Dear Friends,
Greetings to you. First I want to extend a note of thanks to the Scholarship Committee for the gift that allowed me to attend this wonderful conference on behalf of the Presbytery.
The conference was held August 29-31, 2007 in Nashville, TN. Almost 300 elders from across the country and Canada were in attendance at this first National Elders Conference. The short time that we spent in Nashville was jam packed with information, fellowship, learning, and worship. Our time together started Wednesday afternoon at 1:30 with these memorable words from Gradye Parsons, “We want to create a bunch of dangerous elders, elders who know what the ministry of being an elder is about and want to claim that ministry for their own.” These words set the tone for the next two days.
Our first of five plenary sessions was “Elder as Worship Leader” led by Melva Costen and Rhashell Hunter. The book of order gives a complete discription of what we as elders are called to be about as worship leaders. Just a few of which are to lead the body of Christ in prayer, celebrating the sacraments, and music. We are to get up from the body of Christ to speak the word of Christ. One point that they made that sticks with is “We live as we worship.”
The second session was “Elders and Mission” led by Corey Schlosser-Hall. Corey gave many examples of what churches in the greater Seattle area are doing to reach out to their communities. Corey also said the we should remember to love God, and love our neighbor, Go, and guide. He encouraged us to read the book of Acts, which I am working on little by little. He finished with these words, “Wake up, pay attention, and go,” reminding us that the “sending” which ends our worship services is the beginning of what we are to continue in our communities, both near and far.
Our third session was “Elders and prayer and spiritual life” led by Ann Weems. Ann reminded us that our call as elders is to pray. (I have to deviate from our Nashville trip here to tell you a story about a recent mission trip I went on to Puerto Rico. One of the churchs we worshiped at had the elders stand at the front of the church and pray for individuals that needed prayer. This was done during the “prayers of the people” or “pastoral prayer.” It was an amazing thing to witness.) The reason for this story is I believe this is what Ann’s message to us was.
The fourth session was “Elder as biblical teacher” led by Valerie Small, who was reading for Freda Gardner. Unfortunately Freda had a family emergency and couldn’t make the conference. Her message was about elders leading bible studies. In her talk Freda said that good teachers “create a space where truth can be known.”
Our fifth and final session was “Elder as Leader” led by William Winter. As elders we are called to be leaders in the church. However, we are not called to play God, but to follow God. I have to be honest, I was so engrossed with what he was saying I had a hard time taking any notes. The line above was one of many that stuck out. But the only one I took the time to write down. I didn’t want to miss anything.
We also had two “break-out” sessions that we could attend. I chose to go to “Bridging Generations in the Church” and “Reclaiming the Call.” In the first workshop, Rachel Pederson, gave us great resources for furthur study. Two of the major points that Rachel highlighted were to identify the needs (and possible challenges) and identify the gifts of all the members of the membership.
In the second workshop, Ann Weems, spoke on the call of elders. The call to serve as an Elder is sacred and we need to work on reclaiming that call. Once again, I became so engrossed with what she was saying, that I failed to take any semblance of what could be called notes. A few phrases that popped out to me were, “We are a community, we can’t be spiritual by ourselves.” “Jesus is the true vine…we are the branches.” And “Beware of mistaking church work for being disciples.”
We also celebrated worship three times during our time together. The services Wednesday and Thursday evenings were held at the Downtown Presbyterian Church, which was a short 1.5 block walk away in good weather. Wednesday evening we were called to remember our baptisms, and we were reminded as we left the church to head back the the hotel, that God indeed has a sense of humor. During the service we went forward in pairs and dipped our hands in a bowl of water, as we left the church it was pouring rain and the majority of us hadn’t brought any kind of rain gear. So as we tried to walk back to the church we got “baptised” again.
Thursday evening our speaker was Joan Gray, Moderator of the 217th General Assembly (2006). We also had a choir of volunteers from the conference. The choir was lead by Melva Costen and was comprised of about 40 conference attendees.
Our Friday service was held at the conference center and was lead by Eric Hoey. There was also a group of outstanding youth that lead us in music. They go by the name SLAMM Band (Students Learning about Music and Ministry.) The youth were between the ages of 13 and 16, and I have to tell you they were amazing!
Friends, I could go on for pages about this conference. I am honored that I was able to attend this very first Elders conference and hope that there will be more in the future. I urge you to jump at the chance to attend future conferences like this. I came back with a renewed longing to do the work for which I was called. And I think that others who attended feel the same way.
Once again, I urge you to read the Book of Order starting with section G-6.0301 regarding what it says about Elders.
I’ll end with the theme of our conference. “Elders rule…when they serve.”
Grace and peace to you, Jessica Harrison, Elder, First Presbyterian Church, Winneconne
