The Time to be the Church

by the Rev. Darrel Peterson
Assistant to the Bishop in the Southeastern Synod

My brother sent me an email a few days ago informing me that the country church where we grew up, has determined to disband on June 19 of this year. It wasn’t really surprising. The filled church of our youth has become a small gathering of the remaining faithful. I’m not aware that there is any conflict and folks aren’t trying to leave the denomination. But the part-time retired pastor has really retired and the heating system has given up the ghost. Area demographics tell the story. It’s time. Norunga Lutheran Church was organized by Swedish immigrants in western Minnesota 140 years ago. Thanks be to God!

I do have a stake in this faith community. This is where I was baptized and confirmed. This is where I was nurtured in the faith. The adjacent cemetery, where we used to play after church, is where my family is interred. Would you believe, my parents, an infant brother, two sets of grandparents, four sets of great grandparents, and a host of other relatives. And I am aware that I am a part of the living legacy of this ministry.

Recently I represented our Synod at a “Giving Thanks” event on the Southside of Atlanta. St Timothy Lutheran Church in Forest Park, Georgia, has ended her ministry and this was a celebrative gathering to disburse funds and furnishings to church and community entities. No amounts of these final gifts were publically announced and one by one, grateful beneficiaries came to the podium to receive checks and items. There was emotion. There was affirmation of significant past ministry. Many of the speakers talked about the legacy this stewardship event was providing. And as you might expect, the event ended with a spread of food and good fellowship.

In my remarks, I alluded to my recent visit to some Early Church sites in Turkey; places like Nicea and Ephesus. We saw remarkable and fascinating ruins, but we didn’t find evidence of any current church members. The ministries there had been completed long ago. But what legacies! We envisioned the bishops from all over christendom gathering to construct the Nicene Creed in the church at Nicea. We could reference the words of Paul as he traveled to Ephesus and to the many other New Testament communities.

As we gather in these days of extreme significance leading up to Holy Week and Easter, we can be reminded that it is God and his saving grace that are eternal…it is not our venues of ministry. I am certainly not advocating that we assertively close churches. But I am reminding us that now is our time to be the church. One hundred years from now, perhaps 10 years from now, we might be history. The ministry of Christ is a dynamic enterprise. We need to be progressively clear about our mission and faithful to being modern day disciples. Just because we are a church on Ash Street, doesn’t mean we will always be a church on Ash Street.

Sometimes when churches close, we have to conclude that we have failed to be Christ’s church. Other times, when circumstances necessitate, it is just time to say “mission completed”. Thanks be to God!