Finding a flower in the crack

Photo credit: KevinCarden via Lightstock

Finding a flower in the crack

A story of shared humanity within the child welfare ecosystem

by Kay Rideout

One meeting — that’s all they agreed to in the beginning.

On Feb. 26, 2018, an email from Liza Cagua-Koo of the Emmanuel Gospel Center (EGC) pinged the inboxes of six individuals intertwined with the child welfare system in Greater Boston. A suburban fostering grandmother with the church-based initiative Home for Good. An urban bivocational pastor and social worker with the Massachusetts Adoption Resource Exchange (MARE). A leader from the New England Christian non-profit Fostering Hope. A certified counselor and foster parent.

The email extended an open-ended invitation.

“You are receiving this email because I or someone else on this list knows about your engagement in supporting & recruiting families doing foster care and/or adoption,” Cagua-Koo wrote. “I don’t have an agenda for this time – the goal is for you to connect….”

Recognizing the opportunity to build on shared connections and passions, the group agreed to meet in MARE’s Newton offices the following month.

Before this meeting, individuals in the group had experienced the weight of the child welfare system — each from a different vantage point.

As a kinship foster parent, Wendy Jacobi knew the difficulties facing children and families in the system and the lack of available resources. For 17 years, Jacobi and her husband have worked to build support systems encompassing neuropsychologists, developmental pediatricians, and childcare workers.

For years, Rev. Dr. Ricardo Franco recognized the need for cross-system collaboration between churches and child welfare workers but found that the timing was never quite right. Letters, emails, and intentional conversations led to few open doors.

“It really is invaluable. Just having a space where people feel comfortable, where they feel safe, where they truly feel like they can share their thoughts — even if they haven’t fully grappled with them.”

— Ana Maria Tormes

Never envisioning himself in the world of foster care, Jonathan Reid began his journey as a foster parent with negative assumptions surrounding both children in the system and their families. Through interactions and first-hand experiences with these families, Reid became passionate about helping to reframe churches’ perceptions of children and families within the child welfare system: a desire which has since led him to develop the Fostering Hope initiative.

Though individual, their experiences represent patterns of pain and complexity embedded in the child welfare system.

Like many complex systems, the child welfare system can often feel concrete: heavy, immovable, challenging to navigate, and often built on conflicting agendas. A system where families are both separated and supported — where turnover rates are high, emotional and professional burnouts are frequent, and change is glacial.

But life, movement, and beauty are still at work in heavy, inflexible spaces. Despite the difficult realities in every system, there are moments when the concrete cracks long enough for a flower to take root in the gap.

On that day in 2018, eight individuals, connecting on shared hopes and experiences, discovered a crack in the concrete.

“I prayed for this and I (had) been waiting for this — more than pray … I yearned for this,” Franco said. “I longed for this in my heart from the very beginning, but I didn’t feel like it (had) any echo, any resonance with other people.”

One meeting turned into two, and two turned into a series of monthly meetings arranged over four years — interrupted by COVID-19 but not derailed.

The group’s structure was organic and relational: formed by Cagua-Koo and Franco’s intentional decisions to empower all the voices and individuals in the room. This context, set apart from the whirlwind of personal and professional responsibilities, cultivated honest discussions.

“(Systems language has) definitely made a big difference in (Fostering Hope’s) thinking and planning as an org. I’m regularly thinking about some of these simple baseline questions like, ‘OK, what’s an unintended consequence if we do this? Who is this going to affect that we wouldn’t want it to affect?’”

— Jonathan Reid

“It really is invaluable,” former Fostering Hope Programs Coordinator Ana Maria Tormes said. “Just having a space where people feel comfortable, where they feel safe, where they truly feel like they can share their thoughts — even if they haven’t fully grappled with them.”

More people entered into the conversation as members and guest speakers — individuals from different backgrounds, communities, roles, beliefs, and experiences — who could together better understand the system which affected their lives and directed their work.

A dozen individuals participate in this space today. Group members have come and gone as needed, introducing friends, co-workers, and supervisors along the way.

Years later, the fruit that has come from the group can be seen internally and through participating leaders’ efforts.

Connection has led to collaboration: both within the group and with those outside of it.

Group members have shared insights and resources at Vision New England’s forums that connect Christian leaders across the region interested in engaging the foster care space. They have successfully supported one another throughout the COVID-19 pandemic: working together and coaching one another as they transitioned from exclusively in-person events to virtual spaces that effectively engaged new families.

But while these collaborative, external accomplishments are significant, leaders in the group consistently point to the internal, personal and relational fruit that has formed within and between them.

Intellectually, group members were exposed to systems models that help articulate and inform the ecosystem in which they operate. Discussions surrounding differences between urban and suburban strategies, characteristics that define supportive foster families, and best practices for church–agency collaborations have given new language and ways of thinking to those involved in the conversations. Group members are not just sharing what they already know but revealing new insights and points of leverage in their discussions with one another.

“I can read books about strategies and how to support families, how to recruit families — there are tons of materials … but this has been my best social work education in terms of bringing the humanity of the field in front of me.”

— Rev. Dr. Ricardo Franco

“(Systems language has) definitely made a big difference in (Fostering Hope’s) thinking and planning as an org.,” Reid said. “I’m regularly thinking about some of these simple baseline questions like, ‘OK, what’s an unintended consequence if we do this? Who is this going to affect that we wouldn’t want it to affect?’”

The intellectual curiosity this learning requires has served the group well as individuals engage their own stereotypes, preconceived narratives, and misplaced assumptions. As people from different spaces in the child welfare system and the broader systems serving urban families gathered in one room, shared stories and experiences quickly began to challenge individual perspectives.

For Jacobi, one of the most significant moments of learning took place when a family case worker was invited to share the complexity and weight of her role with members of the group. “She talked about her trauma — that she had been traumatized [by her job] had never occurred to me … I so wanted to weep for this woman,” Jacobi said. “That to me was the moment that made me say, ‘I understand it now.’”

In conversation with eight other group members, each voiced this same perspective–shift — this expansion of worldview that has added new layers of complexity to their perceptions surrounding other individuals, churches, organizations, institutions and families interacting in the child welfare ecosystem.

“I learned so quickly from the insights (and) from these other folks sharing their perspective,” Reid said. “Adding insights and ideas and concepts and perspectives that I would have not ever known or thought of had I not been at a table with them and in a space where we could kind of quietly listen and learn from each other.”

Cagua-Koo noted that the work of listening to one another and “humanizing” individuals within the group has been a critical outcome.

Franco echoed this idea. “The learning for me has been the (human) part — the humanity of all the players,” Franco said. “Because you know what? I can read books about strategies and how to support families, how to recruit families — there are tons of materials … but this has been my best social work education in terms of bringing the humanity of the field in front of me.”

Shared humanity has brought more than a perspective shift: it has brought healing, compassion, and mutual trust.

“Regardless of what progress looks like to each person, nothing will move forward if we cannot maintain each other’s humanity and change the way in which we view systems and our place in them.”

— Liza Cagua-Koo

This shared humanity has the potential to become a foundation from which leaders in the system can work together to reimagine better ways to support vulnerable families and their children.

“Descriptors of the child welfare system in the urban context vary from ‘needed’ to ‘broken’ to straight up ‘demonic’ — and what word you use largely depends on your felt experience with its institutions and your vantage point in a society with a history of separating children from their families and over-policing families of color. Some activists would like to see the child welfare system radically overhauled, even abolished,” Cagua-Koo said. “But regardless of what progress looks like to each person, nothing will move forward if we cannot maintain each other’s humanity and change the way in which we view systems and our place in them.”

Like Cagua-Koo, members of the group have come to recognize that the child welfare system is not simply a machine to be overhauled, endured, or defended but that it is also a broad web of human beings working to support children and their families — human beings who are all subject to the limits of their organizational systems and institutional worldviews.

And while each group member lives within these limits, they have found that — together — limits of understanding, worldview, and best approach can be challenged.

Nevertheless, entering a deeply relational space that brings tangled, messy narratives to the forefront requires humility, patience, and commitment. It demands both the desire and the capacity to make space for critical conversations amid organizational priorities, family routines, external meetings, and overflowing schedules. It involves a willingness to journey into unknown areas and follow the path as it unfolds.

“Certain people stick, but not everybody stays,” Cagua-Koo said. “The more that you have a singular focus on quick and ‘effective’ action, probably the harder it is for you to be in the group because of the way the group has had to flow.”

The work needed within these complex systems is not simple or easy, but it is possible.

A few years into the process, this group is still just beginning — a crack, if you will, in the concrete. But out of this crack, a flower of collective learning, mourning, celebration, humanity, and possibility is beginning to grow.

Kay Rideout

About the Author

Kay Rideout served as a Summer 2022 Communications and Research Assistant at EGC. She is currently working towards a B.A. in Multimedia Journalism at Taylor University in Indiana and plans to graduate in 2024. Kay is passionate about in-depth narratives (specifically those coming from lesser-seen spaces), storytelling and the value of an individual’s lived experience. While still in the process of discerning post-graduation plans, she knows narratives will play a key role in whichever field she enters! Having grown up both overseas and in the Greater Boston area, she enjoys Boston’s unique culture and culinary experiences (Mike’s Pastry topping the list!).

Why I Love CUME

Why I Love CUME

by Jeff Bass, Executive Director 

On January 21, I attended the opening convocation day at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Boston campus, more commonly known as CUME, or the Campus for Urban Ministerial Education. I am an adjunct professor at CUME, and each spring, I teach one of their core urban ministry courses, Living Systems in the Urban Context. 

Attending the convocation is one of the obligations of teaching at CUME. But even though I went out of duty, it didn’t take long to reconnect with my sense of why CUME is so important and to remember why I make teaching there one of my priorities. Throughout the day, I was reminded why I love CUME, and I went home with a renewed appreciation for and commitment to CUME’s vital ministry in urban Boston.

I love CUME because it is a genuinely diverse expression of the church in Boston. The Bible is clear that we are heading for a multiethnic reality, with people “from every nation, tribe, people and language” standing before the throne (Rev. 7:9). The CUME community is the best representation of this that I have experienced. The room has no majority and is a glorious mix of Black, white, Asian, and Latino; men and women; people from different countries and backgrounds; and a range of ages from young adults to seniors. It’s a joy to worship, pray, interact, teach, and learn in this beautiful expression of the kingdom of God in Boston.

Jeff Bass teaching a class in the Living Systems in the Urban Context course in Spring 2023. Emmanuel Gospel Center.

I love CUME because of the passion and commitment of the students. The vast majority of CUME students have jobs as well as active ministries. In one small group session, we heard from a student who has a full-time job, is a senior pastor and a grandfather, and is, of course, taking classes at CUME. His energy for his life and learning was palpable, as was the energy from all the students I interacted with that day. It’s inspiring to be with so many people who expressively love the Lord, invest in their learning and growth, and put their faith into action in their whole lives. 

I love CUME because of the real difference it makes in the lives and ministries of its students and graduates. CUME students are urban ministry practitioners. They are not there just for academics but also to deepen their knowledge and practical skill sets so they can engage in effective ministry now and in the future. While I was eating my lunch, a student came over and spoke to me for five minutes about how he is applying what he learned in my systems class and how it is positively impacting his ministry. CUME undergirds the active ministries of its students with theological understanding and tools for practical ministry, and it is fun to see the enormous impact this has had across the church in urban Boston over decades.

“CUME undergirds the active ministries of its students with theological understanding and tools for practical ministry, and it is fun to see the enormous impact this has had across the church in urban Boston over decades.”

— Jeff Bass

I love CUME because of its strong and dedicated leadership. I’ve known CUME’s dean, the Rev. Dr. Virginia Ward, for many years now. She is a gifted and passionate leader who is building a solid team around her. The feeling at the convocation that day was one of confident team leadership, with all the parts working together to create an excellent experience for the students. Despite its many challenges, CUME is well led and is moving forward with strength and competence. 

I love CUME because its mission is critical to the health of the church in urban Boston. CUME’s mission dovetails beautifully with EGC’s mission, and this dovetail is intentional. CUME was founded in the 1970s to provide theological education to urban ministry practitioners. At the same time, EGC was re-envisioned as a center for applied research and ministry development, all in the service of Christian leaders. As we approach the 50th anniversary of CUME’s founding, I love seeing CUME’s vision and mission still being turned into a beautiful reality each semester as we continue to work together to strengthen Christian leaders and seek the peace and prosperity of this city to which we have been called.

Snapshot of CUME

Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary—Boston

Campus for Urban Ministerial Education (CUME)

1976

CUME was founded in September 1976 at Twelfth Baptist Church in Roxbury, Massachusetts.

Student Body*

For the 2021 to 2022 academic year, total enrollment at CUME stood at 138 students, including 86 men and 52 women. 72% of the enrolled students are ethnic minorities, not including international students. The students represent 28 denominations and come from 19 different countries. Like other theological schools, CUME’s enrollment has been negatively impacted by the COVID pandemic.

• African American: 46 students (33%)

• Asian: 25 students (18%)

• Hispanic or Latino: 26 students (19%)

• White: 12 students (9%)

• Two or more races: 2 students (1%)

• Unknown/Unavailable: 19 students (14%)

• International Students: 8 students (6%)

Faculty

CUME has two full-time and 14 adjunct professors.

• African American: 10 (63%)

• Asian: 1 (6%)

• Hispanic or Latino: 1 (6%)

• White: 4 (25%)

Certificate and Degree Programs

• Urban Ministry Graduate Certificate

• MA in Christian Ministries

• Master of Divinity, including the Urban Ministry Track

Languages

Classes are taught in English as well as some in Spanish and Portuguese.

*The data is based on Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s ATS Enrollment Reports for Fall 2021. The numbers are based on fall census data from September 27, 2021, and not on full-year totals.  

Contact Jeff

New Form

Would you be willing...?

Would you be willing...?

by Jeff Bass, Executive Director

Editor’s Note: In this opinion piece, Emmanuel Gospel Center’s executive director, Jeff Bass, shares how his life took an unexpected turn from the suburbs to the city. His story is one of the many ways God calls different people — from those down the street to others around the globe — to embrace the call to join him in his “divine mission for redemption.”

There I was. Alone in a room with the Rev. Dr. Michael Haynes. He looked me straight in the eye and said, “Would you be willing to go to the city?”

But I wasn’t really alone. I was among thousands of other college students that Dr. Haynes, the senior minister of Boston’s historic Twelfth Baptist Church and former pastor of Martin Luther King Jr., was addressing at Urbana ’79, just south of Chicago. That question has led to other “Would you be willing” questions over the decades, each one shaping God’s call on my life.

Urbana is InterVarsity Christian Fellowship’s famous missions conference, but I really had no interest in being a missionary. My college roommate and I had asked the English theologian John Stott a question when he spoke at Princeton a few months back, and Dr. Stott invited us to discuss it more over breakfast if we would come to Urbana in December. In retrospect, I think he was keener on getting us to Urbana than he was truly interested in our question. Be that as it may, after Christmas with my family in the suburbs of Cleveland, I drove to Urbana to have breakfast with Dr. Stott and attend the conference.

Jeff Bass as a young college student around 1979. Emmanuel Gospel Center.

It turned out that Urbana ’79 was an amazing experience. Forty-plus years later, I remember Luis Palau’s dynamic speaking, the energetic worship, the challenging small-group conversations, and a very well-orchestrated communion service with 17,000 participants. I don’t remember Billy Graham speaking, though I see he was on the agenda. I do remember that Dr. Stott’s devotions on Romans each morning were the best Bible teaching I’ve ever heard, and I remember that it was cool to have breakfast with one of the greatest theologians and Christian leaders of our time — though I don’t remember gaining much ground on our question.

What I remember most was Dr. Haynes’ passionate speech about the importance of God’s work in the city. I remember him saying at the end of his talk, “Some of you will be called to the city.” Thanks to the wonders of the internet, I just discovered that what he really ended with was:

“God this day may be directly calling you to personally covenant with him in a partnership to fulfill the most exciting yet demanding and critical mission of the Church of Jesus Christ in this new age and in the decade of the 1980s — right in center city, urban America, USA.

Brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ, our Lord is waiting for you to walk and work the city streets of this world with him in a divine mission for redemption. Would you be willing to go to the city?”

I can’t explain it, but it really did feel for a minute like Dr. Haynes was talking just to me — like I was alone with him in that big hall, and the Holy Spirit was asking me: Would you be willing to go to the city? And somehow, I knew at that moment I was being called to the city.

“I can’t explain it, but it really did feel for a minute like Dr. Haynes was talking just to me — like I was alone with him in that big hall, and the Holy Spirit was asking me: Would you be willing to go to the city?”

— Jeff Bass

Of course, I had no idea what that meant. It would not have been any stranger to me if Dr. Haynes had said, “Would you be willing to go to the farm?” I really had no connection with the city, and no real interest in the city either. I grew up in the burbs and was happy there. I picked Princeton over MIT in part because of its bucolic campus. I was studying environmental engineering and thought I would be headed to the woods someday.

But God had other plans. Not only was he calling me to the city, he was calling me to Dr. Haynes’ city. In the summer of 1981, I graduated from college, got married, moved to Watertown just outside of Boston, and started a new job as a hazardous waste management consultant at Arthur D. Little in Cambridge. And so began a journey to develop what so many others have had all along, a sincere love and appreciation for urban communities and urban people in general, and a passion for Boston in particular.

My wife, Ellen, and I did our best to get to know urban Boston. We joined an urban church — Ruggles Baptist on the border of Boston and Brookline. (It seemed pretty urban to us at the time.) We found a little ministry in the Yellow Pages (yes, this was pre-Google) called Christians for Urban Justice and started volunteering with them.

Through Ruggles, we met other people who cared about the city, and eventually, ten of us moved together to Boston’s Mission Hill neighborhood, building homes on land no one wanted. And through Christians for Urban Justice, Ellen and I met folks at the Emmanuel Gospel Center, including Doug and Judy Hall. I took their inner-city ministry course in 1988 and got my first introduction to systems thinking in Christian ministry. Around that time Doug, EGC’s executive director, asked me to join the organization’s board. From there, Rev. Bruce Wall, EGC’s board chair and a spiritual son of Dr. Haynes, encouraged me to join the staff in 1990, and I replaced Doug as executive director in 1999.

My life took a turn in December of 1979. An opportunity to have breakfast with a Christian leader I admired turned into an apparently clear word from the Holy Spirit, which led to a whole series of “Would you be willings”: Would you be willing to come to the city? … to move to Mission Hill? … to raise your family here and send your kids to Boston Public Schools? … to learn from the richness of people often labeled as “poor”? … to become friends with, work with, and work under people who are very different from you?

These “Would you be willings” challenged my faith, caused me to take risks and to grow, and led me to make choices in my life to follow through on what the Lord was calling me to.

More lately, the “Would you be willings” have been: Would you be willing to lament? … to find the courage to speak up even when it’s challenging or costly? … to repent of your arrogance and grow in humility? … to see things from other perspectives? … to give up power to empower others? … to learn to serve in new ways?

The journey has been — and continues to be — challenging, fulfilling, and often unexpected.

I want to continue to be willing…

TAKE ACTION

Since Dr. Haynes spoke to the young crowd at Urbana in the late 1970s, urban ministry has become even more crucial to the mission of the Church of Jesus Christ as more and more people migrate to the world’s cities. A lot has changed since then, and I wonder what challenges Dr. Haynes would have for us today.

I am clear that the Holy Spirit often challenges us with “Would you be willing...?” to invite us to cooperate with what God is doing around us. What “Would you be willings” is the Lord asking of you?

• Would you be willing to embrace the new opportunities God has created for the church through the COVID pandemic?

• Would you be willing to fight racism and injustice in your settings, even if it is personally costly to you?

• Would you be willing to listen to “the other side”?

• Would you be willing to follow instead of lead if leading has been your norm?

• Would you be willing to take the risk to follow God in a new way in this challenging season?

Jeff Bass

Jeff Bass joined the staff of EGC in 1991, and was named executive director in 1999. A graduate of Princeton University (civil engineering major), Jeff first worked as a consultant for Arthur D. Little, Inc., but left in 1987 to become the business manager of a local church, where he learned first-hand about the inner workings of an urban congregation. In 2014, Jeff was granted an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from Gordon College. Jeff is an avid tennis and paddle tennis player. He and his wife, Ellen, have two adult children and two amazing grandchildren.

Cry Out: New Music Video & Lyrics

Cry Out

This year, EGC’s annual urban ministry celebration was a bit different. Instead of a party, we sent out a gift. Straight from the heart and spirit of EGC’s creatives, this song and music video is for you to enjoy, reflect on, and share. Below you’ll find the video link, lyrics, and art photos.

Like the Christian leaders we serve, EGC is in a time of deep listening—to God and to other leaders—in this unexpected season of distancing and connecting, conserving and giving, caring and surviving.  Friends, may this song inspire you to cry out to God with all that you need, as you also hear the cries of those Jesus loves.

Music Video

Cry Out. Music and Lyrics by Caleb McCoy & Jaronzie Harris. Sound Production by Caleb McCoy. Video Directed & Edited by Elijah Mickelson. Videography by Giovanni "Fugi" Acevedo and Sue Murad. Behind the scenes Photography by Rosa with R9Foto. All precautions were taken in the filming of this video to ensure the health and safety of the artists, film crew, and Boston public.

Lyrics & Photos

CALEB

See I just wanna go on record

That this is never what I expected

Take away our pride and possessions and

It’s gonna beg the question, what is anybody left with?

What do you do in a pandemic?

Who takes the blame and who gets the credit?

Some will second guess it and others will get prophetic

Some sayin’ it’s the endin’, I think it’s a new beginning

We still have abundant life, we can live it up

But when Lord speaks we should listen up

And it shouldn’t take a virus that’s killing us

To think about the elderly, the poor, and the prisoners (that’s real)

It changed the whole world as we know it

But hopefully we can learn from this moment

We need beauty from artists and words from the poets

It’s time to dive deep, like the pearls in the ocean

I know you sad Sunday service is closing

But this the best time for the Church to be potent

How can we go serve the hurt and the homeless?

Do we really believe every curse can be broken?

I think we do, so let’s see it then

Some people need food, some will need a friend

Some people need a song, go and sing it then

This our prayer ‘til we meet again, that

We need perseverance through the pain

We need God to clear it when it rains

It’s only by the Spirit that we change

So let the people cry out



And God gave a command—it was, “Love one another”

Through the hard times enemies become brothers

The only thing certain is the God that’s above us

Let the people cry out

Jaronzie

We cry out in this world where calamity’s conjectured on a curve

We confront our own fragility

Raising up petitions and repenting on our bended knees

Seeking asylum from a sickness of a different breed

Shadow of death looming long on society

But servants of the Most High still trust in His authority

Who grasps the globe in His hands? Who is the King of Kings?

Holding all of our existence in supreme dexterity

Lifting up the cup of my salvation, calling urgently

Hoping that the God who formed creation will deliver me

Resting in His promise, drawing power from the NIV

Knowing that He’s faithful so I give Him this doxology

Chorus

We need perseverance through the pain

We need God to clear it when it rains

It’s only by the Spirit that we change

So let the people cry out

And God gave a command—it was, '“Love one another”

Through the hard times enemies become brothers

The only thing certain is the God that’s above us

Let the people cry out (So we all pray together)

ALL

Let the people cry out to you

Let the people cry out to you

Let the people cry out to you

Let the people cry out

Let the people cry out to You (for healing)

Let the people cry out to You (for breakthrough)

Let the people cry out to You (for deliverance)

Let the people cry out

The Word

When the righteous cry out for help,

The Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles

The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.

Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers them out of them all.

Psalm 34:17-19

About the Artists

Caleb McCoy

Caleb writes, performs, records, and shoots videos for Christian hip-hip through his ministry called OAK. His ministry also mentors other Christian hip-hop artists in Boston. Before the stay at home advisory, you could find Caleb ministering in schools, communities of youth at risk, and sold-out concert venues across the region. The OAK albums are available on Apple Music, Google Play, Spotify, and wherever albums are sold. Caleb also is EGC’s Development Manager and teaches the EGC 101 introduction to EGC’s city ministry.

Jaronzie Harris

Jaronzie is an educator, worship leader, playwright and director who uses research and the arts to unite communities and promote justice. She is currently a scholar in the Institute for the Study of the Black Christian Experience at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and the Research & Networking Associate at EGC for the Boston Black Church Vitality Project. Before the stay at home advisory, you could find Jaronzie meeting with Christian leaders across eastern Massachusetts to bolster youth programs and develop spiritual vitality through collaboration and the arts.

Elijah Mickelson

Elijah is a storyteller, pastor, and director. He serves as EGC’s director of communications helping churches and Christian leaders tackle the complexity of the urban environment. He is also the founder of the Filmmaker Collaborative. The purpose of the Filmmaker Collaborative is to build community, encourage one another in the creative process, and explore collaboration. Contact Elijah at emickelson@egc.org.

Rosa Cabán

Rosa Cabán is R9 Foto. Rosa is a photographer who uses the arts to bring influence to communities in need of God's love. She is currently serving on the creative team in the media department at Impact Church. Before the pandemic, you could find her cooking, hosting friends, and working on projects with other Kingdom artists.

EGC FILMS

Courage for Troubled Times: The Surprising Power of Hymn Poetry

Courage for Troubled Times

The Surprising Power of Hymn Poetry

By Rev. Dr. Dean Borgman

Dear friends, in my distress concerning our country’s political turmoil, I’ve often felt anxious and confused. For this reason, I’ve found myself drawing back from discussing “the elephant in the room,” as many Americans do when we face opposing opinions in our families, workplaces, and churches. What then can I and other followers of Jesus Christ do with our feelings?

The Apostle Paul suggests encouraging ourselves and one another “with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs” (Ephesians 5:19). As I confront this new political climate, I look to these forms of poetry for the inner peace which leads to godly action. 

I’d like to acquaint you with some hymns that may be unfamiliar to you. The best hymns combine sociopolitical laments with personal emotions, confessions, and spiritual hope. I find that reading them as poems allows me to take in and soak up their richness of spiritual comfort and inspiration.

god moves in a mysterious way

William Cowper’s life was described by biographer John Piper as “one long accumulation of pain.” Cowper came to faith in the asylum at St. Albans when he happened to pick up a Bible in the garden. After this experience, Cowper was forced to reconcile a life marked by death and mental illness with the goodness and sovereignty of God.

God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform.

He plants His footsteps in the sea and rides upon the storm. 

Deep in unfathomable mines of never-failing skill,

He treasures up his bright designs and works His sovereign will.

Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take—the clouds you so much dread

are big with mercy and shall break in blessings on your head. 

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, but trust Him for His grace.

Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face.

His purposes will ripen fast, unfolding every hour.

The bud may have a bitter taste, but sweet will be the flower.

Blind unbelief is sure to err and scan His work in vain.

God is His own interpreter and He will make it plain.

Reflection Questions

• As you take your time to read Cowper’s hymn, what most resonates with you?

• In a world and life like Cowper’s—and ours—in what ways do God and God’s actions often seem mysterious?

• How do you see our Creator and Redeemer becoming His own interpreter amidst our cultural chaos?

God is working his purpose out

In writing the refrain of “God Is Working His Purpose Out,” scholar Arthur Campell Ainger drew inspiration from Habakkuk 2:14: “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of God, as the waters cover the sea.” It, too, speaks to trying times.

God is working his purpose out as year succeeds to year.

God is working his purpose out and the time is drawing near.

Nearer and nearer draws the time, the time that shall surely be

when the earth shall be filled with the glory of God as the waters cover the sea.

From utmost east to utmost west wherever feet have trod,

by the mouth of many messengers goes forth the voice of God:

'Give ear to me, ye continents, ye isles, give ear to me,

that the earth may be filled with the glory of God as the waters cover the sea.’

What can we do to work God's work, to prosper and increase

the love of God in all mankind, the reign of the Prince of peace?

What can we do to hasten the time, the time that shall surely be,

when the earth shall be filled with the glory of God as the waters cover the sea

March we forth in the strength of God, with the banner of Christ unfurled,

that the light of the glorious gospel of truth may shine throughout the world.

Fight, we that fight with sorrow and sin to set their captives free,

that the earth may be filled with the glory of God as the waters cover the sea.

All we can do is nothing worth unless God blesses the deed;

vainly we hope for the harvest-tide till God gives life to the seed.

Yet nearer and nearer draws the time, the time that shall surely be

when the earth shall be filled with the glory of God as the waters cover the sea.

Reflection Questions

• Do you ever feel yourself asking with Habakkuk, “Why, God? How can you stand by while such things happen?”

• What do you do when you feel this way?

• What possibilities for action does this hymn offer to you, even when you feel directionless?

once to every man & nation

Concerned about slavery and the impending Mexican-American War, professor and abolitionist James Russell Lowell penned “The Present Crisis” early in his career. This poem later became “Once to Every Man & Nation,” and as a hymn retains its message about social responsibility. Though the gender-exclusive language is dated, what can we take from this 1845 hymn to use in our own lives?  

Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide

In the strife of truth and falsehood, for the good or evil side.

Some great cause, some great decision, offering each the bloom or blight,

And the choice goes by forever 'twixt that darkness and that light.

Then to side with Truth is noble when we share her wretched crust

‘Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and 'tis prosperous to be just.

Then it is the brave man chooses while the coward stands aside

Till the multitude make virtue of the faith they had denied.

By the light of burning martyrs, Christ, Thy bleeding feet we track, 

Toiling up new Calv'ries ever with the cross that turns not back. 

New occasions teach new duties, ancient values test our youth. 

They must upward still and onward who would keep abreast of truth. 

Though the cause of evil prosper, yet the truth alone is strong.

Though her portion be the scaffold and upon the throne be wrong. 

Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim unknown 

Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above His own.

Reflection Questions

• What stands out to you from this hymn? In what ways is it different from the earlier two?

• How are we as Christians asked to follow Jesus, carrying our crosses up “new Calvaries”?

• What does Truth mean to you? Do you think that this is a moment when all Americans must decide about Truth?

In conclusion

Although changing our world is an enormous task, encouraging ourselves and others with psalms and hymns is a doable first step. Can you give yourself some time daily or weekly to devote to songs like these? 

As you do, may this powerful poetry lift your spirit and give you the courage to cooperate with our Father, who is fulfilling our prayer that God’s Kingdom might come to this world.

Resources for Christians Navigating Political & Theological Divides

Resources for Christians Navigating Political & Theological Divides

Compiled by Andrew Tsou and Dean Borgman

We live in polarizing times—but we’re not the first. Many time-tested kingdom principles about how to engage with others in political matters are already recorded in insightful Christian books and resources.

““Moving out to do something has to have a deeply spiritual basis.” - Professor Dean Borgman”

On November 9, 2018, the Emmanuel Gospel Center held its first Long View Session—a new series of gatherings where seasoned, visionary ministry thinkers discuss matters crucial to the future of urban ministry and Christian engagement in society. At the inaugural session, Professor Dean Borgman discussed Christians’ call to engage in political conversation amidst explosive and frayed emotions in our nation, state, and communities, and he offered tips and resources to light the way.

Upcoming Long View Sessions

Tell me about upcoming Long View Sessions!

Long View Session participants also had the opportunity to share ways that they’re already engaging—well, poorly, or not at all—with friends and family on issues of political relevance.

“Moving out to do something has to have a deeply spiritual basis,” Prof. Borgman cautioned. For biblical principles on how to engage well about politically-charged issues when talking to friends, family, and people on the other side of political divides, check out Dean’s recommended resources below.

Suggested Resources

The New York Times, September 29, 2018

“What should the role of Christians in politics be? More people than ever are asking that question. Christians cannot pretend they can simply transcend politics…. Those who simply avoid all political discussions and engagement are essentially casting a vote for the status quo.” - Pastor Tim Keller

Evangelicals on Public Policy Issues: Sustaining a Respectful Political Conversation by Harold Heie (2014)

“…One of my primary proposals for a “Way Forward” beyond the debacle of current American Politics that emerged from my recent eCircle on “Reforming American Politics” is that politicians and their supporters need to ‘develop personal relationships of mutual understanding and trust by listening to and talking respectfully with those who disagree with them’. …To develop such a personal relationship is to become a friend.” - Harold Heie

The Politics of Jesus: Rediscovering the True Revolutionary Nature of Jesus’ Teachings and How They Have Been Corrupted by Obery Hendricks (2007)

Obery Hendricks is an ordained Elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, a former Wall Street Investment executive, and a scholar, professor, and author also of Living Water and The Universe Bends Toward Justice: Radical Reflections on the Bible, the Church, and the Body Politic (2011).

God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It by Jim Wallis (2006)

God’s Politics covers the taboos of talking about religion and politics, and how spiritual values impact international relations, economic justice, social issues, and social change.

The Politics of Jesus by James H. Yoder (1994)

“Tradition has painted a portrait of a Savior aloof from governmental concerns and whose teachings point to an apolitical life for his disciples….Such a picture of Jesus is far from accurate,” argues John Howard Yoder.

Yoder gives us a picture of a political Jesus, and offers a polemic for Anabaptist pacifism.

Other Movements, Organizations & Resources

Civilitas, Doug Birdsall

Civilitas represents a foundational commitment to strengthen the influence of the Bible and the role of the Church as a means of bringing healing and cohesion to our fragmenting society.

Civil conversations will work to change the tone of our society by supplanting vitriolic public discourse with respectful listening, constructive exchange, and positive partnerships.

Revive Civility, from the National Institute for Civil Discourse: To Restore and Call for Civility in our Democracy

Integrated research, practice and policy to support and engage: 

• Elected officials who are capable of working to solve the big issues facing our country.

• A public that demands civil discourse as well as government that works in the best interests of the country as a whole. 

• A media that informs citizens in a fair and responsible way.

Citizen Engagement and Civil Discourse Resources

National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) is committed to the success of all legislators and staff. Its mission is to:

• Improve the quality and effectiveness of state legislatures.

• Promote policy innovation and communication among state legislatures.

• Ensure state legislatures a strong, cohesive voice in the federal system.

[Video] The Power of Story: Defying the 'Godless New England' Narrative

[Video] The Power of Story: Defying the 'Godless New England' Narrative 

If you’re ministering in New England, you’re probably familiar with the well-worn “godless New England” narrative. Reports such as this one by the Barna Research Group about America’s most post-Christian cities reinforce this view. But there’s another narrative of New England spiritual vitality that a Barna report doesn't capture. 

God is on the move in New England cities. When we share our stories of God at work, we glorify God—and we build one another's faith and vision. 

Listen to this brief talk by EGC’s Stacie Mickelson and Caleb McCoy about the importance of story in Christian witness.

Stacie Mickelson and Caleb McCoy of Emmanuel Gospel Center, GO Conference, Springfield, MA, February 17, 2018.

Why Christian Activists Wait For God

Why Christian Activists Wait for God

by Jess Mason

Christian social activists are a busy bunch. They’re action-oriented, and the world never lacks work for those concerned with the suffering, the marginalized, and the oppressed. But if Christian social activists run on the same steam as everyone else, they’re not actually making Christ’s difference in the world.

At a worship gathering of over 30 EGC leaders and social activists, the worship leader posed the question, “In all that we have going on, what’s the value of waiting for God?” I was moved by the breadth of responses. I felt it such a rare privilege to be in the company of so much gathered wisdom that I wanted to give other Christian leaders in Boston a taste.

I pray that these perspectives encourage you in your waiting for God—possibly the most strategic action we can take to make a lasting difference in the city.

Nika Elugardo, Chief Growth Officer

I feel personally transported to another dimension when I move into a quiet space of recognizing God's presence. In those moments, it's not that I am invited into God's reality, but that I invite myself into an awareness of reality itself.

This deeper awareness seems to unlock the constraints of our physical world and release God—who seems to restrain himself by the very laws he created—to be who he is in this (our) world, where our sin has closed us off to him. It’s in stillness and quiet that new buds of faith flower.

Brian Gearin, EGC Missionary

We wait for God so that we can "be with Him" and know His purposes for each issue we face. I think that He desires us to "know Him" and respond to issues with His guidance.

Liza Cagua-Koo, Assistant Director

I wait for God for the same reasons I ask my kids to wait for me.

First, it's dangerous without me—There's a street to be crossed ahead! Also, I want them to value that staying together is more important than getting something done, or getting there first—No one gets left behind! The importance of togetherness with God can't be overestimated. He waits for us, though we often think we're having to wait for him!

When I am the one having to wait for my kids, when I see how small they are, or how much practice it takes to learn something, I am reminded of how patient and steadfast God is with my own growth. He never leaves me behind. He waits for me.

When I wait on him, I become present to those realities, which in turn fills my tank for being able to wait on others—and be patient with myself—as we all travel this pilgrim road.

Sarah Blumenshine, Co-Director of Greater Boston Refugee Ministry

Waiting puts us in a posture of receiving. God is the main actor, and we act as we receive direction. Waiting trains us to discern his voice. It requires us to back away from our impulses and evaluate, “Is this God leading, or is it me, or something else?"

Caleb McCoy, Development Manager

God is outside of time. Waiting on him helps us to reconnect with the mystery of His timing and submit our plans to his will.

Jeffrey Murray, Director of Operations

Any response or action taken without waiting before God runs the risk of being idolatrous. We are— intentionally or unintentionally—elevating our thought processes and plans above God's intentions.

God's commandment clearly instructs us, “You shall have no other gods before me" (Ex 20:3, Deut 5:7; NIV). To take action (i.e. move, do, respond, etc.) prior to—and thus outside of—seeking God's will is a way of going against his instructions for us.

Jeff Bass, Executive Director

In 1 Kings, Elijah is running from God. God comes to meet him, but not right away. God was not in the wind, the earthquake, or the fire. He came after, quietly. Elijah had to wait to experience him that day.

God's timing is often not our timing. We want things now, but God's plans take time. God called David to be King, and Samuel anointed him. But he didn't get to be king until years later, after Saul was removed. We need to wait if we want to stay connected with God's plans.

Gregg Detwiler - Director of Intercultural Ministries

Waiting on God is a gift from God—it’s rest for our souls.

In God’s presence, we also become more self-aware of our inner world, the broken and darker parts of our being, and our motivations. There we can submit our lives and our plans to God to lay them in his hands, so that we can give him glory for anything good that comes out of our action.

Even youths get tired and weary; even strong young men clumsily stumble. But those who wait for the Lord’s help find renewed strength. They rise up as if they had eagles’ wings. They run without growing weary. They walk without getting tired. - Isaiah 40:30-31 (NET)

Sarah Dunham, Former Director of Abolitionist Network

Waiting on God helps us remember that we are not in control. We need to stop striving, and running around trying to make things happen.

Once we step back and remember who is really in control, then we can really join God in what He is doing. Christian social action is not about a frenzy of doing things for God—it’s knowing God, and allowing him to work in and through us.

Elijah Mickelson, Director of Communications

We see in part, God sees the whole.

RESPOND

The Psalms Vigil

Waiting on God is both healthy and strategic. The Psalms Vigil is a simple, ancient practice that helps focus our hearts with God. I have found the Psalms Vigil to be a powerful form of active waiting on God. The vigil has a simple, three-part rhythm:

1. Read a psalm.

2. Talk or journal to God about any emotions or issues come up in your heart from what you’ve read.

3. Rest in silence for anything else the Holy Spirit may want to do in your heart.

When you feel ready, you can move on to a new psalm, repeating the three-part rhythm with as many different psalms as you like. 

Connect with Jess

Contact Jess Mason

Jess Mason is a former licensed minister and spiritual director. She is currently a ministry innovation strategist in Applied Research & Consulting at EGC, and the chair of Christian Formation at a church in Jamaica Plain. Her passion is to see God’s goodness revealed to and through Christian leaders and pillars in the Boston area.

From the Bible Belt to Boston: What God's Doing in New England

From the Bible Belt to Boston: How God’s Moving in New England

by Kathryn Hamilton

Do the numbers lie?

In the most recent “post-Christian” study by Barna Group, a research organization focused on the intersection of faith and culture, Boston ranked 2nd among “The Most Post-Christian Cities in America: 2017.” In fact, eight out of the top 10 are located in the Northeast, five of which are located in New England.

To qualify as “post-Christian” for Barna’s study, individuals had to meet nine or more of Barna’s 16 criteria that indicate “a lack of Christian identity, belief and practice, including, individuals who identify as atheist, have never made a commitment to Jesus, have not attended church in the last year or have not read the Bible in the last week.”

https://www.barna.com/research/post-christian-cities-america-2017/

As I reflect on my two months interning for EGC and prepare to return home to my “Bible-Belt” town in West Texas, I find myself a bit baffled, as my experience has been far from spiritually dry and Godless.

“Saying you’re a Christian in Boston is weighty. There is no cultural norm influencing your religious affiliation. ”

Knowing the Lord was calling me to Boston, it was seeing numbers Barna posted in 2015 that sparked my initial interest – that Boston ranked 4th among the top dechurched cities. However, as I settled into my temporary home in Cambridge and plugged into a local church there, I was in awe of how “Christian” the Christians in the Boston area were.

Cultural Christianity is prominent in my region of Texas. You grow up “Christian,” go to church on a regular basis (or at least on Christian holidays) and hold to what you consider “good Christian morals.” You hear the Gospel preached so much that the meaning numbs and you fall prey to the comfort and ease of day-to-day life.

Let me disclaim, this is a broad generalization. I'm where I am spiritually because of devoted and loving Christian parents and mentors that demonstrated the hands and feet of Jesus. I generalize the culture of the Bible Belt to make the point that saying you’re a Christian in Texas and saying you’re a Christian in Boston can reveal starkly different fruit. Saying you’re a Christian in Boston is weighty. There is no cultural norm influencing your religious affiliation. You’re a Christian because you choose to follow and live for Jesus.

The Christian community that I have found here in Boston is unlike anything I’ve seen or experienced before. The community seen in the early church of Acts is still alive, and, from my experience, flourishing. It’s small but strong.

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

Acts 2:42-47 has been my Boston.

Where I thought there was going to be nothing but pluralistic, moral relative doctrine, I have found sound, Gospel-oriented teaching. Where I expected to see scattered believers, I have seen great unity. Where I knew social injustices and needs to be present, I saw the church on the front lines. Where I expected to be a lone believer and disheartened by the lack of believers, I’ve been the one nurtured and influenced.

“Where I expected to see scattered believers, I have seen great unity. Where I knew social injustices and needs to be present, I saw the church on the front lines.”

So if Boston Christian community is anything like the early church, the Lord is going to “add to their number daily” those who are being saved.  

I’m sure that Barna’s numbers are accurate, and that Boston is in fact one of the most post-Christian cities in America. But as church planters who come to Boston because of that number partner with and learn from the Christian vitality already here, the fruits of both their labors are multiplying.

Seeds are being sown on good soil in Boston, and a revival is growing roots.

RESPOND

Are you from the Bible Belt? Do you agree? Disagree? Have a different experience? I'd love to hear from you! 

Share Your Thoughts

Contact Kathryn

Are you interested in internships with EGC? We have volunteers, interns, associates, and fellows working with us each semester.

Inquire

Inquire about Internships

About the Author

Kathryn Hamilton is a Summer 2017 Communications BETA at EGC. She graduates in 2018 with an Advertising and Public Relations major from Abilene Christian University. Growing up in the church in Dallas and Abilene, TX, she developed a heart for missions among unreached people groups. After graduation, she plans to work in the non-profit sector or with corporate social responsibility. In Boston, she has enjoyed the diverse culture, the "T", lots and lots of J.P. Licks and, of course, the people. 

Choosing to Listen

PERSPECTIVES

Jeff Bass, Executive Director, Emmanuel Gospel Center

Last night I attended a community meeting at the Boston Islamic Center in Roxbury Crossing. Over 2,600 people came together in my neighborhood to hear Mayor Walsh, Senator Warren, and assorted leaders and citizens from the Greater Boston Interfaith Organization challenge us to stand together against bigotry and for community.

“It would be arrogant and naïve for me to continue to ignore my own arrogance and naïveté as I process this. So what do I do now?”

Like many in Boston’s blue bubble, I was shocked and deeply disappointed by the results of the November election, and I’ve spent the last few weeks trying to get a handle on our new and emerging reality. I have been asking myself, “What was I missing?”  It would be arrogant and naïve for me to continue to ignore my own arrogance and naïveté as I process this. So what do I do now?

As I heard speaker after speaker affirm last night, my first responsibility is to listen. As a White Evangelical male organizational leader, growing in listening is especially important for me.

I know many people who are angry, and many who are fearful—not just about the divisiveness in our country, but about the impact the election will have (and is having) on their families and neighborhoods. One friend wrote that she feels like someone is pointing a gun at her children saying, “Don’t worry, I won’t pull the trigger.” Even though the gun is not pointed at me in the same way, can I appreciate the danger that she and so many others are experiencing? Can I begin to understand the pain and betrayal they feel?

At the same time, I know people who are hopeful—even excited—about a change in leadership and the opportunity for the country to move in what they see as a new direction. They had a different set of “deal-breakers” in the election (change, the economy, the Supreme Court perhaps). Can I understand their views, and appreciate their decisions? Can I empathize with the pain they’ve felt these last eight years that would lead them to choose Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton? It’s unfathomable to me, yet look at what happened.

“Even though the gun is not pointed at me in the same way, can I appreciate the danger that she and so many others are experiencing? Can I begin to understand the pain and betrayal they feel?”

So I have a lot to learn, and I’m going to start by doubling down on listening. Well. And a lot. This means taking the time for more conversations, more reading, and more pressing into new relationships. And when I do, I want to seek first to understand, feel, relate as best I can, before I say or do anything else.

“I want to first seek to understand, feel, relate as best I can, before I say or do anything else.”

As we create space at EGC staff members to speak up with our perspectives on what we are learning and seeing in the church in Greater Boston, and as we weigh in on issues that affect us, I hope that we can stay grounded in listening.

If you’d like to talk about any of this, please let me know. I’d love to listen.

Jeff Bass and his wife Ellen live in Roxbury Crossing, about a mile from the Islamic Center.

What is Living System Ministry?

What is Living System Ministry?

Living System Ministry is a discipline of Christian practice that recognizes the differences between the living systems that God makes and the constructs that people make, offering insights and practical tools to help us align with and effectively engage living social systems.

Consider cats and toasters

People make toasters. Only God makes cats. And, clearly, we can’t fix a sick cat with the tools we may use to fix our broken toaster. So why do those of us who are in Christian ministry try to fix our churches with tools designed for accomplishing simple tasks, which don't take into account what is truly living, the rich complexity of our people-based, Spirit-filled churches?

Churches, cities, and cultures are living systems

The Bible describes the church as a body, an organism. Yet, in our Western culture, we have grown accustomed to thinking of churches in terms of organizations or buildings because our culture is very organizationally and technologically centered.

Our thinking about our social context is inadequate, so our actions are unfruitful

God is always at work and, as his children, we want to participate with him in his work. If we use our organizational mental models to work with living systems such as churches, neighborhoods, and cities, unknowingly we cause much long-term harm instead of good. We need to learn to adopt the right mental models about living systems to avoid that.

Through redemption, we can learn a better way of thinking

Through our friendship with Jesus Christ, we find that his ways are higher than ours, and, through a consistent process of redemptive thinking, we internalize his ways of growing and nurturing what is alive. More like farmers than technicians, we learn, through this redemptive process, to be involved in and “in tune with” what causes fruitfulness. We never “cause” fruit to happen! God does!

With a new perspective, we can participate with God in his work

As our work becomes aligned with what God is already doing, and as his vitality begins to flow through the veins and arteries of the living social systems, there is an explosion of life within us and around us. Multiplication of this life is the natural outcome of living system ministry. It is our joy to discover it, and to give all honor and praise to God.

Bear fruit in every good work

We learn that real change in any living system is not dependent on what we do, but on what God does. Therefore, to get anything done, we are going to have to learn to think more about working with God’s living systems and think less about trying to fix problems with our plans and procedures and programs. When our ministry activities are better aligned with what God is already doing, there is an explosion of life! Then, instead of our actions causing more decline, our actions contribute to fruitful ministry.

To learn more

These are just some of the core principles of Living System Ministry. At the Emmanuel Gospel Center, we have been teaching these concepts to seminarians and ministry practitioners for many years. To learn more, you can start by reading Doug Hall’s 2010 book, The Cat and the Toaster, Living System Ministry in a Technological Age (Amazon: https://amzn.com/1608992705). You can search this site for more on the topic of Living System Ministry. Or get in touch with us. We would be happy to help!

Summary/synopsis:

What is Living System Ministry? Doug Hall sets out the core ideas of this discipline of Christian practice where we learn to discern the living social systems around us and align our actions to what really creates lasting change.

Emmanuel Research Review

WHAT IS IT?

The Emmanuel Research Review (2004 - 2014) was a digital journal from the Emmanuel Gospel Center’s Applied Research department. The Review featured regular articles, papers, and other resources to support urban pastors, leaders and community members in their efforts to serve their communities effectively. Ninety-five issues of The Review were published during its ten-year run from 2004 to 2014.

THEN AND NOW

When EGC’s Applied Research and Consulting department began a comprehensive reorganization in 2014, we discontinued publication until we were in a better position to produce new materials that would be even more effective. In 2016, when we launched a new website, the ERR archive was no longer available. Now we are working to repost some of the best from the past while we continue producing new resources addressing a wide range of urban issues.

LIST OF PUBLISHED ISSUES

2014

Issue No. 95 — March 2014 — Knowing Your Neighborhood: An Update of Boston’s South End Churches. (EGC reassessed the status of churches in our own neighborhood, Boston’s South End.)

Issue No. 94 — December 2013 - January 2014 — Understanding Boston’s Quiet Revival. (Steve Daman, Senior Writer, EGC, offers questions and discussion that lead toward a working definition and overview of “the Quiet Revival.”)

2013

Issue No. 93 — October-November 2013 — Mapping A Systemic Understanding of Homelessness for Effective Church Engagement. (EGC’s Starlight Ministries shares a homelessness system map for Boston and suggestions as to how churches can more effectively engage and impact homelessness in their communities.)

Issue No. 92 — September 2013 — “Why Cities Matter” and “Reaching for the New Jerusalem,” Books by Boston Area Authors. (Reviews of: Why Cities Matter: To God, the Culture, and the Church, by Stephen T. Um & Justin Buzzard, and Reaching for the New Jerusalem: A Biblical and Theological Framework for the City, edited by Seong Hyun Park, Aída Besançon Spencer, & William David Spencer.)

Issue No. 91 — July-August 2013 — Grove Hall Neighborhood Study. (Story and statistics on many facets of life in one Boston neighborhood.)

Issue No. 90 — June 2013 — Hidden Treasures of the Kingdom Uncovered. Celebrating Ministries to the Nations: A Manual for Organizing and Planning an Event in Your City. (Rev. Dr. Gregg Detwiler, Director of Intercultural Ministries, EGC, and Dr. Bianca Duemling, Assistant Director of Intercultural Ministries, describe a ministry event and the journey they pursued to pull it together.)

Issue No. 89 — May 2013 — 2013 Emmanuel Applied Research Award: Student Recipients. (Excerpts from the award paper, “Cambridge City-Wide Church Collaborative Cooperates to Meet Community Needs,” by Megan Footit, and abstracts from the three runners-up.)

Issue No. 88 — April 2013 — Perspectives on Boston Church Statistics: Is Boston Really Only 2% Evangelical? (Rudy Mitchell, Senior Researcher, EGC, evaluates the sources, accuracy, limitations, and weakness of some commonly used church statistics, especially with regard to their application in Boston.)

Issue No. 87 — March 2013 — Christian Engagement with Muslims in the United States. (Rev. Dr. Gregg Detwiler, Director of Intercultural Ministries at EGC, hosts a video conversation on Christian Engagement with Muslims in the U.S. Panelists: Dave Kimball, Minister-at-Large for Christian–Muslim Relations, EGC; Nathan Elmore, Program Coordinator & Consultant for Christian-Muslim Relations, Peace Catalyst International; and Paul Biswas, Pastor, International Community Church – Boston.)

Issue No. 86 — February 2013 — The Vital Signs of a Living System Ministry. (Dr. Douglas A. Hall, President of EGC and author of The Cat and the Toaster: Living System Ministry in a Technological Age, shares how Living System Ministry principles serve as vital signs which can guide our understanding and practice of leadership in urban ministry.)

2012

Issue No. 85 — December 2012–January 2013 — “Toward A More Adequate Mission Speak” and Other Resources by Ralph Kee. (An introduction to five booklets by Boston-based church planter and animator of the Greater Boston Church Planting Collaborative, Rev. Ralph Kee.)

Issue No. 84 — November 2012 — The Boston Education Collaborative’s Partnership with Boston Public Schools. (History and highlights of recent collaboration between EGC’s Boston Education Collaborative and the Boston Public Schools Faith-Based Partnerships in building church-school partnerships; and details on the BEC’s “Reflection and Learning Sessions” that provide support for Christian leaders working with students.)

Issue No. 83 — October 2012 — Churches in Boston’s Neighborhood of Mattapan. (Erik Nordbye, Research Associate of EGC, studied and analyzed data on 65 Christian churches in Boston’s diverse Mattapan neighborhood.)

Issue No. 82 — September 2012 — Christian Churches in Somerville, Mass. (A profile of 46 Christian churches in the city of Somerville, Mass.)

Issue No. 81 — August 2012 — Christian Churches in North Dorchester of Boston, Mass. (Hanno van der Bijl, Research Associate at EGC, studied the diverse and vital expressions of the church in the North Dorchester neighborhood of Boston. The report also documents the slow growth in the number of churches over the last 25 years.)

Issue No. 80 — July 2012 — Developing Safe Environments for Learning and Transformation. (Rev. Dr. Gregg Detwiler, Director of Intercultural Ministries, EGC, shares from his experience regarding “a model for personal and organizational transformation” while underscoring the importance of creating a safe environment.)

Issue No. 79 — June 2012 — Emmanuel Applied Research Award: Student Recipients. (The 2012 award paper, “Miriam’s House Ministries and The Melville Park Micro-enterprise Experiment,” by Jim Hartman, is presented in its entirety, and there are links to the executive summaries of the three runners up.)

Issue No. 78 — May 2012 — The Rise of the Global South: The Decline of Western Christendom and the Rise of Majority World Christianity, by Elijah J. F. Kim. (An introduction to the above named book by Elijah J. F. Kim, former Director of the Vitality Project, EGC. Dr. Kim says “the center of gravity of the Christian faith has shifted from the West to the non-West.”)

Issue No. 77 — April 2012 — The Black Church and Hip Hop Culture & Under One Steeple, Books by Boston Area Authors. (Reviews of The Black Church and Hip Hop Culture: Toward Bridging the Generational Divide, edited by Emmett G. Price III, and Under One Steeple: Multiple Congregations Sharing More Than Just Space, by Lorraine Cleaves Anderson, former pastoral of International Community Church in Allston.)

Issue No. 76 — March 2012 — Hartford Survey Project: Understanding Service Needs and Opportunities. (Jessica Sanderson of Urban Alliance shares about the purpose, process, analysis, findings and application of the Hartford Survey.)

Issue No. 75 — February 2012 — Behind the Scenes: Setting the Stage for Conversation about the Church in New England. (Video series from Brandt Gillespie of PrayTV and Dr. Roberto Miranda of Congregación León de Judá in Boston about the church in New England.)

Issue No. 74 — January 2012 — Shared Worship Space, an Urban Challenge and a Kingdom Opportunity. (Dr. Bianca Duemling, Assistant Director, Intercultural Ministries, EGC, outlines the challenges of churches sharing space.)

2011

Issue No. 73 — December 2011 — Let’s Do It! Multiplying Churches in Boston Now. (Rev. Ralph A. Kee, animator of the Greater Boston Church Planting Collaborative, connects first century practices with 21st century potentialities for Boston.)

Issue No. 72 — November 2011 — Crossing Beyond the Organization Threshold. (Dr. Douglas A. Hall, President, EGC, shares thoughts on the limitations of organization and the danger of having it become our ministry’s focus, and how we can use organization and technology appropriately to benefit a living system.)

Issue No. 71 — October 2011 — Human Trafficking: The Abolitionist Network. (Sarah Durfey, director, the Abolitionist Network, an emerging ministry of EGC, talks about how we can address human trafficking using a Living System Ministry approach.)

Issue No. 70 — September 2011 — Urban Ministry Training in Metro Boston. (Hanno van der Bijl, Research Associate, EGC, offers a brief introduction on urban ministry training in Metro Boston, the Urban Ministry Training Directory, a brief analysis, and a list of related resources.)

Issue No. 69 — August 2011 — The Diverse Leadership Project. (Dr. Bianca Duemling, Assistant Director, Intercultural Ministries, EGC, gives a brief overview of the project which seeks to better understand leadership development, styles, and priorities within various ethnic church communities. Includes interviews with six New England church leaders in five different ethnic contexts.)

Issue No. 68 — July 2011 — Metro Boston Collegiate Ministry Project: Focus Group/Learning Team Report. (The story of how the collaborative project began, initial group assumptions, and the “hexagonning” exercise that engaged 50 local leaders in a shared learning process to understand local college ministry.)

Issue No. 67 — June 2011 — Metro Boston Collegiate Ministry Project: Student Enrollment Report. (Who attends Boston’s colleges? This report examines student enrollment profiles for each of the 35 schools in Metro Boston.)

Issue No. 66 — May 2011 — Emmanuel Applied Research Award: Student Recipients. (The 2011 award paper, “Faith-Based Healthcare for the Underserved of Lawrence, MA: A Pilot Project,” by Stephen Ko, is presented in its entirety.)

Issue No. 65 — April 2011 — Boston Education Collaborative Church Survey Report. (How Boston-area churches are engaged in education, what areas of programming they are interested in further developing, and what resources are needed for them to become more involved in education.)

Issue No. 64 — March 2011 — Connecting the Disconnected: A Survey of Youth and Young Adults in Grove Hall. (An April, 2010, report on out-of-work and out-of-school young adults ages 16-24 in the Grove Hall area of Boston, and an interview with Ra’Shaun Nalls and Martin Booth of Project R.I.G.H.T., who share the story behind the study.)

Issue No. 63 — February 2011 — Youth Violence Systems Project Special Edition Review. (An overview of the community-based process that is at the heart of the Youth Violence Systems Project (YVSP), the YVSP strategy lab, the reason why we haven’t solved the gang violence problem, and what we are learning.)

Issue No. 62 — January 2011 — The Urban Apostolic Task. (In this issue, Rev. Ralph Kee, animator, Greater Boston Church Planting Collaborative, illuminates the vision, practical instruction, and urgency of an apostolic ministry that engages the entire church in “new-world building movements.”)

2010

Issue No. 59 — September/October 2010 — A New Kind of Learning: Contextualized Theological Education Models. (Dr. Alvin Padilla, Dean of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Center for Urban Ministerial Education, Boston, considers the challenge theological schools have best serving the needs of diverse cultures in cities today.)

2008

Issue No. 41 — September/October 2008 — Urban Youth Mentoring. (Rudy Mitchell, Senior Researcher, summarizes his research findings regarding various practical aspects on mentoring youth in an urban context. Rudy’s research draws from both secular and faith-based sources regarding preparation, planning, recruiting, screening, training, matching, support, monitoring, closure, and evaluation of youth mentoring programs.)

More to come!

This is just a start. Stay tuned for more back issues listed and posted on this site. Or check out the Wayback Machine link below for another way to find back issues.

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Questions? Is there something missing from our archives that you need? If you have questions or comments about the Emmanuel Research Review, don’t hesitate to be in touch. We would love to hear from you! 

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The City Gives Birth to a Seminary

The City Gives Birth to a Seminary

The founding of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Boston campus, the Center for Urban Ministerial Education.

by Steve Daman, Senior Production Advisor, Applied Research and Consulting, EGC

What if you want to start a seminary? Where do you begin?

What if, instead of showing up with long-term goals and administrative strategies for organizational development, you

• choose to allow the color and complexity and diversity of a changing city to shape the seminary?

• start by listening rather than directing?

• not only welcome collaboration, you insist on it?

• launch your first class just three months after you get the nod to start?

What would that look like? It would look like CUME, the Center for Urban Ministerial Education, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Boston campus.

Eldin Villafañe

In the fall of 1973, Eldin Villafañe and his wife, Margie, settled into student housing at Boston University (BU) and Eldin started work on a Ph.D. in social ethics. Already a graduate of Central Bible College and Wheaton Graduate School of Theology, Eldin had been serving as director of Christian education for the largest Hispanic Assemblies of God church in the country at the time, Iglesia Cristiana Juan 3:16 in the Bronx. His thought was to come to BU, get the degree, and get back to New York. But God had another plan.

Not long after coming to Boston, Eldin made his way to a little bookstore on Shawmut Avenue, a store bursting with books and music in both Spanish and English, furnished with vintage display counters and decorated with brightly painted maracas, guiros, tambourines and a variety of flags. The little store seemed dark at first coming off the street, yet the room was always full of cheerful conversation, lively music, and warm Christian fellowship.

Eldin struck up a friendship with the manager, Web Brower, who had launched the store in 1970 as a ministry of the Emmanuel Gospel Center (EGC). The store served as a resource center for the growing Hispanic church community as thousands of Latinos were moving into Boston from across Latin America as well as from New York and Puerto Rico.

One day, Web invited Eldin to join the planning team for an inner-city Christian education conference. It was a good fit as Eldin was a seasoned Christian education director and well-respected in his denomination, the Assemblies of God. Eldin remembers, “They asked me to mobilize some Latinos. And Web and the folks were thinking, you know, if we get 20 or 30 people that would be great. Well, because I had been known in my denomination and I knew the pastors, I was able to bring close to 300 Latinos.”

The conference spilled over into two churches. That event built new relational bridges for Eldin, especially with some of the city’s African American leaders such as Michael Haynes, Bruce Wall, and VaCountess (V.C.) Johnson, all on staff with Twelfth Baptist Church at that time. God gave him much grace, he says, and the other leaders valued his contribution to this conference.

Somewhere along the way, Eldin was asked to be a guest lecturer for a few seminary classes held at the Emmanuel Gospel Center. In 1973, the same year that the Villafañes came to Boston, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (GCTS) launched a program called the Urban Middler Year (UMY). Seminarians could choose to spend their second full year of study in Boston, attending classes at the Gospel Center taught by Doug Hall, at that time the director of EGC, and Professor Steve Mott of Gordon-Conwell, with additional help from Professor Dean Borgman and other urban leaders. Students would serve with an inner-city church and be mentored in urban ministry. Then they would return to Gordon-Conwell Seminary in Hamilton for their third and final year. When Eldin spoke at the Gospel Center those few times, he did not realize he would soon be working in partnership with Steve Mott.

The Birth of the Center for Urban Ministerial Education (CUME)

In 1969, one of the mandates of the newly formed Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, arising from the merger of the Conwell School of Theology in Philadelphia and the Gordon Divinity School in Wenham, Massachusetts, was to engage the city in some fashion. Both schools had historical commitments to urban ministry that it was unwilling to abandon; however, the specific shape and form for the new institution remained rather unclear.

Initially, Dr. Stephen Mott was hired to direct a program to be housed in Philadelphia, continuing the Conwell tradition of training African American clergy. In effect, Dr. Mott became a full-time professor of church and society, located at the Hamilton campus of Gordon-Conwell in South Hamilton, Massachusetts.

Other GCTS constituencies, particularly urban clergy, also shared this interest that the seminary’s original urban mandate become a full reality. Dr. Michael Haynes, senior Pastor of the historic Twelfth Baptist Church in Roxbury, Massachusetts, and a longtime trustee of GCTS, took a leading and crucial role at this juncture. He became a strong advocate for the Seminary’s need to be involved in the inner city, and powerfully articulated the plight of the church in the inner city to the Seminary’s Trustees and senior administration.

Before Gordon-Conwell launched the Urban Middler Year program, there had been talk of doing more for the city. A few years earlier, in 1969, Doug Hall sent a letter to the seminary’s leadership asking them to consider addressing three critical needs that Doug and his team saw emerging in Boston:

• the need for an urban training component for traditional seminary students, which initially was addressed in 1973 with the start of UMY

• the need for research on demographics and trends in the city to keep ministerial training relevant and to inform the pastors

• the need for contextualized ministerial training for pastors already working in Boston.

The UMY program was importing eager seminarians into the city. Gordon-Conwell never addressed the research concern, but, in 1976, God sent a researcher to EGC. Rudy Mitchell, still EGC’s senior researcher, has been studying the city and its churches for four decades.

But what was to be done about the remaining challenge, the need to better equip pastors already serving? Many pastors in Boston’s newest churches had little or no formal education, many did not speak English, but, with anointing from God, they were leading dozens of Boston’s most effective churches.

Doug Hall remembers conversations with busy, bi-vocational pastors who wanted more training, but wondered how to fit that into their busy lives, as they were already feeling burned out. He also heard his friend Michael Haynes voice deep concerns about the lack of access to evangelical ministry training and higher education for urban residents—a gap that had widened in the twenty years since Gordon Divinity School had moved out of the city of Boston in the mid-1950s.

By 1976, the leadership at Gordon-Conwell was ready to do more. They began looking for the right person to build bridges among urban church leaders across many ethnic groups, someone who could administer new programs—possibly an urban seminary, and teach and mentor students. Professor Steve Mott asked Eldin if he was interested, and then Doug Hall and his wife Judy drove Eldin the thirty miles up Route 1 to introduce him to the seminary leaders.

When the offer was extended, Eldin readily agreed to join Gordon-Conwell as assistant professor of church and society, working alongside Steve. Eldin was made coordinator for the Urban Middler Year program and he was asked to do one more thing: to begin to think about ways the seminary could establish a new and separate program for training and equipping the urban pastors already serving congregations.

“There was great interest in doing this, and I just took the ball and ran,” Eldin says. V.C. Johnson, a Gordon-Conwell graduate and ordained minister who was working at Twelfth Baptist, was also already involved in exploring this idea. V.C. and Professor Dean Borgman had been conducting some simple surveys to see whether a program for indigenous pastors and leaders would fly.

Eldin and V.C. soon began working together. Eldin recalls, “I had been named the director of the project, and I started calling V.C. the assistant director right away rather than a secretary or administrative assistant as someone suggested, because she was doing much more. I can remember the meetings I had with V.C. coming up with a name. We were thinking of a few names and then she said, ‘Let’s call it: Center for Urban Ministerial Education.’ And we called it that from day one.”

Then came a flurry of gatherings with pastors and leaders from the Hispanic, African American, and Anglo communities. “A lot of folks were very supportive,” Eldin says.

Just three months after receiving the challenge from Gordon-Conwell to think about what could be done for indigenous pastors, the Center for Urban Ministerial Education opened its doors in September 1976 at the Second African Meeting House on 11 Moreland Street in Roxbury. “We started with 30 students,” Eldin remembers. “About 16 were Latinos and 12 were African Americans, and maybe one or two were White.”

Contextualized Urban Theological Education

After a year or two, V.C. left because of her work commitments at Twelfth Baptist. “I wanted the seminary to look like the city,” Eldin reflects, “so I began to pray for an individual who has credentials, and an African American, and God sent Sam Hogan to join the team.”

Sam was finishing his second master’s degree at Harvard, a Master of Theological Studies. Today Bishop Hogan serves as a pastor and a leader in Boston with the Church of God in Christ denomination.

Other workers were added, such as Naomi Wilshire, Bruce Jackson, Efrain Agosto and Ira Frazier. Doug Hall continued developing his courses in urban ministry he had pioneered with the UMY program, and they eventually became core courses for the Masters of Divinity in Urban Ministry degree, and are still offered today.

“I really was given carte blanche,” Eldin says. “I was given freedom. I had been a Sunday School man, and I knew how to organize, mobilize, and that was key because from day one I fought for some issues.” While the school did not immediately offer advanced degrees, “one of the things I wanted was that pastors and leaders would be able to take courses and that when the time came that we would get the degree component, all the coursework they had done would be counted toward that degree,” Eldin says. Eldin fought for them, and four years later, when CUME awarded its first master's degrees, students from his first class were among the recipients.

The idea of “contextualized urban theological education” soon became the underlying philosophy of CUME. To “contextualize” means you have to keep listening to the needs of the city, Eldin says.

“You have to be faithful to the reality that is there, and then you have to discern what the Spirit is doing, even in the immigration patterns. Right from day one we started classes in English and Spanish. Two years later, we saw the growth among the Haitians coming to Boston. I asked Marilyn Mason, who worked with EGC, if she would help me convene Haitian leaders.

"And what we did then became a principle. Here is what you do. You get one or two key leaders, have them convene others for a meeting, and when they get here I say, ‘Look, we are here to prepare leadership. But you need to push us. What do you want to do? How far do you want to go? Do you want a certificate or a degree program? We can do it, but you have to push us so I can push further up.’

"And of course with critical mass and the key leadership we had among the Haitians, one of the first ones who started to work with us was Soliny Védrine.”

Pastor Védrine was busy planting a church in Boston. He also worked as a bookkeeper to support his growing family. With a law degree and a recent theological degree from Dallas Theological Seminary, Pastor Sol began to teach Haitian pastors in Creole. Pastor Sol continues to serve the Haitian Christian community today through the Emmanuel Gospel Center.

“Later we did the same thing with the Brazilians. Ruy Costa was doing Ph.D. work at BU with me. Through him we convened the Brazilians and they began to come,” Eldin says. CUME began offering classes in Portuguese. Today, Dr. Costa works as executive director of the Episcopal City Mission in Boston.

For a while, CUME even offered courses in American Sign Language taught by Rev. Lorraine Anderson, when she served as senior pastor of the International Community Church in Allston.

CUME and the Quiet Revival

Boston’s Quiet Revival is understood as an unprecedented and sustained period of Christian growth in the city of Boston beginning in 1965 and persisting over five decades. As CUME got momentum, there was, at the same time, robust church planting in Boston, particularly among these immigrant populations.

In 1965, when the revival began, there were 318 churches in the city. Fifty years later, despite the fact that many church plants are short-lived and not a few mainline churches have closed; there are now more than 575 Christian churches within city limits, according to EGC’s research.

“My perspective is that we have to be discerning and faithful to what the Lord is doing. I believe the Lord is sovereign in the world, so movements of people to different places don’t just happen because they happen,” Eldin says.

“We have to ask, ‘What is the Lord doing by bringing all these people? What does it mean?’ We want to serve the city. We started with these four languages because they represented a strong Brazilian community, a strong Haitian community, a strong Latino community, and of course the bottom line, we want to teach in the language of those who are marginalized from society at that time, these people who are very gifted. So language, immigration, all this was tied to the revival.”

The move of God that started among the Hispanic churches and then ignited among other people groups, by and large identified with Pentecostalism. “The Quiet Revival is a move of God through Pentecostal churches, be they classical Pentecostal or independent,” Eldin says.

“Many of these churches were Spirit-open churches, and even when they were Baptist or otherwise, they were very charismatic. When I started CUME, the greatest majority of students were Pentecostal. The reason I teach theology or ethics is because I am concerned that all churches, but Pentecostal churches particularly, need solid theological training.” As an insider in the Hispanic Pentecostal movement, Dr. Villafañe has written extensively about this in The Liberating Spirit: Toward an Hispanic American Pentecostal Social Ethic.

One of the reasons the Quiet Revival has endured and prospered for almost fifty years and the churches continue to be strengthened is because CUME was there from the beginning.

EGC Director Jeff Bass says, “I think CUME is the most important Christian organization in the city, because you are backfilling theology into this movement that could have gotten weird, and it has not. There are a lot of strong churches today because there are so many hundreds of CUME graduates out there that have learned theology, and have learned Living System Ministry, the principles we teach here at the Emmanuel Gospel Center as well, such as the importance of unity among the churches, or that God is at work in the city and you have to join in with what he is already doing. We are impacting people to collaborate, to understand the living systems, to ask ‘system questions,’ not to be lone rangers, and to be on the lookout for unintended negative returns.”

CUME AND EGC

“The churches, CUME, and EGC,” Eldin says, “were part of the institutional ‘feeders’ God used to help nurture the Quiet Revival. The trio of EGC, CUME, and the emerging churches nurtured an amazing renewal in Boston over the past four decades.” He calls the relationship “triple nurture,” as there was an organic ebb and flow among the three living systems, each nurturing and being nurtured, shaping and being shaped.

Starting in the late 1960s, EGC began pouring resources into the immigrant church communities. EGC

• created pastoral networks which are still in place today

• provided state of the art street evangelism equipment used by urban churches to reach their own neighborhoods

• ran a multi-language Christian bookstore that was both a supply center and a relational networking hub for urban pastors

• offered a Christian legal clinic which worked to help pastors and church members with immigration issues, churches obtain tax exempt status, and church leaders negotiate red tape in renting or buying properties.

• Supported CUME in training indigenous pastors to fan the flames of the Quiet Revival.

Today, through applied research and issue-focused programs, EGC equips urban Christian leaders to understand complex social systems, to build fruitful relationships and take responsible action within their communities, all to see the Kingdom of God grow in Greater Boston.

EGC is helping leaders engage issues related to gender-based violence, urban youth, public health, homelessness, urban education, and refugee assimilation, to name a few. By learning to align to what God is doing in Boston, Christian leaders are creating innovative and effective approaches to what some see as intractable problems.

CUME's ONgoing Mission

CUME, now Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary-Boston, is a seminary shaped by the Quiet Revival. But as both the revival and the seminary are interconnected living systems, CUME has also shaped the revival, giving it depth and breadth.

“One of the problems with revivals anywhere,” Eldin points out, “is oftentimes you have good strong evangelism that begins to grow a church, but the growth does not come with trained leadership who are educated biblically and theologically. You can have all kinds of problems. Besides heresy, you can have recidivism, people going back to their old ways. The beautiful thing about the Quiet Revival is that, just as it begins to flourish, CUME is coming aboard.”

To that end, CUME helps students achieve Paul’s charge in 2 Timothy 2:15, “Make every effort to present yourself before God as a proven worker who does not need to be ashamed, teaching the message of truth accurately” (NET).

A further contribution of GCTS-Boston beyond theological education is that it fosters cross-denominational and cross-ethnic collaboration by providing a safe, neutral place for emerging leaders to build close relationships. The students know each other by name, grow to love each other, and find it easier to work together on common goals. They know they are not alone. They learn that they are part of a growing network of men and women who are passionate about the Church in Boston. This collaboration strengthens and empowers each individual as each one stays connected with others.

Eldin says that CUME intentionally provides space for leadership to get together. The goal is that the emerging leadership will build relationships and that out of those relationships more Kingdom fruit will grow.

Most of CUME’s classes are held in the evenings as many students work during the day, either as pastors or in some other employment or both. In the middle of the evening there is a welcome coffee break when students gather informally around snacks.

Once, Eldin says, someone in the business office challenged that idea, thinking it would be better stewardship of both time and money to teach right through. “I said, ‘Don’t you touch that! When we get to heaven, we might find that might be the most important thing we did!’”

Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary-Boston (CUME) today serves 300 students per semester, representing nearly forty denominations and twenty countries. It has had strong and capable leadership following and expanding on Eldin’s vision of Contextualized Urban Theological Education; leaders such as Dr. Efrain Agosto, Dr. Alvin Padilla and Dr. Mark G. Harden. 

CUME DISTINCTIVES

• The school’s qualified faculty members work in the same ministry context as the students.

• Courses are offered evenings and weekends to accommodate working students.

• In addition to English, various courses are offered as needed in Spanish, French, Haitian-Creole and Portuguese.

• GCTS-Boston offers master’s programs in several disciplines and Th.M.- Doctor of Ministry in Practical Theology. Nearly forty percent of the students pursue the Master of Divinity in Urban Church Ministry.

GCTS-Boston students gain the foundation and skills they need to be effective coworkers with God as he lavishly pours out his redeeming love across the city of Boston.

____________

Steve Daman is the Senior Production Advisor with the Applied Research and Consulting department at EGC.

The article was developed from a conversation with Rev. Eldin Villafañe, Ph.D., Founding Director, Center for Urban Ministerial Education (CUME), Boston Campus of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (1976–1990) and Professor of Christian Social Ethics, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, and was originally published online by the Emmanuel Gospel Center in Nov. 2013. Excerpts were published in Inside EGC, Nov-Dec 2013, a newsletter of Emmanuel Gospel Center. With additional editing by the author, and by Aida Besancon Spencer, Eldin Villafañe, and John Runyon, the article was reprinted by Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in the Africanus Journal, Vol. 8, No. 1, April 2016, p. 33.

The Process of the Gospel

The Process of the Gospel

A Relational Foundation for Doing God's Work God's Way

by Doug Hall

It is an inestimable privilege for me to “do God’s work” and to be a “fellow worker” (1 Cor 3:9) with God.[1] This high calling makes me very nervous, however, because I take doing God’s work very seriously, and I have always carried within me a deep fear of being counterproductive.

Over the years, I have come to see that this fear has been beneficial, because it has motivated me to seek God more, and has allowed me to become involved in very fruitful, multiply productive ministry.

One way of being hugely counterproductive is to do ministry in a programmatic manner. I am very convinced that ministry must not be carried out programmatically but rather through genuine relationships.  The Process of the Gospel is not a program but a relational tool for doing God’s work. It creates a relational foundation for very effective ministry that will be multiply productive rather than counterproductive.

Earlier this summer, we took students from our Doctor of Ministry class on a tour of ministries in Greater Boston.[2] We picked ministries that we felt demonstrated integrity, long-term practice, fruitfulness, and cooperative participation across the Body of Christ. On our visits, I heard each ministry leader cite relationships as the most critical factor in their overall success.

Indeed, working through relationships is one of the primary ways God goes about his work. The Bible tells about one relationship after another that God established with individuals, families, cities, and nations. God’s work of redemption requires that his message be planted among us, understood by us, and that it grow and bear fruit. This all comes through relationship.

We know this is true, but I want to understand how God does it.

• What actions does he use to create relationships with his fallen children?

• How does he introduce, communicate, and affirm his message?

• And then, how does he go about planting his message in our hearts and nurturing that message to maturity?

I believe that if we can get a handle on how God does his work, maybe we can learn to do our work in the same way. And if we learn to do things the way he does, I believe there is a stronger likelihood that our work as ministers of the Gospel will bear the fruit God desires to see.

Process of the Gospel in the Bible

Consider what Jesus did during his ministry on earth and how he communicated the Father’s message to us. In other words, what is the process he used to bring us the Gospel?

I identify six stages of the Process of the Gospel:

1. Observation

2. Positive Appreciation

3. Relevant Communication

4. Meeting Perceived Needs

5. Meeting Basic Needs

6. Multiplication

Here is what God did:

• God observed his fallen creation. Our sin condemned us to death. We were eternally lost without him.

• Because he knows us and loves us (positive appreciation) he sent his Son who communicated relevantly through his life, his parables, and teaching.

• When Jesus walked among us, he identified and met our perceived needs with miracles, as he meets our needs today, and then he met our basic, core need through the atoning work of his death and resurrection.

• Finally, he prepared his disciples for his leaving, laying the groundwork for the multiplication of his Kingdom through his church, made possible through the coming of the Holy Spirit.

These stages describe a pattern that God has designed to allow the power of redemption, working in and through living systems, to grow his Kingdom.

By definition, a living system is an orderly, highly complex, and highly interrelated arrangement of living components that work together to accomplish a high-level goal when in proper relationship to each other.[3] When people come together, living systems like families, churches, cities, and nations are formed.

Because the Process of the Gospel helps us to align with and engage God’s living systems, it can be used not only for ministry with individuals, but with larger social systems, such as a local church or an entire city.

This cycle can be repeated many times in ever-widening realms of influence, from an individual person to a neighborhood or a local community of faithful people, to the community of faith in an entire city, to many cities working together. It works in one-on-one relationships, in ministry development, in cross-cultural missions, in church planting, and in community organizing. With it, one can reach the poor and the rich. It can work in both sacred and secular settings. It can and has transformed entire cities and has allowed Christianity to grow throughout the world.

I call this six-stage pattern an archetype because these elements work together as a unit, an entire process that follows an enduring, stable pattern or model that transcends time and space across all human history.

For almost five decades through our work in Boston with the Emmanuel Gospel Center,[4] we have found countless opportunities to use this approach, and it has helped us to avoid counterproductivity while consistently producing long-lasting fruit for the Kingdom of God.

The fruit we have seen God bring during this time is not insignificant. We have been privileged to experience an incredible revival in Boston that we call the Quiet Revival. In four decades, the number of churches in Boston has nearly doubled, from approximately 300 in 1970 to 575 in 2010. Also, the estimated percentage of the city’s population in churches has increased from about 3% to about 14% and has demonstrated many of the characteristics of healthy growth, including increased unity and prayer, trained leadership, and effective ministry that produces significant social change. [5]

It is an exciting place to be at work in God’s Kingdom, and it is from this context of vibrant and sustained growth of Christianity that I write today. Let me first share with you how I stumbled across this pattern.

Discovery

The Process of the Gospel evolved out of suggestions originally intended for short-term student participants in urban ministry. To guide the students in properly relating to people in the community, I reflected on what had worked well for Judy and me in the past.

Several basic characteristics of our relationships with our neighbors surfaced over and over again and I wrote a short teaching paper to help my students navigate relationships with our urban neighbors. It eventually became evident that the relational approach we suggested to these students was the pattern Jesus had followed in his ministry. Therefore, in using it, we would be doing what Jesus did. The “Process of the Gospel” was born as I realized that what I had originally penned as “steps to short-term involvement” was really something deeper.

Because living systems are at issue, readers must resist the temptation to take the easy way out, to try to make the Process of the Gospel into a program, rather than allow it to become an integral part of who they are. Those who make it into a program will be missing the point entirely, and missing the opportunity for fruitfulness, which is the goal.

Defining “Process”

A simple definition of process would be “a series of actions directed to some end.” Although that captures the heart of it, I see it as so much more. It is important to make the distinction between process and procedure as we are not talking about a new procedure for ministry, but an age-old process.

I view procedures as isolated steps we need to do in order to complete a task in a systematic, orderly way. Process is different. The goal of process is not merely to complete some isolated task but to see transformation or change in something, to move toward a desired outcome that is much bigger than ourselves and is beyond our control.

While procedures are people-driven, processes are driven by the larger living systems we engage. For example, to grow tomatoes, we work within the rules and powerful forces that already exist in the environment, including the weather, the presence or absence of pests or diseases, the need for nutrients in the soil, and so on. We might follow certain procedures for growing tomatoes, but the actual process is very complex, and the result of all we do is really up to God.[6]

The same holds true for the Process of the Gospel. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians, “I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow” (1 Cor 3:6). So it is never about how well we follow the steps and do the task. Rather, it is about how well we work with the complex and interrelated processes God has already put in place. He is the Author of all life and the Lord of all living systems. In the end, he will get all the glory for all he has done.

Stage One: OBSERVATION

I love the city. I love to be in an inner-city neighborhood with all the people sitting on their stoops, the children in the playground, the youth playing baseball, the neighborhoods that seem filled with baby carriages, poor people, or elderly folk. My city has a pulse, and I feel it beating.

The highest levels of observation are required to perceive social systems, large or small, as living realities. When we are able to do this, we do not simply see streets and buildings, but a complex social organism called Boston, Philadelphia, or New York, for example.  

The Old Testament prophets addressed entire cities and countries as though they had the characteristics of a living person. New Testament writers wrote to cities as though each city, represented by its one church, were persons who could receive a letter.[7] They understood the “body of Christ” and the “Kingdom of God” as living systems.

God himself models this skill of observation for us. Moses wrote, “God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them” (Exod 2:25). God’s compassionate observation of the children of Israel in slavery under Pharaoh moved him to action.

“Observation is a humble skill. Anyone can do it. No college degrees are needed. But it challenges the greatest intellect to assimilate and make sense of what one sees.”

God's observation is very thorough. Is there anything about us he does not see? The writer of Hebrews says no. “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account” (Heb 4:13). He knows every intimate detail about us. “And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered” (Matt 10:30). He knows what we are thinking now and what we are going to think later. “Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely” (Psalm 139:4).

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem, a full thirty years went by before he began his ministry. What was he doing for thirty years? We know little about those days, but we can be sure he was observing and learning about the people who lived in Nazareth and the surrounding region. Most of Jesus’ earthly life was lived in the critical observation stage, through which his Father was preparing him for the day when he would begin to proclaim the Kingdom of God.

Observation is a humble skill. Anyone can do it. No college degrees are needed. But it challenges the greatest intellect to assimilate and make sense of what one sees. We study the situation. We try to see real people in the way they really operate. We pray, “Lord, give us eyes to see!” And here, of course, we are not merely asking for physical eyes but for deep insights, revelations, intuitive understanding, and subconscious vision.

Since the mid-1970s, the Emmanuel Gospel Center has had a full-time researcher on staff. Over these many years, Rudy Mitchell has gathered information on Boston’s neighborhoods and churches to help us see and understand what God is doing in our city. Not only has our research informed our own ministry decisions, but we share what we learn with others to help them make wise decisions about their ministry objectives.

Today, a lot of our research incorporates team learning. By engaging others in the learning process, we work with the community to deepen everyone’s understanding of the issues, obtain new information, clearly articulate the issues, and assist those affected to develop and implement an appropriate response.[8]

The conversations that emerge from this observation and research process lead everyone involved to deeper understandings and positive appreciation of the people and issues involved. This paves the way for practical responses that make sense both to those seeking to serve and those being served.

No matter where you find yourself in ministry, become a learner. Humble yourself to be open to what God will teach you as you look around. We do not start by doing. We start by observing. Take the time to do the research.

The deep understanding we gain from keen observation will naturally flow into the next stage of the Process of the Gospel, a positive appreciation of the people around us and their unique environment.

Stage Two: POSITIVE APPRECIATION

The second stage, positive appreciation, means making room in our hearts to respect honestly and actively and care about people and their potentially foreign cultural context.

There is a marked difference between respecting people for who they are and helping people merely because they have needs. In fact, if you jump in to help people because they have needs, without respecting and loving them first, you may be accomplishing nothing at all. Is that not what the Apostle Paul meant when he wrote, “If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing” (1 Cor 13:3)?

If our relationship with someone is not based on affection that emerges from esteem, but is only built on our ability to give some service or thing to the receiver, there is danger that the relationship is paternalistic and dehumanizing. That kind of relationship produces short-term results or dependency or both, but not spiritual fruit.

So, the rule of thumb is this: until you can first honestly appreciate people, do not try to reach them with your message or your acts of service.

Our model for positive appreciation is God himself. God’s unthinkably huge sacrifice, the selfless death of Jesus on our behalf, flows from his perfect love for us. Jesus expressed immense positive appreciation of people. He wept over them as “sheep without a shepherd” (Matt 9:36). John said of the Cross, “Having loved his own, he showed them the full extent of his love” (John 13:1).

The person or group we want to engage may not be willing to engage, either because of fear, hostility, ignorance, brokenness, lack of self esteem, or some other obstacle. Positive appreciation is not necessarily reciprocal at this point, nor does it need to be. Jesus loved us and died for us while we were yet sinners (1 John 4:19). His giving did not depend on our positive response to him.

If we really care about people, they will sense that, and even when we make mistakes—for we will make them—they will forgive us because they know we care about them. We will offend and be offended; we will misunderstand; we will act defensively, prejudicially, or chauvinistically. But most people will eventually forgive us if they know we have a genuine love for them. As the Apostle Peter says, “Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8).

Positive appreciation may not come easily. But the more we practice it, the more it is going to be perfected in us, though there will always be a huge gap between the way God loves and the way we love. This gap is a reality, not a problem. This is what the fallen world is about.

As we walk through the stages of the Process of the Gospel, we must always keep in mind that we are in a redemptive process, we are always confessing sin and always submitting to God, who will show us what to do.

Stage Three: RELEVANT COMMUNICATION

I think the real goal of relevant communication is congruence—that what you think you are saying is what the other person is actually understanding you to be saying; and that what you are hearing is what the other person is really intending for you to hear.

Relevant communication creates a deep connection between people. Your words will connect first to the matter at hand, but also to the heart of the listener. What you say will be practical and applicable. Your listener will have a sense of inner satisfaction that he or she is being heard, because what you say is congruent with their needs, their interests, their requests, and their worldview. At the same time, we carefully listen, hear, and receive from them.

God communicates through his “Word,” Jesus Christ. The writer of Hebrews makes this point clearly: “In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son” (Heb 1:1-2). God spoke all of creation into being, and Job says, “God’s voice thunders” (Job 37:5a). When God spoke to Elijah, however, he spoke in a “still small voice” (1 Kings 19:12). Our God is a God who speaks! And he is also a God who hears our cry, who is closer than a brother, whose Spirit intercedes and groans inexpressible words within us (Rom 8:26,27).

From the beginning of our time in Boston, we would often have people living with us, whether they were people from the streets, ministry students, or fellow workers. The street people who lived with us taught us to be clear in what we said, because they were looking for honest love, and if we said something we did not mean from our hearts, they would pick it up immediately.

They were our textbooks on developing integrity and transparency. If we said we would do something we really did not plan to do, we would see their hopes crushed, and distrust would creep back into their eyes. Many of the people we met had been injured in multiple ways, and trust was not easy for them.

Relevant communication goes beyond words. It goes into the depths of who we really are and how we are communicating who we are. Communication also involves nonverbal cues such as hand gestures and a listening posture. Relevant communication means knowing what people are saying and, to a degree, what they are thinking, and then carefully using stories and other ways to communicate clearly.

Are we listening well enough so that what we hear is really what people are intending to say? Are we speaking carefully, so that what we are saying is really what we intend to say, and our listeners are hearing what we intend them to hear?

Stage Four: MEETING PERCEIVED NEEDS

The Gospels are full of stories about Jesus meeting the perceived needs of the people around him.

You know the story of blind Bartimaeus. When at last he stood before Jesus, the Lord did something very unexpected. He looked at him and asked what seemed to be an odd question: “What do you want me to do for you?” The man was obviously blind! But it was important for Bartimaeus to verbalize his own perceived need. Jesus waited for relevant communication that revealed the man’s own perceived need before he took action.

Bartimaeus was very clear about what he wanted. “Rabbi, I want to see,” he said.

“Go,” said Jesus, “your faith has healed you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road” (Mark 10:46-52).

Jesus came to provide the answer for our most basic need, that we would be redeemed from sin and death, but on his three-year journey to the Cross he responded to many, many perceived needs that people were concerned about. The Gospel is not only what Jesus said, it is what he did.

God has created us to help others. Paul says, “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Eph 2:10).

Why does Paul say we are created to do good works? Surely it is not to earn our place in heaven. That work has been accomplished on the Cross. Jesus said, “Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven” (Matt 5:16).

In a very real way, our good deeds, prompted by love, are the Gospel message, without words. We do the Gospel. At the same time, of course, we preach the Gospel using words. God has given us his special revelation, and he wants everyone to hear and know what he has to say to us.

The point is, we want the way we live to speak as loudly as our words. Meeting felt needs is an important step, because it is incarnational ministry. For the recipient, it is spiritual reality experienced through practicality.

“Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead” (James 2:15). James makes it clear that our words are not enough, and actions, including helping to meet perceived needs, spring from faith.

Those of us in ministry are always faced with the immensity of human need all around us. There is no escape from the press of need, and knowing that Jesus is the answer to all our problems, we want to help in his name.

When Judy and I first came to Boston, we felt our lives were coming apart because of the craziness of trying to respond to the needs around us. Judy clearly remembers how busy we would be meeting the needs of just one person: taking her to the outpatient clinic, to the grocery store, to the social security office, to apply for food stamps and fuel assistance, to the welfare office, typing up forms and applications for her, and helping her deal with her addiction and relational problems. And that was just one of scores of people at our door every day of the week.

Here are a few things we learned along the way:

1. Be realistic.

After carefully listening to what the person or group say they need, it is best to choose a need that can actually be met. For especially those people who have lost hope many times, we cannot afford to make promises we cannot keep.

Choose something you have every reason to believe you may be able to accomplish with and through their participation, and then pull out all the stops to make sure it happens.

2. Be collaborative.

Make room for the person or group to fully participate in meeting the need. This should not be a giveaway program. Their participation in the process will build their confidence and ownership of the solution.

Change must come from within, not from without. It is through helping to address a felt need that hope is built in people, and that hope will help them begin to surface their more basic, core needs.

Stage Five: MEETING BASIC NEEDS

When we move from meeting perceived needs to meeting basic needs, you may think that this is no big deal—that we just go from a focus on surface needs to deeper needs. But in reality, a seismic shift takes place as we move between these two.

If you miss the importance of this transition, you will miss the power that comes from the Process of the Gospel. Your ministry may very well stay on the surface, and you may not see the abundant life you want to see take root and grow in the life of your friend.

Here is the best way to tell the difference. Perceived needs are identified by tangible solutions where the meeting of the need is finite. The solution does not internally transform the person, though it certainly brings a measure of hope and relief. The change is additive.

But on the other hand, you know basic needs are met when the solution brings an ever-widening range of other needs also being met simultaneously and spontaneously. There is an explosion of life as one door after another opens in the person’s life. The change is multiplicative.

When, for example, a long-term alcoholic becomes sober, a whole series of needs begins to be met at the same time. These may be physical needs, employment, family issues, a sense of self-worth and value, and gaining a purposeful life.

In meeting basic needs, the transaction is between God and the individual, and unless the individual participates with God in his or her restoration through willingness, obedience, and depending on God, nothing of any lasting significance happens.

We cannot force this. We cannot make it happen. God must do the heavy lifting. “Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain,” Solomon wrote (Psalm 127:1). My role is to support and nurture the individual, and make sure he or she is connecting to the broader body of Christ as God is at work doing things I cannot do, and as he brings redemption and restoration.

The basic need is only fully met when my new believer friend is nurtured within a new family of supportive believers that is part of the larger extended family of the body of Christ. Nurturing these family relationships is a good way to “engage God’s living systems” and is the heart of Living System Ministry.

There are some basic needs common to all humankind that have arisen because of the Fall, such as sinfulness, our fallen human nature, separation from God, and rebellion against him. Paul puts this matter very strongly. “Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior” (Col 1:21). Our most universal, core spiritual need, then, is for reconciliation with our Creator and the subsequent transformation of our sin nature.

We might think that the end goal of the Process of the Gospel is to see someone come to faith in Christ. But there is one more step beyond that. The sixth stage of the Process of the Gospel is multiplication.

Stage Six: MULTIPLICATION        

Living systems thrive on their own as they receive the sustenance they need.

Judy remembers that when our baby daughter was just two months old, a friend said to her, “Rebecca seems to be thriving!” Judy was beaming, very proud to be a new, successfully nursing mother. “And you probably did not have a thing to do with it!” he concluded, with a laugh.

This took the wind out of her sails, until she realized our friend was really saying that our daughter was experiencing the natural tendency of living things to thrive when they receive normal care and sustenance. Naturally, there came a time when Rebecca moved out to be on her own and a time when our son, Ken, left home to start a family of his own.

This is a normal part of nurturing a living system. We expect to release maturing systems to grow apart from us. Multiplication in an organic system requires that we let go.

Must I empty myself of short-term goals and focus on long-term goals? Must I release the future into the hands of other people when it is easier to organize and do it myself with my group in my way? These things are hard to do but they are necessary. We must empty ourselves of the short-term goals and individualism, both of which will hinder multiplication.

In multiplication, we want to envision those we have walked beside to do the “greater things” that Jesus talks about in John 14. “Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father” (John 14:12).

A goal in this is leaving in such a way that life flows from the people that we are working with, so they start reaching people we could never reach. Then we have been a part of a birthing process. We want to make disciples who will make disciples.

As we follow the Process of the Gospel, we will, indeed, participate with God in the way he builds his Kingdom. We experience what it means to be a co-laborer with God!

Completing the Circle

We started out wondering how God goes about creating relationships with us, planting the message of the Gospel in our hearts and nurturing it to fruitfulness. Now, as we have come full circle, the effective engagement we sought for is complete. “The fruit that remains” is the goal, and multiplication is the fruit. The recipient now becomes the giver.

The point of Jesus’ death and resurrection was to redeem a lost people who will then actually and zealously join him in his work. This is the Gospel: “Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works” (Titus 2:14).  Yet, even now, multiplication points us back to where we started.

Because the Gospel is alive, this living cycle of redemption starts up again in ever-widening circles.

From multiplication to system-wide balance

The Process of the Gospel restores relational balance to society. Rather than drawing from flawed or self-serving institutions which rely on technological, financial, intellectual, or organizational capital, the Process of the Gospel both draws from and builds up what I call “relational capital.”

While the Process of the Gospel effectively meets real human needs on every level, this process is not needs-based, but asset-driven,[9] because

• it works out from a positive appreciation of everyone involved

• liberally uses the assets that flow from healthy living systems

• throughout the process, develops reservoirs of internal relational capital that nurture the growth and development of living systems

This article was previously published in Missio Dei: A Journal of Missional Theology and Praxis 3, no. 2 (August 2012).

REFERENCES

[1] Scripture quotations in this paper, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 Biblica. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

[2] This course is offered through Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary: http://www.gordonconwell.edu/doctor-ministry/Urban-Ministry.cfm

[3] We introduce the idea of living system ministry in our book, The Cat and the Toaster. Hall, Douglas, Judy Hall, and Steve Daman. The Cat and the Toaster: Living System Ministry in a Technological Age. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2010.

[4] For more on the Emmanuel Gospel Center (EGC), visit www.egc.org. Judy and I started serving at EGC in 1964.

[5] Based on analysis of data gathered by the Emmanuel Gospel Center, Boston.

[6] Isaiah 26:12 says, “Lord, you establish peace for us; all that we have accomplished you have done for us.” (italics mine)

[7] For example, see 1 Co 1:2, “To the church of God in Corinth…”; Eph 1:1, “To the saints in Ephesus…”; Gal 3:1, “You foolish Galatians!” (here referring to a group identified by a geographical region).

[8] Learn more about EGC’s applied research

[9] For more on asset-based community development as compared to needs-based efforts, see, for example, the Asset-Based Community Development Institute. http://www.abcdinstitute.org/

A New Kind of Learning: Contextualized Theological Education Models

Resources for the urban pastor and community leader published by Emmanuel Gospel Center, Boston

Emmanuel Research Review reprint
Issue No. 59 — September/October 2010

Introduced by Brian Corcoran, Managing Editor, Emmanuel Research Review

“There are many challenges facing theological schools in the 21st century and the challenge of dealing well with the different histories, worldviews, languages, dialects, and cultures is the most significant and most overwhelming,” says Dr. Al Padilla, Dean of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Boston campus, the Center for Urban Ministerial Education. Boston is a prime example of the ways the ethnic and cultural composition of North American society continues to become more diverse. Recognizing this cultural shift, Dr. Padilla asks what bearing and challenges does this present to our current understanding and approach to urban theological education systems and models? And what does all this mean for the broader Evangelical Church? Padilla observes that “God is performing a transformation in the Church… reshaping the very core of what the church is,” and says that God is working through “women and men from diverse backgrounds and perspectives teaching us.” This is not a comfortable thought to some. However, guiding all of this is “the clearest theological image of contextualization,” the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ—“pitching his tent with us,” as Dr. Padilla says.

Our lead article, “A New Kind of Learning: Contextualized Theological Education Models,” by Dr. Alvin Padilla, Ph.D., Dean of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Center for Urban Ministerial Education, is based on his plenary presentation at the 2010 Ethnic Ministry Summit in Boston in April this year. You can also download or listen to 32 selected seminars from the Summit at http://reimaginegrace.org/summit-audio.

Also in this issue is a sample list of urban ministry training systems in Metro Boston prepared by EGC.

A New Kind of Learning: Contextualized Theological Education Models

by Alvin Padilla, Ph.D., (former) Dean of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary – Boston, the Center for Urban Ministerial Education (CUME). [ed. Dr Padilla is at Western Theological Seminary as of 2017.]

It is undeniable that the ethnic/cultural composition of our North American society has changed in the last 50 years and, as a result, the face of American Christianity is rapidly changing as well. All of us here today are aware that the numeral epicenter of Christianity has shifted to the Global South. A century ago, Europe and North America comprised 82% of the world’s Christian population. Today, Europe and North America comprise less than 40% of the world’s Christian population. It is estimated that by 2050, 71% of the world’s Christians will be from Africa, Asia, and South America. Closer to home, it is estimated that by 2050, ethnic minorities will comprise over 50% of the population in the U.S. By 2025, minorities will comprise 50% of all children. Those are staggering statistics and in some way or another they challenge all of us—for diversity seems to be overwhelming us.

Scripture, Cultures, and Unity

Even to the casual reader, there is little doubt that the Christian Bible is a broad collection of documents spanning millennia in composition, multiplicity of literary genres, and diverse in its content. Yet there is, at the same time, little doubt that unifying theological themes can be readily discerned throughout its voluminous pages. For centuries, Christians read and talked about this wondrous collection and discerned that “embedded in all these differences and diversities there was a single voice and that this voice was personal, the voice of God.” (Peterson, Eugene H. Eat This Book: A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading. Grand Rapids, Mich: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co, 2006, p. 26.)

Genesis 1:26 is often cited as the cultural mandate wherein humanity is assigned the task of creating human culture.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” —Gen. 1:26

By the time of the prophet Isaiah, humanity has evolved into many cultures resulting, sadly, in a state of enmity among the nations and cultures. The poet-prophet expresses his longing for a day when all the different cultures of the world would gather together on the mountain of the Lord:

It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be lifted up above the hills; and all the nations shall flow to it, and many peoples shall come, and say: “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.” For out of Zion shall go the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide disputes for many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord. —Isaiah 2:2-5

The prophet envisions a time when peace and justice will prevail for the Lord sits enthroned, ruling humanity with equity.

Eight hundred years later we see the fulfillment of this desire on the day of Pentecost—all the nations present in Jerusalem—Mt Zion, the Mountain of the Lord—and they hear the wonderful news of God’s gracious offer of salvation in their own tongue. This fulfillment is only in part for the time being, and we see in 1 Peter 1:1 and 2:11 that those who claim to live on the slopes of Mt Zion must live as aliens in a foreign land—living in the here and now but knowing that we do not belong here; for we know that we have not yet reached the ultimate summit of the mountain. Christians must live as aliens (pilgrims) ascending the path toward the summit of the mountain. In reality, we know that those who rule on earth see us as undocumented aliens who have no right to be here. Finally, we see in Revelation a vision of how it will all turn out; a vision of our arrival at the final summit and the gathering of God’s people from all nations, and cultures, and languages.

After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands. —Rev. 7:9

Though we “see” the idyllic vision of Revelation 7:9, and “hear” in it the melodious harmony of many languages and cultures weaved together into a intricate symphony of unequal beauty, the reality is that most in our North American society see only disunity and hear cacophony. On the Day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit descended upon those gathered on Mt Zion, it was only those who were from foreign lands who recognized the miracle for what it was—“Why, are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we each hear them in our own language to which we were born?” (Acts 2:7-8) Those who were “native born,” the dominant culture in Jerusalem, could only mock and say “They are full of wine” (Acts 2:13). They too heard the apostles speaking in their own language (Aramaic most likely), but to them that was no miracle, for that was the dominant language group in the region. Trusting in the familiarity of their own cultural preferences (in this case, language) they were unable to grasp the significance of the miracle happening literally before their very eyes and ears. Their only reaction is mocking—for they do not understand what God is doing. If you would grant me some homiletical license, these persons would be the ones caucusing for an Aramaic-only stature in Palestinian law.

I am afraid that a significant segment of the Evangelical Church in North America finds itself in the same dilemma—the works of God are manifested for all to see—yet we mock them for they appear to be nothing but a rabble of uneducated men and women speaking nonsense. In the Presbyterian circles that are familiar to me, there are many who cannot fathom how God could use the apparent “indecency and disorder” of these churches—particularly those that label themselves Presbyterian.

The Evangelical Church in a Pluralistic World

Early in this 21st century, the Christian Church—the Evangelical Church—finds herself in a challenging position as we confront the multicultural, postmodern and pluralistic world in which we have been called to bear witness to Christ. At best, we are perplexed and bewildered, not knowing what in the world God is doing through us. At worst, some of us claim the death of the Church and even Christianity itself—ignoring the tremendous growth of Christianity in cities like Boston. Still others see the next wave of Christianity emerging over the southern horizon and long for the arrival of its powerful undertow on our very shores, so that it may take hold of the North American Church and sweep it under its power. I do pray that you count yourself among the latter group.

Indeed, the whole world has come to our doorstep. Learning to live well in the diverse culture of North America is no longer an option, but a necessity. The U.S. Census estimates that in 2050 the proportion of whites in the population will be only 53%. Our children will live and serve in a society in which their classmates, neighbors, and fellow disciples of Christ will be equally divided between whites and people of color. As new people move into our cities and local communities, the communities undoubtedly will change. The changes could be haphazard and filled with misunderstandings, hurt feelings, and even violence, or the changes could permit all to reinvent and reinvigorate themselves for the better.

Although the West (North America, Europe) has indeed lost the numerical superiority, it still retains an iron grip on the reins of power in the Church. We in the West assume that we speak ex cathedra for all of Christendom. It is our theology that is normative; our way of being the Church is the standard for all to follow. In the area of theological education, we continue to assume that Western educational methods work best for everyone. We have not dared to envision new ways of learning to serve the increasing ethnic and cultural diversity overwhelming our society. We are unwilling to reinvent ourselves.

It should be noted, for example, that current practices in American seminaries reveal that theological schools remain enamored with pedagogical systems that are dated and increasingly irrelevant to our communities and are disconnected from both global and local realities. They fail to incorporate Hispanics, Blacks, and others in leadership roles at all levels of the school’s structure and neglect paying attention to issues of particular relevance to ethnic Americans, such as immigration reform, healthcare, education, etc. There are many challenges facing theological schools in the 21st century, and the challenge of dealing well with the different histories, worldviews, languages, dialects and cultures is the most significant and most overwhelming.

While Christianity in North America continues its progress toward the creation of a multiethnic Church, seminaries are mired in monoculturalism. Yes there are mission statements indicating the school’s commitment to ethnic diversity and its desire to attract non-White students. However, these statements are rarely accompanied by a significant multi-ethnic presence among the faculty and senior administrators. Recently I spoke with a colleague from another seminary in the midst of searching for its chief executive. A comment he made surprised me. He commented that the majority culture finds it difficult to follow someone who is non-White or has a notable foreign accent. With opinions and comments like that, no wonder seminaries lack ethnics among their senior leadership. What my colleague demonstrated with that comment is the school’s lack of intentionality in its pursuit of ethnic diversity—though its mission statement clearly indicated their welcoming stance of the stranger. Lacking intentionality, schools find reasons to rationalize the continuation of past hiring practices. The challenge to diversify staff and faculty is endemic to Christianity because of our commitment (in principle) to the equality of all—Christian institutions must diversify or risk making a mockery of our belief that all men and women are made in the image of God.

The fact is that as ethnic Christians in North America, we find ourselves confronted with the reality of being marginalized in the context of our own faith tradition. We identify with American evangelicalism on a broad scale; indeed many of us are immersed in evangelicalism. My own personal journey of faith is not uncommon: conversion from Catholic to Pentecostalism, educated at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (GCTS), ordained, serving mainline churches, Bible teacher at an evangelical Christian College and now GCTS. On the surface I am part of the evangelical mainstream. Yet I am oftentimes still seen and treated as an outsider. As my colleague Dr. Soong-Chan Rah has stated, “I grow weary of seeing Western, white expressions of the Christian faith being lifted up while failing to see nonwhite expressions of faith represented in meaningful ways in American evangelicalism.” (Rah, Soong-Chan. The Next Evangelicalism: Releasing the Church from Western Cultural Captivity. Downers Grove, Ill: IVP Books, 2009, p. 16.)

In the Pain of Transformation

Indeed, God is performing a transformation in the Church, a transformation that is reshaping the very core of what the Church is—how we are structured, when we meet to worship, how we worship, in what language, with what instrumentation, women and men from diverse backgrounds and perspectives teaching us. It is transforming how we envision and deliver theological education. Transformation is a wonderful thing; it is the process of changing from one state to another. However, if you do not like change, transformation can be a very troubling thing. If you do not like uncertainty nor unpredictability, then transformation is indeed a daunting thing. Whatever your take, transformation is a very painful process—but the end results are well worth it.

The Pentecost nature of Christianity enables us to create new paradigms for witness and evangelization. Instead of rejoicing, many find themselves threatened and on the defensive, wondering whether all this heterogeneity is not merely the babblings of a world falling apart, rather than the blessing of a world that God is giving birth. In too many cases, Christian institutions, particularly evangelical theological seminaries, see themselves as the last line of defense in a siege by a pluralistic and skeptical age, maintaining the status quo down to the last member.

Christ’s transforming presence provides us with the willingness and the power to adapt ourselves for missionary ministry in this postmodern world, to contextualize the Gospel message to the culture that surrounds us.

Look at the opportunities some of this ethnic diversity provides for the Church we are called to serve at this time. Let us look, for example, at Hispanics in our communities. By the year 2020, Hispanics will make up nearly one quarter of all U.S. residents. Researchers predict that by the end of this decade, Hispanics will make up more than 50% of all Catholics in the U.S. “Organized nationally and possessing forceful leadership, Hispanics will make a major impact on the future of Catholicism in the U.S. much the same way the Irish did in the 19th century.” And it is not just the Catholic Church that Hispanics are changing. An estimated one out of every seven Hispanic left the Catholic Church for a Protestant church in the last twenty-five years. If this trend continues at the same rate, then half of all Hispanics will belong to Protestant churches by the year 2025. The question we need to answer is: “How many of them will join the church you will be leading?” For theological seminaries, this implies that they must seek ways to make theological education accessible and practical for Hispanic Americans.

Becoming the People of God

If we were to take seriously the vision of Revelation 7:9, then we will understand that becoming a multicultural church or seminary is not a condescension of the white dominant culture to facilitate evangelistic efforts among ethnic minorities around us. Rather, it is the elevation of every one of us, including the white dominant culture, into something far greater, far more marvelous and wonderful—the people of God.

A number of years ago I heard an illustration concerning the post-war life of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. The speaker used it to highlight the dignity and humility of a great man who lowered himself so that others might be lifted up:

It’s a warm spring Sunday at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Richmond. As the minister is about to present Holy Communion, a tall, well-dressed black man sitting in the section reserved for African Americans unexpectedly advances to the communion rail; unexpectedly because this has never happened here before. The congregation freezes. Those that had been ready to go forward and kneel at the communion rail remain fixed in their pews. The minister stands in his place stunned and motionless. The black man slowly lowers his body, kneeling at the communion rail. After what seems like an interminable amount of time, an older white man rises. His hair snowy white, head up, and eyes proud, he walks quietly up the aisle to the chancel rail. So with silent dignity and self-possession, the white man kneels down to take communion along the same rail with the black man.

Now this illustration was meant to illustrate how Robert E. Lee lowered himself so that this black man could take communion in the church. In my opinion, this application of this story misses the mark altogether. What I see is how this unidentified black man elevated the congregants of St. Paul’s into the very presence of God. He raised their status into the very presence of the divine rather than lower them; it is our arrogance that sees a great white man lowering himself for the sake of the marginalized. In reality, the opposite happens—and it happens on a daily basis for those with eyes to see.

Allow me to return to the idea of cultural norm referred to above. Seeing our cultural perspective as the norm, we view others as divergent and devalue their contribution to our lives, to our churches, and to our educational institutions. We value them as definitely less than we are and we do a great thing to humble ourselves for their sake. It is like that in far too many of our congregations and educational institutions. In dire need of new members and students, they would be welcomed into our hallowed halls and sanctuaries—as long as they conform to our norms, as long as they become just like us in every shape and form.

As we take note of the diversity among us, we marvel at what God is doing, and in the process disclose our ignorance of early Christianity.

Take a quick glance at the original New Testament story of the early Christian movement: how the slaves, the disenfranchised, the low merchants, the widows, the unemployed, the immigrants, and the socially downcast found a new and exciting alternative to social life that that world had not imagined possible. In this new community, everyone was accepted with reverence and respect. For the early Christians understood that the Lord himself had emptied himself of all social status for their sake; then shouldn’t they do the same for each other?

Consider the originality of the Christian movement: everyone had a new family name, Christian, a third race. A new common bloodstream, the blood of Christ! This new reality was created not by transforming the basic nationality of each person, but by transforming the limitations of national identities inherent in each person. The early Christians were considered atheists by others because they refused to recognize the national gods of any particular nation while accepting the One God of all humanity.

Having taken a brief look at this original Christianity, doesn’t it seem strange that we in North America see multiculturalism as something new?

The Qualitative Dimension of Multiculturalism in the Church

Taken as a whole, definitions of multicultural communities provide both quantitative and qualitative dimensions. The quantitative dimensions deal primarily with the numerical makeup of the ethnic groups that meet together. We all agree that there must be sufficient representation of particular ethnic groups in order to claim that a church is multiethnic. One or two families do not a multicultural community make!

The numerical makeup of a multicultural community is a determining factor, but it is only one factor that defines the multicultural community. Multicultural communities also hold significant commitments to the qualitative dimension, which is the aspect of the church that refers to the life and organization of the local ministry. Here the church or educational institution has biblically contextualized its ministry to the multiethnic context in which it finds itself demographically. This includes reforming the structure and administration of the body to represent the church biblically in the same way it did when it was a homogeneous institution.

How are each of the ethnic groups represented and involved in the life of the church (or seminary)? Does the organization/structure of the church involve or allow for the actual membership of the church to lead and to direct the ministry God has given to the congregation? It may be that structural change will have to represent the cultural mix of that congregation, but this cannot be done without a clear understanding that the Bible provides the necessary tension for that formulation.

The qualitative aspect also has to do with matters of reconciliation and justice. It is important that the educational institution understand the goal of the multicultural community. Maintaining ethnic diversity in a local church is part of the multicultural community, but it is not an end in itself. Gaede states in his book, When Tolerance Is No Virtue:

Multiculturalism also carries much baggage that ought to worry Christians. This baggage has less to do with the details of multiculturalism than with its general orientation. And perhaps the best way to get at this is to notice that more and more, those who favor multiculturalism argue not on the basis of a desire for justice, but on the basis of multiculturalism’s practical necessity or its validity as a general worldview. (Gaede, S D. When Tolerance Is No Virtue: Political Correctness, Multiculturalism & the Future of Truth & Justice. Downers Grove, Ill: InterVarsity Press, 1993, p. 36.)

This is often called, the “pragmatic” approach to building a multicultural community. “The problem with the pragmatic approach to multi ethnic sensitivity,” Gaede continues, “is that it rules out Jesus’ approach. It says that the end is cooperation, good relations, harmony and agreement. And it thereby undermines and displaces the true ends of human existence.” (Gaede, p. 37.) Both quantitative and qualitative dimensions are necessary for a multicultural community to be effective in reaching out to a community that is ethnically diverse and growing in this diversity. Presence of the multiethnic community in the local church is a given if mission is applied, but presence without incorporation limits the process of true biblical discipleship. The qualitative dimension occurs as participants are discipled and become responsible members of the local ministry. It is a state of incompleteness when the church neglects to train and incorporate believers into the fullness of the ministry.

In a true multicultural community, as women and men from other cultures and ethnic groups are incorporated into leadership roles, the structure of the institution, of the community of faith itself, is reshaped (reformed, if you will) in order to allow for a smoother transition, and in response to the inner workings of the Spirit in the community. Conversely, if you do have some participation of ethnic persons in your community of faith, but it has not structurally changed the institution, then what you have is assimilation and not a true multicultural community. Referring to the tragedy of assimilation, Hispanic educator Arturo Madrid states, “Diversity is desirable only in principle, not in practice. Long live diversity—as long as it conforms to my standards, to my mind set, to my view of life, to my sense of order.” Not only is there structural change, there is also change in purpose, in mission and, of course, in the overarching vision of the ministry. As we are transformed into a godly multicultural community, we incorporate the issues and concerns affecting the lives of everyone in the community and we allow the Other to lead us in this transformational journey.

Take a cursory look at Acts 6. The Church continues to grow, and we encounter the first cultural conflict: the Hellenistic Jews (most likely Jews born and raised in the diaspora) complained that their widows were being neglected by the Hebraic Jews (most likely Jews born and raised in Palestine). The solution is to choose seven Hellenists to be part of the leadership of the community. Can you imagine the change in our national history if our founding fathers had asked the men and women who were enslaved if they could give an opinion as to their future?

Qualitatively Multicultural Theological Education

The challenge before us as we seek to become truly multicultural Christian institutions is: how do we become really multicultural without the trappings of a merely quantitative approach—interested only in numbers and balanced budgets? How can we reach a level of interaction and personal engagement wherein everyone feels welcomed and affirmed? Christian ministry (service, really) at its core is interacting with all kinds of people in ways that give them glimpses of Jesus in us. In Christianity, we affirm the value of each person. Indeed we claim that before God we are all the same, we are equal regardless of ethnicity, culture, or language.

In empowering others for Christian service, the problem for educational institutions and the Church is multilayered. How do we prepare our students and would-be disciples to live in a multicultural, multiethnic world that is largely freed from racism? The word “prepare” in the above sentence suggests an educational process. One of the key objectives of educational institutions is the reshaping of life in relation to human purpose. For theological schools, this implies that we must seek to reshape our students to enable them to live well in a multicultural world. The work of the Church is expressed through koinonia (community and communion), diakonia (service and outreach), kerygma (proclaiming the Word of God), and didache (teaching and learning). To foster an environment of multiculturalism within its institutional ethos, theological schools must create a climate that embraces this work of the Church.

How can we foster this process in our educational institutions so laden with traditional structures that resist change to the core in order to enable them to become multicultural communities?

• The process of developing a curriculum that fosters multiculturalism begins when members of the institution come together to discuss issues relevant to multicultural communities. This is koinonia.

• The school’s leadership drafts and develops an intentionally anti-racist, pro-multiethnic statement to be adhered to by all. This is kerygma.

• This intentionality must be accompanied by practices that promote multiculturalism (diakonia).

• Lastly they discuss strategies, policies, legislation needed to further promote multiculturalism (didache).

Elizabeth Conde-Frazier recommends, among other things, that we follow a trajectory of intentionality, hospitality/friendship, and that we learn to encounter the Other by risking friendship. (See: Conde-Frazier, Elizabeth, S S. Kang, and Gary A. Parrett. A Many Colored Kingdom: Multicultural Dynamics for Spiritual Formation. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2004.) When authentic relationships are built that embrace diversity, tremendous growth in Christ likeness can occur. In following intercultural friendships, safety is critical. We must learn to become safe persons. A safe person has:

a. listening ears,
b. limiting loaded words, and
c. loving arms.

In this risk-taking, we learn to tell and listen to stories—stories of the struggles, and particularly for the dominant culture, they must learn to listen attentively and respectfully to the story of invisibility that we as ethnic minorities feel, even in a Christian institution.

Develop Cultural Intelligence, Not Polite Thoughts

Allow me to add another option for us to consider. As Christians in a multicultural world, we need to approach cross-cultural interaction that stems from inward transformation rather than from information or, worse yet, from artificial political correctness.

Our goal should not be that we may learn more about different cultures, nor should our goal be to simply be better able to navigate cultural differences. Our goal should be to develop what David Livermore calls cultural intelligence, CQ. (The term is not original with him.) (See: http://davidlivermore.com/ for Livermore’s information and resources on Cultural Intelligence.)

CQ is a meta model which provides a coherent framework for dealing with the array of issues involved in crossing various cultures at the same time. CQ deals with people and circumstances in unfamiliar contexts on a daily, continuing basis. CQ also measures our ability to move seamlessly in and out of a variety of cultural contexts that we will encounter by merely being present in any North American city.

Basically, as outlined by Livermore, cultural intelligence (CQ) consists of four different factors:

• “Knowledge CQ” refers to our understanding cross-cultural issues; it measures our ongoing growth in understanding in cross-cultural issues. It refers to our level of understanding about culture and culture’s role in shaping behavior and social interactions.

• “Interpretive CQ” measures our ability to be mindful and aware as we interact with people from different cultural contexts. It helps us intuitively to understand what occurs in an actual cross-cultural encounter; it is the ability to accurately make meaning from what we observe. Interpretative CQ calls for a reflective, contemplative mindset, which mitigates against the zealous, activist approach permeating much of American evangelicalism, where thinking and reflection are often disparaged at the expense of getting things done.

• “Perseverance CQ,” or motivational CQ, indicates our level of interest, drive, and motivation to adapt cross culturally; in other words, Perseverance CQ is our intentionality. And finally,

• “Behavioral CQ” refers to the ability to observe, recognize, regulate, adapt, and act appropriately in intercultural settings; how we behave in such settings.

It might be easier to adapt our message, our curriculum, and our programs, but adapting ourselves is the far greater challenge. CQ provides us with a mechanism by which we gauge our commitment and level of cultural interaction and contextualization. What does it look like to contextualize ourselves to the various cultures where we find ourselves in a given time and place? What do we do when we encounter the Other and how do we react to her or him? That is the challenge we face, the challenge you will face as you venture out to minister in the name of Jesus in the multiethnic, multicultural society he has called you to.

Ministry in Context

At GCTS, CUME has grappled with these realities for decades, determining to provide contextualized theological education in its holistic dimensions—evangelism and social justice, theology and praxis. In doing so, CUME has structured itself to be in the city, of the city, and for the city.

Contextualization may connote different images to many people, but the clearest theological image of contextualization may be found in the Incarnation. In the life of Jesus Christ, coming to dwell on earth in physical, bodily form, we see God dwelling among us—pitching his tent with us. Contextualizing an educational endeavor in the midst of a city means expressing an “urban kenosis”—emptying oneself for the service of others. The theology, curriculum, teaching methods, and academic policies are informed by the context of ministry—by the city and its constituencies.

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ALVIN PADILLA, Ph.D. (former) Dean of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Boston campus, the Center for Urban Ministerial Education; Dean of Hispanic Ministries; Associate Professor of New Testament. Dr. Padilla has a B.S. from Villanova University; a Master of Divinity degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary; and a Ph.D. from Drew University Graduate School. He came to Gordon-Conwell after five years teaching biblical studies at Nyack College in New York. Prior to that, he founded and taught at the Spanish Eastern School of Theology in Swan Lake, NY, for seven years. He has also served as pastor of the Fort Washington Heights Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) in New York City, a Spanish-speaking congregation. In his work as Dean of the Center for Urban Ministerial Education, he oversees the educational programs of CUME, including Masters and Doctor of Ministry degrees. Dr. Padilla is an ordained minister in the PCUSA and holds professional memberships in the American Academy of Religion, the Society of Biblical Literature, and the Asociación para la Educación Teológica Hispana. [ed. Dr. Padilla is at Western Theological Seminary as of 2017.]

Resources and Links

Urban Ministry Training Systems in Metro Boston

The following is a sampling of urban ministry training systems currently operating in Metro Boston [in 2010]. The list is divided into four categories: Lay Training Centers, Pastoral Training Centers, Bible Schools and Christian Colleges, and Accredited Divinity Schools. (Because of its diverse offerings for students at different levels of academic and professional backgrounds, Gordon-Conwell’s CUME program is listed in three of the four sections.)

Lay Training Centers

1. Células, Congregación León De Judá (Cells at Lion of Judah Church), Pastor Gregory Bishop, www.leondejuda.org/es/taxonomy/term/69

Our cells are one of the most exciting ministries of our church. These are small groups of people gathering in homes, universities and work place for worship, Bible study, prayer and ministry to one another as needed, to evangelize and offer mutual support. They offer a great opportunity to introduce nonbelievers to the fundamental principles of the gospel.

2. Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Center for Urban Ministerial Education (CUME) Lay Ministry Training and Diploma Programs, Eldin Villafañe, www.gordonconwell.edu/boston/cume_lay_ministry_training_and_diploma_programs

CUME seeks to serve the larger community by offering a variety of non-degree certificate programs. Each certificate spans approximately one academic year with a multiplicity of educational experiences:

• Urban Christian Streetworkers Certificate Programs: CUME offers a unique program of study for the training and equipping of men and women reaching out to the youth at risk in our cities. The program spans eight workshops/courses over two semesters.

• Diploma in Foundational Christian Studies: CUME offers a ten-course, modular program of study leading to a Diploma in Christian Studies. The program provides the student with a basic overview of theological education for ministry and consists of nine (9) required courses and one (1) elective. The Diploma in Foundational Christian Studies may be applied toward coursework in one of the M.A. degrees or the M.Div. degree once a student is accepted to one of those degrees. Credit determination will be made by the admissions committee.

• Diploma in Urban Ministry: CUME offers a ten-course program of study leading to a Diploma in Urban Ministry. The program focuses on the essentials and practical training of benefit to the urban practitioner. This program of study seeks to provide the urban practitioner with theological and biblical reflection on his/her call to ministry and the nature of that ministry. Five (5) courses comprise an urban theological core. Four (4) courses are taken in a particular concentration area with the remaining one (1) course taken as an elective. Particular emphasis is given to the equipping of these men and women for a holistic ministry in the city. The diploma is awarded upon the completion of ten (10) courses.

3. Institute for Christian Leadership, Mario Antonio da Silva, www.leadershiptrainingcenter.org

The certificate program in Lay Pastoral Ministry is designed for Christian men and women interested in evangelism and church development. It is a program for those who want to expand their knowledge, faith, spirituality, and leadership abilities. This program serves as a means of preparation for those seeking to serve as lay ministers according to their churches' affiliations. The LPM Program is a rich learning environment for personal development, spiritual growth and practical training in Christian ministry. It is sponsored by the Presbytery of Boston, PCUSA.

 4. Urban Academy (URBACAD), Paul Bothwell, www.urbacad.org  

URBACAD provides lay people with discipleship and leadership training that is practical, culturally relevant, flexible, accessible, and solid. It emphasizes the vital nature of ministry through the local church by centering its training in and around the local church. Materials are in many languages.

Pastoral Training Centers

1. Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Boston campus, the Center for Urban Ministerial Education (CUME), Eldin Villafañe, www.gordonconwell.edu/boston_admissions

Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary’s Boston campus, also known as the Center for Urban Ministerial Education (CUME), is particularly focused on equipping urban pastors and church leaders for more effective ministry and outreach in their own communities and throughout the world. CUME also serves in a support capacity by providing resources, ministerial fellowship, and stimulation for cross-denominational endeavors in evangelism and church growth.

The Doctor of Ministry (D. Min.) is the highest professional degree for men and women already successfully engaged in ministry. The M.Div. or its equivalent is a prerequisite degree for entrance into the program. The D. Min. enables leaders in Christian ministry to increase their effectiveness in the church, parachurch organization, or mission in which they minister. The degree is designed to help students improve their skills and understandings in urban ministry to such an extent that they can impact their congregation or community more powerfully for God. Over a three-year period, participants spend two weeks per year in residency on campus. Over the course of the year, they carry out practical, residency-related assignments in their own context and also do the extensive reading required for the next residency. The program concludes over the fourth year with participants designing and implementing a thesis/project which serves to culminate their learning experience.

2. Instituto para la Excelencia Pastoral (Institute for Pastoral Excellence), www.excelenciapastoral.net

Instituto para la Excelencia Pastoral strives to strengthen the Hispanic pastor of New England by providing them with the knowledge, skills and skills demanded by today’s pastoral practice, strengthening the capacity of lay leaders accompanying him on his work and contributing to the integration of the pastoral family.

Bible Schools and Christian Colleges           

1. Boston Baptist College, David Melton, www.boston.edu

At the heart of every academic program at Boston Baptist College is the study of Scripture. While collegiate general education is offered, as is an array of instruction in the practical skills of Christian ministry, all programs require a major in Biblical Studies. Within the Boston Baptist College family there is complete unity in the confession of the Bible as God’s inerrant Word and the challenge to understand truth in all disciplines through the context of the divine revelation.

2. Eastern Nazarene College, Corlis McGee www1.enc.edu/

Located on Boston’s historic south shore, within walking distance of Quincy Bay, Eastern Nazarene College (ENC) recently celebrated its 100th birthday. A fully accredited traditional liberal arts college, ENC has about 1,075 students distributed across a traditional residential undergraduate program, adult studies, and a graduate program. ENC is known for its success in getting students into top graduate and medical schools and has a 100 percent acceptance rate for its students into Law School. While many faculty are active in publishing and research, and some are leaders in their fields, the emphasis is on the teaching and mentoring of students in a nurturing, spiritually informed, and academically supportive environment. Students are encouraged to travel, engage in service learning projects, and participate in praxis experiences as a part of their education. ENC is one of 160 members of the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities (CCCU).

3. Gordon College: Clarendon Scholars, R, Judson Carlberg, www.gordon.edu/newcityscholars

The Gordon College Clarendon Scholars program offers full scholarships to 10 students each year from city settings to attend Gordon, and provides support systems to encourage their success. The Scholars are identified through relationships the College has built with city-based organizations throughout (but not limited to) the East Coast, such as Emmanuel Gospel Center's Boston Education Collaborative in Boston. Through mentoring relationships, training and peer support, the students are helped to make the transition to college and given leadership experience to help ensure their success.

4. Zion Bible College, Charles Crabtree, www.zbc.edu

Zion Bible College in Providence exists to teach and train students for Pentecostal ministry, in fulfillment of the Great Commission.

Accredited Divinity Schools

1. Boston Theological Institute (BTI), Rodney Petersen, www.bostontheological.org.

The Boston Theological Institute (BTI) is an association of nine university divinity schools, schools of theology, and seminaries in the Greater Boston area, including:

• Andover Newton Theological School

• Boston College School of Theology and Ministry

• Boston College Theology Department

• Boston University School of Theology

• Episcopal Divinity School

• Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary

• Harvard Divinity School

• Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology

• Saint John’s Seminary

BTI is registered as a tax-exempt 501c3 organization. It is one of the oldest and largest theological consortia in the world. It includes as constitutive members schools representing the full range of Christian churches and confessions. Additionally, persons representing other religious traditions are present in many of our schools. The BTI is not a degree granting institution, but coordinates various administrative, program and academic activities so as to enhance the work of the member schools.