| Mt. Rainier and ACMNP Click here to return to the Church Innovations web site. Dear Partners of Church Innovations, As I write this note to you, I am staring at Mount Rainier; it is totally surrounded by blue sky with a hint of fog. I am sitting at a picnic table along the Nisqually River—the sound of the glacial river fills my ears—at Longmire in the National Park in front of the Community Building, built in 1927 and the site of many midwinter gatherings of the year round workers in the Park. I am overwhelmed by time, actually the different senses of time, the temporality of this moment, especially this moment of Church Innovation’s contribution to leadership in God’s mission in the presence of the mountain’s time. While surely Mt. Rainier represents time way beyond human telling, it remains a young mountain, a still lively and thus deadly volcano that, like Mt. St. Helen’s, could erupt into a violence well beyond ordinary human violence. The contrast of ages upon ages yet still way younger than the universe—or even way younger than many places in my beloved Black Hills—and the tiny, indeed, almost infinitesimal moment of my gaze upon this mountain stretches me, my imagination, more than I can express. Inside the Community Building the Board of Trustees of A Christian Ministry in the National Park wrestles with its future. And, more importantly, God’s preferred and promised future. Like every other Board of Trustees, they hold that vision for ACMNP for good or ill. They, like most Boards, are quite captivated by their past and the challenges of the present. They must meet their fiduciary trust to ACMNP but, if they only meet that trust, ACMNP is likely to die. If they open themselves to God’s preferred future, they will enjoy the greatest power of the Universe, the Spirit of Our Risen Lord, the Holy Spirit. I believe that is true. I further believe that I get to invite them into that future in the life of the Trinity. What a delightful blessing and task to be so privileged to invite, guide, and accompany this Board in that act of faithful prayer through Christian imagination and Christian practical wisdom. Behind this moment is a sustained conversation, created by disciplined listening to the community that makes up ACMNP. In fact eight different teams listened in a careful and disciplined manner to eight different constituent groups and sent those stories and reflections to eight Reading Teams at Church Innovations. The Reading Teams, gathered by our Managing Director of Research and Development, Dr. Patricia Taylor Ellison, spent hours and weeks reading, analyzing, and preparing a report to each of the listening teams and then gathered an executive report with myself and others, including members of the leadership of ACMNP. From our human point of view, so much time and energy is invested in this moment at the foot of Mt. Rainier. The tension of temporality, the age of the mountain still poised for new creation, the age of the universe, the pull and urging of God’s preferred future, even at this tiny moment in time in the life of ACMNP, leaves me for the moment out of breath. I am overwhelmed, grateful beyond expression, fearful, mostly fearful of the Lord, hopeful for wisdom in such moment. In such moments I can only ask the Lord of the Universe to remember his servants in this time and place and to make of our discernment by the power of the Holy Spirit fruit worthy of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Come, Holy Spirit, Creator, bless. Peace, Pat Keifert |
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