God's Shalom Endeavor

The arc of the biblical story shows us a God who relentlessly acts to restore all of creation. At the center of that "shalom endeavor" story is Jesus' life, death and resurrection.

Pastor Article, MennoNotes , November 2009:

We gather as a community and worship on Sunday mornings in order to become more like our Lord Jesus Christ and actively participate with God in God’s restorative mission in the world. Our worship is both vertical—connecting with God, and horizontal—being the people of God. 

In the vertical dimension we offer God praise, we pray, and listen to God’s Word. Horizontally, we introduce guests, share and pray as a congregation, sing, and hear the message. Both the dimensions of knowing and being with God are experienced. 

One of the ways that we worship as the people of God—the horizontal dimension of actively joining God in God’s mission in the world—is hearing from each other in our Ministry Moments. Ministry Moments help us share how different persons or groups in our congregation are living in ways that reflect Jesus Christ and are helping God in God’s work in the world. 

Sometimes we feature ministries that are part of our church’s programming, such as Family Fun Nights, retirement communi-ties we support, or Mennonite Disaster Service trips. Other times we feature ways that members of our congregation are personally active for God in their lives as professionals or volunteers, such as a summer theatre program at the Lincoln Correctional Center, hosting international students, or a personal service trip overseas. 

Sometimes horizontal dimension of our worship (of Ministry Moments, for example) is disturbing. We are made aware of needs in the world which remind us that there is suffering, hurt, abuse, violence, and need in our world, and with our creation. Being pre-sented with the disturbing parts of what it means to be active followers of Jesus when we are in worship can be jarring. It can be extra hard if one especially treasures worship for its vertical dimension, and having an inspirational encounter with God as the Sunday morning experience. 

Worship is planned with both dimensions in mind. As someone has said, where the two dimensions intersect, there is the cross. We will find that Sunday morning worship is both for personal connection with God, and for communal engagement. Sometimes these will be inspirational and reveal to us comforting aspects of God; other times they will be disturbing and present to us conviction or challenge. Both experiences are part of what it means to become more like our Lord Jesus Christ in order to actively participate in God’s mission to love and restore the world.           

Pastor Jane Roeschley