January 4 Sonny’s Sayings

As we celebrate the new year as a church, I have become convinced that our mindset needs to be that of an organism, not an organization. An organization has one primary goal: survival through building and expanding its structures. It survives by maintaining these structures. It is more concerned about its functioning than about its health. When something is not functioning well, it is concerned with making that thing function again, so that the organization can continue. An organism is slightly different, but in important ways. An organism has one primary goal: health. While an organization would evaluate itself as healthy when everything is functioning, an organism sees its highest goal as health, and assumes that when things are healthy, they will function well. When something is not working right, the organism seeks to make that aspect healthy, so that it can again function as it is intended.
When we think about our church, it is very easy to fall into the trap of letting the church be an organization. We have structures that are in place that have evolved over time, each for a good reason at the time; and when one of those structures is not functioning, it is easy to think that the best thing to do is try and make it function again. But when we are working as an organism, and something is not working, we first look to make it healthy so that it again can function well with the other parts of the organism.
An organism is also different in that it is not seeking to maintain a structure, it, instead, wants its structure to support its health. As a church, we become a healthy organism when our relationships are healthy, when our sense of purpose is healthy, and when our collective and individual spirits are healthy.
I believe that we took a good step forward this year in developing a healthy sense of purpose: being unapologetically inclusive and intergenerational. I also think that there were some strides made in our intergenerational relationships this year. There is a good feeling and good spirit in what is taking place on the fourth Wednesday of each month between generations; but as is the case in every organism, there is work to be done: there are relationships that need mending, and that will, in turn, help us to work on building our sense of spirit in the church. I am committing myself to work into this journey, and I hope that as a congregation we will commit ourselves to the same things. Many blessings to you today, and I hope that worship is a special experience of God’s presence. Blessings, Sonny