In less than two weeks (Monday, February 28), we will be gathering together for our first regular, quarterly worship arts workshop as an entire ministry area (see article on back page). You can view them as an on-campus mini-retreat, with the three-fold emphasis being teaching and training (stronger), socialization (closer), and vision- casting (further). In most cases, as in this first one, we will begin with a meal together (our attempt to grow wider). This usually will be provided, so fret not. We will include some round table discussion questions to help you get to know each other better. After eating, we will move into some form of instruction or inspiration. This month we will watch a powerful video called Indescribable, which celebrates our God as the Master Artist. You won’t want to miss it! Finally, we will conclude our time together with some group discussion on the “so what’s?” or “now what’s?” of what we have learned. Every member of the worship and arts ministry is invited, including singers,instrumentalists, actors, writers, technicians, etc.
You might be asking yourself why is this necessary? Don’t we already have opportunities for this? Yes, we do have a yearly retreat in the fall, but it is often a working retreat preparing Christmas music or the like, and it is decidedly tilted toward the choir. We have fellowship opportunities and prayer support at our Sunday morning communities, but again, we routinely have only a small percentage of the entire ministry, and we are always
pressed for time.
By choosing to intentionally invest three hours a quarter in the form of a mini-retreat, we give everyone a chance, apart from the work of their ministry, to rediscover what binds us together as a team, builds us up, and sends us out again. As your pastor in this area of ministry, I cannot emphasize strongly enough how important I think these gatherings will be to help unify us and strengthen our ministry to Hope and beyond. We need each other, and we need to discover together how each part of the ministry contributes to the whole. Paul wrote about this in his first letter to the Corinthians, a church which, by the way, was not doing unity OR community very well. This was his very practical, yet powerful, illustration:
Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body.
The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor… If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it. Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.
My prayer is that each of you will prioritize this quarterly event by making a place for it on your calendar, attending, and coming ready to fully engage and invest yourself for the work God is doing. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. See you there!
-tad
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