You are here: Home > News >United Church News > Minister and President's Message
Interim Minister and President’s Message
May we learn fresh ways to discern the will of God
February 2001
By Erwin R. Bode
At the beginning of 2001 perhaps you are in the midst of a decision about your life, such as pondering where to go to college, or what job to take, or what to do in a relationship, or whether to retire. The list is legion, for there is always a personal decision that is unclear at the moment.
In congregations in our Massachusetts Conference there are discernments going on, as well. I think, for example, of the 35 congregations currently looking for a new pastor. Who should they call to be their new spiritual leader? Their search committees are spending countless hours seeking to discern the right decision.
Leaders of the Massachusetts Conference are also in a year of discernment in 2001, as we seek to know what is the will of God regarding key choices to be made. Within the next 12 months decisions will be determined regarding a new Minister and President, a Metropolitan Boston Area Minister, a Northeast Area Minister, and a Western Area Minister. Search committees are daily discerning about candidates for these positions. Since I serve on three of these committees, I know what an exciting and complicated task this is.
The more I reflect about discernment, whether on a personal or congregation or conference level, the more it intrigues me. Charles Olsen, a Presbyterian minister and leader of a Conference workshop on April 21st, helps me to dig deeper into its meaning. He refers me to Romans 12:2, where it says, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may discern what is the will of God _ what is good and acceptable and perfect.” The understanding of discernment is elusive and mysterious. Who really knows God’s will?
The term discernment has historically been the property of the Quaker movement and Roman Catholicism. In fact, the Quakers have worked at it faithfully for 300 years, and they say they don't have it down pat yet. Chuck Olsen says we are tempted to substitute deliberation for discernment, but deliberation suggests a rational and deductive process that doesn't really get at the heart of discernment.
In essence, discernment is a mystery that we cannot completely describe or control. The best we can do is circle around it a few times and offer a few hazy snapshots. When we wish to make a large decision, we usually revert to a set process. We get all the information. We consider our options. We weigh the pros and cons. We reason our way to a conclusion. We get on with a vote, decide about an implementation, and eventually evaluate what we have done. But in the church we are supposedly marching to the beat of a different drummer. What is God calling us or a congregation or a conference to do? What is God's will for us now? Such a decision is not so easily rationalized and managed.
Discernment means to “see” or to “know” or to “acknowledge” what is. It is to see the movement of God in our individual and collective lives, perhaps only in the dust kicked up by the wind. It is to attempt to see reality from God’s perspective. It is to uncover a decision, rather than to make it. It is to find the divine “aha” in our life. Discernment has a life of its own. It cannot be pushed and resists any effort to manipulate it. It is precocious and powerful and difficult to corner. That’s what makes it at one and the same time terribly threatening and wonderfully exciting.
As Chuck Olsen points out, the methods to do this kind of institutional discerning are gentle and require patience — questions, silence, dreams, and images. These subtle ways enable the will of God to surface into our consciousness and to be discovered before our eyes. What is God calling us to do?
It is my hope and prayer that in the year 2001 we will learn in fresh ways how to discern what is the will of God for us as we make key decisions in the Massachusetts Conference and in our congregations and, yes, in our personal lives. It is a path worth taking. But it will challenge us to the max!
Return to United Church News front page
Return to Massachusetts Conference home page