The Grace of Conversations
“And God said…”
“And God has given us the ministry of reconciliation.”
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In the unrestricted archives of my memory, I see a drawing of a family gathered around a dinner table. Everyone is sketched as talking away. Upon closer inspection, you see the people are drawn without ears.
Most of us are better at ‘transmit’ than ‘receive’. Such is not limited to family life but most everywhere humans gather. Perhaps, our minds go to media coverage of congressional meetings. Of late, in the United Methodist Church, as we deal with the tender topic of sexual orientation, great effort is required to hear one another.
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Somewhere hiding on my vaguely organized bookshelves is a copy of Reuel Howe’s little classic THE MIRACLE OF DIALOG. “Only through dialog can we be reconciled with one another.”
Simple, but not simplistic: when people talk with and listen to one another, there is a better chance to live and work together with our mix of agreement and disagreement about things. The hope is to move beyond talking about and at people...to speaking and listening with one another.
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I’ve mentioned before my observation: people who may not know or perhaps like each other very much can get to know and like each other more once they discover they have love of dogs (probably cats, too) in common.
Call it dog diplomacy. I have playfully/seriously suggested that members of Congress bring their dogs to work with them. Perhaps, it would give them practice of talking with instead of just at or about each other. Might be worth a try for our UMC upcoming General Conference next year.
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Two stints as a District Superintendent. Both times my office was down the hall from the Bishop – Bob Fannin, first time; Debra Wallace-Padgett, second. Best I could tell, part of their jobs was seemingly endless conversations with people who streamed in, sometimes we DS’s. Bishop Fannin’s statement has stuck with me: “Whether you agree or not always be willing to have the conversation with people.”
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Whatever else the Bible, Scripture is, it is an ongoing conversation. Genesis 1 begins with the words/conversation of the great mystery God calling things into being. ‘And then God said…”
John begins with the Word of God becoming flesh having the great conversation with us in the life, death, and new life of Jesus.
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, you have heard in the past, now I say to you about such… From eye for eye vengeance to turning cheeks and going second miles. From hating to loving enemies… The God of Jesus keeps moving us forward.
Most of Jesus’ ministry is his ‘conversation’ about recognizing God’s love includes all sorts of people previously rejected by ‘religious’ people. Jesus ‘the Word of God’ helps us sort through the conversations of 750,000 words and 31,000 verses of scripture.
Paul’s letters are conversations about previously divided people – Jews and Gentiles, slaves and free, male and female – becoming one in Christ.
Faithful, intelligent Bible study seeks to discern what is timebound and timeless for present life application. In the manner of the unfolding conversation of the Bible, over the years, such conversation among people has moved us beyond acceptance of slavery and inferior status for people of color and females.
And now we have critical conversations about the status of committed love between people of the same gender and the matter of ordination of homosexual persons.
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Central for Christian faith, for United Methodists is the mystery of grace. Sometimes grace is described as the unmerited forgiving love of God.
A working definition for me is grace is the beyond our own doing love/help/strength God gets to us and through us without which we can do anything that much matters.
John Wesley spoke of MEANS OF GRACE. These means are actions/practices that become channels of that beyond our own doing love and help. Understandably, Wesley cited worship, prayer, scripture study as primary means God’s strengthening, guiding love is channeled to us.
A bit surprisingly, right up there with those ‘means’, Wesley also cited ‘Christian conferencing.’
Call it conferencing, dialog, or conversation, somehow when people faithfully seek to speak and listen with one another with kindness and respect, the miracle of grace happens. We discover without denying differences, we have far more in common to hold us together. Most of all: our common need to love and be loved.
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At Canterbury United Methodist Church where I am hanging out again for the second time – initially showed up there 1st Sunday February 2003 – there are some 20+ Discernment Dinners, each with 20 or so different persons, are going on between January and March. These will be conversations focused on listening and clarification.
Heroic effort has been given by the dozen or so people on our Discernment Team to insure this congregation has trustworthy information.
All this is a part of a well-done process to discern and decide what kind of church we are and will be. Doxology! A congregation can be a means of grace, a channel of God’s unconditional love for all.
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Best I can tell, most all the people signed up for these conversations pretty much like and respect each other. But it still might be a good idea for us to bring our dogs.