The First Baptist Church of Redlands
TA PE S T RY Woven Together In Love: Colossians 2:2 FEBRUARY 2017
ISSUE No. 2
A MESSAGE FROM PASTOR SHAWN
Stirring the Pot I am not necessarily a cook. I occasionally enjoy the experience of creating something at the stove—I especially enjoy eating what someone has created at the stove. So maybe it is a bit strange that the image of “stirring the pot” is the one that has emerged as I try to explain how I would like for us to begin to understand what God is calling us to do and be as we move into the future. There are processes for “envisioning” that ask all sorts of questions and do all sorts of analyses. They come up with a
“I am suggesting that we begin to stir the pots around our church life. ... As the ingredients blend and the aroma begins to arise we will start to see what comes to the top and how they connect and complement one another.”
vision statement and then a mission statement and then align all of the programs and parts to that vision. What I am suggesting is not completely different from that process but it may be a bit more organic and intuitive. I am suggesting that we begin to stir the pots around our church life. This involves looking at our past and present. It involves listening to the voices within and around and outside of our church. It involves sharing with one another and dreaming together in smaller groups and then bigger ones. It is “stirring the pot” here and then “stirring the pot” there and another one over there. As the ingredients blend and the aroma begins to arise we will start to see what comes to the top and how they connect and complement one another. All of this is bathed and basted in prayer, Bible study and the movement of the Holy Spirit. Though we have been laying the groundwork for this process of envisioning through study and preaching and experiments like “Worship Outside of the Box,” we took another step in the process by having an envisioning work shop with the Christian Education Commission. Pastor Deena reports
more of the particulars of that gathering in her article in this Tapestry. The C.E. Commission is now assigned the task of allowing the work that we have done to “percolate” or “simmer” for a while as we continue to pray and listen to God, each other and voices from inside and outside the church. We will come together again in a couple of months to see where we are and move to the next steps. Meanwhile we will begin similar processes with the other commissions and people related to those areas of ministry within our church—stirring the pot here and stirring that one over there. Though this is not an exhaustive description of the process, hopefully you are beginning to get a picture of how we might ultimately hear the voice of God as we are led to pursue the future that God has for us. We desire to be relevant in our mission as a church and effective in serving God in the world that begins at our doorstep. Please join me in praying and listening. If you have any thoughts or concerns or inspirations, please share them with me. Meanwhile, we stir the pots.