Overview Week One: Come and See Week Two: Hearing God's Voice Week Three: Living by Grace Week Four: Gathered at the Table Week Five: Sent into the World Week Six: Walking the Way

In our first session, we began with this story. We heard Jesus say, “Come and see,” and we talked about the invitation to begin a journey with Jesus. Now, at the end of our journey together, let's hear the same story again. But this time, listen for what happens between the people who encounter Jesus.

Read John 1:35-51

  • Notice how rarely anyone encounters Jesus alone. Andrew brings Simon. Philip finds Nathanael. One person tells another, “We have found him.” Imagine yourself as Nathanael. Philip comes to you excitedly telling you about Jesus, and your first response is skepticism: “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Yet Philip doesn't argue with you. He simply says, “Come and see.” Can you think of a person who, at some point in your life, invited you into something you might not have discovered on your own? What made you willing to “come and see”?
  • At the beginning of this journey, Jesus said, “Come and see.” After walking this way together, what is something you have seen that you would want someone else to come and see? Who might you want to invite to come and see?

What is a church? Our 16th century ancestors lived in a world where people were constantly trying to claim this or that community wasn’t “the true church.” For them, that didn’t reflect the heart of discipleship which was constituted in the Bible as a group of people who were doing their best to follow Jesus and to do ministry together. So, they came up with a very simple definition: The church is anywhere where believers are gathered, the Word is preached, and the sacraments are administered. So it has three parts and each part is essential to the life of discipleship:

  1. Word – Ee gather to hear the story of God and have our lives formed by it.
  2. Sacrament – God doesn’t just form us through ideas but gives us tangible and outward signs we can all taste, touch, and see.
  3. Community – none of us follow Jesus alone. We must gather together.

That is the minimum for constituting the church. That being said, Lutherans are also realists, and we know that when communities gather together we need some helpful structure to protect one another and make sure we don’t neglect one another, we don’t get exploited by others, or we don’t lose sight of the global church to which we are connected. For that reason, we value what we call “good order,” meaning the institutional structures that keep us focused on our work and ministry.

Messiah is not simply a congregation on its own. We are in partnership with two other, what we call, “expressions” of the Church:

  1. The Synod – this is a regional community of congregations, governed by an annual assembly (to which our congregation sends 3 delegates), a Synod Council, and our Bishop (who acts as a pastor to our pastors). Our synod is the Northern Texas-Northern Louisianna Synod. Our Bishop is the Rev. Dr. Erik Gronberg. We support the synod’s ministries by sending a portion of our offerings to the synod, and the synod helps guide important decisions in the life of our congregation, like calling pastors, starting new ministries, or managing conflicts.
  2. Churchwide – this is the national community of synods and congregations across the entire Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. It is governed by a triannual assembly (to which our synod assembly sends delegates), a Church Council, and a Presiding Bishop (who acts as the pastor to our bishops). Our current Presiding Bishop is the Rev. Yehiel Curry. Churchwide staff and leaders help coordinate international ministries, broker dialogues with other denominations, oversee seminaries and the credentialling of clergy, and develop many programs and publications to support the ministry of congregations and service organizations within the ELCA.

Along with congregations, synods and the churchwide body are considered three co-equal expressions of the church. None is greater than the other. They all work together.

As a congregation, Messiah is governed by its voting members who meet to decide important business at least once a year (the last Sunday of January). When not meeting as a congregation, the Congregational Council helps oversee the day-to-day governance of the congregation. The congregation is governed by a Constitution. Any pastor or deacon in the congregation serves at the discretion of the congregation. A pastor or deacon is called by a vote of the congregation, in coordination with the synod which makes recommendations. The pastor exercises sacramental and preaching/teaching authority in the congregation, but it is important to note that that authority is not hers/his alone but is placed in his/her trust by the congregation. When a pastor leaves, that authority is returned to the congregation. When a pastor is unavailable, and in consultation with the bishop, any lay person selected by the congregation can temporarily administer sacraments (like communion or baptism) and preach.

All of these technicalities may feel like bureaucratic red tape, but they exist so that we can continue to do ministry together smoothly, with transparency, accountability, and trust. These institutional structures exist because we believe so strongly that the Church is the ministry of all the baptized, and we want to ensure that conflict, lack of clarity, or corruption do not tempt us to abandon the project of community altogether. Discipleship is done in human community, and that means it also exists within some human structures of what we might call “institution.” Just as Jesus took on flesh in the humility of a human body, so too the Church takes on flesh in the somewhat humdrum reality of institutionalism.

Think about your time at Messiah. Complete these sentences:

Messiah is a place where I have…

Messiah is a community that…

I hope Messiah continues to…