Our Hope in Ages Present

This blog post written by Pastor Matt James is a result of Leaders for Hybrid Futures, a community of learning and practice created by Rev. Tim Schenck and Learning Forte’s CEO, Rev. Stacy Williams-Duncan, to reflect on and experiment with hybrid ministry.  This innovative program is a partnership with LEAD, TX, and Learning Forte’s Digital Ministry Initiative and is funded by a leadership grant from Trinity Church, Wall Street. 

I often think back to “TBP” (time before pandemic) and how little we knew about how the world would change, how nearly everything would change. Today I’m thinking about “Pandemic+1” (one year into the pandemic).

I made a return to parish ministry in November 2020. I knew, or thought I knew, full well the challenges I was getting into. But one reality I didn’t fully imagine, looking about a year back, was the fullness of how “decision fatigue” would impact my ministry, and perhaps most of our ministries.

“Decision fatigue” has interfered with determining, rethinking, and re-determining our worship and gathering practices. At times, and even more challenging for me at least, it has impacted my ability to create, innovate, and write (yes, even these words!). Thinking back to “Pandemic+1,” I can remember thinking of all the wonderful possibilities that were before us as we imagined hybrid ministry – new ways of connecting, new ways of reaching out, new ways of being church.

Now in “Pandemic+2” (hopefully you’re figuring out the system) some of those dreams have been set aside. Some of the ambitions have faded away. Sure, we continue to hold most of our meetings via Zoom. Many of us admit that it’s nice to be home in the evening and simply ‘sign-on’ for Council meetings. Just this week, the chair of one of our committees was feeling unwell, but she was able to Zoom into our meeting.

These are indeed changes that are here to stay. Yes, we still have the faithful few who tune into our worship on Facebook Live and YouTube. I hear from so many home-bound members that I visit how much they appreciate being able to worship with us. I hear the hope in their voices as they ask, nearly every time, whether we will continue to livestream our worship. ‘Without a doubt!’ I assure them.

Many in our community are glad to return to in-person practices. We are beginning to see who is returning, who remains on the fringes, and who may have moved on. There is lament at how our community has changed, but our refrain has become “God is still at work in us.”

God’s vision for us might have changed, but we, in myriad forms, are still here. Even in our exhaustion God is still managing to do something new. The vision and imagination that we all might have had even one long year ago might still be changing. It IS most certainly still changing, but the one certainty, the one thing we can rely on and trust in is that God continues to walk with us and strengthen us, even when our cup of creativity runs dry. God, our Good Shepherd, still gathers us, leading us to those bountiful waters, refreshing us with the gifts of community, hope, and grace that we need for times such as these. THANKS BE TO GOD!

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