For the Future Take Us - Forum of Churches Together in Dorset

Two clocks, one going forwards as normal and one back to front, going backwards. These were the images before us at the Forum of Churches Together in Dorset in October as we considered where the Church is going – forward into the future, ready to be changed by the challenges now facing us, or retreating backwards into the old ways, resisting change?
We had presentations from 4 contrasting projects: the Connect 2010 summer event at Holton Lee, the Dorchester Quiet Space, the Resound Bus Project for young people and the Faithworks Personal Budget Coaching project.
These were all planned and came to fruition but all had unexpected outcomes as well. When we engage in mission activities are we prepared to be changed ourselves in encounter with others, as individuals and as churches? Radical hospitality is about listening and being changed by our encounters, being vulnerable, so that transformation is possible. A useful Bible story is of Moses and the burning bush, being called by God, with the reassuring promise ‘I am with you’ but where God might lead is not specified or limited.
In discussion we considered barriers to mission: lack of expectancy; fear of the unknown; a club culture on Sunday mornings – who is ‘in’ and who is ‘out’; the desire to control; looking only to ourselves and survival and not recognising Church in the amazing activities in our midst. On a more positive note we then asked ‘What do we need to build God’s Kingdom?’ The answers included:

• Ask the right questions – what do we need to do to build God’s Kingdom, not what do we need to do to survive?
  
• Openness to possibilities and to widen our horizons – ministry to the whole world, locally and globally; listening to the world in all its need. 
  
• We are all part of the one Church, we need to change our mind-set to recognise all that is happening as of the one Church, to celebrate, encourage and pray for what is happening – in other churches, not only in our own. 
  
• Balance planning, community audits with being open to the unexpected
  
• Readiness to be changed in the process and move out of our comfort zones – more likely to be changed by encounter with those not like ourselves
  
• Discernment of when to speak and when to listen
  
• Prayer with others and for others, in lay groups and clergy gatherings
  
• Accept that change is painful
  

For the Future Take Us?
The clock and time move forward – we can do no other. We need to move out of our safe places into the unknown, with God both in front and alongside us. God’s perfect love casts out fear. We journey together – with God and with each other. The Church has strong growing points and areas of vulnerability, both need each other and are transformed by each other.
Lord for ourselves; in living power remake us
self on the cross, and Christ upon the throne,
past put behind us, for the future take us:
Lord of our lives, to live for Christ alone