What would happen if…“A Generation of Believers Gathered Together for One Simple Purpose: To Build Relationships Now that will Transform the Future of the Church and the Culture?” This was the original vision statement for The Vine when we gathered in 1999. Jennifer Jukanovich, to whom God whispers, had reached out to Andy Crouch, Joe Maxwell, and me to see if the magazine we published then, re:generation quarterly, would want to partner on this vision, we said of course “Yes”, and The Vine met for a total of six times til 2006, with smaller regional gatherings around the US and Canada. This past weekend me and 100 others gathered for our 25th Anniversary Gathering in Lake Geneva Wisconsin, with Coracle supporting as the non-profit sponsor. It was an important gathering “in a deeply divided time.
The vision for this year’s gathering was set in our current context. “We live in a deeply divided time. Our churches and our culture are polarized. In this climate, a group of committed Christ followers sense a call to gather again and testify to the good God is doing in the world and to encourage one in another to bring forth His goodness in new and imaginative ways. We believe this will be a significant gathering. There are seeds to be sown and relationships to be rekindled for the good of human flourishing and Christian witness. Vine participants always believed in the power of Christ-centered relationships to be a transforming presence in the world, and we are asking what our role is in unifying and healing our church and nation at this moment.”
This year’s Vine gathering was a diverse gathering of “architects, business executives, educators, homemakers, musicians, pastors, physicians, philanthropists, publishers, scientists, and much more. We are from diverse traditions: Anglican, Baptist, Brethren, Catholic, Christian Missionary Alliance, Episcopalian, Mennonite, Methodist, Presbyterian – PCA and PCUSA, Quaker, Seventh-Day Adventist, Vineyard, and more. We have chosen to come together this weekend because we believe in the power of Christ-centered relationships to be a transforming presence in the world.” Amen to that!
At The Vine, every participant speaks, either in a plenary session or a panel (they are short talks!), on topics like
- Lessons Learned: A Note to my 25-Year Old Self
- Partnership in Practice: Working Together Across Differences
- Business Practices: Faithfulness in the Global Economy
- Forgiveness in an Age of Bitterness
- Reconstructing Faith in an Age of Deconstruction
- Perspectives on Presidential Politics
- Transformations: Communities that Make an Impact
- Standing on the Shoulders of Giants: What We can Learn from the Saints
- Artificial Intelligence: Challenges and Opportunities
- The Imago Dei Amidst Transhumanism
- Rising Protests versus Sound Business: Faithful Responses to the Global Economy
- A Parents’ Roundtable: Faithfulness for the New Generation
There was a lot of wisdom shared, a lot of stories, a lot of pain, and a lot of hope.
With so many presenters and so many topics and so much insight, it’s tough to be comprehensive in a report. So here are some of the notable things I wrote down that spoke to me…perhaps they’ll speak to you as well.
“Conflict is an opportunity. Conflict is energy that can be destructive OR constructive” Tanner Smith
“Sometimes your crucible shows who you are” Nika Elguardo
“Don’t waste your suffering!” Elizabeth Wirth, who also quoted Therese of Lisieux, “Sufferings gladly born for others convert more people than sermons.”
“When you lament in good faith, you are clearing the way to praise” Tashya Dalen sharing a quote
“Dance when it’s darkest” a Jewish proverb
“I want to know Jesus, not American Jesus.” Kami Rice
“With diversity comes deep disagreements. If you’re not arguing, you’re not dealing with the disagreements.” Josh Swamidass
Regarding the election results, “Now is the time when artists get to work.” Toni Morrison
“We will be alright if we tell good stories.” “Christians don’t have the luxury of being pessimistic.” Sho Baraka
I spoke on several occasions, once on “The White Christian Response post-George Floyd”, and another time on “Wounded Healer”. From the latter:
…Until middle-age I didn’t know it was possible to feel this weak. I’d thought it and taught it and kinda knew it, but I didn’t viscerally know how deeply it is true that it is in true weakness that true power lies, God’s own power to do through us things we can’t do.
Between the Gospels and the book of Revelation, it’s rare to get direct quotes from God in the Epistles. Oh yes, it’s all the Word of God, but then sometimes there’s the Words of God within the Word of God. These are worth deep reflection. One of those places is 2 Corinthians 12, where Paul recounts a unique experience of YAHWEH that he didn’t know how to make sense of, except that it was exceedingly awesome. He’d had an Encounter. Then Paul was given some sort of suffering—the thorn in the flesh— to keep him from becoming proud about having had that experience. He didn’t want that suffering, he asked God to take it away. God responded with a flat no, and then Paul writes the words that YAHWEH said directly to him that we are fortunate enough to overhear.
“My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.”
This is a deep truth, one to be leaned into, even welcomed.
“My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.”
One gift of middle age is that we sometimes, perhaps oftentimes, we find ourselves so weak that we must truly rely on God to do what is ours to do…and then God does stuff, more than we could ask or imagine.
Paul goes on to say that because of what YAHWEH said to him, now he would boast all the more about his weaknesses.
I’m not there yet.
On most days, I comfort myself in weakness knowing that it is prerequisite for God’s power to flow through me. On my better days, I can even thank God for it. Maybe we can boast about it at the 50th anniversary of the first Vine gathering.