Table of Contents
- Lenten Spiritual Practices
- Meditations on the Stations of the Cross
- Funding Your Congregation's Ministry
- Grad News and Notes
Lenten Spiritual Practices
By Dr. Jessicah Krey Duckworth, Wesley's professor of Christian Formation and Teaching
At the beginning of Lent my pastor encouraged our congregation to pick up a spiritual practice rather than give something up. Although I wanted to oblige, I still have not found the spiritual practice "that works for me." Here are a few that our family has practiced since Lent began three weeks ago:
Prayer
- Attended "The Way of the Cross" at our church, a prayer service that reflects on Jesus' journey to the cross.
- Prayed parts of Luther's Small Catechism and reflected on Luther's explanations.
- Nearly every morning my family gathers at the door of the house as the first person is leaving and we recite together Luther's morning prayer (sometimes with a brush and barrettes in hand).
Hospitality
- My husband and I shared a meal with a widower in our congregation.
Service
- Our family made and served a crock-pot meal for the county's winter homeless shelter.
-Volunteered in our church's cry-room during Sunday service.
- Sponsored a child from Uganda along with other members of my church.
Telling the Christian story
- Read the Bible stories of Moses and the Exodus, Jonah and the Whale, Daniel and the Lions with my four-year-old daughter.
Are these practices anything different from what I would do throughout the rest of the year? Perhaps. Am I more reflective because it is the Lenten season and as I participate in these practices I am receiving the means of grace? Absolutely. Theologian and author Craig Dykstra explains, "From its own history and experience, the church knows that such practices enable community and its people as individuals to continue their experience with God made present in Word, in sacrament, in prayer, and in the community's life in obedience to its vocation in the world."[1]
So much of what I am doing, our family is doing, our congregation is doing and what we all do in our daily lives is sacred and holy. We have been called to vocations as parents, spouses, physical and mental health providers, students, teachers, farmers, industrial workers, service providers and pastors - and so many others! Through these unique vocations we are called to be God's means of grace in the world.
I remember my pastor's words on the Second Sunday of Lent. "It's not too late to pick up a spiritual practice." His words were so comforting to me, a busy mom of three little ones who is also a new professor at Wesley Theological Seminary. And yet as I look back on the list above I see that indeed I have picked up a spiritual practice this Lent -- daily reflection on the balance of my vocation and the world's deepest needs. In the following weeks of Lent I will continue to practice confession, give generously, suffer with and for my neighbors and struggle to understand the complexity of the world God loves, together with countless other spiritual practices noted by Dykstra and others.[2] Perhaps, too, I will find many more that work for me. But in that dabbling and searching -- and the living that happens between my dabblings in dedicated spiritual practices -- I know that God is at work to conform my life to the cross and give me the new life that is promised in the cross.
Meditations on the Stations of the Cross
These meditations correspond with paintings on display in Oxnam Chapel at Wesley Theological Seminary. Dr. Deborah Sokolove, curator of the Dadian Gallery at Wesley and associate faculty in Religion and the Arts, created both the paintings and meditations.
1. Jesus is condemned to death.
Jesus is bound. His hands are tied. He can do nothing but accept what is coming. The word "passion" comes from the same root as our word "passive." The passion of Jesus is not so much in the agony that he endured, but in his acceptance of it, in his willing refusal to return evil for evil.
Where are my hands tied? How much do I struggle against what cannot be changed? How do I know the difference between what I can change and what I must accept?
2. Jesus receives the cross.
Jesus lifts up his hands as if in prayer. He receives the burden of the cross as gift. He carries it lightly above his head, a banner proclaiming his solidarity with those who are outcast and forsaken.
What am I carrying, and what is its message? Is it a heavy burden? A gift? A banner? For whom, and to whom, do I carry it?
3. Jesus falls the first time.
The cross grows heavier with time. Jesus stumbles and falls. He puts one hand on the ground to steady himself, to find his balance, to touch the firm ground at his feet.
What trips me up? How do I react when I lose my balance or when something gets in my way? What restores me to a firm footing?
Read the full list of the meditations and see pictures of the stations of the cross now on display in the Wesley chapel.
Funding Your Congregation's Ministry
The Rev. Dr. Lovett H. Weems, Jr., director of the Lewis Center for Church Leadership at Wesley, invites you and others from your church to attend a workshop, "Funding Your Congregation's Ministry." The Lewis Center is offering the workshop on two different dates and two different locations:
- Saturday, April 5 in New Freedom, Pennsylvania, which is just across the Maryland line on I-83
- Saturday, April 12 in Richmond, Virginia
These events are intended for both clergy and lay leaders and will cover a diverse range of topics related to financial stewardship, such as how to expand your sources of income, ways to encourage faithful giving, and uses and sources of operating, capital and endowment funds.
Both workshops run from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and cost $30 per person. Visit the Lewis Center's website at http://www.churchleadership.com/ for more information on the program and locations or to register.
Grad News and Notes
For and About Wesley Alums
Please send information you'd like to share with other Wesley alumni to Graduates@wesleyseminary.edu.
The United Methodist Church's Ministerial Education Fund featured current M.Div. student Chris Schafer in an advertisement in the current issue of Interpreter magazine.
Rev. Keary Kincannon, M.Div. '81, will deliver the opening prayer in the House of Delegates at the March 6 session of the General Assembly. Kincannon will deliver a prayer that was written with the assistance of Kim Wannenwetsch, a homeless member of his congregation. She will join him on the House floor.
Kincannon is pastor of Rising Hope United Methodist Mission Church in Alexandria, Virginia. He received the Society of John Wesley Award of Merit in 2007. The seminary gives this award annually to alumni who, through sacrificial leadership, exemplify a high standard of commitment and devotion to God, the church (referring to the universal church) and Wesley Theological Seminary. Recipients are Wesley graduates nominated and selected by fellow alumni.
Mark your calendar for this year's commencement ceremony, which will be held on May 12 at the Washington National Cathedral. Additional details to follow in upcoming issues of eCalling for Graduates.
[1] Craig Dykstra, Growing in the Life of Faith: Education and Christian Practices, 2nd edition (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2005), 43.
[2] Dykstra, 43. See also, Dorothy C. Bass, ed., Practicing Our Faith: A Way of Life for a Searching People, ed. Dorothy C. Bass, The Practices of Faith Series (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 1997).
