The Rector’s Annual Meeting Address

I begin with a personal note.

 I am so grateful for all of you. Last night Ann and I were talking about just how amazing you all are . . . every one of you. So let me begin by saying thank you. 

As you are aware, this has been a difficult several years for the Paddock family as our daughter Jessye lives more deeply into the grip of an unrelenting disease that goes by the name of Mixed Connective Tissue Disorder. Your prayers, concern, understanding, and support help to sustain us as we walk through this dark valley. Thank you.

And now to other matters.

So much in our lives is focused on numbers. Statistics tell us how we’re doing in so many areas of life: unemployment, healthcare, energy consumption and so on. The state of the economy is measured by Dow Jones, Nasdeq, S&P 500. 

This is true for the Church as well. We measure membership, ASA (Average Sunday Attendance), number of services, baptisms, confirmations, income, expenses. We compare the numbers year-by-year and we track the trends. That’s important work and, on one level, it’s good to know where we stand.

You’ve heard the reports. You know that income is down – expenses are up – your staff’s salaries are stagnant – total pledge numbers and amounts are declining. It’s hardly any comfort to know that what we’re experiencing is happening all around this country – even in many of the mega-churches.

It is very easy – watching the decline in the numbers – to fear that we’re dying – that Christ Church, Dayton, is on the slippery slope and that the end is inevitable. We might fear that God’s work in this place is finished. 

Speaking of numbers, I know that the Book of Numbers (the 4^th book in the Old Testament) I know that it may not be high on your reading list, but there’s a story in chapters 13 and 14 that’s instructive. The Hebrews had escaped from Egypt and were wandering around in the wilderness of Sinai. 

Wanting to know what was ahead as they prepared to enter the Promised Land, Moses selected 12 men—one from each of the 12 tribes—to spy out the land of Canaan. And off they went—for 40 days. (There are those numbers again—12 and 40). When they returned they reported to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of Israel that the land was indeed flowing with milk and honey and abundant fruit. Two of the spies, Joshua and Caleb, wanted to organize the people to go at once and occupy the land that God had promised them.

But 10 of the 12 spies said: ‘We’re not able to go up against this people, for they’re stronger than we are.’ So they brought to the Israelites an unfavorable report of the land that they had spied out, saying, ‘The land that we have gone through as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants; and all the people that we saw in it are of great size.”

Then all the congregation raised a loud cry, and the people wept that night.” And they demanded that they find a captain to lead them back to Egypt. They lost their faith that God would be with them; and they continued to wander in the wilderness for another generation.

We, too, have a choice. We can choose to believe that the glory days of Christ Church are in the past when the numbers were better, and that the future will eventually devour us. This is the way of death. For you see, if our vision of life has no compelling vision greater than death, then that is the end. If we believe that no one is interested in the Gospel and the Church, if we believe that people are too difficult to reach, then we limit God ourselves.

Or we can choose to believe that God is still out in front of us, leading us into a future that belongs to him.

Look at the end of Jesus’ own life. Peter denied him, Judas betrayed him, all but one of the 12 ran away. Only John and Jesus’s mother were reported to have been at the foot of the cross. And yet . . . the future was his.

We have many challenges as we nurse along this old Great Lady of First Street. We are still exploring how much of a Capital Campaign to enter into. How long can we reasonably expect to keep her going? Your new Vestry will have to face some of those questions very soon. But God’s work in this city is not done!

As you’ve heard here today, the Trustees of our Endowment have found a way to shore up our finances in a way that allows us time to rethink past assumptions and practices as we discern what God is calling us to do as we go forward . . . perhaps leaner . . .  but smarter and wiser.

In the past few months we have recast the vision for our life together:

The vision of Christ Church is to become an inclusive community that reflects, embraces, and responds to the mystery and challenges of the human condition, in the name of Jesus. 

And we have refined our mission:

Christ Church is called to love and serve God, giving of ourselves as we worship, wrestle with questions of faith and nurture the Christ in all people: the friend and the stranger, the satisfied and the needy, the believer and the unbeliever.

We have a lively group that is working on a new strategic plan with measurable goals for each of the next three years in the areas of worship, community life, outreach and mission, Christian education, and Evangelism. Yes, you heard that right. Evangelism!

We have a story to tell. We have personal stories about how our lives have meaning as a result of our faith and our participation in this community. We also have great stories to share about this extraordinary Christ Church, Dayton, and the saints we have known in the past who’ve inspired us—as well as the saints we still know and associate with on a regular basis. 

Do you know how evangelism works? Here are the numbers (More numbers!) Here are ways that people come to join churches.

• • Meeting special needs (community outreach, counseling, performing weddings etc)    2-5%
• • Walk-ins        2-5%
• • Pastor Attracts Newcomers      2-5%
• • Visitation (everything from knocking on doors to cold-calling in hospitals and hanging out at community centers and events)         2-5%
• • Sunday School         2-5%
• • Evangelistic Series (tent meetings or weeklong preaching series)   2-5%
• • Invitation from friends or relatives    75-95%

The Mormons have found that those 2 guys in white shirts, going around knocking on doors, they get 1 person for every 1000 visited (0.1%). So they’ve changed tactics. They still knock on doors. But they spend more time making friends. Because 50% of their friends eventually join the church. 

One of our goals for this year is to work together on our stories so that when we get a chance to share with family and friends, we’ll be prepared to tell our stories and to invite them to come to church. 

Here is an affirmation of faith for our time and for the challenges we face:

We believe in God,

maker and re-maker of everything that is,

in whom there is always more,

and more to come;

and by whose wonder, work, and will,

even the dead find life.

We believe in God.

 

We believe in Jesus Christ,

maker and re-maker of tables and tales,

in whom the welcome is wide,

the feasting free;

and by whose weeping, words, and wounds,

even the lost are found.

We believe in Jesus Christ.

 

We believe in the Holy Spirit,

maker and re-maker of imagination,

whose eyes see over the horizon,

beyond the end;

and by whose urgency and fire,

even the truth gets told.

We believe in the Holy Spirit.

 

Therefore, we also believe

that everything that lives can be reborn,

all hidden things can come to light,

all broken things can be remade,

the empty larder can be filled,

and promises gone stale and hard

can taste like bread again.

 

And we believe the old, old Story can be told again

to thrill sad hearts like rediscovered love;

that even lost and frightened lambs like us

can be retrieved, restored to courage,

and declare the Truth

that makes the tyrants tumble

and the captives free. (From the blog “Sicut Locutus Est,” An Affirmation of Faith (Trinitarian) 

 

Bishop Carey of North Carolina has said: “If there is a vision of life saturated with love, if there is a vision where there is room for all of us, if there is a vision of life that is good and beautiful, if there is a vision of life – then life can be lived. It is that vision of life, that dream of God, that kingdom of God, that new heaven, that new earth, that has the power to lift us up from the mire and the muck and say, ‘Glory, hallelujah!’”

I am grateful to be one of your priests, and I look forward to discovering the wonders that God has in store for us in the years to come.