Mosaic Mennonites

Missional - Intercultural - Formational

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Disc Golf and Comforters

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Doylestown (PA) Mennonite Church (DMC) started an experiment some years ago by looking “out there.” We assembled a team to explore, ask questions, and identify God’s work that DMC could support. The team began to see fertile soil within us, that God was doing work here within our own souls. We began to see that being missional was our own calling and not something to be hired out.

A major shift happened for me in how I viewed my faith journey. I realized that my faith is to be an integral piece that is a common thread in all the boxes of my life: home, work, church, and play. Jesus is present in all my boxes, encouraging, convicting, and transforming. I began to look for ways to bring these boxes together.

I began inviting people from my different boxes to gather for coffee, football games on TV, and meals. Risk & vulnerability are present when you have your work friends and neighbors meet your church friends. Risk & vulnerability are present when you begin to share your thoughts, dreams, failures, and struggles. I John 1:5-10 invites us to walk in the light, to live an authentic life, to experience forgiveness, and to have fellowship with one another.

Two examples of fellowship that intentionally cross the boundaries of our boxes at DMC are disc golf and knotting comforters.

Lois and Freida Myers have for some time gathered folks from various boxes in their lives to create some interesting mixes of people to knot comforters. We know that when you put people together, fellowship and connection will develop.

Steve Landes plays disc golf any chance he gets and turned it into a missional activity. 

My own story with disc golf began by doing something that I enjoy and inviting others to join me. The fun begins by expanding the group to include random strangers, friends from church and work, and friends of friends. I am a self-proclaimed disc golf evangelist, trying to convert those who don’t play to become those who do play. The Missional Experiment that DMC took on challenged me to invite anyone who would listen to join me in playing disc golf.

Some members of “The Chain Gang” at a recent disc golf outing. 

I created by own vision of this mission in my life. “Build community among a diverse group of people, to create space for trusting relationships to grow and where ministry to one another happens.” My vision became a “fresh expression.”

Fresh Expression is what happens when we move from a missional outlook to a more intentional gathering of listening, loving, and caring. A Fresh Expression is where we experience God and have connection or fellowship with one another: a church, but not one that looks like the traditional church. Fresh Expressions come about by following a passion, building trusting relationships, sharing ourselves authentically, and sharing our faith journey.

Fresh Expression is a movement; it is a thing. It is in dog parks, restaurants, Tattoo parlors, yoga studios, disc golf courses, and living rooms. Fresh Expressions are birthed out of the traditional church, are supported and encouraged by the traditional church, and not surprisingly, are revitalizing the traditional church. Fresh Expressions become a new distinct entity and are not intended to be a new church growth scheme building the church’s roster. The Fresh Expression is church.

Stretched Out

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Every other month I join the Mosaic Women’s Gathering to talk about our annual gathering, share stories, and empower each other. At our last meeting, as we were brainstorming ideas for this year’s gathering, Marta Castillo shared from Isaiah 54, about enlarging our tent, or dreaming big.

2 “Enlarge the place of your tent, 
    and let the curtains of your habitations be stretched out; 
do not hold back; lengthen your cords 
    and strengthen your stakes. 
3 For you will spread abroad to the right and to the left, 
    and your offspring will possess the nations 
    and will people the desolate cities. 

Isaiah 54:2-3, ESV

After the meeting, I found myself reflecting upon this passage for the rest of the week. As little children, we were often told to dream big. Every Sunday at Philadelphia (PA) Praise Center, the benediction includes, “May God enlarge your territory to the left and to the right…” in Indonesian.

However, Isaiah 54 reminded me that before we can enlarge our tent, we first must let ourselves be stretched out. And as we all know, being stretched out is uncomfortable.

We’re still in the middle of a global pandemic. Throughout this time, I’m sure that all of us had to pivot and adapt to the current situation. Personally speaking, I have felt stretched thin because I feel trapped in a season of waiting yet having too little time to do everything. I can feel overwhelmed, like God is stretching me too hard.

Close-Up Shot of a Person Holding a Pink Slime

However, God has always found a way to gently remind me whenever I feel like I’m at the lowest point in my life. I find strength by being reminded of this passage, that was addressed to the desolate as an eternal covenant of peace.

I am taking away three things from the Isaiah passage: 

1. Do not hold back 

When God is stretching me, I must constantly tell myself to not speed up or put a speed bump on God’s process. I should try to enjoy the uncomfortable. I need to enjoy the stretch!

2. Lengthen your cords 

Sometimes when I feel I don’t have enough to give, I keep telling myself that it’s okay to say no. It’s also okay to ask for help. A tent cord is used to secure a tent to the ground. Our limitations are what ground us and keep us human. In the areas where I feel like I lack, I find peace in knowing that God will be able to fill the empty spaces.

Photo Of People Reaching Each Other's Hands

3. Strengthen your stakes 

A house without a strong foundation won’t last long in the middle of a storm. Sometimes I get so wrapped up in doing things that I forget to recenter myself in God. I can find myself lost. I need to humbly be reminded of how little control I have, and how much I need God to help me through.

Black Ceiling Wall

As I reflected on times when I felt stretched to my limit, I found comfort when I felt God’s helping hands during those times. In my little, God is big. In my weak, God is strong.  

May you find strength and peace in this closing verse, as it did to me: 

“For the mountains may depart 
and the hills be removed, 
but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, 
    and my covenant of peace shall not be removed,” 
    says the Lord, who has compassion on you. 

Isaiah 54:10, ESV

Preparing for MC USA’s Special Delegate Session

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On May 27-30, 2022, Mennonite Church USA (MCUSA) will hold a Special Session of the Delegate Assembly in Kansas City, MO. Each Mosaic congregation is eligible to send delegates to this important meeting in the life of our community and witness together.   

Mennonite Church USA is providing background resources and hosting a series of educational webinars (see below) to prepare delegates and their conferences / congregations for the Special Session of the Delegate Assembly in May.

Mosaic Conference will also be offering preparation work to help resources delegates and pastors in the months ahead.  The resources are intended to help prepare delegates for the upcoming discernment and voting that is planned for this special session.   

Upcoming January webinars:

Monday, Jan. 24, 2022 07:00 PM (EST): The development of resolutions, especially church statements, must seek to follow our ecclesiology. We believe the church exists at the congregational, area conference and national conference levels. While each person is responsible for developing and maintaining a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, our understandings of the revelation of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit are refined and tested by the community of believers on the three levels of our church. This seminar will explore the current role resolutions play in MC USA and hope we might shape the resolution process in the future. 

Monday, Jan. 31, 2022 07:00 PM (EST): Join MC USA’s Iris de Leon Hartshorn (facilitator) and panelists Jamie Pitts of AMBS, Pastor Isaac Villegas of Chapel Hill (North Carolina) Mennonite Fellowship and Shana Peachey Boshart of Mennonite Education Agency for an engaging discussion on biblical discernment. In this one-hour webinar, the panel will address three key topics:

  • Biblical and historical understanding of discernment
  • Congregational experiences with discernment
  • Best practices for discernment 

All webinars will be recorded and available on the MC USA delegate resource page. Please visit the delegate resource page for the full schedule and additional information.

God’s Snow Day

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I love snow. I especially enjoy watching it come down and the accompanying peaceful quiet.

As a child going to bed while it was snowing, I hoped that the accumulation would lead to the greatest possible snow event – a snow day! A snow day represented many things for me as a child: the joy of missing school, making snow forts, sledding, warm cookies, and in general, a quiet, peaceful day at home. It was a chance to take a break from the usual schedule of life and just relax.

In today’s world, snow days are certainly not like they used to be. For kids, they still include the joy of staying at home from school, sledding, and playing in the snow. But now, the fun only happens after they have finished their on-line assignments through virtual school. The requirements to complete a certain number of official school days each year trumps having official snow days.

Members of Mike Clemmer’s family enjoy the fun of sledding on a recent snow day. Photo by Paul Jacobs.

As an adult, I also find the joy of a snow day elusive. In fact, for me, there seems to be no such thing as a day “off” because of the snow. Instead, when it snows, I get up an hour earlier so that I can clear the driveway in order to slide my way into the office or perhaps to the store for milk – because life must go on.

As I begin to write this article, there is a fresh six inches of snow on the ground. I have decided that I am taking a snow day. I am determined to not leave the house for anything. Today, life can go on without me for a change.

Photo by Jonathan Charles.

I believe God intended for us all to have snow days. Perhaps not in the usual way we picture them in our minds – with snow and warm cookies – but with the same benefits for our mind and spirit. We would profit from a day of having a quiet retreat from our normal schedules or simply a chance to experience joy and fun in the ordinary. Most importantly, we would all benefit from the possibility of directing our thoughts and actions towards God.

God has already provided for us a snow day each week. It is called, Sabbath. It is a day where we can experience these very things. But just like snow days, we have often neglected our Sabbath days. Instead we use them to continue our daily grind, living out the idea that we need to keep life going, or things will fly apart without us. But without Sabbath, we are the ones who fly apart.

We easily forget that life is not about us and our desires, but rather it is about embracing, honoring, and worshipping God. Life is about allowing the reins of our lives to be in God’s hands. “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8, ASV) is both a command from God and a reminder to regularly honor our Creator and Sustainer of life by disengaging from the regular life that we so diligently follow. In doing that, we will find rest for our souls and the joy of life will be restored.

The great thing about snow days and Sabbath days is that at the end of the day, both are of greater profit and worth than any work that could have been done in their place. That’s because God’s work has no equal.

I am hoping for a lot of God’s snow days in 2022, for all of us. I can almost smell the warm cookies already!

Reborn and Learning to Dance in the Rain

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Translated into English by Andrés Castillo

Editor’s Note: This is the conclusion to Pastor Dania Hernández’s Call to Ministry story (Part one and Part two are available). Hernández is Pastor of Peña de Horeb, a Mosaic congregation in Philadelphia, PA.  

In the book, The Artisan Soul, Erwin McManus wrote, “Beyond despair, there must always be hope, beyond betrayal, there must always be a story of forgiveness; beyond failure there must always be a story of resistance. If the story of Jesus ended on the cross it could be a story worth telling, but that story could never give life. Only the resurrection can generate life again.”

Forgiveness from any perspective is beneficial. Forgiveness made it possible for Pastor Dania Hernández to be reborn. Dania did not want to spend her life upset and depressed. She longed to meet herself again. To live. To dream. To be restored. Not to be afraid to love and be loved.

Her story appeared to be a failure, a social disqualification. Contrary to what she perhaps thought, this story became the material from which God worked. There was no tear that God did not wipe away, no prayer that God did not hear, no fear from which God did not deliver her. Only when Dania learned to dance in the rain, only when she understood that the one who decides to forgive is the one who makes the greatest act of self-respect, the chains that had tied her no longer controlled her, and she was finally free.

She found rest that goes beyond all human reasoning, offered by the Holy Spirit who, with a tender and gentle whisper, sang in her ear, “Do not be afraid, I am here with you, do not lose heart. No situation, however hard it may be, will last forever. You can count on me, my love for you is forever.”

I Fell in Love and Got Married Again

Pastor Dania concludes her story with these words:

“I never thought I could be restored, much less love again. I thought that my life ended in the long and painful process of divorce. I was left with nothing, in financial ruin. I longed to love again, wished to study in a Bible seminary, but saw no opportunity.

When everything seemed lost, I envisioned hope in Jesus. His love allowed me to dance in the rain. I understood so many things. God restored me. I recovered financially. I fell in love again and got married again. I approached the heart of God like never before and started studying at the Anabaptist Bible Institute (IBA) where I thank Marco Güete and Violeta Ajquejay Suastegui for all the support they gave me.”

Perseverance Through Hard Times

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We will all go through hard times; the Bible says as much. But the great thing about God is that although we will go through hard times, God also says that He will be with us no matter how hard it gets.

One of my favorite Bible verses is Proverbs 3:5, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.” (NKJV) This verse reminds me that, at the end of the day, God knows I won’t understand everything I go through and why I go through it, but it’s ok because I was never meant to know. This verse leads into Proverbs 3:6, “In all your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your path.” (NKJV) In these two short verses we can see that not only are we not meant to understand everything, but if we put everything we are going through in God’s hands, He will direct our path.

I saw these verses put into practice in my life in early 2017, when my father, Pastor Tomas, was diagnosed with cancer. In the beginning stages of doctor visits, a lot of things were very uncertain, from what treatment options were available to when and how many appointments my father should have. Through it all, I saw how my father maintained his faith, believing that God would provide a solution, no matter how difficult or uncertain the situation seemed.

The view from Michelle’s father’s hospital room on the 10th floor of the Advent Health Hospital, cancer building. Photo by Michelle Ramirez.

Before deciding on any treatment, my father would make sure to pray and put God first. On those long hospital nights, when it was uncertain when he would come back home, he and my mother, who was in the room with him, would always put on worship music to drown out the beeping monitors. Even after all his hair fell off from the chemotherapy, he would still have a smile of his face and thank God for another day.

Through the ups and downs of cancer, my father always put God first, just as Proverbs 3:5-6 says. This reminded me that although hard times are going to happen, it is guaranteed that our God will help us every step of the way. All we have to do is put God first and simply have faith and trust He will see us through. Although our individual struggles can seem difficult and never ending, God’s promise to us is that we will never be alone.

Pastor Tomas Ramirez (left) and his daughter, Michelle Ramirez. Photo provided by Michelle Ramirez.

Imagine … Conflict as a Gift

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The Space Between Us: Conversations about Transforming Conflict by Betty Pries (Herald Press, 2021)

Image… a church board, a work team, or a congregation engaged in difficult conversations, who disagrees yet does it with respect and intentional listening, and calls conflict “a gift.” Imagine … where conflict is a gift, there is an opportunity to understand ourselves better, to discover empathy for others, to build deeper and more meaningful relationships. Imagine … conflict that leads us toward developing healthier relationships and communities.

Differences exist. Don’t we know it! As a people of peace. with curiosity and acknowledgment of our differences, we hope to build respectful relationships. Of course, it is not easy. Difficult topics, especially those that involve our beliefs, practices, accountability, and policies, are not easy to maneuver. It is challenging to believe that I am one with those whom I continue to fundamentally disagree.

In his book, Daily Meditations, Richard Rohr writes,

“There are three things in life of which we can be assured: The first is that we are beloved. Regardless of what we have done in our lives or what has been done to us, this truth remains: We are beloved. We are worthy. Second, suffering will come. Life does what life does. In one fashion or another suffering will be thrust on us. This includes the suffering of conflict. And finally, third, when we are in our time of suffering a hand will reach toward us to pull us back to life. That hand may be a community, a friend, a stranger in line at the grocery store…”

I believe a book, such as The Space Between Us, can also be a hand that will pull us back to life.

In The Space Between Us: Conversations about Transforming Conflict, author Betty Pries, a mediator and facilitator, guides readers toward seeing conflict as an opportunity for personal growth, deeper self-knowledge, and a way to build resilience. Rooted in the conviction that conflict can strengthen our relationships and deepen our self-knowledge, Pries offers practical skills rooted in Christian practices of mindfulness, connecting with our most authentic selves and deep listening, to uncover new possibilities for engaging conflict and casts a vision for a more joy-filled future.

As we transform conflict, the space between us is transformed just as the space between us is healed.

Imagine … a book that gently guides, leads with helpful examples, and gives practical suggestions. A book to read, keep on your shelf, share with your church board, and reread. A free online study guide by Karen Cornies is also available through Herald Press and might allow for your entire congregation to read the book together. I personally give the book a 5-star recommendation.

Remembering Martin Luther King Jr and His Legacy of Peace

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MLK Day is Monday, January 17, 2022, and we offer these quotes of Martin Luther King Jr. as a reminder of the timeless wisdom he offered. He stood for truth, justice, compassion, and courage. May you be inspired to continue the work of peace and justice as you reflect on these quotes.

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

“People fail to get along because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don’t know each other; they don’t know each other because they have not communicated with each other.”

“A right delayed is a right denied.”

“I have decided to stick with love … Hate is too great a burden to bear.”

“Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”

“The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.”

“There comes a time when silence is betrayal.”

“We must learn that passively to accept an unjust system is to cooperate with that system, and thereby to become a participant in its evil.”

“Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy to a friend.” 

Looking for a hands-on way to honor MLK’s legacy on January 17?

Join Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) and others in Mosaic Conference and beyond at The City School Poplar Campus (910 N. 6th Street, Philadelphia) or via zoom from 10am-12pm for the 5th Annual Mass Incarceration Service Day. To learn more or to register, watch the video or visit the website.