It strikes me that this may turn out to be the most comprehensive news report about General Conference that some of you receive.
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I was not a delegate. I didn't attend as a guest. I attempted to stream on line but was never able to open the link on my phone...
...but I exchanged approximately 200 messages with an on site source and followed comments on Facebook.
I have reviewed all the messages in a very stimulating conversation. Here are some takeaways:
1. New CGGC Core Values, a new CGGC Mission Statement and logo and a first-ever CGGC Strategic Plan were adopted.
2. The General Conference gathering epitomized classic, traditional, old time CGGC Talk-ism which has dominated the body for generations, in which speaking good speak satisfies. Since I, personally, can remember, General Conference sessions have been an occasion in which the very best ideas of the moment have been on display but there has never been action on them and, truthfully, action on them has never been considered, nor has it been desired. That's, based on what I'm reading and hearing, what just happened in Findlay. More of the old ways happened in which the best and brightest of the CGGC gather to speak and to exchange good ideas yet no plan of action is even considered.
3. I asked, specifically, now that a Mission Statement and strategic plan has been adopted by delegates of the entire body, if it is expected that, for instance, the ERC will practice biblical mutual submission and set aside its own Mission Statement and Strategic Plan to put into action what the General Conference...our whole body...adopted. I am told that not even General Conference leadership wants our Conference to implement their plan. The exact answer I received was, "No. We weren't asked to." I have to ask, then, what this was all about...in terms of real world living. Honestly, I see profound spiritual issues...I'll even call it sin...here. Where is mutual submission in the CGGC. Where is obedience to the love one another as I have loved you command! General Conference leaders develop a whole plan without even asking that it be put into action!?!
4. I'm told that, during open discussion time, several delegates criticized leadership for not walking talk in the past. I'm glad that we're now talking about walk but, as far as I can tell, talk about walk is as far as it will go. Here's why: Based on what I've heard, no one noticed that no plan of action was presented.
5. The new Mission Statement isn't a statement. It is merely a slogan. It's not a full sentence and, it strikes me that it is 2019 faddish gibberish: "to maximize our collective potential for kingdom impact." Lots of big words there. I'm imagining it being presented to the typical CGGC congregation that I'm familiar with. And, I'm thinking that most of our people are too polite to physically roll their eyes in public. But, this is precisely what our people have been seeing coming down from the CGGC elite for generations. And, this will go no further than the previous great ideas have gone.
6. There's no repentance and no confession of past sin here. It's tradition for CGGC leaders to think that the next great idea will save the day for them. Yet, good ideas have never been our problem. We've had a steady flow of brilliant ideas since I entered the Conference in the 1970s. Frankly, this particular new idea strikes me as about middle of the pack as CGGC bright ideas go. Several past ideas, I believe, have been far more compelling than this one. We don't need more brilliant thoughts. What we need is repentance. The Lord of all authority and power and blessing isn't blessing us. We need His grace, His mercy, His authority, His power. We need to accept the invitation of Jesus, "Come to me all you who labor and are burdened...take my yoke upon you." What we need is for people with CGGC institutional authority to, first go to Him as broken men and women...and, then, to come to us in confession of sin. What we got this time, again, is people with institutional authority coming to us as wise men and women with yet another set of clever ideas. This is not the way of Christ. And, it will go unblessed and unempowered.
7. The new logo has, so far, done more harm than good. When the people I know have seen it, they don't get it. I certainly don't. I've heard it called a baseball diamond, a take on the Pittsburgh Steelers logo and, at first glance, I saw the New Orleans Saints' Fleur-de-lis. I read an explanation of it on Facebook and, speaking only for myself, I thought that that was also gibberish. I doubt that the logo will unify, but it may well irritate and divide.
8. There are, by the way, new Core Values, four of them:
Total participation.
Daring action.
Vital connection.
Global mobilization.
I'll say, as a student of our history, these actually describe, for the most part, the Church of God in our movement days but I don't see our current General Conference authorities practicing them in any way at all. If we are to embrace these values, I suspect that Lance and some others will have to travel across our body offering tearful and passionate confession of the sin of defying these values for all their years of ministry to our body. Otherwise, these values will only serve to condemn them, and us.
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Okay. Enough.
I could easily continue but I think that I've made my point as well as I'm going to. And, that I've already prattled on.
Blessings.
We...still...must repent.
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