William H. Willimon - Sermon Untitled (April 29, 1996)
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Transcript
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Man | We're rolling whenever you're ready. | 0:04 |
- | Okay. | 0:06 |
What are three critical issues | 0:09 | |
that face our church in the future? | 0:12 | |
I think the first issue that would | 0:16 | |
come to my mind is appointments. | 0:18 | |
Surely one of the most important things our bishops do | 0:22 | |
is to appoint clergy leaders to congregations. | 0:24 | |
A bishop has the responsibility to ensure that there is | 0:29 | |
a good fit between the mission of a particular congregation | 0:33 | |
and the gifts and the graces of a particular clergy person. | 0:37 | |
When I travel about our connection, I find | 0:43 | |
that many believe we have a crisis of leadership today. | 0:45 | |
And so I would work for a fair, | 0:49 | |
rational, responsive system of appointments, | 0:54 | |
a system based not on factors | 1:00 | |
of gender or seniority | 1:04 | |
or many of the other factors that have alas been used | 1:07 | |
to make appointments in recent years, but rather mission. | 1:11 | |
I want each church to be led to a statement | 1:15 | |
of their particular mission and then to fit | 1:18 | |
that mission statement with the gifts | 1:21 | |
and graces of particular clergy. | 1:23 | |
I think we are in a crisis of leadership | 1:26 | |
where many of our laity and clergy are wondering | 1:31 | |
about the rationality of our present system. | 1:35 | |
That is the first critical issue I think | 1:38 | |
that must be addressed by every bishop in our church. | 1:41 | |
Man | Stop there, and let me just kind of. | 1:45 |
And we're rolling. | 1:48 | |
- | What are three critical issues facing our bishops today? | 1:53 |
The first issue that would come to my mind is | 1:58 | |
the appointment of our clergy. | 2:00 | |
Surely one of the most important things a bishop does | 2:02 | |
is to appoint pastoral leaders for our churches. | 2:04 | |
As I travel about the connection, | 2:08 | |
I feel there is a crisis of trust | 2:10 | |
in our ability to appoint | 2:14 | |
to the right people in the right places. | 2:17 | |
A bishop has to ensure that there is a good fit | 2:20 | |
between a congregation's mission | 2:23 | |
and the gifts and graces of the clergy | 2:26 | |
appointed to help lead that mission. | 2:29 | |
We need an appointment system which is obviously rational | 2:31 | |
and understood, fair and, above all, based on mission. | 2:36 | |
The mission of the local church should be primary | 2:41 | |
in appointment-making, not seniority | 2:44 | |
or primarily questions of salary, et cetera, but mission. | 2:47 | |
We clergy exist to help | 2:51 | |
the local congregation fulfill its mission. | 2:53 | |
Second, I would think that a major concern of our bishops | 2:57 | |
ought to be empowering the local church. | 3:01 | |
My great long-term interest in the restructuring | 3:05 | |
of our church is motivated in great part on my concern | 3:09 | |
that our structure has disempowered the local congregation. | 3:14 | |
Too often we've come to think that the good ideas | 3:18 | |
flow from the top down, whereas I keep saying | 3:21 | |
the really good ideas flow from the bottom up, | 3:26 | |
that is the church, in its annual conference | 3:31 | |
and general conference manifestations, | 3:34 | |
exists to empower the local congregation | 3:37 | |
in the fulfillment of their mission. | 3:41 | |
The structure, our leadership shouldn't be that which is | 3:43 | |
an impediment to mission but which is | 3:46 | |
an encouragement, facilitator of mission. | 3:48 | |
And then the third area I would have to say would be | 3:51 | |
that our bishops need to work at evangelism. | 3:54 | |
I'm in campus ministry here at Duke | 3:58 | |
and work with young adults, and our church has lost | 4:00 | |
an entire generation of young people | 4:03 | |
to our church, and we could do better. | 4:08 | |
Too often we have given our energies and creativity | 4:12 | |
toward internal maintenance issues | 4:17 | |
when I think we need to give more attention | 4:20 | |
to external issues, reaching others. | 4:22 | |
The church turned outward to the world, | 4:27 | |
this is surely part of our historic Wesleyan genius, | 4:29 | |
and it is a an aspect of our church we must recover. | 4:34 | |
Appointments, empowering the local church | 4:39 | |
and evangelism come to mind. | 4:42 | |
Now, what can a bishop do to lead, | 4:45 | |
to motivate us in this direction? | 4:48 | |
Well, I think, first of all, our bishops need to listen. | 4:52 | |
They need to be in the local churches. | 4:56 | |
They need to be with the people on the front line, | 4:58 | |
pastors and laypeople, listening to the frustrations, | 5:01 | |
to the hopes, the visions of the local congregation. | 5:05 | |
We don't need absentee bishops during a time like ours. | 5:09 | |
I think our church is in crisis. | 5:14 | |
We've got to have bishops willing to stay | 5:16 | |
in their Episcopal area to work at the needs | 5:18 | |
that are there in their Episcopal area. | 5:23 | |
I think that is crucial. | 5:27 | |
Too often our bishops have concerned themselves | 5:29 | |
and become entangled in general church committees | 5:31 | |
and commissions and concerns. | 5:35 | |
I think they need to know that the center of their ministry | 5:37 | |
is within that annual conference. | 5:42 | |
And then, after listening and being present, | 5:45 | |
bishops preach, and I love to preach. | 5:49 | |
They can teach. | 5:52 | |
We in our church, I think, are in a kind of crisis | 5:54 | |
of doctrine, a crisis of identity. | 5:57 | |
Who are we? | 6:00 | |
Wesley used to organize his original annual conferences | 6:02 | |
along the questions, what to preach, | 6:06 | |
that is, what is our message, what to teach, | 6:09 | |
that is, what is our doctrine, | 6:13 | |
what is the basic form of our faith, | 6:15 | |
and then finally ask, what to do? | 6:17 | |
I think those three questions are still | 6:20 | |
or perhaps even more valuable for us today. | 6:23 | |
Bishops can write, share their ideas, | 6:27 | |
and interchange with our people, and I also enjoy writing. | 6:30 | |
I think, alas, too often the bishops we have been electing, | 6:35 | |
as I've said, have been managers rather than leaders. | 6:40 | |
I think a bishop should be a person with ideas, | 6:43 | |
should be willing for those ideas to be exposed | 6:46 | |
to the examination of the wider church, | 6:48 | |
and then be present in the interchange | 6:51 | |
as we all work on energizing and changing our church. | 6:55 | |
Finally, what is my vision for our church? | 7:03 | |
I've been critical of our church, | 7:08 | |
and I've been criticized for my criticism, | 7:10 | |
but overall I'm extremely hopeful. | 7:13 | |
I think we United Methodists have | 7:15 | |
a wonderful way of structuring ourselves | 7:17 | |
for mission if we will make that primary. | 7:21 | |
I think we have a marvelous system of clergy deployment | 7:24 | |
in that we clergy are important to the church | 7:27 | |
only on the basis of what needs | 7:31 | |
to be done in the local congregation. | 7:33 | |
I feel that we are poised for a great period | 7:36 | |
of renewal and rethinking. | 7:40 | |
I believe that we're turning the corner | 7:42 | |
on our decades of denial. | 7:45 | |
It's hard to imagine an organization | 7:48 | |
which has lost 20% of its constituency | 7:50 | |
in the last two decades that has not made | 7:53 | |
really one major structural change | 7:58 | |
in the way we do business. | 8:03 | |
I get the feeling that that may be behind us, | 8:06 | |
that we have increasing numbers of us | 8:08 | |
that are ready to ask the tough questions, | 8:11 | |
to face the reality, to think, to dream, to re-envision. | 8:13 | |
And I think it would be a great opportunity to be | 8:19 | |
part of the church during this period of renewal. | 8:22 | |
We Wesleyans have always been known to be practical people. | 8:26 | |
What works is what's good. | 8:31 | |
The church exists to be impacting the world | 8:34 | |
and spreading the Gospel and moving out and reaching others. | 8:36 | |
I want that vision to be regained, and I'm hopeful, | 8:41 | |
excited, energetic, feel that it can be regained, | 8:45 | |
particularly if our leaders hold us accountable | 8:49 | |
to the best that is within us, | 8:52 | |
hold us accountable to the strengths of our tradition, | 8:54 | |
and then help us to move forward. | 8:58 | |
Thank you. | 9:01 | |
Man | Okay, whenever you're ready. | 9:13 |
- | What are three critical issues | 9:18 |
which face our bishops in our church? | 9:19 | |
Well, the first issue that would | 9:24 | |
come to my mind is appointments. | 9:25 | |
One of the most important things a bishop does | 9:28 | |
is to appoint clergy to local churches, | 9:30 | |
and as I travel about our connection, | 9:32 | |
I feel it can be said there is a crisis | 9:35 | |
of trust in our appointment system, | 9:38 | |
on the part of both clergy and laity. | 9:40 | |
A bishop has got to demonstrate that appointments of clergy | 9:43 | |
are made in a rational, open, fair and caring way, | 9:47 | |
and that they are made on the basis of mission, | 9:53 | |
an assessment of that local congregation's mission | 9:57 | |
and an assessment of that particular pastor's gifts | 10:01 | |
and abilities to help that congregation be in mission. | 10:05 | |
Bishops have got to work at appointment-making. | 10:09 | |
Then I would say the next critical issue | 10:15 | |
is to empower the local congregation. | 10:17 | |
Empowerment of the local congregation | 10:21 | |
is related to wise appointment-making, | 10:23 | |
but it's also related into the structure, | 10:27 | |
the way we do business. | 10:29 | |
My decade-long concern with the structure of our church | 10:31 | |
is based upon my deep faith in the local congregation | 10:35 | |
as the chief locus of our church's ministry. | 10:40 | |
I believe all good ideas, in a sense, | 10:43 | |
flow from the bottom up, rather than, as our structure | 10:46 | |
would make you to believe, from the top down. | 10:50 | |
I think we've disempowered our congregations | 10:53 | |
with the way we've appointed clergy, | 10:56 | |
with the way we have done our business. | 10:59 | |
I want to return a sense of vision | 11:01 | |
and empowerment to the local congregation, | 11:04 | |
so that everything is dependent upon that congregation | 11:07 | |
coming to a sense of its own mission | 11:12 | |
in its particular time and place, | 11:15 | |
and then our larger connection giving that church | 11:17 | |
what it needs to fulfill its God-given mission. | 11:20 | |
The third critical area I would mention is | 11:24 | |
something dear to my heart and that is evangelism. | 11:27 | |
Our church has been too internally concerned, | 11:31 | |
expending too much energy and resources | 11:35 | |
and time on purely internal concerns | 11:37 | |
and not enough energy and creativity | 11:42 | |
and innovation expended on external concern, | 11:45 | |
the world about us, the people who need us. | 11:50 | |
I work here at Duke, on a university campus, | 11:53 | |
and so I am deeply concerned | 11:56 | |
about our young people, our young adults and youth. | 11:58 | |
And yet our church has had a sad record | 12:03 | |
in the past two decades with this particular age group. | 12:05 | |
It is as if we have lost an entire generation. | 12:08 | |
I would want to work to change that, | 12:13 | |
to ask our church, what changes do we need to make | 12:15 | |
among ourselves in our own self-understanding, | 12:19 | |
our own definitions of the church, | 12:21 | |
to turn our church more outward, to reach, to teach, | 12:24 | |
to preach, to integrate new life into our churches? | 12:28 | |
That would also go for my great concern | 12:32 | |
about the excluding ethnic population in the United States, | 12:34 | |
a population which we, alas, as United Methodists, | 12:38 | |
have not been doing well in reaching. | 12:41 | |
I think that our failure to evangelize | 12:43 | |
both our younger generation | 12:46 | |
and the exploding ethnic population | 12:48 | |
are due in part to the way we have structured ourselves, | 12:51 | |
to the way we have deployed and utilized | 12:55 | |
our clergy, to our failure to undergird | 12:58 | |
the local congregation and reaching out. | 13:02 | |
Now, what can a bishop do to lead, | 13:07 | |
to motivate a church to attain these visions? | 13:10 | |
I think the first thing a bishop can do is to listen, | 13:15 | |
to get down in the local church, | 13:18 | |
to listen to those people there, their frustrations | 13:21 | |
and their dreams, their hopes for our church. | 13:25 | |
This means that we need bishops to be present. | 13:28 | |
During a time of crisis, which I think our church is in, | 13:31 | |
we can't afford absentee bishops. | 13:35 | |
Our bishops, many of them have spent | 13:38 | |
far too much time getting entangled | 13:40 | |
in general church commissions and committees and processes | 13:42 | |
and not enough time in residence | 13:45 | |
working within their annual conference. | 13:47 | |
And I think that is essential, to keep the bishops | 13:50 | |
close to their Episcopal area. | 13:53 | |
A lot of internal work needs to go on | 13:56 | |
so that we can be an external mission. | 13:58 | |
Bishops can preach, and I love to preach. | 14:01 | |
Bishops can teach the faith of the church. | 14:04 | |
A lot of United Methodists say they don't know who they are. | 14:08 | |
There's a crisis of identity. | 14:10 | |
Who are we? | 14:12 | |
What is the basis of the faith? | 14:13 | |
Teaching the faith is important. | 14:15 | |
A bishop can write, and I enjoy doing that, | 14:18 | |
putting one's ideas out before the whole church | 14:21 | |
for examination and discussion. | 14:23 | |
Alas, I think for the past couple of decades, | 14:26 | |
as I have said, at many places, | 14:30 | |
we have been electing managers rather than leaders, | 14:31 | |
managers who merely keep the status quo | 14:36 | |
rather than help the church in dreaming | 14:38 | |
and envisioning and moving forward. | 14:41 | |
Well, I think a bishop should be a person of ideas, | 14:44 | |
a person who is in constant interaction with the church | 14:48 | |
about how to make our most lively future. | 14:50 | |
What is my vision for the United Methodist Church? | 14:55 | |
Well, I'm hopeful. | 14:59 | |
I've been critical of our church, | 15:00 | |
and some have criticized me for my criticism, | 15:02 | |
but I want to assure you that my criticism of our church | 15:04 | |
arises from my deep love and faith in United Methodism. | 15:08 | |
We've got a wonderful church | 15:14 | |
and a wonderful way of going at ministry. | 15:15 | |
The United Methodist Church, from our Wesleyan roots, | 15:19 | |
inherits the idea that the church exists | 15:23 | |
to take part in Christ's service to the world. | 15:26 | |
Therefore, at our best, everything, | 15:31 | |
clergy, laity, the structure of the church, | 15:33 | |
everything is subordinate to mission. | 15:35 | |
What works is what's good. | 15:38 | |
We are practical people. | 15:40 | |
I believe, from my travels about our connection, | 15:43 | |
that we are turning the corner | 15:45 | |
on now a couple of decades of denial, | 15:47 | |
that we are at last ready to confront some tough issues. | 15:51 | |
We're ready to dream and to revision. | 15:55 | |
It's hard to imagine an organization like ours | 15:59 | |
that has lost 20% of its constituency | 16:02 | |
and much of its giving power in the past two decades, | 16:05 | |
where we have not made really one fundamental change. | 16:09 | |
I believe we're turning a corner on that, | 16:15 | |
and we are ready to move forward. | 16:17 | |
People are looking for voices of change, | 16:19 | |
of innovation, of new thinking. | 16:23 | |
People are looking for ideas. | 16:26 | |
And I find it exciting to be part of that change, | 16:28 | |
and would welcome the opportunity to help lead | 16:33 | |
in what I think may be | 16:37 | |
one of our greatest decades of United Methodism. | 16:39 | |
Thank you. | 16:45 |