Tuesday, June 24, 2008

PC(USA) Elects a New Moderator


Finally the PC(USA) has elected a blogger as the moderator - the Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow. This guy spawns more web sites and blogs than kids (he has three kids.) More importantly to me is that as a new church development pastor he understands what it means to live as a "missional church" - the understanding that we are missionaries in our own communities, living out God's word in our daily lives and reaching those who have not experienced the saving grace of Jesus Christ on their terms, not ours.

This excerpt from his acceptance speech underscores Bruce's missional philosophy:
If the church responds to these realities by stepping out in faith rather than clinging to survival, just imagine what our church could look like in this new day, this new world, this new time, this new opportunity to be Christ in the world.
  • To be a church family that thrives more on the nature of our relationships than the number of dollars or members we report;
  • To be a church family that is joined together by the covenantal bond of Christ rather than the contractual relationship of property or pension;
  • To be a church family that sees God’s best in one another before being so sure of our human worst.
  • To be a church family that cares more about being faithful than being right;
If we, the church, can embrace these ways of being and these ways of interacting, I have no doubt that we will be able to live into a future in which we are a vibrant and inspiring presence in the world.
We'll be hearing a lot more from Bruce over the next two years, but check him out on all these links:

Bruce's Moderator web site
Web Site of Mission Bay Community Church, the new church development Bruce pastors in San Francisco
Bruce's personal web site & blog
Bruce on YouTube
Bruce also has a face book page, for those of you who are members of that online community.

1 comment:

Reyes-Chow said...

Thanks for the too kind words. the next two years will certainly be interesting!