I remember press coverage of a “private” conversation between world leaders at a G8 summit a few years back where our (then) prime minister complained about the lack of thinking time and the relentless unceasing mill of meetings and decisions. There was no opportunity to pause or reflect or to gather evidence before setting events in motion, and as the leaders talked they each revealed a longing for space to reflect and consider.
The opportunity to reflect, pray, listen, seek vision, and plan a change of direction is a priceless luxury, more common for clergy where a pattern or policy of sabbatical is well-established. For administrators though, lockdown has taken us to one of two places. Many have found themselves furloughed, and probably therefore aren’t even able to receive this or read it. Many others though have found demands and pressures on their time to have doubled, and even mixed up with child-care and all sorts of unexpected and incompatible expectations.
If you have been granted furlough – think, pray, reflect, relax, enjoy time with family, read, garden, paint, forgive, explore, and learn. Now is a perfect opportunity to access to the UCAN Communications material we’ve just posted online this week – learning and self-study is encouraged within furlough arrangements, as it keeps you sharp and equips you for the period ahead.
If demands upon you have increased, this does not mean they are reasonable or that expectations of others have settled in the right place. As this lockdown period trundles inexorably onwards, it is even more important that we model balance and sustainability, not exhaustion and burnout.
For all our churches, now is a good time to let ministries and some of our “good works” drop and not necessarily restart. At the UCAN national conference in February, Andy Bagwell reminded us about the Lego church whose motto was “everything is awesome” – characterised by the incremental addition of multiple ministries, until the point that it was clear that everything was anything but awesome.
This virus has just delivered a perfect way of stopping everything. Let us not allow our default position to be attempting to restart everything.
The persecuted church are way ahead on doing church without being able to meet in public areas, and can’t even enjoy open communication or advertising. They have not been able to meet for years and are well practised at being devoted to an empowered by God in the equivalent of lockdown. Who is to say that our previous ways were right?
So, let us not rush to try and restore what once was. The reality is that we may not be able to meet again until January. We need new processes, new flows, and a new church. Throughout history, God has changed civilisations through bringing Christians into service of their communities at the place where it is hurting most. In the midst of wars, disasters and plagues, it is Christians who God has called to serve those who are hurting, and it is in that costly service that God arrives in might.
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
James 1:27
Consider the “widows and orphans”. In our context these are people in our community hardest hit and the most disadvantaged. Focus the church on meeting their needs – in food distribution, money advice, social care, practical help – it is always God’s desire and always the opposite of where the world heads.
As we are not allowed to meet as church together in numbers, aim not to head back to where we all started from – but for a new interim period. What could be put in place while we can’t meet? What opportunities are there to use the space you steward differently in a new way? A foodbank? A money advice clinic? Seek out those who are able to serve and provide them with resources and a framework to follow as God calls them. Think of ministry shapes which have small numbers of people or a one-by-one model.
We have a perfect opportunity to ensure that nothing begins unless it passes criteria of safety; renegotiated resources in terms of space and funds; that has the right people in place with the appropriate skills; and a clarity on goals and accountability for them.
Setting a fixed timescale for a review to enable a point of closure, reshaping or for increase and promotion, is key to enabling you to prevent a return to the Lego church syndrome.
Stop the world? It happened… Allow God to create your church anew, and take your time. You have all the time in the world.
Julian Mander
Executive Director, on behalf of the UCAN team