On Sunday we will have (cue epic action movie trailer voice) an “Annual Parish Meeting.” What is that? What do I need to expect? Or, as one of my beloved children have said, doesn’t this “sound boring” to put it bluntly?
More importantly, maybe, for some, is the question of hallowedness: “What does all this ‘business meeting’ stuff have in God’s house —isn’t this why Jesus turned-over the tables on the rulers of the Temple?”
I’ll answer the last question first: In brief, no. Jesus in fact did not over-turn the tables in the Temple because of the temple-rulers care and concern for the right stewardship of his House. Jesus turned them over precisely because they were not stewarding his House well (cf. Matt. 21:12-13; Mk. 11:15-18).
God’s law, in fact, gives provision for exchanges of money as a part of the ritual life of his people (e.g. Ex. 30:11-16; Deut. 14:22-29'; Lev. 27). What makes Jesus so angry is both the way they have (1) turned it into a business that takes advantage of the poor, (2) used the Temple not as a house a prayer for the nations (Is. 56:7; Jer. 7:11; Mk. 11:17) but as a place to feel secure in their self-righteousness, and (3) because they’ve turned it into a “den of thieves” (Matt. 21:13). As Peter Leithart explains, a den is not where thieves go to rob, it’s where they go to hide from the robbing they’ve done. So also, the money-making machinery of the Temple is where the corrupt stewards have gone in order to hide from their moral bankruptcy. One can think of the easy justifications we ourselves might give if we were in their shoes: “Oh, I know I struggle with [insert sin] and I know that this really puts [insert victim of injustice] in a financial bind, but look at the progress we’re making with [insert social or cultural value we’ve made more important than obeying God].”
No, a good reading of the Bible should convince us that God cares very, very much about all of the tedious, business-y, death-and-taxes, things that go on in our lives. God cares about the finances of his House, He cares about the leaders and stewards of his Household, He cares about healthy governance, He cares about protocols and systems that protect people from abuse, He cares about vision and values of the local parish.
Jesus did not overturn tables because he doesn’t care about these things but, rather, because he does.
Now to the first question. What goes on at an (insert epic action movie trailer voice again) “Annual Parish Meeting” and All Saints? A brief synopsis, though the arrangement varies from year to year:
Call to Order; Roll Call.
Everyone matters, you are not cogs in our business meeting, you are a regal heir in this co-regency of ours with Christ).Opening Prayer & a Song of Praise.
What we’re doing here is not outside of worship. It is the form that worship takes when we meet and hold counsel together as a parish.Vision & Values.
We remind ourselves of what we understand our calling at All Saints to be. We look at the map of the pacific, with our islands smack-dab in the middle, and we pray for God to work in us that we might be a part of His Salvation coming to all those who do not know Him in our region.Voting.
We elect, from the body of our parish, new members to sit on our vestry —the body who works with me in the stewardship of the wealth and resources and vision God has entrusted to us at All Saints. (What’s that? You want to know what those meetings are like? Well golly, I’ve got a blog post for you right here on that very subject.)Giving Thanks.
Now we spend some time sharing how God has been good to us, how we have seen him at work in our lives, and giving thanks for all that he has done. And thus we render this meeting as a kind of eucharistic act, a thanksgiving for what God has given us.Vision-casting.
”Wait didn’t we already do this?” Well here we separate ‘vision’ (a thing that does not change) from ‘vision-casting’ which changes as the year changes. Our vision and values don’t have to change each year. What changes each year is the way we live into them, giving them unique expression, placing particular emphases on these or those areas of ministry, growing in this or that direction, etc. The question we seek to gain unity on under this heading is “how is God calling us to live into our vision this year?”Results of Voting & Prayer.
The results of the vote are announced and the new vestry members are welcomed and prayed-over.Financial Report.
God cares about money. Think I’m wrong? Go and read the first three gospels (Matthew Mark and Luke) in full and then come back and tell me he doesn’t spend a whole lot of time discussing money. But, you’ll also notice, the way Jesus speaks about money is not how we speak about money, often, in contemporary society. At All Saints we don’t care about “money” in the abstract. We care about money in the very unique, gospel-oriented way that Jesus cares about it: the way it is being used to sustain the mission and worship of God.Wardeness’ Report.
The head of the vestry (sometimes a Warden, sometimes a Wardenness) gives a report measuring the “vitals” of the parish. Brief and punchy.Rector’s Report.
The rector gives a report on the spiritual and missional “vitals” of the parish. Also brief and punchy.Small-group Prayer.
We break into small groups and spend time in prayer together and for one another about where God is calling us to labor in the kingdom in the year to come. We bgin this time by asking, “Where do you feel like God is calling you to be a part of the work of the Kingdom, in this small portion of it at All Saints?” We share how we can pray, we lay hands on one another, we pray.Closing Prayer & Benediction.
We close, we are ‘collected’, in a communal prayer by a member of the vestry; and then we are sent-out on mission by either the rector or one of the assisting priests. We go forth from the meeting as a host, arrayed in white, diademed with slavation, and crowned with God’s loving promise to be with us, even to the end of the age (Matt. 28:20), and we go into the world in the power of the Spirit. A good church meeting should make us more missional, not less.
I look forward, as I always do, to our annual meeting this coming Sunday. I hope, really and truly, with all my heart, to see you there.