[To save space, where elements of this plan are adaptations of the Basic Tools, the Basic Tool is noted by title. Parts appearing in full are from a handout. They are included to set forth the particular goal of the event and to illustrate unique portions of it.]
Come . . .
Wake the Sleeping Giant within YOU.
Discover your Missions and God’s Gifts to do them.
November 8, 2003 – 8:00 A.M. to 3:00 P.M.
St. Martin’s Church, Brown Deer, WI
Leader: A. Wayne Schwab (The Rev.), Director of the Member Mission Network, Inc.
8:00 -8:45 A.M. Registration / Continental Breakfast
8:45 -9:00 A.M. Music
“I will celebrate”
“Father, I adore you”
9:00 A.M. Opening Prayer – Fr. Ed Thompson
9:05 A.M. Welcome / Introductions – Ramona Lewis of St. Martin’s
9:10 A.M. SETTING THE FRAMEWORK (See section below)
OUR SIX DAILY ARENAS (Basic Tools 2)
GOD’S MISSION AND OUR MISSIONS (Basic Tools 3)
(Break)
DISCOVERING GOD’S GIFTS FOR OUR MISSIONS (Basic Tools 4)
Three observations
A Spirituality for Missionaries (Basic Tools 11)
Maslow and member mission (Basic Tools 6)
Member Missions and body missions (Basic Tools 5)
12:00 P.M. Blessing / lunch
12:45 P.M. Music
Solo – violinist – Miss Nerissa Dyett
“Lord, I lift your name on high”
“I Love you, Lord”
1:00P.M. DISCOVERING OUR MISSIONS IN OUR CONGREGATION AND IN ITS OUTREACH (See following pages)
(Break – optional)
SOME HELP IN FINDING SOME HELPERS (See section below)
PRACTICE IN FINDING SOME HELPERS (Basic Tools 10)
CLOSING (See section below)
2:45 P.M. Music
Solo – steel drummer – Miss Brandi
“I will celebrate”
“Father, I adore you”
“Lord, I lift your name on high”
“I love you, Lord”
3:00 P.M.. Closing prayer
A vision:
God is most interested in how we live from Monday to Saturday.
Sunday – all of church life – is to give us the guidance and the power to do it better.
Congregations, therefore, make their primary purpose – or among their top purposes – supporting their members in their daily living as Christians.
* * *
SETTING THE FRAMEWORK
[We are here in the church because the Kitchen Crew needs to work in the hall during the sessions.]
Some Theology:
Background theology – for your reference later:
– God has overcome evil, sin, and death in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the victor over evil.
– God continues to struggle with evil, sin, and death in and through Jesus Christ.
– God’s works among us are love and justice. Justice is the public face of love. Wherever you meet love and justice, you are meeting God. Wherever love and justice are needed, you are sure to meet God at work. This is God’s mission – to overcome all that is against love and justice.
– God’s mission has a church. The church does not have a mission.
– The church is the visible instrument of God’s mission in Jesus Christ. The church works with anyone who works for love and justice.
– We join Jesus’ mission in baptism. We Jesus’ coworkers. Jesus shares his power over evil with us.
For us today:
Evil, sin, and death are real. God conquers them in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ continues the struggle with evil, sin and death and is the final victor over it. In baptism, we join Jesus in this struggle. As his coworkers, Jesus shares his power over evil with us as we are guided and fed by him at his table. Love and justice – justice is the public face of love – are the signs of Jesus’ work among us.
“As the Father has sent me, so I send you . . . Receive the Holy Spirit” (John 20:21-22).
Today we dig into our work with Jesus – our daily missions – and the gifts – the gifts of the Spirit – he gives us to do it. The sleeping giant in each of us is awake already. We just don’t know it!
* * *
DISCOVERING OUR MISSIONS IN OUR CONGREGATION AND IN ITS OUTREACH
Our missions in our churches:
Each of us would like to see the quality of our church’s life / or our church’s outreach to our community improve. Let’s think through how we might be part of the solution. Working alone, use these six questions to help you think about what you might do – and how you might find some help to do it? We’ll do this in two steps. First, we will think through, what it is we will try to do. So take a few minutes to fill in questions 1 through 4. [Leaders will see that the worksheets have about 4 or 5 blank lines between the questions.]
Finding a mission for me to make our church life better or to make the outreach of our church better:
1. What do I believe God wants done at our church to make life there better / or to make the outreach of our church to our community better? [Try beginning with: “I believe God is . . . .”]
2. What in our church life / or in our outreach to our community is not as faithful or loving or helpful or just as it could be?
3. What change is needed to make our church life / or our outreach to our community more faithful or loving or helpful or just than it is?
4. Considering my interests, gifts, limitations, and values, what will I do to make our church life / or our outreach to our community more faithful or loving or helpful or just than it is? [Limit yourself to just one action of mission.]
SOME HELP IN FINDING SOME HELPERS
Finding a teammate – maybe, even, a team – to help.
We do not have to be the lone ranger. It’s okay to ask for help. But, then that is not so easy either. Well, we are going to make it easier. First, look at the easy steps. Then, we’ll share some stories. Then, work it out for ourselves. Here are the simple – and easy – steps:
1. Think of people who might be both able and willing to help. For outreach, be free to think of people outside the church who value love and justice, too.
2. Word what you are trying to do in a way that might appeal to them.
Here are three true stories of people asking for help. As you listen to each, listen for how each answered these two questions for him/herself:
Jim finds a team mate:
Jim was working nights and caring for the kids in the daytime while his wife worked as a teacher. He found he was getting irritable at home because of never getting a break. He shared this with Mary and wondered if playing golf would give him the break he needed. [The choice of golf may sound very conventional but, for Jim, it was a breakthrough to ask for something for himself.] She agreed to plan 4-5 hours twice a month for him to play and sealed the promise with the gift of a new set of clubs.
Did you hear Jim do #1? #2?
Susan finds a team mate:
Susan represented her ward on the San Bernardino city council. She wanted to revive the rundown 64-acre park in her ward by starting a farmers’ market there. She turned to a man she had met as he coped with an illegal operation of some kind in his neighborhood. He had so impressed her, she made him her park commissioner. She resolved to try the idea with him. She asked, “Can you imagine what the park might become again?” Then she shared her vision of this 64-acre park in the center of the city that might one day hold a senior center and a swimming pool and a “Y” and tennis courts and a sports stadium. It would build community as a place where folks could just stroll and “people watch.” He agreed.
Did you hear Susan do #1? #2?
Amy finds some help – an unusual, but true, story:
Amy’s teen son had fallen in with the wrong crowd. His grades were dropping and Amy knew the crowd used drugs. She knew her son liked to help people – like helping with church dinners – and to make new friends. If only she knew of some other mother with the same problem and a son who also liked to help people and who made friends easily. Amy told a church friend her problem. Her friend said, “My neighbor, Endice, is in the same situation. Let me get the two of you together.” Amy gasped saying, “I never heard that name before until two nights ago. I had a dream that ended with someone telling me to help Endice!”
Did you hear Amy do #1? #2?
So, now fill out your answers to #5 and #6.
5. I will need – or could use – some help to make this change. Among the people I know, who might be both able and willing to help me make this change?
6. How will I describe what I am trying to do so that it will appeal to the person or people I would like to help me in making this change? [Answer with words you might actually use with a possible teammate / team: “ . . . .”]
Reform the same trios; each shares their two answers with the others listening for and commenting on the clarity of what help is needed and the appeal of how it is worded to the potential helper.
Now let’s practice what we have come up with [see Basic Tools 10 from “Practice in Team Building” on].
* * *
CLOSING
Our theme was:
Come . . .
Wake the Sleeping Giant within YOU.
Discover your Missions and God’s Gifts to do them.
The sleeping giant is God at work in you and through you already. You are God’s missionary already and, probably, did not know it.
Have a sense of worth and of power you might not have had before!
See how God has showered you with gifts for your daily missions!
Hear God’s call to a specific way for you to make life better at church or to improve your church’s outreach to your community.
See some helpers you never thought of before!
Fully rely on God. God has the power you need to make things happen. And God is right in there working with you to make it happen.
Peace and power to you from God almighty;
the Lord Jesus is breathing his power, the Holy Spirit, into you;
do and talk the wondrous works of God!
[Rev. A. Wayne Schwab; Director of Member Mission Network, Inc., President of Member Mission Press, Member of the Spiritual Formation Committee for the United Church of Hinesburg, VT, Author, and Speaker; John 20:21-22.]