2010 Colloquium, San Diego
Wednesday, Feb. 3, 8:30-8:45 AM
Grace Alone
I am grateful for being a member of this Colloquium. Two years ago after I attended my very first Colloquium in Florida, I returned to San Francisco and shared this model of collegial sharing and self-care with a group of pastors of Chinese churches in the Bay Area. These pastors from largely mainline denominations are descendants of an organization that has been together in the past under the auspices of the NCCC over 50 years ago. But as succeeding generations have come and gone, our connectedness has waned and we became increasingly distant from one another.
We have had two Bay Area Chinese Pastors Retreats since my first Colloquium. These are one-overnight events at a Catholic retreat site. Last November’s retreat was planned by an UCC pastor whose church is 2 blocks away from FCBC, an Independent Baptist pastor who is 4 blocks away, and me. Our criteria for participation are that pastors are still actively serving in ministry, serving a mainline or historic church, and an openness to actively participate. Sounds familiar?
Our agenda last November, like ours here was shaped by what the pastors wanted to share or talk about.
The Nazarene pastor shared that he and his wife are reaching troubled youth by being foster parents.
The Berkeley UCC pastor, a former Navy chaplain quizzed us about adequate compensation and wondered how he can survive with his meager salary.
The Cumberland Presbyterian pastor searched for models of leading one church on two campuses with the fear of church divisions.
The SF UCC pastor wondered about the future of his pastorate after the church completes their discernment process.
The Methodist pastor was anxious about adding a new English-speaking pastor to his pastoral team to hold on to their few English-speaking young adults.
The Oakland Presbyterian pastor was troubled about reaching young adults and families to his inner city church.
The Episcopal rector shared the struggles of maintaining appropriate boundaries between clergy and laity.
I shared the hope of partnering with the Chinatown YMCA that is just across the street from our church. The idea is to help renovate their gymnasium so that we would have more space to use on Sunday mornings. We would be one church using two and possibly three buildings in Chinatown. For the past 18 months, I have been running up against the challenges from fiscal conservatives in our church, legalese from our attorneys, and whether or not the congregation would trust my leadership on this matter as they have trusted in me for the past 10 years.
Our congregation will vote this Sunday at our Annual Meeting to adopt this partnership. We would contribute $250,000.00 that will entitle us to use the gym 4 hours on Sunday mornings for the next 30 years. Before Christmas, our negotiating team began to have cold feet. They heard that I was thinking about retirement. To reassure our church that this is a worthy project to support, I have pledged to continue serving as Senior Pastor for at least the next 5 years. I told them that I wasn’t going anywhere. I then went home that afternoon to tell Joy this. Besides, after hearing the MMBB report, I can’t afford to retire yet. My prayer is for our church to believe that our historic ministry of 130 years in Chinatown is still worthwhile for the next 30 years.
There’s a Jewish story about a woman who left her village, weary of her life, longing for a place where she could escape all the struggles of this earth. She set out in search of a magical city—the heavenly city of her dreams.
She walked all day and by dusk found herself in a forest, where she decided to spend the night. Eating the crust of bread she had brought, she said her prayers, and just before going to sleep, placed her shoes in the direction she would continue the next morning.
Little did she imagine that while she slept, a practical joker came along and turned her shoes around, pointing them back in the direction from which she had come. The next morning, she got up, gave thanks to the God of the universe, and started on her way again in the direction that the shoes were pointed.
For a second time, she walked all day, and toward the evening finally saw the magical city in the distance. It wasn’t as large as she had expected. As she got closer, it looked curiously familiar. But she pressed on and found a street much like her own; she knocked on the familiar door, was greeted by some rather familiar looking people she found there. In the magical city of her dreams she lived happily ever after.
How often have we stopped seeing or expect to see God’s presence in our daily surroundings? Has our church become so familiar with just doing ministry within the confines of its four walls that we can’t see how God may be calling us to cross the street? We might not be living happily ever after, but just maybe, our search for that “magical city” is not far away but is just across the street.
I ask for your prayers!
Getting back to the pastors of mainline Chinese churches, we discovered that we were all very interested in how to successfully and faithfully lead our congregations that are composed of both English-speaking and Chinese-speaking people and mainly situated in Chinatowns. The problem of power and control seems to affect us all. Our conversations usually went on long after midnight.
What has happened to the dozen of us who serve churches in the Bay Area is that we are seeing each other as truly colleagues instead of rivals, team members instead of competitors, learners instead of a need to protect our fragile egos, friends in similar but different settings in ministry instead of isolated and frustrated servants. We extended hospitality to each other. Being singled out as “the pastor” when we so badly want to be a part of the group is hard enough. But when we may have valuable and supportive colleagues available for us to develop trusting and encouraging relationships and not taking the initiative to do so would be outright tragic.
After the resurrection, the disciples were afraid, confused and scattered. They hid behind locked doors. Not knowing what to do next, they picked up their old lives that they left behind and decided to go fishing. They probably felt like failures after denying Jesus. Out of grace, Jesus taught them how to fish for men, extended hospitality to them by starting a campfire to cook up their fish. Jesus taught them how to feed the hungry thousands. They worked together to haul up the fish. Jesus forgave Peter and sent him out to feed his sheep. Out grace alone, the disciples started to believe in themselves to become ministers, missionaries and pastors. They became colleagues because of God’s grace.
I am indebted to this Colloquium and to the Bay Area Chinese Pastors group for making my pastoral ministry possible, sustainable, and collegial.
In the epistle lesson for this Sunday, the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:9-10 said,
For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God, but by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them—though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.
When the Chinese pastors worshiped together, the SF UCC pastor, gifted in music, led us in singing Grace Alone. It has now become our theme song in our collegial life together. I know that by the grace of God I am who I am today and I pray that God’s grace toward me will not be in vain.
I am grateful for our Colloquium because you have blessed the Bay Area pastors of Chinese churches and me with a model to be truly collegial. Our third retreat is planned for this November. We are helping each other see that in the daily surroundings of our ministries, whether it’s in our church building and according to God’s plan–across the street, the presence of God is there.
What started as my first Colloquium in Sand Key, Florida, 2 years ago has caused a chain reaction of blessings, a blessing that as pastors in the Bay Area and as pastors in this 2010 Colloquium that,
Every promise we can make, every prayer and step of faith;
Every difference we will make is only by his grace.
Every mountain we will climb, every ray of hope we shine;
Every blessing left behind is only by his grace.
Grace alone which God supplies; strength unknown he will provide.
Christ in us, our cornerstone, we will go forth in grace alone.
Song: Grace Alone (twice)
Closing Prayer
Gracious God, we thank you for the rest and re-creation that we are receiving from one another as your faithful and grateful servants. Guide our steps and lead us to trust that in everything that we do in the name of Jesus Christ, we are confident that it’s your grace alone that provides us with strength, encouragement, and hope to go forth. Help us Lord to see your presence in our daily surroundings. We pray in the name of Christ, our Lord. Amen.