I was raised better than this, I know. Not only should conversations about politics and religion be avoided at all costs, but one should NEVER consider talking about them at the same time. So I am sorry. But I cannot help it. For whatever reason, this story has just gotten to me and I felt compelled to do a little reflecting on it.

I am not going to take the time to rehash the details of the story here. You can read about it by going to http://bit.ly/ban4ew. I will summarize by saying that Ms. Sherrod was forced to resign from a position with the US Department of Agriculture after a blogger chose to post a piece of a video from a speech Sherrod made in March. The section of video, taken out of context, led officials to consider Ms. Sherrod’s statements not in keeping with the “zero tolerance” policy on racial discrimination. Once the story was picked up by the wire services, the assumption that a federally appointed person was guilty of discrimination against a Caucasian farmer became “fact.”

Somewhere in all of this, I kept feeling a strong voice of the prophet warning us about our actions and assumptions. The prophet speaks to the people of God, and so, this seems to me to be a warning to the church. “Woe to those who drag guilt along by the reins of duplicity…” (Isaiah 5:18a) So, for what it’s worth, here are five things I have learned from this incident:

1. The presumption of wrongdoing and ill-intent can be devastating to real people leading real lives (and in the case of the church, real lives of faithfulness).

It appears that Ms. Sherrod pleaded for those asking for her to resign to listen to the entire speech in order to understand the context of her comments. Once the news broke about the edited video, even the NAACP weighed in on the side of chastising Ms. Sherrod. In the end, while she is waiting for a new position, her life has been forever changed by these events.  And when things like this happen in the local church or presbytery, to those without the option of bringing this to a public debate, the ability to respond to inaccurate or incomplete information is severely curtailed. People are labeled, shunned, “scapegoated,” and judged. Meanwhile, those who observe Christians lambasting one another continue to feel that a major problem with the church is its hypocrisy.

2. Policies and practices cannot be administered outside of relationship without the potential for great harm.

I doubt that anyone, including Ms. Sherrod, would argue that a zero tolerance policy on racial discrimination is a good thing. However, when coupled with an assumption of guilt, it became nothing more than a bludgeoning tool. I can’t get into a whole debate here about policies and practices in the church, but I do think this incident reminds us that real people are affected by the indiscriminate application of policy. The church is not a nameless, faceless entity. It is no more and no less than real people.

3. Vitriolic and divisive language and action hurts real people, not just groups or agencies.

It appears as if the intent of the person who posted the video had nothing to do with Shirley Sherrod. He was not trying to get her fired. He was trying to point out something about racism within the NAACP as a response to NAACP comments about racism amongst Tea Party members. How many more times must we be told that no group is a monolith before we believe it? The more we divide ourselves, by ideology, race, or musical preference, the more we seem to feel it is our right to denigrate those outside of the group with which we affiliate. I was told long ago, whenever you draw a line in the sand, you can bet that Jesus is on the other side of it. I guess I am just foolish enough to still believe that we can have unity and decency coexist.

4. Listening can bring healing.

Ms. Sherrod’s boss apologized. President Obama called her, as well. (I don’t think he apologized, but he did talk with her for seven minutes.) And the farmers referred to in the video clip have come forward in strong support of Ms. Sherrod and in the interest of the whole truth being revealed. The fact that folks have taken the time to speak is important. However, the fact that people listened to Ms. Sherrod seems to have brought her a measure of peace. I don’t know how else to listen to one another than to stay in relationship with one another. We don’t need to be persuaded to change our perspectives all the time, but we honor one another simply by listening more often than we speak. And who knows, sometimes we may just have our hardened hearts turned.

5. Grace abounds.

In all of this, there seems to be very little bitterness on the part of Ms. Sherrod. I know she is considering a lawsuit against the blogger. I kind of hope this has taught him a lesson without the legal system getting involved. More than that, it is hard to be unaffected by the story or to have our own assumptions go unchallenged. What would happen if we began to assign to one another pure motives? What if we assumed the best of one another? How much more of all that God intends might we experience if we opened ourselves to grace?

I guess that having recently returned from the 219^th General Assembly, I am particularly sensitive to the ways in which we can hurt one another, dismiss one another, and make assumptions about one another. And somewhere in the midst of it all, the prophet also cries, “Hope! Believe! God is doing a new thing!” May God continue to do a new thing in the Presbytery of Geneva, the PC(USA), and your life.

Like me, I bet that you can hardly contain your excitement that we are almost ready to enter the church season of Lent.  Let’s face it – nothing says “good times” like Lent.  Now, if you are going to be in New Orleans for Mardi Gras, (especially this one – congratulations to the Saints!), at least the proximity to Lent holds some appeal.  But Lent itself?  Really?

We have our own unique ways of marking this time, of course.  Some of them are quite meaningful.  I remember, as a parish pastor, my attempts to encourage people to take on a spiritual discipline rather than “giving up” chocolate, for instance.  (Yes, clearly a personal agenda in that one.) We did some wonderful scripture studies.  One year we did a whole series on death and dying, including planning our funerals, during Lent.  (They were right there with me until the day we had to put our wishes for our funeral on paper…)  We sang some hymns that we didn’t otherwise sing and tried to avoid saying “Alleluia” during worship (which chaffed, let me tell you).  Still, I am not sure what people gained from these Lenten opportunities.

I certainly can appreciate the role of both penance and discipline in the life of disciples.  And I suppose that these do offer some people real opportunities for spiritual growth in the process. I would encourage you to discover a purpose for Lent. (I know…Purpose Driven Life comes to mind…I guess that works for some people.) However, I really would embrace a reflection on another understanding of Lent.

Lent was a time (once upon a time…all good stories start with “once upon a time”…) when those who were going to join the church, those who would be baptized into the faith, were prepared for this momentous moment.  It was a time of study and reflection.  It was a time of learning and growing. And it was all in preparation to become part of the covenant community of Christ, the church. It was a BHD (big, hairy deal) to become part of the church!  People were intentionally prepared for baptism, discipleship, and membership.  Wow.  What a concept.

But this is not a call to look at how we prepare people for membership (although that is a good idea). Rather, I would like us to utilize Lent to look at that for which we would be preparing people. In other words, what would make someone want to be a part of us, our church, our denomination? How are we prepared to be a place where people would want to be involved because there is something happening there? Is there a God thing here?  If not, why would anyone want to be a part of it?  We can keep baptizing people we know won’t grow up in the church, and making people members that we then drive out the back door because we ask them to serve on standing committees that waste their time, or we can prepare ourselves to by a Spirit-filled place where people encounter God, are equipped for ministry, and are sent into the world to use their God-given gifts to do the work of Christ in the world.

The General Council has been working with the image of building a plane while we are flying it as we transform the presbytery into a place people want to participate. (This comes from a pretty funny EDS commercial you can check out here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2zqTYgcpfg) Well, now we have a plane. Where are we going with it?  I used to believe in the Lewis Carroll saying, “If you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.” (And for those of you who hear me in the future in some presentation use this phrase, well, be compassionate.) Now I think, if you don’t know where you are going, God will probably still lead you where you need to be.  We are ready to take this plane someplace, and we think it is where God is leading. We hope that we have made a place ready that people will want to be a part of, or, that we can help congregations become places like that.

Check out the news section of our homepage for a link to our unique presbytery meeting on March 6, 2010. We hope you will come, and bring lots of people with you. We are excited to land this plane in Lyons and see where we are next called to fly. We hope that we will provide you with some more tools…for the journey.

In a recent article in The Presbyterian Outlook (Vol. 191 No. 5, October 19, 2009), the Rev. Clark Cowden, executive presbyter of The Presbytery of San Diego, voiced a fundamental obstacle to transformation of any kind. Namely, as he rightly points out, “we already have the church we want.” The church, like any other organization, has designed itself to achieve its current results. Therefore, if we really wanted things to be different, we would actually have to do different things. Things that make you go, “Hmmmm….”

We are a presbytery being transformed. We are not, in fact, happy with the results we have been getting out of our old models of operating. We are not happy with fewer members, dying churches, elders without a sense of being spiritual leaders of their congregations, or ministers of word and sacrament acting as Lone Rangers. So, we transform. We do things differently. And people don’t like it.

It’s human nature. We like things to be the same, especially in the church. We want the church to be a place we can count on, where things will last from one generation to the next, and where we find some measure of solace and peace in the turmoil of a society changing faster than we can handle. We like church to be the place we always have known. And certainly, we imagine, other people should come and appreciate that, too.

This presbytery transformation has been hard. It has been confusing. It has taken a lot of energy. We have felt lost and frustrated. We have grumbled in the desert and built some golden calves and been humbled. We have also felt grace and joy, hope and delight. We have celebrated and been surprised, played and laughed. We have sensed the movement of the Spirit and followed where God has led us. And we are not done. We continue on this journey, knowing that transformation is the journey and not a destination.

We now invite our congregations and members and friends and tribe members to wonder and wander together into the next part of this journey. You already have the church you want. What if you could have the church you need or the church you long for or the church you hope and dream for? We have some clues about how to do that. It is not a program, or a workshop, or even a quick fix. It takes energy and passion and grace and faithfulness. After all, we are changing how we do things in order to achieve different results. We will be rolling out some new opportunities for those who decide to take that leap. We hope you will find this gives you hope, and some bread for the journey.