Reawakening Vermont

What does your church need right now?

What need would you love to meet in your community?

These are the questions we asked the host church when we begin to dream, listen, pray and plan a custom-made Reawakening Weekend. Bp. Andrew Williams, of the Anglican Diocese of New England (ADNE) has invited Dandelion to partner with him in the desire for the Holy Spirit to move in New England through his churches using these “Regional Reawakenings.” The big one - to which you are all invited - is in October. Throughout the year, we are bringing that teamwork, worship, and creativity to you. The weekends consist of 1) building into your church through Word, prayer, worship and creativity and 2) helping you do a creative outreach to your community.

Dandelion is also doing this with churches outside of the ADNE! Could be with you!

Here’s the story of our most recent one at St. Timothy Anglican Church in Burlington, VT in November.

The Rev. Micah Thompson gathered a crew of networkers and servant-leaders in his church: Amy Bowen, Director of 7th Seed Retreat Center and Farm School and Amanda McGann, counselor and Director of the Isaiah 40 Foundation. As Sean, Elena Williams, and I began to meet and listen to them, the vision for the weekend emerged.

7th Seed Farm School

Meeting your needs

St. Timothy’s needed community. They have a short window on Sunday mornings due to sharing worship space with other congregations. They are all spread out over a large region. Burlington is very post-Christian and the church feels like an outpost. They needed time to meaningfully connect with one another, with the Lord, and with other Christians. They needed food! The idea of a fellowship meal was born. 7th Seed provided the unrushed, peaceful, modern yet cozy space. We created the weekend theme of God’s comfort, and Bp. Drew brought the Word, plus a gift! St. Timothy’s gathered on Friday night around a catered meal. One woman’s daughter joined who had stopped going to church years ago. Her daughter was so touched by the love and welcome. So was her mother. Bp. Drew emphasized the etymology of the word, comfort: it encompasses companionship, compassion, and strengthening. He drew from Paul’s letter to the Corinthians in 2 Corinthians 1 where Paul comforts out of the comfort he has first received from the Lord. To emphasize God comforting us in our place of need, Bp. Drew gave out bracelets that symbolize the closeness of God’s promise to comfort you. Each person picked a bracelet. Then we broke into small groups to share where we needed comfort. We prayed for each other. It was honest and needed. We got to know each other better.

Meeting your community’s needs

The community needed St. Timothy’s. The outreach ended up expanding! At first, Amanda McGann wanted to support their local Department of Child and Family Services. (Amanda and Gabriel have adopted 3 of their own foster children, plus they foster infants.) She approached the local DCF to host a gift-card give-away at St. Timothy’s. The DCF said yes! She was thrilled that they trusted the church to do that. However, they could not do it until the winter (thus not in time for the Reawakening retreat). So, St. Timothy’s will host it mid-winter! In addition, the DCF asked St. Timothy’s to help furnish an apartment for a foster mother fleeing domestic violence from out-of-state. Again, Amanda was thrilled the DCF trusted St. Timothy’s! The church rose to the challenge starting the Sunday of the Reawakening and went shopping :)

There’s still more fruit! A local foundation in Burlington is dedicated to supporting Christians and the community: 150 Cherry St. St. Timothy’s has lots of connections with it, but had not had the chance to serve alongside it yet. This was the time! St. Timothy’s volunteered to serve the Banquet, which was started by a Michelin-starred chef who moved to Burlington with a vision to have a monthly banquet for the homeless where they are treated with dignity and respect. His vision of white table clothes, volunteer waiters, and excellent food is realized every month in “The Banquet,” served out of the 150 Cherry St. headquarters. St. Timothy’s arrived in force and stayed through clean-up. They loved, served, and prayed for homeless and got to partner with other Christians in Burlington in Jesus’ name. We even handed out more of Bp. Drew’s bracelets as gifts to show that God loves each attendant and comforts them. St. Timothy’s also donated handwarmers, which were put to immediate creative uses.

Out of the desire to do one outreach, came three solid, sustainable, and ongoing opportunities to serve the needy in Burlington in Jesus’ name. And they are things people in St. Timothy’s want to do anyway. That’s the Holy Spirit.

“It was so wonderful to see St. Timothy stretch beyond our walls in a new way. The regional reawakening conference offered a number of different options that met a number of different needs for our church. From the dinner and worship on Friday, to the art project and mission outreach on Saturday, to the confirmation service on Sunday, we constantly saw the members of St. Timothy ministering to one another and to our broader community. Thanks be to God - He stretched us, and in the stretching, He met us with His comfort, love, and a greater vision of the days ahead for St. Timothy.”
- The Rev. Micah Thompson

More meeting your needs with art and worship

The St. Timothy’s team also asked for a collaborative art project. They wanted extra time together and to see how the arts fit into worship in the church. I designed a project based on Ezekiel to show the prophetic role of art in the church.

I began by listing all the areas of pain in Ezekiel’s life and asked if the congregants related (Ezekiel 1)? If they did, they got to add tape to the wooden board, which would become the canvas.

Have you ever felt…
far from home?
Alone?
Overwhelmed by a problem you cannot fix?
Like everyone is against you?
That your sin was so bad that God was angry with you?

Their white tape made the “ground” of where God would meet them, as he did Ezekiel. God came to Ezekiel in a storm, on a living throne wrapped in fire and rainbows and carried by angels with four faces. The angels were like the idols in Babylon—God was riding upon the idols in victory, dominating them so that they would bring him to his people. God was against the sin in his people, but he would take the punishment for sin fully upon himself, not them. The rainbows told Ezekiel that God remembered that promise. Jesus kept it. God used art to break through to his people, and to comfort Ezekiel.

The rainbow beads represented God’s promise of mercy—that he was for Ezekiel even in the big problem.

God strengthened Ezekiel through the Spirit, lifting him on his feet, reassuring him three times to not be afraid, and promising to be with him (Ezekiel 2). Although God was sending him among thorns and scorpions, he would strengthen Ezekiel, making him as tough as the people were.

The wire represented the thorns around Ezekiel – the place where God would comfort and strengthen him.

Finally, God called Ezekiel to be his prophet but then bound him so he could not speak (Ezekiel 2)! He sent Ezekiel out using art to preach to his people: sculpture, drama, metaphor, story-telling, and finally a painting about a new Temple (Ezekiel 3,16,44-48). This Temple could not be built – it is not a blueprint; it is a painting - architectural preaching. The Temple is entirely dedicated to making sacrifices for sins. Its walls are very thick, to symbolize holiness, yet very low to show there are no more enemies. It is perfectly square showing perfection and symmetry, and it is for prayer. It is a picture of Jesus. Ezekiel was seeing Jesus’ body and sacrifice for his people in Temple form. The last line of Ezekiel is that the city around the Temple will be called, “The Lord is there.” That is our testimony of God’s comfort. All the places of barren white tape are places where we need Jesus’ forgiveness, his coming to us, his reassurance. Now, our thorns and scorpions (wires in the white tape), where felt alone, overwhelmed, and ashamed are places where God has come to us, remembered his love and mercy for us, and strengthened us. They bud new life. They connect us with others. They become our testimony that “the Lord is there.”

Celebration

Finally, we joined St. Timothy’s for worship on Sunday. It’s one of the great joys of the Regional Reawakenings – we get to come to you and be a part of the way you worship! Bp. Drew confirmed a young Sudanese immigrant, which continues to open doors to the local Sudanese community. We shared testimonies from the weekend. God had answered prayer! St. Timothy’s had enjoyed unhurried, prayerful, artful, and delicious time together. They also came alive as they gave to their community. They linked arms with other local Christians. They built trust with community services who desperately need the love of Christ. They blessed us by their welcome and partnership. The Lord was there and still is.