November, 2007
Greetings,

"Love your neighbor as you love yourself."
(Luke 10:27b)

Which of us doesn't know that it's hard to care well about others when we're weak or down on ourselves?  What makes us selfish is doubt about our own value and strength: we seek rather than share love and assurance.

True of us individually, this is also true of the church.  We look at the budget and get down on ourselves because of "how much money we spend on ourselves."  In the majority of congregations, at least two-thirds of the annual budget is spent on what gets called "overhead" or "maintenance."  We forget that "maintenance" is also mission!

By its very existence, the church is not simply to do mission but to be mission: a people that in its own life embodies justice and mercy, forgiveness and love.  We then give what we have first received out of the abundance made ours in the spirit of Christ.

Learned well through the worship and work of the local congregation, including the ways we relate to one another, the generosity of God's love is irrepressible: it demands to be shared beyond ourselves. 

As author and psychiatrist Scott Peck reminds us, "Self-love is not self-centered and includes the capacity to receive, and to be humble."  When we listen to another, we're not just being nice: we might just learn something.  Self-love is about caring, respecting, and hence being honest about ourselves, aware of what we need. 

How honest are we in the care we have for ourselves—and the church?  How well do we welcome what others have to offer?  This question pertains to all our relationships, beginning at home and church, extending to our jobs and community, and in how we support our church and the work of the church in the world.

The love of God is not limited to what we already know and welcome. It also comes as blessing from people and experiences different from what we've known—as happens in making new friends we never thought we'd like, or doing something we never thought we'd want to do.

Thanksgiving is an excellent time: to give thanks to God for His love for us (we love because He first loved us); to give thanks to God for the church and her mission of justice, mercy, forgiveness and love He has laid on our hearts; to give thanks to God for our ability to be generous in sharing our time, talent and treasure for His glory and the building up the faith; to give thanks for His help in days gone by and our hope for days and years to come.
 

 With gratitude to God,