intercultural

Deep Run East joins MAMA Project in Honduras

April 22, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

Deep Run & MAMA Project — The dedication service at Iglesia Evangelica del Principe de Paz.

by Barb Rice, Deep Run East

Ken Burkholder, pastor of Deep Run East congregation (Perkasie, Pa.), joined the 27th MAMA Project Team that Deep Run East has sent to Honduras since 2001. Over the years, Pastor Ken had heard from teams reporting on their experiences and had met some of the MAMA Project partners on their visits to the US, but on March 15-22, he joined the team in Honduras.

On March 16, one day after arrival in San Pedro Sula, the team arrived at Iglesia Central Menonita (the largest Mennonite Church in the city) for an inspired and holy time of worship. Wow… talk about a worship team and praise music! Pastor Ken was invited to preach and his sermon followed worship, focusing on II Cor. 5: 17-21, “In Christ—New Creation.” In the context of violence and poverty in Honduras, the call to reconciliation and being ambassadors and coworkers with Christ was powerful to all who were listening.

After the worship service it was good to play a little “Mennonite game,” meeting Honduran young persons who had been part of the Mennonite Central Committee IVEP program and also discovering that the worship band leader had attended Eastern Mennonite University’s Peace Institute. What a blessing to fellowship with other believers around the world; Pastor Ken and another team member were visiting so long that the rest of the group left them behind!

Pastor Adalid Romero, president of the Honduran Mennonite Church, met with our team and explained how life in Honduras was lived in the midst of organized crime and corruption, with much illegal immigration to the US, Mexico, and Spain. He shared that “the situation here would be that much worse than it already is, if it wasn’t for the presence of the churches in Honduras!” The Honduran Mennonite Church works to teach peacemaking in schools where guns and knives show up routinely, introducing students to a different way of problem solving without violence.

That Sunday evening, the team headed to Iglesia Evangelica del Principe de Paz, a church in a poor community at the edge of the city. The church is located in the middle of drug traffic and gang tensions, but the community loves our teams and helps to ensure we are protected. Deep Run East and Swamp congregation (Quakertown, Pa.) have partnered with the pastor of this church, Juan Angel Ramirez, to work in this community. A new church has been built over the last two years and, as we arrived, everyone was waiting outside for the “big reveal.” The dedication service included ribbon cutting, with eight children dressed in rented wedding clothes holding the ribbons. Pastor Ken, as the honored guest, was given the scissors. The new building is an amazing testament of God’s desire for the church to be a beacon of hope, sitting up on the hill for all in the community to see.

That week we traveled to a remote community each day, setting up a clinic to give parasite medicine and vitamins and do medical consults. In addition, a work project was planned in each community. Our team organizer, Irma Dinora Molina, an involved member in the Honduran Mennonite Church, suggested working in some of the poor struggling Mennonite communities around San Pedro Sula. This plan was a perfect fit for a team with a Mennonite pastor. It was a highlight to see Ken connect, pray, and worship with the pastors in these communities. These are some of Ken’s comments after our trip:

The Church is the Hope of the World – In the midst of the poverty, suffering, and brokenness that we encountered in Honduras, we witnessed how the church is a beacon of light and hope. I greatly enjoyed interacting with the pastors. They love the Lord, they love their communities, they believe in the power of prayer, and some of them are literally risking their lives to be pastors!
Power of Prayer – The people of Honduras pray often and fervently! We prayed together before beginning our work for the day, we laid hands on and prayed for a vehicle that wasn’t running well, and we experienced answered prayers from our Deep Run East and Honduran friends in various ways throughout the week.
Spontaneous Worship/Prayer Experience – Words simply cannot capture the one experience I had of spontaneous worship and prayer among a group of Hondurans as we were finishing a painting job. I clearly witnessed the power of the Holy Spirit and I would describe this as a “modern-day Pentecost experience.”

If worship experiences like these seem intriguing, think about joining even more powerful worship services at Mennonite World Conference in Harrisburg, PA, July 2015. Our friends in Honduras are anxious to come too…please pray for the visa process.

A lesson from Rwanda

April 9, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

by Dennis Edwards, credentialed pastor serving in Minneapolis, MN

I recently spent several days in Rwanda as part of a teaching team for the Shepherd’s Leadership Conference, a weeklong conference for Rwandese pastors and other church leaders. There is much to share, especially having been there so close to the 20th anniversary of the genocide (April 6th). I hope to post several reflections on my time in Rwanda. This first is not about the genocide, but about my interactions with a pastor who attended the conference.

Pastor Vincent sought me out after one of the teaching sessions. He appeared to be young, maybe not yet 40 years old. He smiled broadly, eager to greet me. I listened as he reflected, in English, on the session entitled, “The Church and Social Justice,” where I had been the speaker. Pastor Vincent embraced the ideas of my message and wondered how he could help his many members who struggle just to survive. Pastor Vincent serves people who barely have enough food and whose daily lives are more difficult than most of us can imagine. I felt somewhat helpless at that moment. I thought about the things we often talk about in the USA regarding urban ministry, such as strategic partnerships where churches with more resources can share with those who have less.

Pastor Vincent said that his small church outside of Kigali does not have a “mother” congregation and he often feels isolated. Much of what he was saying reminded me of my first church-planting experience. Twenty-five years ago, I struggled to start a church in Brooklyn, NY. My wife and I burned out trying to meet the practical, emotional, and spiritual needs of a young congregation with limited resources. I developed some partnerships with suburban churches so that some money came in to help us, but I still had to work as a teacher to supplement my income and not be a burden to my congregation. My struggles in Brooklyn allowed me to relate—even if just a bit—to Pastor Vincent’s predicament, yet I knew his situation was much harder than mine was.

Sadly, much of my experience with churches in the USA reflects how spoiled many American Christians are. We fuss over things like musical styles, the color of walls and carpets, and whether we were duly entertained on some particular Sunday. Church has become—at least in many evangelical sectors—a contest. Church leaders struggle to be hipper, cooler, and more entertaining than other churches so they can find their niche in the marketplace formed by Christian consumers. At times I have become very cynical over such ways of doing church. Many American Christian writers and bloggers pontificate over how the contemporary church needs to be more like the early Christians seen in the Book of Acts, but honestly, we are far from that picture. We are simply too affluent and self-centered to be like that community of sharing, caring, learning and growing that we read about in the New Testament.

This is not to say that contemporary churches lack charitable enterprises. Some give a good deal of money, food, clothes, and other practical things away to those who have less. But even in the midst of our generosity, we are slow to share our lives with others—particularly with others who are different from ourselves racially, ethnically, and economically. Sometimes even our financial generosity is a way of saying “You stay over there, while I stay over here.” The power dynamics are reinforced even though we think we are helping.

Perhaps the simplest thing is for me to send Pastor Vincent some money. But I know from my experiences that money is not always the best solution. The real solution, the biblical dynamic that is often missing from our contemporary churches when compared to the early Christians, is community. It is connection. It is being sister and brother, across the lines of geography, ethnicity, nationality, gender, economics—whatever.

Pastor Vincent and I have already been in email communication. His broken English is better than my non-existent Kinyarwanda. Am I willing to see how God will let us be brothers, and not just me be a benefactor? Am I willing to learn from Pastor Vincent and not assume that I have answers to his questions?

I never got to take a photograph of Pastor Vincent, but in my mind’s eye I see his smiling face and how happy he was to have a conversation with me. I know how it feels to have someone listen when I am struggling in ministry—especially someone who has been speaking to a large group and appears to be an expert. Those sorts of people never had any time for me when I was a younger pastor. I wanted to make sure Pastor Vincent had my time and interest. Maybe that’s the place to start. I will trust God to guide Pastor Vincent and also to guide me. But at this moment, I am simply grateful that God allowed me to meet this brother in Rwanda.

In light of the 20th anniversary of the genocide in Rwanda, we will likely hear more news over the next few days. As you do, please take that as an opportunity to pray for Rwanda: the nation as a whole, the leaders, the churches, and for pastors like Pastor Vincent.

Dennis blogs at dennisredwards.com.

New LEADership Ministers join Franconia Conference staff

April 2, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

by Sheldon C. Good

Experienced Mennonite pastors John Bender and Aldo Siahaan have joined the Franconia Conference team of LEADership Ministers, bringing experience in church planting, intercultural leadership, and congregational pastoral work. Each will serve alongside several congregations yet to be decided and will work from home bases in southeastern Pennsylvania’s largest cities while continuing pastoral ministry assignments.

Aldo Siahaan, based in Philadelphia, helped start Philadelphia Praise Center in 2005. The congregation joined Franconia Conference in 2006, and Siahaan became credentialed as lead pastor in 2007.

Siahaan’s other ministry experience includes being a board member of Mennonite Central Committee East Coast, teaching a summer cross-cultural course at Messiah College, and being a member of the Indonesian Pastoral Network.

Siahaan hopes that in his role as a LEADership minister he can both “be a blessing” to others and “learn more about leadership in a broader way.”

John Bender, based in Allentown, Pa., is a graduate of Eastern Mennonite University and Eastern Mennonite Seminary. He and his wife, Marilyn Handrich Bender, started Raleigh (N.C.) Mennonite Church, where they co-pastored for 18 years. For the past nine years, John pastored Pittsburgh Mennonite Church.

In July 2013 the Benders moved to Allentown, Pa., where John is the part-time director of Ripple Community, Inc., a ministry of the RIPPLE congregation. He is also interim associate pastor of the Franconia congregation.

Bender served in a number of leadership capacities with Virginia Mennonite Conference and Allegheny Mennonite Conference and has close to 30 years of pastoral ministry experience.

“I care deeply about pastors and churches and helping them to pursue healthy relationships together, and I hope I can be a resource to pastors and a guide along the way,” Bender said.

Both Bender and Siahaan bring fresh perspectives and proven track records as they join the team of LEADership ministers resourcing congregations in mission and ministry, said Ertell Whigham, Franconia’s executive minister. “We feel that both John and Aldo bring a variety of gifts and experience that will help us to provide the support congregations need while enabling us to continue the intercultural work that we have stated as one of our conference’s values.”

LEAD is the conference’s platform for oversight, designed to Lead, Equip, And Disciple both lay and credentialed leadership as they guide congregations. A congregation’s LEAD team is comprised of a LEADership minister, the pastor, the chair of the congregation’s governing body (when relevant), and a LEAD advisor from beyond the congregation. LEADership ministers serve as the primary point of contact between congregations and Franconia Conference.

Recovering catholicity

April 1, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

by Steve Kriss, Director of Leadership Cultivation

I still remember the words of my tour guide in St. John Lateran in Rome. She referred to our group’s Protestants with loving disdain. She announced, “For the Protestants here, I want you to remember that this was your ‘Vatican’ — the center of the Western church for centuries before you splintered away. Your faith has come to you through this space.”

I sought to find my own story in the midst of the grand, bright cathedral on Rome’s east side, close to the city wall. In my six months living in Rome, this worship space became significant as I worked to reconcile myself with the “catholicity” of my faith.

Walter Klassen’s book Anabaptism: Neither Protestant nor Catholic was published a year after I was born. His phrasing shaped many of the ways we Anabaptists have understood ourselves within the Christian story — as belonging to neither tradition. Upon reflection later in life, Klassen suggested the book might have been better titled with “both/and” rather than “neither/nor.”

I’d say it is clear that Anabaptists have been Protestants, but we have yet to live into what might be possible if we take our catholicity seriously.

In these days of Mennonite Church USA turmoil, what does it mean to embrace the best of catholicity?

Anabaptists are more than local, temporal communities. New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman writes that to flourish in a global era, organizations will need to embrace both their local and global nature. In the church, this suggests both the local and the catholic (global) are essential for identity and decision-making.

While many of us are biased appropriately toward our localities, we cannot ignore our catholicity, our togetherness. Privileging local discernment alone can ignore both the possibility and responsibility of living within and incarnating God’s shalom intended for all of the world.

Localities can be just as toxic, menacing and oppressive as distant and hierarchal systems that don’t understand the local or respect the relational context — where we sit face to face, see eye to eye, in relationship with one another.

Neither our locality nor our temporality alone will effectively shape our discernment and trajectory in a global age. Our faith and movement is undeniably interconnected (even though at times we wish it weren’t) and providential (part of the holy intention of the Spirit to cultivate a peoplehood beyond racial, ethnic, socioeconomic, national boundedness).

Localities can become self-referential and ignore the voice of the other. Our willingness to tell the story of a God who loved the world so much must be tied to a willingness to do likewise across the chasms of difference of experience and interpretation.

Our lifetimes will be filled with relentless questions and complexities presented by the gospel and our cultural contexts. Though it may be easier to disintegrate into 100 million blooming localities, I wonder if the time and the Spirit might not require more of us. I can’t shake the idea that Jesus’ final prayers for us included a plea for “oneness.” I hear this as an invitation to catholicity — a community that goes beyond the local, into the holy intention of mutuality.

Withdrawing into familiar localities is the invitation of the spirit of our age but not the invitation of the Spirit of our Lord. The Spirit and the Word require much more of us.

“Come and See”: Mennonite leaders visit Israel/Palestine

March 25, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

Participants in the Mennonite learning tour of Israel/Palestine visit the separation wall in the Aida Refugee Camp in Bethlehem. The wall cuts off the camp from an olive grove where residents used to work and play. (l. to r.) Isaac Villegas, Stanley Green, Ann Graber Hershberger, Mohammad Al-Azzah (Palestinian tour guide), Joy Sutter, Joanna Hiebert Bergen (MCC Jerusalem staff), Ron Byler, Tanya Ortman, Chad Horning, Ed Diller and Duane Oswald. (Photo by Ryan Rodrick Beiler)

by Jenn Carreto for Mennonite Church USA

Fifteen board members and staff representing various Mennonite agencies and organizations traveled to Israel/Palestine Feb. 24–March 4 to take part in a “Come and See” learning tour; participants included Joy Sutter, a member of Mennonite Church USA’s Executive Board from Salford congregation, and Noel Santiago, a member of Mennonite Education Agency’s board and a staff member for Franconia Conference.The tour marked the beginning of a denominational initiative to send 100 Mennonite leaders to the region on similar tours over the next five years.

While Mennonites have been involved in relief work, service, witness and peacemaking in the region for more than 65 years, the tour was organized in response to a 2009 appeal from Palestinian Christians called “Kairos Palestine: A Moment of Truth”

A coalition representing a range of Christians in Palestine—including Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant and Evangelical—issued the open letter to the global body of Christ as “a word of faith, hope and love from the heart of Palestinian suffering.” They invited Christian organizations and faith groups to “come and see, in order to understand our reality.”

“The memories of our experiences keep intruding on my everyday thoughts some two weeks after our return,” reflected Chad Horning of Goshen, Ind., Chief Investment Officer of Everence and a member of the learning tour. “I am inspired by the steadfastness of Palestinians and Israelis alike in working for peace in the face of many years of disappointments.”

The learning tour followed the path of Jesus’ life by traveling to Bethlehem, Nazareth, Galilee and finally, Jerusalem. Along the way, they visited Bethlehem Bible College, Nazareth Village, refugee camps, settlements and community organizations, meeting local activists and villagers in each setting and hearing their stories. In Jerusalem they spent time at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial, and attended a Jewish Sabbath service. The group also connected with people serving with Mennonite Central Committee, Mennonite Mission Network and Christian Peacemaker Teams.

Participants were left with much to contemplate and share with their faith communities. Horning said he gained a better understanding of the terms often used to describe life in the region.

“Words like security, wall, border, military, settler, outpost, tear gas, demolition, rubber-coated bullet, and confiscation have more meaning when I tell the stories of people we met and who live in the context of these sterile terms,” he said.

Participants brought with them a range of experience and familiarity with the region. Some had visited or served there, but most were witnessing the realities for the first time.

Madeline Maldonado, associate pastor of Iglesia Evangélica Menonita Arca de Salvación, Fort Myers, Fla., and board chair for Mennonite Mission Network, was a first-time visitor to the region. Before leaving, she shared, “I hope to experience the culture and the conflict. I hope to feel the pain and frustration that are felt there. I pray that I can see God in what seems impossible for my Western and Latina mind to comprehend. I pray that God opens my eyes.”

Isaac Villegas, pastor of Chapel Hill (N.C.) Mennonite Fellowship and Mennonite Church USA Executive Board member, shared reflections four days into the tour: “I’ve seen too much. Towering walls stretching for mile after mile, turning Palestinian cities into open-air prisons. Can I choose not to see … the used tear gas canisters I held in my hand—used against Palestinian youth, bought with my taxes, manufactured by a U.S. company in Pennsylvania?”

In addition to questions about the United States government’s involvement in the region, the group was encouraged the consider questions of faith in new light.

“Our experience gave us new insight into Jesus’ life and ministry, as well as the current situation,” said André Gingerich Stoner, director of holistic witness and interchurch relations for Mennonite Church USA. “We return better prepared to pray and work for God’s peace and blessing for everyone in this land.”

In 2011, Mennonite Church USA Executive Director Ervin Stutzman—in consultation with the Executive Board (EB)—responded to the writers of the Kairos Palestine letter, committing to expand opportunities for Mennonite leaders and members to visit Palestine and learn firsthand about the suffering there. Stutzman and the EB also wrote a letter to members of Mennonite Church USA, asking them to read and discuss the Kairos document, to study Scriptures together on the matter and to consider how their financial lives may be enmeshed in the occupation of Israel.

In 2013, the EB underscored its desire to help the church more fully understand both the Israeli and Palestinian experiences and the role of Christian Zionism in this conflict. A “Come and See” fund was established with initial contributions from Mennonite Central Committee U.S., Mennonite Mission Network and Everence to offer some scholarships for present and future learning tours. Individuals, agencies and local congregations covered the remainder, according to Stoner.

For more reflections from learning tour participants, see: www.mennoniteusa.org/2014/02/26/israel-palestine-learning-tour-travelogue

The next Israel/Palestine learning tour is scheduled for October 2014 and will include participants from Franconia Mennonite Conference, Eastern District Conference and Atlantic Coast Conference. There are limited spots available and some possible financial assistance is available as well. Contact Steve Kriss, skriss@mosaicmennonites.org, to express interest and learn more. To be considered as part of the delegation, you must contact Steve by April 7, 2014. This trip is intended for persons who have not previously traveled to the region.

Local churches to offer hospitality for 2015 MWC Assembly

February 26, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

Mennonite World Conference Staff

Gahira sat on the street, resting from her one-mile walk into the city.

Cheryl (United States) had met Gahira on the plane into Axum, Ethiopia. After using gestures and drawings to get to know one another, Gahira made it clear that she wanted to serve Cheryl coffee, an Ethiopian act of hospitality.

When they had parted at the airport, Cheryl wasn’t sure if she would ever see the Ethiopian woman again. But here Gahira was, a woven basket of injera and a carafe of coffee in hand. Cheryl gathered coffee cups from the hotel and sat on the patio with Gahira and her son, an interpreter, and the other members of Cheryl’s touring party.

“Together we celebrated our presence in this place,” Cheryl reflected later. “This place made holy by the warm, loving gesture of Gahira.” (read the full story)

Cheryl and her companions were just some of the hundreds who participated in Assembly Scattered in 2003, where they encountered the people, ministries, and stories of Anabaptist churches in an urban area or community while traveling to or from the Mennonite World Conference Assembly Gathered in Zimbabwe.

In 2015, Assembly Scattered will take place in communities across North America immediately before and after the Assembly Gathered in Harrisburg, PA, USA on July 21-26, 2015. These visits provide opportunities for Anabaptist brothers and sisters from around the world to get a taste of the church in North America and for hosts to experience the wonderful diversity of the global family of faith.

“After 20-some hours on planes, with my body clock six hours off, I finally arrived in Harare, Zimbabwe, eager for rest and sleep,” remembers Daniel (United States). It was dark when he arrived at his hosts’ home, but the evening meal was ready. “[Canaan and Listei] had me sit down in the living room in front of a coffee table arrayed with food.”

Listei washed his hands in a Zimbabwean gesture of welcome. “She apologized that she couldn’t kneel before me because her knees were stiff,” says Daniel. “We older people understand each other on a subject like this.” (read the full story)

The 2015 Assembly Scattered will open doors for building new relationships with Anabaptists from around the world. Each location will include partnerships among local congregations and ministries to introduce participants to a specific context of Anabaptism in North America. Although the participants are responsible for their own travel arrangements and paying for their own lodging and food for the 1-3 day trip, local communities are encouraged to offer hospitality.

“Despite the additional work involved, it was a great privilege to serve borscht [soup] to so many visitors,” says the main cook at the KM 81 Mennonite Leprosy Hospital in Paraguay, which hosted an Assembly Scattered group in 2009. “I dare say that most enjoyed the food and showed their appreciation by singing beautiful hymns.” (read the full story)

Groups of North American churches are invited to submit applications to host an Assembly Scattered in their community. Go online at www.mwc-cmm.org/pa2015 and click on “Assembly Scattered” for more information and registration forms.

“I’m looking forward to working with North American churches that are eager to extend hospitality to guests in their communities,” says Evanna Hess, the newly appointed Assembly Scattered coordinator from central Pennsylvania. “It will be exciting to see the friendships that develop as a result of their hospitality.”

The deadline for submitting proposals is June 1, 2014.

Won't you be my neighbor?

February 25, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

by Brooke Natalie Blough, West Philadelphia Mennonite Fellowship

As a white woman who somewhat recently moved into an area that is considered to be “gentrifying,” I try to be acutely aware of my impact on my community. Dannette Lambert’s article on “how not to be a gentrifier” was exactly what I needed. I absolutely love my neighborhood and its diversity, so a practical guide on being a positive force in your community for everyone gave me so much to think about and put in action.

The one piece of advice this article gives that I find the most powerful is her recommendation to view everyone you see in your neighborhood as your neighbor. This seems obvious, but it’s so easy to look at people who are different from you or even distasteful to you as not really being a part of your community. The homeless people sleeping on the sidewalks, the women selling their bodies, the young men who look like someone who might rob you: They are all your neighbor.

That word is so heavy. Neighbor. It shows up all over the Bible. Old Testament laws command us to show our neighbors dignity and justice. When Jesus is asked, “What’s the most important commandment?” he answers that we must love God with everything we’ve got and to love our neighbor as ourselves. And when asked, “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus tells us the parable of the Good Samaritan, teaching us that anyone could be our neighbor, we just have to accept them as part of our community and our lives.

Since I walk about half an hour to work every day, I see a lot of people. And Philadelphia is not New York — you are not just an anonymous and ignored person, invisibly walking down the sidewalk. In Philadelphia (and especially West Philly) you see and are seen by most everyone who walks past. Over the last few weeks, I have been intentionally thinking to myself as I approach each new person, “This is my neighbor.” Often, this has no effect on the way I treat that person; but sometimes when I see someone who is different from me or even distasteful to me, I can feel something in my attitude change when I think “This is my neighbor.”

That teenager who just dropped their trash on the ground is my neighbor.
That man who leered at me is my neighbor.
That mother who just screamed at her child is my neighbor.
That homeless person who just asked me for money is my neighbor.
That angry-looking person who didn’t return my smile is my neighbor.

Jesus didn’t tell us what set number of people we are to consider our neighbors, but showed us that anyone we encounter can be our neighbor if we open ourselves up to the responsibility of claiming them as part of our community. If I have a right to be a part of this community, so do they. If I am deserving of grace, so are they.

Jesus didn’t just ask us to love our neighbor, he asked us to love our neighbor as ourselves. That change in attitude can best be summed up as me asking myself, “How would I want to be treated if I were them?” Looking at my daily interactions through this lens has helped me tap into a well of compassion and empathy I didn’t know I had. The practice of putting yourself in someone else’s shoes is humbling.

For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” — Gal. 5:14

Brooke Natalie Blough lives in Philadelphia, Pa., and works at the University of Pennsylvania. She is a regular attender of West Philadelphia Mennonite Fellowship and writes at Now Faith, where this blog first appeared.

Shaped locally, connected widely

February 19, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

by Steve Kriss, Director of Leadership Cultivation
(reposted from Mennonite World Review)

I attended my first binational conference ministers gathering in December. This meeting happens annually with conference leaders from Mennonite Church Canada and Mennonite Church USA.

It’s a closed meeting where leaders from coast to coast share the burdens and joys of their work. Conference work is lonely and difficult these days. The forces of postmodernity menace our fragile unions, which cross theological, economic, cultural and geographic boundaries.

Conference ministers gather in these times for prayer and frank conversation. As the new guy in the room, I noticed the high levels of commitment and the near impossibility of the tasks these dedicated men and women are called to do.

I wondered why in the world anyone would want to do this kind of work. I wondered whether I have the faith and fortitude it requires.

In MC USA and MC Canada, the role of conferences is increasingly pinched. Due to economics and sociopolitics, conference systems can struggle to find senses of purpose and voice. It can be hard to speak and act coherently in the midst of near constant discernment. This makes it difficult to be a conference and a cohesive denomination.

Our systems were constructed for different times — before the Internet changed how we organize and relate, before we advocated a missional framework that can encourage congregations and communities to take their contexts so seriously that the voices of the neighborhood play as loud as the voices of the denomination.

As a conference leader, I find myself situated at a perfectly impossible intersection. I work in a voluntary system with mostly decreasing financial resources to do a job that requires an ever-increasing amount of relational investment, coordination and sensitivity.

As we take the call to mission more seriously, what it means to be Mennonite is increasingly shaped locally. Bridging the gap between these localities and the conference is a task filled with tension and interpretation.

I’m writing this article at the airport in Atlanta on my way back from a congregational visit with Georgia Praise Center. It’s a Franconia Conference Indonesian-speaking congregation that meets just north of Atlanta’s Chinatown. It has strong connections to the Philadelphia Indonesian Mennonite community.

I’m here to celebrate the congregation’s third anniversary, which lands intentionally at the onset of Lunar New Year. This year Franconia adjusted a meeting date, recognizing that 10 percent of our congregations celebrate Lunar New Year. It’s these kind of realities that make the role of conferences and conference leadership tricky.

The anniversary celebration featured Chinese dance, a sermon in Indonesian from Franconia’s first Indonesian pastor and solos by high school students with music that plays on Atlanta’s contemporary Christian radio stations. Georgia Praise takes a lot of cues from Jakarta Praise, a Mennonite megachurch in Indonesia.

My job as a conference minister is to be here to bless, celebrate and live alongside the beauty at the intersection of three identities: Mennonite, Sino-Indonesian and Atlantan. For me it’s both overwhelming and invigorating.

What I’ve glimpsed in my work is that our hope is tied up with these points of intersection. It’s the unexpected juxtaposing that offers signs of the Spirit at work. We’re moving into space where God’s Good News can flourish.

My work is sustained by the Spirit in these moments. I trust that in the midst of my own lack of faith and fortitude, the reign of God still comes near.

I have the holy and seemingly impossible opportunity to notice and proclaim the intentions of the Creator. And I remember the words of Jesus, that with God even the impossible can be a reality.

intercultural

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