Yesterday following worship several tables worth of church members met to determine our bedrock beliefs. Bedrock beliefs are the principles or symbols of faith that matter most in the daily life of congregational participants (Tom Bandy). Each table met to determine up to 7 Bedrock beliefs and following this exercise, we attempted to develop a consensus list.
We did.
Grace. There were other beliefs identified shared, a lot of discussion around the words and beliefs proposed. But when we broke everything down, we came back to one word upon which EVERYONE could agree. Grace.
On one level this represented a sense of frustration for those gathered. With words like Scripture (Word of God), redemption, God is love, etc... thrown out for various reasons (not that these are rejected terms for our church, just that they did not "matter most in our daily lives), we wondered what we had done wrong in light of the fact that we could have up to 7...
And yet, on another level, the time spent was a tremendous success. It is powerful to say that the belief most important to the membership of Crooked Creek Baptist is grace! Webster defines grace as:
unmerited divine assistance given humans for their regeneration or sanctification
a virtue coming from God a state of sanctification enjoyed through divine grace
For those gathered on this Sunday afternoon free from distractions such as Colts football games (they play Monday night) it was a powerful statement about the membership of Crooked Creek Baptist and what we believe to be the most influential concept in the life of our church family.
Grace. This Sunday in our regular worship service, we will be focusing on this powerful word (acutally ,it seems we have been focusing on this word for some time now) as we sing, pray, and think about the grace we have from God.
I am proud to be able to serve a church where Grace, God's unmerited assistance for creation, exists as the most basic building block of our faith.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment