| Update on PMC in the United Kingdom Click here to return to the Church Innovations web site. September 28, 2009 I am sitting at Heathrow Airport, London, UK reflecting on the exciting events of the last few days: the first Cluster Gathering of the first cluster of Partnership for Missional Church (PMC)-UK. I am excited about how well it went; how delightful the challenge, energy and spirit of the work I have enjoyed these last few days. After some struggles, even times when I didn’t believe this day would ever happen, it has. Deo Gratias! Some five years ago, through our comrade in the missional church movement, Alan Roxburgh, Church Innovations staff met Martin and Linda Robinson of Birmingham, UK. Martin is the National Director of Together in Mission (TiM) and an old hand in missional church circles. He had the pleasure of a friendship with Lesslie Newbigin when the founder of the Gospel and Our Culture (GOCN) returned to Birmingham from his many years in India. Martin has written extensively on the history and practice of mission globally and locally. He also is a respected author on matters of Celtic Christianity. Needless to say, simply getting to know Martin and Linda was an honor and delight for which we thank Alan most sincerely. God seemed to have more in mind than the delight of acquaintance. With due British care, Martin took the chance on our little American operation: he explored our ability to work in southern Africa where, with our southern Africa partners, we have developed a very energetic and fruitful PMC—SA. He then offered to partner with us to create a similar partnership for the UK. He invited Methodists, United Reformed, Baptists and Anglican church leaders to listen to what we were doing in the U.S.A., Australia and southern Africa. Then, some of those leaders decided to come and have a look for themselves. They visited our offices in Saint Paul, Minnesota; they visited cluster gatherings in the eastern and western U.S.A. They even participated in a .5 event in Portland, Oregon with Churches of Christ. They went away even more engaged and exploring what the Lord might have in mind by the way of a partnership with CI and PMC internationally. Following these initial explorative visits across the pond, a rather earnest effort to design PMC-UK began. The differences in culture, society, and church organizations were not trivial. The reality of asymmetrical gifts is one of the most exciting parts of such partnerships. Each partner brings asymmetrical gifts that simply defy the usual ways of forming a partnership; indeed, these asymmetrical gifts demonstrate how desperately the entire journey of the missional church depends upon the Holy Spirit. If we needed to see tit for tat, quid pro quo patterns of partnership, it simply would not work; if we were to simply have a system of benevolence, it would not work. No, by the power of the Spirit the partners took significant risks on both sides to bring us to the beginning of the first cluster in the UK. Nor was the risking on the Spirit just the work of the formal partners of TiM and CI but, indeed, the regional leaders of the churches involved. When I think of the risk that Nigel Coles, Team Leader/Regional Minister in the West of England Baptist Association in the UK and Canon Roger Medley, Diocesan Missioner in the Diocese of Bath & Wells took both to work with one another (Baptists and Anglicans—think of it, my fellow Americans), I am humbled and delighted. Then, they took the risk of engaging their co-workers Alisdair Longwill, Paul Rush, and Sandra O’Shea. These latter didn’t even have the experience of seeing PMC at work but trusted their colleagues in ministry. They showed up about a year ago at the Deanery at Wells Cathedral, a magnificent medieval building started in the 900s and completed in 1100! At the Deanery, we wrestled through what it would mean for them to function as “judicatory staff persons,” a term they simply would not suffer under. For purposes of PMC-UK we will try “regional staff persons.” We struggled to find the places where their considerable experience at congregational care and community development synergized with PMC. Already I see some marvelous ways their experience in community development, especially with what we in the US call civil society, will strengthen phase 2 of the PMC journey. God’s mercy and goodness abounds in such partnerships. And others also risked upon the Holy Spirit to make these last few days happen: the leaders, lay and ordained, who joined this risky venture in the missional journey in the life of the Trinity are perhaps the most impressive. They represent congregations founded in the 8th Century, some since the Second World War, others within the last decade. They represent State Church and Free Church traditions; they are of very significant different sizes and cultural and social backgrounds. All arrived with significant suspicions of this American import but also a tremendous generosity of spirit. They gave me more than the benefit of the doubt; they gave me the benefit of hope. They worked harder than most beginning clusters and they spoke more candidly about the realities of post-Christendom than any cluster in southern Africa, Australia, or North America. They understand the basics of Newbigin’s critique of Western Culture more pointedly than most in those other cultures. In all of this waiting and finally the fruition of a beginning, I remain more deeply aware of how true it is that the missional journey requires dependence upon the Holy Spirit. For me, with my heritage, theological, cultural, and social, that is a stretch. As a result, I am humbled by the dependences upon the Spirit that these UK partners and my colleagues at CI (especially Barbara Miller) have shown. Their faithful trust that shows the fruits of their baptisms moves me to trust the Spirit even more. During the next few months, we will be taking the next steps with the churches in Denmark, Norway, and Germany. In November I will be joining our PMC-SA team to review the first five years of PMC-SA at a major conference sponsored by Stellenbosch University and Communitas. In June we start conversations in the Netherlands. Once again, venite Creator Spiritus. Amen. Peace, Pat Keifert |
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