAD Nehemiah Action at the Celeste Center.  It’s the climax of BREAD’s annual cycle of organizing around solutions to problems facing folks in Franklin County.  Here are three things I’m chewing on the morning after…. + One of the opening reflections was given by Rabbi Alex Braver of Congregation Tifereth Israel.  He referenced BREAD’s framing biblical story of the Exodus, with Pharaoh representing the entrenched forces that set themselves against justice, and BREAD congregations representing the plague of the gnats – individually small but powerful when we swarm.  To this he added a reference to the plague of darkness, which Exodus says prevented the Egyptians from seeing one another.  Rabbinical commentary notes that the true curse wasn’t the darkness but the Egyptians’ inability to see others – as fully human.  Rabbi Braver invited us to escape the plague of darkness

It’s good to have friendships across borders.  It enlarges our world and personalizes distant places.  In Christian language, it is the nature of the body of Christ to transgress boundaries of tribe and nation.  In Christ we are one.  I’d like to use this week’s midweek reflection to pass along a message from a friend of the congregation, Yasir Makki.  Yasir studied at OSU about two decades ago and was part of CMC before returning to his homeland of Sudan where he leads churches and a school.  He visits us and other local churches annually to give updates and invite continued financial support.  You may have seen headlines about the violence erupting across Sudan.  Here is a message from Yasir sent two days ago. —————————– Greetings in Jesus name. I started writing this email to all of you, but was not able to send it.  We had a long blackout