TransFORM East Coast Gathering in DC

I had the opportunity this weekend to participate in a gathering of emergent church leaders – folks who are involved in or seek to be involved in planting missional, emergent faith communities rooted in the life and teachings of Jesus.  I was able to hear speakers such as Brian McLaren, Peter Rollins, Kathy Escobar and Anthony Smith. I also attended workshops on Christian ecology; turning Jesus’ teachings into living practice as a community; developing new Christian communities alongside more traditional congregations; and a discussion on the way forward for Christians who are neither willing to exclude queer folk from the Church, nor downplay our respect for Scripture. Finally, and most importantly, I was privileged to connect with folks from all over the country, including quite a few from my neck of the woods.

The most spiritually-charged and powerful moment for me this weekend was Friday evening, when we gathered to hear Peter Collins preach.  He spoke to us about the importance of doubt in our walk with God. Rollins observed that Christ himself cried out in doubt on the cross, and he emphasized the need to release our comforting beliefs and sense of identity, because they in fact separate us from God. God is Truth, not our limited and self-serving conceptions; the Truth – as terrifying and incomprehensible as it can be – must be a the center of our life in Christ. To place our own beliefs and desires at the center is to replace God with an idol, and to dodge the suffering of the cross, which we as Christians are called to bear with our Lord.

Peter Rollins believes that our worship together should reflect the “dark nights of the soul” – our times of spiritual despair, doubt, and sense of separation from God. Our corporate worship can tend to focus exclusively on our experiences of assurance and connection with God; but Rollins encouraged us to consider the role that acknowledgement of suffering, darkness and doubt might play in our shared life as church communities.

To give us a taste of what this might look like, Rollins asked Vince Anderson and Amy Moffitt to perform a song from the Ikon community in Ireland, where Rollins serves. It was a hymn of darkness, despair, loss and doubt. To be honest, it made me feel very uncomfortable. As the hymn came to a close, though, something remarkable happened. The Holy Spirit descended on us, and the entire gathered assembly was still and silent, hushed with awe. This was a clapping group, which normally gave applause after every event – but after this hymn, no one moved.

The awed silence was broken after a short while by the facilitator, wanting to move us along in our evening program. I felt grieved that the work of the Holy Spirit was being brushed aside. Others certainly felt this way, too. A man rose from the audience, interrupting our facilitator, “Thy kingdom came!” I heard voices say, “Amen!” The man continued to address the facilitator, “can we acknowledge the grace of God among us for a moment?” After perhaps a minute more of silent reverence before God, the facilitator again took up the schedule.

When we were dismissed a few minutes later, a young woman rose from the audience, interrupting folks as they greeted one another. She invited anyone who wanted to pray to join her at the front of the sanctuary where we were gathered. Faith and I immediately rose and followed her to the raised area at the front of the room. Five of us gathered in a circle while the rest of the group socialized and made their way out of the building. We took turns praying aloud as we were led. Praying for the gathering; that God to continue to pour out the Holy Spirit on us; asking forgiveness for the way in which we had turned away God’s presence from our midst. I feel so grateful for the way in which a few of us were drawn together in the Spirit in that moment to cry out to God and intercede for the Church.

I am in awe of how I see God at work in the wider Church, despite our failure to fully embrace the Spirit’s work in our midst.  I feel grateful for the connections that I have made this weekend with other followers of Jesus, both here in the DC area and across North America. I had never been exposed to the emergent church movement before, having focused almost all of my attention on the Quaker community in the years since I became a Christian. As a result of this gathering, I feel energized to engage with emergent Protestants; both to learn from them and their experiences as disciples, and also to share with them the rich heritage of Quakerism, which informs my own walk with Christ. Together, I believe we can grow into more faithful friends of Jesus.

A few relevant links:

• The TransFORM Network - organizers of this weekend's event
• Videos of the main sessions at TransFORM East Coast Gathering
• Wesley Theological Seminary - our hosts this weekend
• Emergent Village - a hub of the emergent conversation online

Micah's Ministry Newsletter #13

Dear beloved sisters and brothers in Truth,

The past few weeks have been a time of getting settled into a new way of life. I have begun to adjust to life in the District of Columbia, at the William Penn House. I have taken time to be present with my wife, my housemates, and my neighborhood; and I have spent a good amount of time alone seeking God's guidance for me in my next steps in this new chapter of my life. As I have sought to be intentional about giving myself time to develop roots here in DC, I have also spent some time exploring my relationship with the wider Mid-Atlantic region. This month has been a time of rest, renewal, spiritual growth and deepening relationships.

Life at the William Penn House is good. It has been a joy to be present on an ongoing basis in the community where my wife has lived and worked for more than two years. I have been impressed with the professionalism and good management that I have observed at the House, and it has been a particular joy to see Faith at work, exercising her considerable gifts of administration and hospitality. I feel that I am able to participate in the community life of the house to a great degree, but I appreciate that I am also given the space I need to focus on my own work and recreation.

I have attended a couple of Friends Meetings in the DC metro area. The first was Friends Meeting of Washington, part of Baltimore Yearly Meeting. I attended this Meeting alone, because Faith had work that day. Friends Meeting of Washington has three worship services on Sunday, two of them concurrent. Of these two simultaneous services, there is the larger one held in the main worship room, as well as a smaller one held in an adjacent building. I had already attended the larger service a number of times, so this time I tried out the smaller one. It was, as advertised, a quiet worship service. There was only one spoken message, and I gathered that most Sundays are either entirely silent or with very few spoken messages.

On another Sunday, Faith and I attended the Friends Meeting in Alexandria, Virginia, also a part of Baltimore Yearly Meeting. Faith and I had visited this Meeting once before, and we were pleased to be among them once again. Friends in Alexandria are a very sweet community of seekers, and we felt very welcomed among them. Faith and I felt blessed that each of us were called upon to deliver vocal ministry during the meeting for worship. We pray that our visit was profitable in building up the Body of Christ in Alexandria.

On the first Sunday of this month, Faith and I visited Friends near Harrisonburg, Virginia, at Rockingham Friends Meeting, part of Ohio Yearly Meeting. We had been excited to visit this Meeting for months, and it was a joy to be with them for worship, followed by a meal. We were honored to join them for their monthly meeting for business, and we were very impressed by the gospel labor of spiritual nurture and evangelism that this small Meeting is involved in throughout the world. This tiny group of Friends has care of a worship group outside Atlanta, Georgia, as well as serving a large number of affiliate members throughout the world.

Rockingham Meeting is two and a half hours South of DC. Despite the distance, Faith and I hope to return on a regular basis. We sense a deep spiritual affinity with these Friends. Of all of the Meetings that either of us have experienced in this region of the United States, Rockingham is the one that we feel most akin to. This feeling of affinity was further confirmed when I visited the Stillwater Quarterly Meeting of Ohio Yearly Meeting the following Saturday, in Bird-in-hand, Pennsylvania. I was very impressed by the ministers and elders of Stillwater Quarterly Meeting, to which Rockingham belongs. Their dedication to the gospel of Jesus Christ as understood in the Friends tradition is inspiring to me, and their emerging focus on evangelism is in line with my own concern to share the good news across borders, cultures, languages, national identities and ethnicities.

Almost one week after traveling to Pennsylvania for Stillwater Quarterly Meeting, my work with Earlham School of Religion took me North again, to the city of Philadelphia. I spent the better part of a week meeting with Friends in the Philadelphia area. I met with a number of young Quaker leaders, talking up the YAF gathering that will be happening in Wichita next May and hearing their questions, concerns, and feedback about the event. This was a very valuable experience for me; I felt like I learned a lot about the needs and perspectives of Young Adult Friends in Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. I was made more sensitive to how to work more effectively with Philadelphia YAFs as we seek to share the love of Christ with all people.

While in the Philadelphia area, I was also able to travel to Pendle Hill, where Betsy Blake spoke about her experience of Jesus. (She was magnificent!) In addition to the blessing of being present for Betsy's witness, it was also a delight to be present with the wide array of Friends who attended the lecture. It felt great to connect with many Friends that I had not seen in months or years, as well as to make connections with Friends I had not previously met. After all of this, I drove from Pendle Hill to New Jersey to have a brief but blessed late-night opportunity with Martin Kelley and his family.

I feel very blessed by all of the work that God has been doing in my life these past weeks. I have experienced times of spiritual darkness and desolation, but I have been repeatedly delivered and built up in Christ. I praise God for the spiritual baptism that the Holy Spirit is working in me as I pass from darkness into light, from death into new life in Christ. I thank God for every single person and event that has been placed in my life and for the way that God works through all things for our transformation and reconciliation to God in Christ.

May each of you know the tender love of our blessed Savior. Pray for me as I pray for you. Peace and grace be with you in the Lord.

In brother- and sisterhood,

Micah Bales