Monday, February 14, 2011

Monday, February 14, 2011

Happy Valentine’s Day!  May you know God’s love and grace.

At the Evergreen Leaders Retreat, we worked on our “virtual” jigsaw puzzle, creating a picture of Evergreen Association today and the future. We first agreed on our foundational pieces, the corners of the puzzle, our “core values”: unity, cultural diversity, acceptance and shifting perspectives. Today, I want to reflect a bit on the “unity” core value. All our core values are present when we are together. Unity is a core value of ours, it is seen most in our decision making process of consensus building. Unity doesn’t mean that we agree exactly the same on everything. It does mean that we are glad to share that we agree on the important things and are willing to live and work with each other because of these things. We believe that God gives us this gift of unity, it is not ours but God’s gift to us. The more we exercise our gift and understanding of unity, I’m convinced, the more God blesses us. It doesn’t mean we all have to agree with each other, but it does mean we listen for the places and points where we can come together. It means that when we understand God’s call to a particular work or ministry, we can work together to make it real and make it happen. Our mission statement ends with “translate our unity to the world.” I believe that the world sees the church/Christianity as divided (especially Baptists?!). Yet, I also believe one of the things the world is seeking is a sense of unity, of partnership or “brother/sisterhood”, so our call to share with the world what we experience is not an afterthought, but a call to share our faith, our walk with God, with others, particularly as they have need.

Your response is welcomed. You can respond at the “Contact Evergreen” page of this website.

Marcia