Hello Church!

It has been a mild week here in Southern California as Debbie and I enjoy time with the California grandsons, time with good friends, and dreaming about the future. This two-and-one-half-week period of working remotely is a time for me to recharge, reboot, and reframe the work you continue to call me to do. The next six months of my interim service with you will be full of more changes and challenges. Between the beginning of February and the end of July, I hope to accomplish three major goals:

Establish a preaching team, so that the collective ministry of the Word on Sunday mornings at Blooming Glen isn’t a monologue, but a multi-voiced proclamation of the Gospel that gives us multiple perspectives on transparent, faithful, and effective Christian discipleship. To that end Josh Meyer, former teaching pastor at Franconia Mennonite Church and currently on staff with Everence Financial, will serve in a preaching role at Blooming Glen for a seven-month experiment. This is an initial step in the process of creating a lineup of preachers who collaborate with worship planners and each other to deepen our lived understanding of the good news of Jesus.
Onboard new staff and further align current staff job descriptions, so that the collaborative ministries of staff, elders, and core ministry leaders is nurtured and strengthened. Elders provide spiritual counsel for core ministry efforts through intercession, discernment, and conversation. Staff provide coaching and administrative expertise for ministry efforts by recruiting, equipping, deploying, and supporting core ministry leaders who are hearing and answering God’s call by establishing sound process for implementing ministry, creating abundant communication about ministry, generating healthy decision-making about ministry, and assessing costs of doing ministry. Additional staff, supporting the various parts of the Sunday morning experience and the ongoing engagement with the neighborhood, need to be identified and brought into the efforts we are undertaking to work together and honor one another’s calling to use our spiritual gifts to grow more deeply in our experience of Jesus, to love one another with radical candor, and to serve our neighbors.
Benchmark our discipleship values, so that we know better what we are working on together … and why we are working together in this way. In every other area of life, we measure what we treasure, and we treasure what we measure – until, it would seem, we go to church. It is important to seek ways to align the impressions we feel about the church with accurate data about the values which are vital and important to resilient health as a household of faith. How do we know we are doing the work of nurturing a Jesus-centered identity, finding belonging together, and living into God’s reconciling purposes well? It will take more refined and granular data that “bottoms in benches and bucks in baskets.” While these are important measures, they do not tell us the whole story of our efforts at living out the simple and non-resistant faith that looks for the blessed hope, Jesus Christ. Having a well-crafted set of measurements that are shared with the leadership systems of governance (CLB) and asset management (Foundations) for analysis and policy making, and shared among the Elders, Staff, and Core Ministry Leaders, to provide common direction will keep us moving together and moving forward as a congregation.

As I lead us at working on these three goals, I am optimistic we will experience God’s invitation to embrace a greater joy at being the church together – finding greater coherence in faith we confess, truly caring deeply and challenging directly, and being more and more generous to our neighbors near and far. I am also optimistic that God will lead in pivoting us toward deeper faith-filled friendships in our neighborhoods as we serve with love, wed peace and justice, and eventually get over our allergic reactions to evangelism.

There’s a lot to do in the next six months. Sisters and brothers, I’m looking forward to the journey.

More will be revealed,
Pastor Jeff
jeff@bgmc.net

Dear Blooming Glen Friends,

Twenty-three months ago, Debbie and I arrived in Southeast Pennsylvania to snow on the ground and snowballs hurled in my direction (yes, Michael Bishop, I still remember …). In these twenty-three months, you have asked me as an intentional interim to focus on three challenges: to preach the best sermons I can, to bring cohesion and direction to our church staff, and to align our leadership systems for greater transparency, effectiveness, and faithfulness. I’m sure I haven’t done those things perfectly, but to the best of my ability, I’ve been attentive to those concerns. Thank you for the privilege you have given me in working at those issues with you.

Deb and I will return to California on January 9 for 2.5 weeks of grandsons, warmer weather, home repairs, scoping out possible service projects for our MYF, and retooling for the next six months of interim ministry. Over the period from February 1 to July 31, I’ll be working to accomplish five core tasks.

First, we are adding preaching capacity at Blooming Glen. Josh Meyer, from Everence, will be engaged in a preaching experiment at Blooming Glen. He will be preaching at Blooming Glen once a month for the next seven months. His first Sunday will be January 14. Please welcome him warmly and receive his ministry with the same grace you have received my ministry among you. On January 21, Nathan and Kate Grieser will lead worship and speak. Lord willing, I’ll be back for Sunday, January 28.

Second, we are going to be on-boarding new staff at Blooming Glen. I don’t know who that new staff is, just yet, but whether the new staff is serving as a called pastor or as program coordinators, they will still need some on-boarding. We have some new nomenclature, and new clarity in leadership systems and core ministries. With the added preaching capacity at Blooming Glen, I’ll be able to be more active with staff coaching and on-boarding than I have been over the last twelve months.

Third, we are going to establish some yardsticks to measure how transparent, effective, and faithful we are at living into our values as disciples of Jesus. How are we doing at inviting people into the transforming grace of Jesus? How are we doing at genuinely and radically loving one another in the way of Jesus? How are we doing at serving our neighbors near and far as the hands and feet of Jesus? These discipleship behaviors invite us to find ways to measure our improvement and plan accordingly.

Fourth, we want to keep working at renewing the joy of being church. Coming out of a long season of stress, and continuing to confront a world of post-Christendom, chronic COVID and digital Babylon, we need the church to be a focal point of celebration. Church is designed by God to be the place where we find joy in a Jesus-centered identity, in a Jesus-led community, and in a Jesus-shaped mission.

Fifth, we want to continue to pivot to the neighborhood. We’ve begun the process of reaching out again post-pandemic. Now we need to begin to figure out how to hold events that invite and welcome new people into the congregation. Watch this space for information later in January about a membership class during Lent, to draw us into closer fellowship and increased membership.

There is still much to do in my time as Intentional Interim Pastor at Blooming Glen Mennonite Church. There are, as the poet Robert Frost said, “miles to go before I sleep.” Debbie and I are off to California, not for vacation, but for a season of remote working and retooling for the next push. Pray for us!

It’s a joy to be a part of the Blooming Glen Household of Faith,

Pastor Jeff
jeff@bgmc.net

PS - Friends, I’ll be at the Broad Street Grind on Friday, January 5, 3:30-4:45 pm. I’ll be at the A&N Diner on Monday, January 7, 7:30-8:45 am (weather permitting!), and then Debbie and I will be back in Riverside, California, January 9-27. I’ll be back at the A&N on Monday, January 28. And I’ll miss y’all where we are back in California.