Kelani’s Groove

You have to keep moving. Otherwise, you get comfortable. You start to think about how good this is; this place, this job, this stuff.

No, you have to keep leaving, and finding yourself anew. You find yourself in the journey. You find yourself in motion. You get to know yourself in transit.

Sometimes you stop to change trains, to switch buses. But we can’t make the station our home. We have to keep setting off, to keep moving on.

You can’t stand still. Or you’ll just never know…

Well, with Humana2.0 slowly receding into history, I thought I’d capture some reflections. Firstly, it was great to meet so many Voxtropolitans in person, and to see again some who I had met at Origins ‘06.

Kudos to Alex, and the IMN team for putting together an inspiring, informative program. Dean and the TO crew made the venue come alive (almost literally). Urban Poets and Jettison Never, you ROCK, separately AND together! Great to finally meet you DA.
Most exciting for me was that, unlike Origins ‘06, this time my wife could attend. There has been a hole in our shared experience that was significantly filled last week. Also, we had a number of our local gathering in Central Florida who were able to take advantage of the opportunity to attend.

A few critical thoughts that have been echoing around in my head (there’s a surprising amount of room up there these days):

from Alex:

How do we project ourselves (and our message) into the world ahead? The concept of altering the trajectory of life was a recurring theme.

It’s not what we can explain (even with eloquence), but rather we should be asking ourselves, “what have we done that needs explaining?”

Innovation is always de-synchronized with the perceived present.

from Gerardo:

Many of us are “afraid to wander, as Abraham was sent to wander.”

from David:

We create art, because art is a matter of life and death to our friends.

from Alex:

We were not born on a neutral planet.

from Thorston:

We are supposed to be God’s “wisdon challenge” to the world.

from Erwin:

Live life as “one elegant stroke” rather than struggling to balance unrelated segments of life.

All in all, a greatly though-provoking and impactful conference.

Here’s a few captured memories from the “afterparty” (the World Music Jam).

“…and it was good”

Just after Thanksgiving, I was out for an evening stroll in a neighborhood not far from my home. To my great surprise, I hear the sultry sounds of doSul coming from one of the modest homes nestled against the woods in a back corner of the development. I thought, “Wow, I have that album too. I should meet those folks”. Imagine my surprise when I approach the open front door to see Alex and Niza (along with the enchanting Evelyn on the flute), playing, live, in the family room of the home.

An eclectic mix of a couple dozen folks of all ages (from college students to retirees), enjoying wine and cheese and some really cool music… Or sitting around the fire bowl flaming in the backyard.

Seems the lady of the house is a bit of an artist herself - I understand the painting over Niza’s shoulder is one of her originals.

I hung out for a few hours, then remembered I had to get back to my own reality. Now here’s the strange part… I drove by to check out the place a few days later, and for some reason, I could not find it again. Like it was gone. If not for the pics, I would have thought is was a dream.

There’s something strange happening in Central Florida…

Day 2 of the conference was as enlightening as day 1. We continued working through Luke 10, which served as our model for the weekend (and the movement). Tony and Felicity Dale really did a good job of having us lead ourselves and each other through the scripture, just as one would do in a house church setting. I’ll share a few more quotes here, and post a more digested reflection within a few days:

Stop obsessing over converting the individual, and focus on God opening the door to pockets of darkness.

Things that can “kill” a house church movement:

1. Lack of a missional DNA (Devine truth, Nurturing relationships, Apostolic mission)
2. Failure to recognize the”death valley” of transition that people must cross when moving from traditional church to house church
3. Becoming of a “mini-church” - same thing in a smaller group.

Three basic principles:

1. No empire-building
2. No control (by man)
3. No glory (but to God).

The weekend really gave me a lot to think about in a lot of respects - My personal “ministry”, the trajectory of my professional career, broadening of my “church implant” thoughts… I pray for clarity in thought as God shows us how this fits into His call for our family.
God is clearly doing something awesome in His church, in many ways including this.

PS: I am sitting in our Vox Cafe, House Blend Cafe, as I post this. There is a group of women who came in to meet over coffee. I watch them talk and laugh and connect and share and support each other. I have no idea what the subject of their meeting is, but church does not have to visibly look any different from what they are doing before me. More to come…

I am in the middle of attending a weekend conference on the Home Church Movement, led by Tony and Felicity Dale (authors of Simply Church and An Army of Ordinary People [Felicity only]), who run House2House magazine. So far it has been really eye-opening. We went (FW and I) just to learn more. And to listen to hear what God is saying to us in this area - He’s certainly giving us an earful…

A few cool quotes so far…

We need to “lower the bar of how we do church, and raise the bar of discipleship”

“God gave the Word back to His people 500 years ago (thru the Reformation), now He is giving His church back to His people”.

“It’s more important to God that he has our hearts and our character, than that he has our work and our successes“.

More to share after tomorrow and after we process things a bit.

An address to the 7^th Annual National Multicultural Conference of the Presbyterian Church (USA). May 27, 2006.

Individual Expression

The third area for consideration is individual expression. Rather than fixating on quotas of demographic representation, let’s find and celebrate the uniqueness of the folks around us. There are two ways to eliminate issues of diversity: to become homogenous, or to completely be blind to the differences in race/ethnicity, gender, age, etc. Even if either were either state were desirable or achievable, we would be faced with the God-given uniqueness that comes in the form of personality, talents, passions, creativity, etc.

One way to lift up each person is to offer a myriad of engagement points for people to get involved with. These could include participation in worship music, flags, praise dance, set design, drama teams, class leadership, and more. God created each of us with a unique gifting of creativity. We need to identify, utilize and celebrate these giftings. The broad cross-section of activities will also provide more potential avenues for community connections. St. Paul’s has been blessed by great individual creativity, we need to find ways to engage it more fully.

Personal Relevance

The last idea I would share is that we need to be personally relevant. If someone waked through our doors by accident, there should be something they can relate to long enough for them to hear at least part of Christ’s message.

This speaks to the look and feel of the environment. And the sound – style of worship comes into play. Now, no church can, or should even try to, be all things to all people, But we should have appeal across a significant range of today’s society. And this is as much generational as it is about ethnic diversity. We should be dreaming of making our churches relevant to our children 10 years from now.

Another form of relevance addresses the natural human tendency to connect with others like us. As we found people coming to us from other ethnic groups, we responded by facilitating a mixture of in-group and across-group connections. For example, we have a Caribbean group that meets for study, service and socialization. For those who are interested, the in-group need is met there. Yet some of the couples in that group and also in our “Couples with young children� fellowship group, an ethnically diverse group with a common lifestage. Others do mission work and ministry together. Most people end up with a diverse array of people they are in relationship with. So we allow and encourage people to form broad networks in the church, to feel connected to Christ’s body through multiple points.

Conclusion

So to wrap up:

1. Embrace change, promote change, BE CHANGE.

2. Develop a missional mindset – give ourselves away to a diverse world.

3. Promote and celebrate the individual.

• Creativity, passion and personality are the most fundamental differences among us
• We were all created uniquely in the image of one loving God

4. Be personally relevant to as many people as possible.

Why go through the effort? Why suffer the discomfort? Why not just “hold out� and fade away? I’ll tell you, it’s not worth it just to say we’re diverse – to show pretty pictures of us all singing Kum-by-ya.

We need to make ourselves culturally relevant today, because we need to make Christ relevant in today’s culture, and tomorrow’s.

If St. Paul’s and the rest of our churches fail to develop a new “apostolic ethos,� we will fail to advance Christ’s kingdom in this wonderfully opportune age.

An address to the 7^th Annual National Multicultural Conference of the Presbyterian Church (USA). May 27th, 2006.

So, St. Paul’s got an infusion of diversity, and was open enough to welcome it. What happened next was critical. Since most new visitors to churches come by word-of-mouth invitation, the questions became: “Can our members be excited enough to invite others to visit?�, and “What do we look like to an outsider?�

In my view, there are four things that churches need to do to survive in this changing world. And that’s what we’re really talking about here, the survival of our churches. We’ve seen the demographic projections and know that if we’re struggling to seem relevant to a population that still resembles us now, how will we ever be relevant to a population with the demographics projected for 2020 and beyond?

Let’s set aside for the moment the fact that what we really should be talking about is the survival of Christ’s church, not of our churches. That’s another topic entirely.

For our churches to survive there are four things we need to do. I say “we� because, yes, St. Paul’s will cease to be relevant and die, unless we continue and/or enhance our efforts in these four areas. We may outlast a few others, but our demise will by just as sure.

Embrace Change

The first, as we’ve discussed, is promoting a culture of change. Now our Pastor is a “crusty old bird, very set in his ways� (as I am certain he would tell you himself), but he has an acute sense for the moving wind of the Holy Spirit. A number of times I have seen him, at a critical juncture, frown, almost sniff the air, and stick up a spit-moistened finger to sense the direction of God’s calling. He is not afraid to change the set of his sails at the stirring of the Holy Spirit. But, we will need to learn to change constantly to survive and thrive in the future.

Missional Ethos

To the second point, you will recall that I declined to show you a bunch of “diversity� pictures of St. Paul’s folks. The main reason is that I just don’t believe that diversity for its own sake has any relevance to Christ.

Christ did not call us to be diverse. He called us to love our neighbor. Yes, the neighbor we greet on Sunday morning when instructed to do so by the pastor, but also the neighbor at home who parks his car in front of your driveway; or doesn’t pick up after his dog; or cuts the lawn too close to my house, so my yard looks smaller and his looks bigger – hypothetically, of course. Christ said he would be with us “to the end of the age� and we would “be his witness to the end of the pew�? Or was it “to the end of the church driveway�?

To be relevant to a broad cross-section of the un-believing public, which is more important: how diverse we are in here, or the breadth and diversity of the people we touch out there? Rather than fighting to hold on to what we have, we should be on fire trying to give ourselves away to every part of the spectrum. Hey, I think there’s even a verse about getting repaid tenfold.

Now, St. Paul’s is very supportive of mission work locally and globally. We give generously, whether it is to provide food to the hungry in one rural community, or backpacks and school supplies to poor students in a local school, or to build a church/school building in a poor mountain community in Haiti, or to pay the salary of local ministry workers in Nicaragua. We support mission workers in fields in Africa so dangerous that we are forbidden to mention the workers by name, for fear of their very lives.

Yet, are we so good at sending money and missionaries, that we neglect the call to be missionaries in our own neighborhoods and towns?

To be relevant in a changing world, we must develop and missional ethos. Because, when it comes to the gospel, it really is about them and not us. Instead of tailoring our services and our culture to make our lives comfortable, we should develop a culture that forces us to go out and make their lives livable; even if it makes us uncomfortable.

The day I returned from Origins in May, I was asked to fill in for someone and represent our church in a presentation on diveristy. I had three days to prepare, the pastor was away, half the staff was out of the office, and I had no idea who the audience was, beyond that our church was invited by the Central Florida Prebytery. Under other circumstances I would have been nervous… but I was just back from Origins. I felt like I had been granted an audience in the court of Agrippa.

It turned out to be a panel discussion at the Presbyterian Church (USA) 2006 National Multicultural Conference. The session, called “Models of Multicultural Worship” was not a breakout, but an open session for the full body of delegates (some 200 - 300 by my rough count).

I thought I would share my remarks with the city of voices. They’re a bit long, so I have broken them into three posts.

Cultural Relevance in a Changing World

May 27, 2006

An address to the 7^th Annual National Multicultural Conference of the Presbyterian Church (USA)

Greetings. My name is Keith Whittingham. The video you just saw showed you St. Paul’s Presbyterian Church, in Ocoee, FL, about three years ago. I’d like to talk to you about the St. Paul’s of today, and a vision for tomorrow.

I am standing in today, for a person who was standing in for our Pastor. I was originally sent some slides to show you, which had a series of pictures under the categories of Leadership, Worship and Fellowship. These would have shown that, across these critical areas, we have faces that span the rainbow: white, brown, yellow, red. We span the ages, from cradle to grave. Our community includes the sight-, hearing- and mobility-impaired. Our campus serves as the worship site for, not just St. Paul’s, but for some seven churches, including a Korean church, a Brazilian church, a Haitian church and two African-American churches (one of which is Seventh Day Adventist).

I imagine that those pictures would have been nice to show. That sort of thing may be important. Christ seemed to value difference among the team. I’m just a math teacher who has read a little of the bible, bit if I recall rightly, among the twelve disciples Christ called were four fishermen (right off the boat). He also called a tax collector – a guy who had probably made himself rich off of the poor people while cozying up to the oppressive Roman regime. Then there was Simon of the Zealots. Now it might be a bit strong to call the Zealots the “Al Quaeda� of their day, but certainly here was guy who had no love for the Roman oppressors, or for any of their collaborating lackeys. So between the fishermen, the tax collector and the revolutionary, there was a lot of difference of background and perspective. And that’s just half of the group.

Then we jump forward to Acts chapter 2, to the day of Pentecost. The believers are in the upper room and are touched by tongues of fire. They spill into the streets of Jerusalem speaking in the native languages of the masses of visitors to the city on this big holiday. We see the seeds of the gospel spreading to far-flung lands. Then a few chapters later, Peter has his vision. He sees the sheet come down laden with “unclean� foods, and God says “Eat!� Shortly afterwards, he is at the house of Cornelius, the gentile, and the foundation is laid for the church to expand to all nations and races.

So it might make sense to show you some pictures of diverse groups of people within the St. Paul’s body, along with a list of the programs and processes which we have used over the years to attract all these folks.

Well, I won’t do either. Firstly, I don’t think you would have invited us to address you if you needed convincing of our diversity. So the pictures aren’t really needed. As for the diversity outreach programs, well in my seven years with St Paul’s, the last two as Session Clerk, I have never heard of our church doing any such thing. In a former life, I designed strategic recruiting programs for Lucent Technologies. These were targeted efforts to increase the numbers of minorities among our engineering ranks. I know a diversity recruitment program when I see one, and I have never seen one at St. Paul’s.

This is a good spot for a disclaimer. I’m going to share with you what I understand of the history of diversity at St. Paul’s, and my personal vision and read on the future. Others may share a different story. In my view, St. Paul’s is the beneficiary of a fortuitous intersection of history and geography. Sociologists and others talk about the radical migration that has taken place over the past century.

In the 1970s and 1980s, large numbers of West Indian immigrants settled in the Pine Hills community of west Orlando, where St. Paul’s was founded. For these folks, mainly from Trinidad, Jamaica and Guyana and of African and Indian decent, it was almost a cultural norm for mainstream Christian preachers to be White. St. Paul’s would have been a very familiar option as they searched for new church homes (considerable more so, for many, than the local AME church would have been).

Erwin McManus, pastor of what is arguably the most diverse church in the country, describes the phenomenon of urban drift that his First Southern Baptist Church of East Los Angeles found itself in, as White churches found themselves in Latino communities, Latino churches found themselves in Korean neighborhoods, and so on. Many church bodies closed ranks, insulated themselves from the perceived onslaught, and slowly died. A few, like McManus’ church, grappled with, and finally embraced the new community, and truly became Mosaic, as the church is now known.

One thing that helped Mosaic, and St. Paul’s, was that each already had a spirit of adaptability. As the Mosaic team puts it, “Never strive to make a change; strive instead to create a culture with the humility to embrace constant change.�

(See next post for part 2)

With a full 48 hours between myself and Origins, I have not yet begun to come down. I still feel the warmth of the embrace of the Mosaic community wrapped around my heart. Thanks to all the new friends I encountered on the way, even those I did not get to meet. Too bad a previous engagement kept me from staying for Ethos.

As I walked across the campus on Sunday night (pre-Origins) with my fellow-traveler on this journey, MM, trying to find our room (thanks N and SC), I made the pleading comment, “I have no idea why I am here”. I really didn’t - I just knew I had to be there. God, once again, has been doing wild and crazy things in my life; drawing me into a dangerous, new relationship with him. I wasn’t frustrated, just amazed that I was off again, on a journey to parts unknown. It had a Gen 12:1 feel to it.

One concrete call on my heart, as I arrived in Pasadena, was the dream of a missional church “implant” from the midst of the fairly progressive (relatively), PCUSA church I attend. I love the church and feel God there, but I feel him urging us to so much more. I was not sent by them. To my knowledge, they did not even know I was going, but there I was.

Beyond that, I am involved in a few really cool projects (more on those later), but I surely did not think of myself as a church planter. Just a Christ follower with a desire to be a foot-soldier in the battle. In early April, I spent a Saturday at the home of a new mentor and friend in LA. I took a big bite of the “red pill”, and feel like I’ve been plunging down the “rabbit hole” ever since.

The two days of Origins felt like a new birth for me. A new call to community, to service to stewardship, to faithfulness, to creativity, to risk, to passion, to an apostolic ethos, to missional life! The vision shared by Mosaic and IMN bring hope and inspiration, and challenge. Somewhere out there is a path, with ground patiently awaiting my footprints. It will include the implant project, but my heart already knows that is just the beginning.

Meanwhile, my heart is fixed anew on him, and whatever I have to offer, pledged more firmly to his service.

PS: thanks MM, it would not have been the same with out you. JD and AM, I am so pumped.

I have been blessed with an incredible wife, Faith, and two wonderful sons, Mark and Justin. Mark (the elder at almost 7) is like his Dad in a lot of ways, including that he is not a “natural athlete�. He is gifted by God in many ways, but like his Dad, some things take more work than others.

We were working with the T-ball setup in the backyard the other day, and I was trying to help him make solid contact. He was concentrating on his hands and wrists too much (it seemed to me) so I tried to help him loosen up a bit. Inspired from somewhere unknown, I had him step back and just turn his upper body for a while, letting his arms swing freely. I tried to tell him that the swing really comes from the center of the body, not the hands.

Then we took the bat and held it next to the ball. I asked him to just turn his shoulders and bring the bat up behind him. Then, keeping his eyes on the ball, just rotate his shoulders and let his arms swing freely. I somehow convinced him that, if he kept his eyes on the ball, directed his concentration at the center of his body, and let everything else relax and move freely, the bat had no choice but to hit the ball dead center.

Wow! The look on his face as the ball sailed away – priceless. Not exactly out of the park, but it made an impression on the both of us.

It took my wife to really bring it into perspective for me, however. When I reported the afternoon’s triumph to her, she smiled and said:

“That’s just like in our walk with Christ, isn’t it? We tend to focus so much on the details of the things we feel pressed to do, on the outcomes and results. We should just keep our eyes on Him, both as our goal and as the center of our being, and relax and let the rest take care of itself.�

Wow!