You may not know this about me, but I am currently working at a federated American Baptist and United Church of Christ Church as a Presbyterian USA Pastor. I love living into this interdenominational reality. Trying to figure out what we have in common of One Baptism, One Table, One Christ. I find it beautiful. I think one of the best places that prepared me for this ministry is NEXT Church
It is probably not a coincidence that I became a board member about the same time I started my ministry at Emmanuel Friedens–the Holy Spirit knows what she is doing.
NEXT Church is one of those spaces that continues to transition as time goes on. I have been attending NEXT for about 13 years. It is a place that continues to wrestle with the questions of what it means to be the church today—but uniquely it does this with hope and joy and for the church at all levels. The mantra NEXT church is trying to live into is that it is better together, therefore anyone who is involved at NEXT church at any level is NEXT church. We are NEXT church. It is more of a movement than an institution.
It certainly felt that way when at NEXT church that the ramification of the Gay marriage amendment passing broke. I’ll never forget that day—Diana Butler Bass was speaking. I was sitting up in the balcony, and we all got text alerts about it. No one was able to hear a word about what she was saying, because the news was so exciting. I was livetweeting the conference and asked if someone was going to interrupt her and announce the news. NEXT church is kind of laid-back, so it seemed hard for anyone in the hall to break in. Finally, I realized I was in a good position. I raised my hand and said “Excuse me Diana, I hate to interrupt, but we just got the news that gay marriage was ratified for our denomination can marry, and we are all distracted by the good news, everyone can marry.” Diana said, “Congratulations, this Episcopalian, welcomes you.” Note this delightful interdenominational interaction! And the entire hall erupted in applause. More Light and Covenant Network had planned a reception for that that evening and what had initially meant to be a small gathering practically the entire conference came out to celebrate, many of them ordering “the Presbyterian” which the bartenders no doubt quickly learned how to make.
NEXT church is not place for clergy to gather at the mountaintop and go just in hope. It is trying to meet all of the congregation as we figure out this thing of if the church is not existing as it is now, what then will it be? That is what the Already Not Yet national gathering of Next is coming together to contemplate—not to provide all of the answers, but to give time and space to be the church together, both now and for the future. The pathways are for all people doing all the work that is the church, because this is who we are.
If you have had a conversation with me about the greater church you have probably heard me say “I’m excited about where the church is going.’ It seems like a strange thing to say at this time, but the church was and is always meant to be a movement for the marginal, it was never meant to be for the rich and powerful. Right now people don’t go to the small town church for prestige or honor. The people who come are attracted by community and through a hunger for something more. We are the church together, God is planting the seeds so that we can be enough of a movement to do God’s work in the world. The buildings and pews are just dressing, the people are the heart of God’s love.
That something more is what is being addressed by the current Pathways for Next Church. There is the self explanatory Community Organizing, One about the Goals of your ministry called: More Than Good Intentions, there is the much in demand Communal Trauma track, there is the one I think I’m going to land on Art as Trauma (my mom and I had a long discussion that she forgot that writing was art), and NEXT church’s pathway about measuring progress other than through membership and money (or butts and bucks) called Cultivated Ministry. I hope you consider joining me in November 11-14th in Grand Rapids, MI. The cost is $499 and includes some meals. If you do not have a Continuing Ed budget, it is reduced to $299. There is a hotel deal as well and of course if you convince a friend to come, you can share a room. If you do not have young children like me, perhaps you can drive out and reduce costs more. The information is here https://nextchurch.net/national-gathering/2025-grand-rapids-mi/
Without community there is no liberation-Audre Lorde
NL and RCL covers Elijah going to the Widow of Sidon during the drought. She says “I don’t know why YOUR God sent you here, I have but one meal left for my son and I and then we will die.” She talks about the pain, loneliness and shame of having nothing. Elijah then asks–“Do you have a cup of water?” and she agrees (I like to think begrudgingly as a tough woman) that she does.
Over this established Table Fellowship and Hospitality Elijah offers pastoral care to a widow. I like to think that as she opens her heart to him, she feels seen and heard, and she realizes that the table fellowship was a moment of openness that was just the beginning of a beautiful friendship. He then says that if they establish a community, that she, her son and he will not run out of the oil, meal/flour (and one would think Elijah would then help to gather the wood to cook them).
Mutual aid works because people who have little share what they have and form strong bonds of community. Community is formed here hospitality, pastoral care, table fellowship and mutual aid, among foreigners of different races, religions, genders, and socio-economic statuses. Community is not just about leadership, but about what the people do to help one another along the way, in the times of trouble when the leadership was terrible Elijah and the widow formed community. This is the work, the hope and the blessing that is before us. 1 Kings 17:8-16
People often romanticize “being in community” without realizing community is formed and sustained through reciprocity—fulfilling mutual obligations to one another—and that this is sometimes inconvenient and often taxing! But your can’t receive support without offering it! by Baena@Silkyyy with thanks to decolonizing.love on Facebook for the images
Feel free to use/share/adapt with credit to Pastor Katy Stenta, “KatyandtheWord”
Quick Taking Justice Making Boundary-Breaking Twitter
A Prayer for the Communities Built across the Alphabet Semi-Anonymous Honesty
A Prayer for the Screw Around And Finding Out The Trying to be Cultural relevant And yet still Yourself
Here’s a Prayer for Doom Scrolling Joy Seeking & Screaming into the Void That is Twitter
Here’s a Prayer for all Trolls on Twitter, Because I’m supposed to Prayer for my enemies May your teeth ache, and May those who hate humanity and those who harm children never sleep through the night
Here’s a Prayer for Twitter Pure Humanity: Bringing the Best and Worst of Humanity Rambling Dictator, Hating Nazi Compassionate Crowdfunding, Diverse Perspectives, Unknown Depths of Learning
Here’s a Prayer for Twitter Here’s a Prayer for Humans May we take the good and leave the bad
And may capitalism and millionaires Princes and powers and principalities perish and love and compassion and food and medicine and housing and creativity and arts endure forever
Amen.
Feel free to use/adapt/share with credit to Pastor Katy Stenta
Sometimes I wonder if you want to just be friends, When I hear the rather cringy Jesus is my lover Christian rock songs filter over my neighbor’s fence, into my yard and I see the latest news of extremists rallying for or against things in your Holy name–I think of how you used to walk, with Noah in the garden, and just hang out.
I think about Jesus, and how much he loved to go to friend’s house a grab a meal, or wash their feet or chill under a tree. I think about how the relationships Jesus sought the most were friendships, and how Jesus cultivated those Like the gardener he was.
I think about the Holy Spirit, How she is an encourage, inspirer, and comforter and that I love to picture her in a room of artists or an anonymous group or on the grass with students who are doing nothing coaxing the miracles of communication and consensus building community, wherever she goes.
I think about our friendship God, How sometimes I’m mad, sometimes we talk Sometimes we do not
And you get it either way.
And I love that you value friendship, because truly you created us because you value companionship.
It’s so beautiful God.
Thanks buddy.
Amen.
Feel free to use/adapt/share with credit to Pastor Katy Stenta
Call to Confession: God is here, to listen, always. Come let us confess ourselves to God.
Prayer of Confession: God we confess that sometimes we feel like we are in competition with fellow Christians, or that our work is not good enough, or that we do not know how to be evangelists for your faith. In truth, we do not often agree with people who call themselves Christians, and we do not know what to do with that. We confess, that we do not really believe that all good works will somehow be brought into fruition in Christ. Help us: to keep at it, to have courage, to take joy in the work and to keep teaching and praying. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.
Assurance of Pardon: God’s Love is from everlasting to everlasting. Let us live into the assurance of the truth: In Jesus Christ you are forgiven.
Prayer of the Day/Dedication: May we go into the world thanking God every time we think of one another, and knowing that the good works that have begun here will be brought into completion by Jesus Christ. Amen.
Hymns: Every Time I Feel the Spirit, I Love the Lord Who Heard My Cry, Lord I Wanna Be A Christian In My Heart, O God Our Faithful God, If Thou But Trust in God to Guide Me, Just As I Am Without One Plea
With Children: How do you know prayers are answered? Talk through about what praying for another person is, and what to do when prayers are answered and when they aren’t. Talk about God’s perspective versus the human perspective.
I think it is amazing that Jesus gets the man to name his demon…or the demon to name itself before Jesus expelled it from the poor man.
How many times do we need to name our demons before we can get rid of them? If it’s something that is (typically) smaller like jealousy or self-righteousness or something all encompassing like mental illness or addiction, so often we humans need to name a problem before we can even work on it.
And don’t we all have demon voices, terrible self-erasing voices in our heads twisting the way we see the world.
Whether they are the kind of demons that self-aggrandize (though I don’t think that is this demon’s way) telling us that we are better than everyone else, telling us we deserve more than others, dismissing others as meaningless, insignificant (or worse of all) dehumanizing them so that we don’t have to care for each other. There are strong echoes of the need for Anti-racists and Anti-Terf and Anti-Ageist work across the board. It’s the voice that tells us we are better Christians (or patriots or workers or whatever) and don’t need to listen to anybody else. Martin Luther King Jr looked towards the humanization of all people and basic humans rights, beyond the dehumanizing results of institutions and systems the include the church and capitalism and nationalism.
Or there is if it is the demon voice that points out every one of our anxieties and failings. It harps on our imperfections and plays our mistakes on repeat in our heads. It gets us to focus on all that is wrong with us and the world so that we cannot hear the voice of God anymore. We devalue ourselves, and can no longer see ourselves as the image of God.
Demons dehumanize.
They erase and X out our names and existence (Madeline L’engle covers this well in her Time Quartet)
When I hear the story of the man tormented by legion–even though no details are given as to how they are making him feel and act crazy only the side effects. When I hear he can’t stand still, and he is driven to live alone, uncleanly with the dead. When I hear that he is cast out as better to be with the dead than the living. I have no trouble hearing those doubting and harping demons in this man’s mind.
In essence that is what the Screwtape Letters is about. The demon has the human focus on the high pitch voices, the gum smacking neighbor and the squeaking shoe fidgeted until these people are no longer seen as community but as annoyances, and all of church is seen as annoying and there is no room to focus on God.
But when we name these problems in our lives, when we lift up our imperfections and sins for prayer, when we ask for support from others and talk about our insecurities. Then people can help us to name all that we did do that day, and how our imperfections are small compared to being a beloved child of God. They lift up that people care for us even when we make mistakes. And remind us of our friends and neighbors good qualities even when (especially when) they are driving us to distraction.
Maybe then it is no surprise that Jesus restores the Gerasenes Man to his community. I do not think it is about if this man is good enough to follow Jesus, nor about his will to follow for he wants to follow Jesus. I think that Jesus has decided that to complete the healing, this man needs to be restored to his community–so he says “god back to your friends…” The community that hopefully can counter the years of bad and do a better job of nurturing and supporting this man. And I hope we as the church can do the same.
I look over as I raise my glass, the bread has been swallowed individually, because we are all individuals in Christ, and there is Westley, 7 years old and dead serious.
“This is the blood of the New Covenant, Friends, drink ye all of it” I pronounce. Westley holds his cup as steady as he can…and then he drinks it and we drink it.
And Westley tastes God.
Watching my autistic son take communion, being soothed by its ritual, experiencing the taste of the liturgy in community in a way the wordy-words of the sermon and even the half-warbled hymns from his throat doesn’t.
Westley loves church, because he knows he is loved. He knows he is accepted. Working on body language, empathy & instinct, Westley will run from the room if he feels unwanted. He knows. This little boy who doesn’t sit, not even in front of his beloved electronics without fiddling or bouncing or squishing. Sits solemnly throughout service. participating not just with the community, but as a part of it.
But this is his church, this is his space, he is growing up here. And for a little boy who has a lot of trouble speaking and understanding words, the bread and the cup (grape juice) speak to him.
For Westley, Communion is community, its love, its ritual, its sensational in all the right ways. Communion is the taste of God, the one-ness with humanity. Seeing Westley take Communion is holy ground, because we ask God to be present, and miraculously, God is there. God is in the little boy who carefully picks his bread from the platter, and eats it, waiting for the cup to be raised, so we can drink it, as communion.
katyandtheword 