Foundation #2: Call for Inclusive Changes

The second foundation of the United Methodist of  Bethany is a commitment to be intentional in our call be an inclusive church.  All are invited to comment that we may crystalize God's call. 
(The words of this page reflects the words of Pastor Thomas at the AdBoard Aug 21 meeting.)

1. Acknowledging the Hurt

So through this process we've heard some concerns from people and some of the concerns that we've heard is that there are members of this church that have family and friends that identify as LGBTQ, who have had experiences here where they have either not felt welcome or they have maybe even felt hurt by this church.

When someone says that they have been hurt we need to listen and we need to take that feedback seriously.

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And so as we've talked about this as the lead team and the pastors  I want to apologize on behalf of this whole church that we are sorry for the ways that we have not been welcoming in the past and we're especially sorry for the times that we have hurt people -  either by actions or by inactions of members of this church.

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As we look to the future we know that we need to do better reaching people in the LGBT community and we're committed to growing in this way moving forward.

I think it needs to be said that this really is true regardless of where Bethany ends up.  It doesn't matter which denomination or network we end up in.  

We know that we need to grow in this and this is going to be something that is going to take some time.

It's going to take a while but we need to have it in the Forefront of what we're thinking about.

Understand God's Call for Inclusive Change

As Bethany moves forward, as one of the pastors here, I really want to share a little bit of my heart for why I think this is true.  It would be easy to just say “hey we need to work on this and move on”.

I think there's more to it than that and I want it to get stuck in our heads a little bit more than that.

So if you'll indulge me I'm gonna I'm gonna try to Shepherd us a little bit by sharing some of the reasons that I believe this is something that God wants us to grow in as a church 

1. First I believe that we are called to grow in this because we are we are called to be a people who love people. 
   
   
1. You could argue that are supposed to be known for nothing else.
   More than how they love that that would be the thing we are most known. 
   
   
2. For I've heard a lot of discussion and conversation in the last nine or ten months of discernment process and however many years before that.  But most of the conversations that I hear are focused on how someone can defend their position.  That seems to be the focal point for so many of us moving forward. We have got to move past just defending a position. 
    
3. We've got to move on to a place where we recognize the call that we have as followers of Christ - to love people. Everyone is created in God's image and worthy of love and respect .
   
   We need to live that out better okay
   
   First and foremost we need to grow and how we reach the LGBTQ community. Because we're called to love people
   
   
2. The second reason we need to grow in this is because we as a church were called to be a church that is serving on God's mission in the world. And on this topic, I'm going to start preaching if you let me but 
1. God's mission in the world is not about keeping us happy in our church buildings.
   It's not about just reaching out just to those who look like us and think like us and act like us.
   
   
   
2. It's really about prioritizing relationships with those outside the church and friends.
   If you look outside the church in our surrounding community in our missional context there are a lot of people that identify as LGBTQ. Gen Z is the current 11 to 26 year olds.
   A recent study says that 21% of Gen Z identifies as LGBTQ.  21%! That that's one-fifth.
   
   
3. So you can think that's a a great number to to talk about you can think that's maybe not so good. Regardless of whether you think that's a good or bad thing for our society we have to acknowledge that we have an increasing population of people who identify as LGBTQ in our community. And we are called to share Christ with them.
   
   
4. If we're going to do that well we have to take time to understand these people that are different than many of us.  We have to take time to think about their experiences. Many people in the LGBTQ community have been hurt by Christians in the past and that hurt can often prevent people from wanting to be involved in church.
   
   
5. Sadly that can prevent people from wanting to even have a relationship with God and we can't take responsibility for all the church hurts in the world, but we can acknowledge that they're there.  
   
   
6. And look for ways to be agents of healing and not be people that further hurt.
   
   That's one of the second reason we need to prioritize this because we're called to be a missional people not just focused on ourselves.
   
   
3. The third reason that I'll put forward is we are called to we're called to be on Mission.
1. I think that we can make a bigger difference doing that together than we can separate.  So I know it's very easy in society today to uh you know self-select into our different echo chambers.
   
   
2. And only hear the people that agree with us and then we start to think that if you disagree with me you must be crazy.  That's how Echo Chambers work.
   
   
3. Just wonder what would it look like to be a church that is not just a homogenous group of people that all think the exact same.  What if we could be a church that would have progressives and conservatives and everybody in between that could serve on God's Mission together.
   
   
4. That could love people well especially those in the LGBTQ community.  I think we can make more of a difference that way than than trying to divide up into our echo chambers and addressing things separately.

I could see that happening here at Bethany.  If we're intentional with it.

Being Intentional about Needs for Inclusive Change

Now I need to I need to be honest with y'all this is not something that's going to be a quick fix. This is not something that we accomplished by me talking up here.  I don't have a 10-step plan for making this happen.  It's going to take a lot of time and hard work on all of our parts if we're really going to grow and how we reach this group of our community.

I want to offer up maybe a starting point of some things that you know.  Some of these things I see us already doing as a church.  Some of these things I think we need to grow in more.

Let me offer this up as a starting place things that we can do to proactively grow in welcoming and reaching out to the LGBTQ community in our area.

First we can welcome all people to our church events:

1. to our worship services 
2. to our classes and 
3. to our groups,
4. we can baptize all people who place their faith in Jesus and want to be baptized in our church 
5. we can welcome all into membership in our church 
6. we can welcome all to serve in Ministry in our church - if someone wants to serve here we're going to say yeah let's find a place for you;  Kelly is going to find a place for you because she does that really well 
7. we can welcome non-traditional family units
   
   if a family comes to us and they say we have we're two moms and some kids or two dads and some kids we're not going to tell them oh sorry that we don't we don't understand that kind of family we're gonna say yeah they're a family and they're in our database as a family and 
   
   We're going to love them and treat them as a family and we can do that because we want to love and respect people 
   
   
8. we will have no tolerance for hateful speech or actions towards LGBTQ people or their families.
   
   There's just a certain minimum of behavior that we expect here because we're supposed to be a place that's known for love and sharing Christ 
   
   
9. and maybe most importantly we can agree to be proactive to build authentic relationships with LGBTQ people in our community friends.
•  the only way I know how to share God's love with people is really through relationship.
•  the only way I know how to share Christ with people is by building real relationships not treating people as projects
• Really having friends that you share your life with and that's something we're going to have to grow in 

We're all going to have to grow in that.

Being inclusive of ALL - including Traditionalist

Now I want to be clear about what I'm not saying I'm not saying that if you have a traditional understanding of marriage you need to change what you believe.

You guys probably already know this but I'm a C Pastor. I believe that the Bible teaches that male and female were created for each other. I believe that scripture is clear that marriage is meant to be between a man and a woman.  

Just a little over a year ago I took a vow to uphold what's currently in the book of discipline and I didn't do it because anyone was making me do it. I did it because I believe that's true.

And while I believe that about marriage and sexuality I also I believe very strongly that the church is called to live on this radical mission of loving all people and going out of its way to share Christ. And to welcome all people into God's family

The New Bethany means personal changes

I think that is just so important you guys so here's what this means if we're gonna do this. It's gonna be messy. We're going to have to get out of our comfort zone, all of us.  

There's not one side or viewpoint that's going to be able to say I'll just stay just like I am. That's that's not a possibility.  We're going to have to engage the world, not hide from it.

We are going to have to learn to understand people different than us and build relationships with people that that we have disagreements with but I think this messy work is so important if we're going to be God's people and I think if we set out to grow in this, regardless of where this church ends up, I think we can do a better job of leading all people to experience God's love,  know Jesus Christ, and grow in His image.

So that's where we need to grow there's a lot of work to get there but please hear that we really mean it when we say that and we want everyone to be thinking about that at this point.