A Call to Arms

Ok … it has been a feisty day … this is a feisty post … you have been warned.

The class I am currently in feels like a waste of my time, to the extent of what I was expecting it to be. What has come out of it is chatting with my fellow students during the course of the class about this denomination that I’m about to enter, which has not been a waste of time. What my classmates and I have discovered is that none of us agree except on the issue of scripture. Once we start to interpret it … everything gets a little fuzzy. (or at least this is my point of view … and I have fuzzy logic to begin with … I warned you.)

What we are kinda finding out is that we all have calls to the denomination, but not so much the ‘How’ and in some cases the ‘Why’ with not much of a response. As much as I have come to love questions I found myself in conversation with a classmate after class and finding out how much I value the opinions of others, not only presently but in the sense that as I’m going forward in ministry I’m going to be dealing with this beast of polity, red tape, and theological differences with these same people. And that these people who I call my friends, are going to become my peers and colleagues in steering this religious denomination that literally spans the world. Intimidating … yes. Doable … I dunno but I think we are going to find out. But I would rather have my friends at the table on whichever side of the argument than be fighting with and against people who I have no relationship with. I can ‘work’ with people I don’t know, but that doesn’t mean I like it. One because I normally function like a blunt instrument in direct confrontation, which has the ability to rub people the wrong way; and second because I respond better if someone blunt-instruments me back (read instruments as a verb).

There is another soapbox that I need to get up on, but I think for now I’ll finish here. My friends who read this I hope you take the following statement to heart. I’m of the mind to give our denomination a good looking at and challenge some things that I don’t really like, or I wish they would do better. I’m not asking you to pick one side over another on whatever may come, but to pick one and stand. And if by chance you want to lead I will stand, with or against, but I will stand.