On plants and planting

August 27, 2010

It’s been nearly a month since 50 of us labored in the 100 degree heat at Vollentine Elementary School.  We planted plants mostly.  Azaleas.  Arbevidas.  In the digging, weeding and planting of the exhausted weekend gardeners we prayed that the school would be a haven for the students that would begin classes 10 days later.  And so, alongside the hostas, we planted prayers.

This weekend Alan & Pam May will be spending their first night in their new rental home in the Vollintine Evergreen neighborhood.  This weekend Living Hope is planting people in the community to follow the prayers that were planted weeks earlier.

Prayers and People.  That’s what we’re planting.  And in the middle of it all Living Hope is asking God to continue planting – that after more prayers and more people, that its a church that gets planted.  That is why, a month ago, we sweated in the 100 degree heat.

Grappling with Racism

August 2, 2010

Racism, in many ways, is America’s original sin; the effects of which have oftentimes filtered into churches and subsequently crippled our witness to an unbelieving world. Memphis has consistently been at the center of the struggle for racial justice and racial reconciliation. In June, Living Hope entered that struggle via an initial conversation about race, ethnicity and the Bible. Facilitated by Eli Morris from Hope Pres., Living Hopers shared frankly, graciously and honestly about their experiences with race and racism. Living Hopers shared about being discriminated against, their frustrations over the role race plays in politics and moving accounts of raising children in a racially charged environment.

These conversations are not easy. They are not comfortable, but they are necessary. As we continue to minister and plant churches in Memphis, it is important that we have these conversations and that we root ourselves in the stories of the Bible that deal with cultural division and point a way forward on the road to reconciliation. As those reconciled to God, we are given the ministry of reconciliation; we’re agents of reconciliation walking with people as they take steps of reconciliation towards God and then towards people – especially those with whom we have historically been at odds.

There are dreams I dream for our church. I dream of us being a church that mobilizes people to reach the nations and spark church planting movements among the unreached and least reached. I dream of us being a church that cares deeply and compassionately for the poor. And I dream of us being a church that stares courageously into teeth of racially divided city and proclaims a gospel of reconciliation and gives illustration to its power. I shared many of these dreams two years ago, not long after I moved to Memphis and joined Living Hope. I’m still dreaming. Only now, I see that many of you have those same dreams. That’s why you crowded into the Studdard’s home in June. That’s why many of you are going through the Bible & Race Curriculum in your small group. That’s why some of you have gone to the Civil Rights Museum recently.

Let’s continue to dream dreams. And let’s work under God’s leadership to see those dreams make their way into reality.

-watson