July 18, 2023
By Rev. Jay Therrell
Special Note: This is a message our president gave at a recent annual conference luncheon for one of our WCA regional chapters. It was based on Exodus 16:1-3. It was for an annual conference where churches were allowed to leave under paragraph 2553 with no additional financial requirements. The WCA acknowledges that there are still many churches struggling to depart The United Methodist Church and being asked to pay egregious exit fees. The WCA continues to stand in solidarity with those churches advocating for fair treatment. This message was focused on churches able to depart the UMC with much fairer treatment by their annual conference.
When I was learning how to drive and I had my restricted license, I was stopped at a red light one day. While I was waiting at the light, I happened to look in my rearview mirror just as a car behind me rear-ended me. Thankfully I wasn’t hurt badly. The driver wasn’t paying attention. In fact, I saw his eyes get very big as he looked up and realized he was about to run into me.
I remember being very cautious for the next few weeks after the accident. I watched my rearview mirror all the time. I watched it so much that my mom would have to remind me that I needed to keep my eyes on the road in front of me. She would say very patiently, “Jay, windshields are bigger than rearview mirrors for a reason.”
She was right, of course. We need both. We need the windshield so we can see where we’re headed and how to get there. We need the smaller rearview mirror to see what’s behind us and learn from it. The majority of our time, however, must be spent on where we’re headed, or we’ll crash and people can get hurt – sometimes very badly.
The scripture lesson that I read just a few moments ago is a classic example of why windshields need to be bigger than rearview mirrors. You know the story, the Israelites were enslaved and oppressed in Egypt. They dreamed of the Promised Land flowing with milk and honey. They lived lives that were brutally hard. God finally sent a deliverer named Moses to free them and according to our scripture lesson, it only took two months before as verse two says, “The whole Israelite community complained against Moses and Aaron in the desert.” Verse three says,
Oh, how we wish that the Lord had just put us to death while we were still in the land of Egypt. There we could sit by the pots cooking meat and eat our fill of bread. Instead, you’ve brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.
Two months out and the Israelites were already looking in the proverbial rearview mirror more than they were concentrating on the Promised Land in front of them. They said it would be better to be dead than free. They began creating revisionist histories, false narratives, and missing out on the blessing that God had in store for them. With that in mind, I want to first think about our present situation and the proverbial rearview mirror. Then I want to finish by thinking about the windshield.
Let’s talk about the rearview mirror. You might know the name Horst Schulze. Schulze is the founding president of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Group. The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Group is the only hotel chain to ever win a Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award once much less twice. The Ritz-Carlton Group is considered one of the standard bearers of what good customer service looks like.
Horst Schulze has said the most seven expensive words in business are: “We’ve never done it that way before.” Those may be the seven most expensive words in business, but I would go so far as to say that they’re the seven dying words of the church. And as our churches are becoming free and moving forward, I hope we will be very conscious not to be like Israel, spend all our time looking in the rearview mirror, and begin to say those dying words: we’ve never done it that way before.
J.D. Walt is the Sower-in-Chief of Seedbed. J.D. writes the Daily Wake-Up Call – a devotional commentary that comes out every morning. It’s been a part of my daily time with God for years. Right now, we’re working our way through the Book of Romans. This past Monday, J.D. wrote about how Romans 8 describes the work of sanctifying grace and how that’s a shift for most of us from just saying “yes” to Jesus to becoming more like Him. J.D. described it as, “…Lord, you took me out of Egypt…now take Egypt out of me.”
We hate change. We do. You’ve probably heard the old proverb that goes something like this, “The only person who likes change is a baby with a wet diaper.” That statement could be said of most, if not all, of our churches. The only problem is that we’ve got to change. We have no choice. If we listen to people who spend their time looking in the rearview mirror and tell us that “we’ve never done it that way before” and we don’t change, then we’re going to die. We’ve got to take Egypt out of our churches.
That kind of change is painful. It just is. It means dying to old things that people hold dear to make room for new things that can bear fruit. Sometimes it means slaying sacred cows that have become idolatrous and sinful. It’s hard work, but it must be done.
By the end of the year, many of us will be out of Egypt. If we fixate on what was or how things used to be done, we’ll start creating revisionist histories just like the Israelites. Worse still, we’ll miss the blessing of the Promised Land. Not necessarily a land flowing with milk and honey, but the Promised Land of seeing the church do what it’s supposed to do: share the Hope of the World, Jesus Christ, in amazing and transformative ways.
I encourage you to be on the lookout for what I call the “Back to Egypt Committee” at your church. Don’t let it form. Gently but boldly remind folks of the truth of where we’ve come from and set a vision for where we need to go. We have a unique opportunity of turning the page to a new chapter. Please don’t waste that opportunity.
Yes, we need the rearview mirror. We need it so we can remember the mistakes we’ve made from where we’ve come and use them to keep us from repeating history. We need it so we can be reminded of the faithfulness of God to inspire us to move forward. What we don’t need the rearview mirror for is looking backward and just doing what we’ve always done for the sake of nostalgia. Let’s put the past behind us as quickly as we can, grieve as we need to, and then look forward to the amazing thing God is doing in our midst.
With that in mind, I want to focus on the windshield: what the future holds for us. God is doing a new thing! I can’t tell you how many stories people have shared with me from across the country of churches becoming free, joining the Global Methodist Church, and finding new ways to do ministry that are making disciples of Jesus.
The GMC was designed from the beginning to be a permission-giving church, not a gate-keeping church. Everything is streamlined and the church has been put back in the driver’s seat. The Transitional Book of Doctrines and Discipline has been reduced by 88% – over 700 pages! This isn’t the same church you’ve been used to. And anyone who says it’s UMC-lite or UMC 2.0 hasn’t done their homework.
Instead of having to focus on internal doctrinal battles, here are the sorts of things we’ll be focusing on. First, we want to help our churches move from an attractional model to a missional model. By attractional, I mean the old Field of Dreams concept: “If you build it, they will come.” If we just had a better choir or band, they would come. If we just had a better preacher, they would come. If we just had a new building, they would come. The fallacy in that model is that people are just waiting to come to our churches if something was better. They aren’t going to. By and large, people in this post-modern, post-Christian culture are skeptical of the church. They like Jesus, but they’re not sure about us. They’ll only come if we go to them and meet them where they are, at their point of need, and offer them Jesus. That’s what John Wesley did and that’s our future!
Second, we want to help our churches move from an internal focus to an external focus. I’m noticing that many of our churches exist to take care of the people already inside them. I’ll go so far as to that totally misses the point of church. The church is one of the only organizations in the world that exists for people who aren’t a part of it. It’s not wrong to take care of each other, but our focus should be on those outside our church and how we can go to them to offer them Jesus.
By the way, I want to be clear that in our quest to become externally focused, we do have to remember to offer people Jesus. We Methodists are so good at feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and helping people, but while we’re doing that if we don’t tell them that we’re doing it because Jesus loves them and wants to be in a relationship with them, then we’re missing the point. We become no different than the Red Cross or FEMA. And while both of those organizations are wonderful and I’m grateful for them, there ought to be something different about us, and it’s Jesus. The local church is the hope of the world. We have to offer that Hope and His name is Jesus.
Third, and last, we’ll focus on getting deadly serious about evangelism and discipleship. The future is remembering John Wesley’s instructions to his preachers:
You have nothing to do but to save souls. Therefore spend and be spent in this work. And go not only to those that need you, but to those that need you most. It is not your business to preach so many times, and to take care of this or that society; but to save as many souls as you can; to bring as many sinners as you possibly can to repentance.
We want to move toward that kind of passion and zeal. We want to lead our churches to the place where our local congregations are actively asking on a regular basis if their ministries are focused enough on sharing the Good News of Jesus. We want to recover another idea from our founder: “Give me one hundred preachers who fear nothing but sin, and desire nothing but God, and I care not a straw whether they be clergymen or laymen; such alone will shake the gates of hell and set up the kingdom of heaven on Earth.” That’s where we’re headed as we look through the windshield.
We can do this. We’re going to do this. I know that I know that I know that God is not finished with us. We didn’t get in this mess overnight, and we won’t get out overnight, but together, arm-in-arm, connected as Wesley intended, and leaning on the power of the Holy Spirit, we can do this! The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step, and together, we’re going to take that first step, and then a second, and then a third.
We’ll get there because we worship and are led by the Hope of the World. And as Billy Graham likes to say, “I’ve read the last chapter of the Bible, God wins!” We’re going to win, too. In Revelation 21:5, we read, “Look! I’m making all things new.’ He also said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.’”
The great leadership guru, Max Dupree, once wrote, “In the end, it is important to remember that we cannot become what we need to be by remaining what we are.” That’s why rearview mirrors are important, but we don’t dwell on them because the future is bright and we have to focus on it so we can know where to head. Together, linked arm in arm, we can do this.
The Rev. Jay Therrell is the president of the Wesleyan Covenant Association and is an ordained elder in the Global Methodist Church.