It’s true that many of us in the Presbymergent conversation have, over the past two years of our existence, cringed at the thought of becoming more structured, fearing that first step towards institutional irrelevance.  It’s also true that the “Presby” side of our heritage embraces things done “decently and in order.”  So the challenge for our tribe has always been to live in the tension between these two natures — the organized and the organic — being true to both and not letting one dominate the other.

When we gathered last month, there was energy around several things — some were proposed events, others were ideas, and some were goals for Presbymergent and related communities.  We quickly realized that our dreams outnumbered our hands, so only those things which gathered enough hands, feet, and commitments were carried forward.  Several “clusters” emerged, each with a point-person committed to shepherding the dream into reality over the coming year.   More specifics on the different clusters to come soon!

The cluster I was part of named itself the Organ(ic)izing Group to reflect our dual nature (and because parentheses are just sooo emergent) — or just “OhGee” for short — and was given the blessing of the Coordinating Group to accomplish the following:

• Establish 501c3 Non-Profit Status for Presbymergent
• Establish bylaws, budgets, transparent record keeping and accounting systems as needed for non-profit status
• Constitute a new Coordinating Group through broad and open invitation, with concern toward diversity of gender, age, ethnicity and geographical location
• Develop a “Conceptual Document” for and about Presbymergent (kind of like a mission statement, but more flexible, organic, and living)
• Serve as a point of contact for inquiries about Presbymergent and for administrative decisions on behalf of the Coordinating Group.

Basically, while the other clusters are having fun being creative, the OhGee gets to do the “dirty work” of administration   But not in a centralized, authoritative or controlling way, — rather with the desire and intent of empowering the other clusters to accomplish their tasks, mindful that our authority originates from and flows through the Presbymergent Coordinating Group.

There are eight members on the Organ(ic)izing Group:  Jan Edmiston, Heather Grantham, Chad Herring,  Carol Howard Merritt, Ryan Kemp Pappan , Neal Locke, Adam Walker Cleaveland, and David Williams.  Members were chosen by interest and consensus within the Coordinating Group (some volunteered, some were drafted) to serve for one year until the next gathering of the Coordinating Group, which will take place next February in Atlanta, GA.

As a final thought on venturing into a new way of existing, I find the metaphor of Wikipedia helpful:  On the surface, it would seem that wikipedia (and all wikis) are chaotic and ever-changing, where anyone has the power to contribute or change the content.  But if you look one layer deeper, Wikipedia is a software application, written in PHP and MySQL. In other words, it has a framework, a structure, a scaffolding, that, rather than locking down and controlling the website, actually preserves and protects the openness of wikipedia, helping it to accomplish its open-source goals.  We hope that we can do the same for Presbymergent, in an organized — but organic — sort of way.

I have been involved in a discussion surrounding Presbymergent for over a year now. The term is a combination of ”Presbyterian” (as in Presbyterian USA) and ”emergent” as in emergent Christianity. As most nascent organizations of like-minded people, it has begun as something with a lot of energy, a lot of ideas, and ideas of structure, but no real structure until recently. But in a pragmatic way of looking at the world, structure is something that tends to follow clear ideas rather than come prior to it. So my own Presbyterianism, a denomination named after its political structure rather than a founder (Lutheran) or a theology (Baptist) or ecclesiology (Catholic), causes a continual problem. Organizational structure comes prior to clarity of good ideas and that structure assumes that it has already been formed by good ideas; or, it has been formed with good enough ideas to persist.

So what happens if we still have the same political structure, but the ideas that formed it create problems with the culture that now exists? What happens is that new ideas have to fit within the confines of the political structure which is assumed to be at the very least satisfying to those who persist in the denomination. The evaluative question I ask is rather simple: what is working? But this is always rooted in clear ideas. And away the wheel spins once more.

Presbymergent is a group of more or less like-minded Presbyterians who recently gathered in the form of a co-ordinating group asking this essential question: what is working? I did not go to the meeting due to many other concerns with work that kept me home. Nonetheless I continued to  listen and read what others were processing during the meeting. My question always came back to another one related to ”what is working?” and that was, ”why this and why now?”

So I pushed people a bit, critiqued a bit (and from someone from the outside looking in this is always problematic and seems a little intrusive), and engaged people who were there with this fundamental question. Thus, in a wonderfully open-source kind of spontaneous dialogue this afternoon with Landon, Chad, and Fritz, I reached a point of clarity not based on my thoughts, but on the thoughts of others. I had posted a twitter post yesterday that read ”finish this sentence: presbymergent is…” After a good hour or so of pretty intense Socratic dialogue, minds met and broke through some pretty palpable cognitive dissonance with this little statement I cooked up to synthesize the discussion:

Presbymergent are followers of Christ who seek continual reform of existing church structures through dynamic, open, and intentionally critical systems.

Let me unpack some of this since the terms are loaded with a lot.

1) ”are followers of Christ” indicates the source and reason for why people would engage in anything to do with the church. When we cease to be faithful to the revelation of Christs redemption, and when we cease to practice due diligence in following his witness through our words and deeds, we simply lose that which makes us distinctly Christian in the world. I am intentional with the word ””are”” as well. This is not a concept or an ideology. This is a group of people who make choices and act on them.

2) ”who seek continual reform of existing church structures” means that there is simply nothing in this world that human beings conceive that is complete and there is nothing that humans say or do that does not change. Change is not a political slogan and never should have been. It is a fundamental and irreducible construct of human being and human sociation. When we resist change, we are not only losing faith in the calling to which Christ demands of us, we are resisting the very core of what it means to be human. The structures which are constitutive and regulative of the Body of Christ are fallible and so, they are mutable. This is inclusive of not only political structures by which law, order, and social norms are established and reinforced, but of class, gender, sexual orientation, race, culture, ability, and linguistic structures that create assumed boundaries for social and theological construction. These norms are always in flux. Thus it can only be demanded that such frail creatures sustained by an undeserved grace from God, who seek to become more like God through the work of the Spirit that calls the people to God together and which founds the church itself, should understand that all human systems of organization are equally frail, incomplete, and change relative to the working of the living Spirit of God.

3) ”through dynamic, open, and intentionally critical systems” is a call for basic principles of organization that are regulated in and through change. While it is simply a necessity that structures of organization exist that are clear and conducive to getting work done, creating immutable systems is restrictive of the principles of the first clauses in this statement. By ”systems” I mean those of communication, team work, collaborative exercises, task forces, activism, etc. These are important organizational principles that should be open and collaborative in order to ensure that the idolatry of faith in an immutable politics is mitigated if not ideally expunged from the process.

I am employing a grounded theory approach to visioning. In itself it is imperfect and requires testing and development, but it is a clear starting point. What I think is important is that Presbymergent have a consensus vision upon which its members fundamentally agree. Once the vision is identified, then specific problems may be addressed that such a vision can pragmatically correct within any social, political, or geographic boundaries identified by willing and able actors. Reporting the outcomes of these ideas through the various means as noted in #3 above are precisely how those items that need to change in #2 above can be identified and influenced.

I welcome continued conversation around these ideas in order to move toward some kind of a consensus vision to which each of our local areas of influence may soon reap the benefit of our sustained flow of energy to follow Christ in this unique calling.

Twitter

If you would like more immediate feedback and updates, and if you Twitter, please be sure to follow @presbymergent, which is our Twitter account.

We are also going to be using the hashtag of #pmergent, so you can search Twitter for that to find out what’s going on. If you want to search on Twitter, click here.

Direct Updates from Presbymergent on Twitter

One thing you might not be aware of, but if you want updates from a specific Twitter user, you can just text “follow username” to 40404 (which is Twitter’s number). So if you want to get text messages whenever @presbymergent updates on Twitter, just text “follow presbymergent” to 40404. You can also find our most recent Tweets and most recent posts with #pmergent in the sidebar.

I’ll be getting out there Tuesday and if you want to follow my updates you can check my blog pomomusings.com but I’ll probably be Twittering more, and you can follow me at @adamwc. If you’re going to be at the Coordinating Group meeting, please leave your name and blog below, and if you Twitter, leave your Twitter username if you want, so people can track what’s going on.

We’re very excited about this gathering – more next week from Louisville!

1.@ clay: what is church for? I think a clearer way of shaping this is to consider church as a verb- those Spirit filled moments (synchronicities, to borrow Jung) when Word and Sacrament are ordered to join and anticipate God’s purposes in creation. This is more incarnational and avoids the platonic urge to pre-design an air-tight formula.

2.@ clay: can deep shifts happen in a 1/3 of the congregation? I can;t think of a time when transformation does not originate in “practices” or “postures” that catch on. In other words, a few folks begin to “do” and “act” differently and their minds are then transformed. Until a few more join them. And then a few more. So why not start with this third and invite them to include those from the other 2/3rds to reflect with them on what is happening. The “traditional” services do not need to change their style to join this more participatory way. An imaginative Traditional Worship Leader like Tony describes is a great way for this to start.

3.@ david: what is contemporary? David, most american church goers who consume pre-fabricated worship formats see contemporary as a closed genre. It is the byproduct of CCM’s successful branding in the 80s and 90s. Try introducing the word “contemporaneous” (remember this from Greek tenses- I believe it was Aorist) and asking how does the worship style or material we use in worship come from the actual everyday world around us (you can grab You-Tube videos, newspaper clippings, popular music, folks music, movie quotes, and styles/chord progressions). We can learn from the Word of God whom/which we follow into the world (C-67) as much as from a Word of God remembered.

4.@ steve: Interesting to pair up “force feeding” and “calling.” CCM and denominational(or ecumenical) top down curriculum has created a consumptive Christian way. How do we reverse this tendency and equip worshipppers to produce, to make their own testimony? Borrowing some of Tom Wright’s pneumatology, the community is sent gifts from the Spirit almost like the Israelite sampled fruit from the promised land brought by the spies. As such, the fruits of enthronement, adoration, and lamentation are gifts from the promised eschaton for worshipers to taste and enjoy. So worship is born out of calling and not out of a top down “force feeding.”

5.@ tony: You wrote, “gatherings exist for the sake of the world.” I love it! Spot on. Somehow blending our “target audience” to include God with us, the body of Christ in which we are united, and the Christ of the Emmaus way- these are how worship looks beyond our congregations. A friend of mine says it this way: the church is not the end user of the gospel. I agree, and neither are we the end users of worship.

6. @ tony: to paraphrase you said, “our worship and everything else would be better if it were subservient to the Word.” I have found folks use this to marginalize order/art/testimony to only “illustration of the preacher’s sermon or the platonic idea presented by the Bible.” I would suggest that the Word is hidden and being revealed, and that the risk of missing is unavoidable… The Word is hidden in our past (such as Jesus’ exposition of the collective memory of the Emmaus road disciples) AND the word is also being revealed ahead of us (such as the angel instructing shepherds to go and see these things, and the voice telling peter to get up and go meet…). As such worship is discovery and not “explanation” or “illustration.” We meet God as we sing and pray. Our bodies are put into play as we kneel and raise hands and kiss one another and wash feet and ‘pray double’ through song. And as such, worship that serves the Word is less of a coersive predetermined posture and more of an open receptive posture. I might be splitting hairs here, but my purpose is to suggest that we cannot avoid the risks of stylizing or crafting or “ordering” our acts of worship by being more “Word” centered. Instead worship is to enter into that risk. Perhaps we can, however, make space for the hidden Word to be revealed in our sacramental habits. And, then, to make space for faithful-yet-risky responses of conversion.

First Place – Submission #14 by Jena Ashton (178 votes)
Second Place – Submission #7 by Margot Starbuck (144 votes)
Third Place – Submission #13 by Dannah Walter (42 votes)
Fourth Place – Submission #15 by Ryan Pappan (32 votes)
Fifth Place – Submission #2 by Stephanie Nelson (17 votes)

Each of these winners will get to choose one of the five prize packages. Congratulations to the winners who were picked by the presbymergent community. If you are one of the winners, please email presbymergent here about how to claim your prize package.

We look forward to the challenge it will be to both live in an open-source world, and also honor our denomination’s call to doing things decently and in order – and seeing how that plays out for leadership in the 21st century. We are very excited to see how this new group will guide the continuing emergence of presbymergent.

We have received 15 entries into the Official presbymergent Logo Contest. Please vote for the logo submissions you think are best (you can vote again after 24 hrs). The voting will be open from today until Thursday night at midnight. On Friday, we’ll be awarding the prize packages to the top five submissions with the most votes. The panel of judges will be deliberating this week as well and you’ll hear from us shortly after the top five are chosen.

So, let the voting begin!

UPDATE: Please vote using the voting/polling module on the right hand sidebar of this site. Do not leave your vote in the comments section, please.

We are hoping that your submission for the logo contest would take into consideration our commitment to the Presbyterian Church (USA) and to the Emergent conversation. It is also our hope that this contest will help both presbymergents and friends of presbymergent think creatively about what our logo might look and feel like. The contest officially begins today, and the deadline for logo submissions will be May 2nd. We encourage you all to submit ideas and spread the word about this logo contest through your blogs, email and Facebook. It’s our hope that this will also be a way to continue to get the word out about presbymergent. Here’s how the contest will work.

• People will be able to submit logos up until midnight on May 2nd.
• Logo submissions should be emailed to presbymergent@gmail.com and can be submitted in an appropriate file format (.jpg/.gif/.ai/.png).
• All entries will be posted on the presbymergent website after the deadline, and anyone can come and vote on the presbymergent site for their favorite.
• The top five with the most votes will receive one of the five prize packages below, be considered automatic finalists for the contest and proceed on to the final judging process. Although the winners will be guaranteed finalists, the panel of judges may also consider submissions outside of the contest for the official presbymergent logo. The panel of judges will consist of the Presbymergent Editors, friends of presbymergent and a few professional designers.

Prize Packages

Prize Package 1
The Practicing Congregation by Diana Butler Bass
From Nomads to Pilgrims, ed. by Diana Butler Bass
Tribal Church by Carol Howard Merritt
$30 iTunes Gift Card

Prize Package 2
Flirting with Monasticism by Karen Sloan
Ancient-Future Worship by Robert Webber
$40 Amazon Gift Card

Prize Package 3
Free of Charge by Miroslav Volf
From Stone to Living Word by Debbie Blue
$40 Amazon Gift Card

Prize Package 4
An Emergent Manifesto of Hope, ed. by Tony Jones and Doug Pagitt
They Like Jesus But Not the Church by Dan Kimball
$40 iTunes Gift Card

Prize Package 5
Everything Must Change by Brian McLaren
The Culturally Savvy Christian by Dick Staub
Your Logo printed on a t-shirt

Again – please pass this on to your friends with gifts in the graphic arts, and help us come up with a logo that symbolizes our hopes for presbymergent. Let the contest begin!

My thanks and respect go out to Carol Howard Merritt, the lone emergent author who, though not completely on board with the idea, at least engaged in the conversation. Emergent Village‘s Coordinator, Tony Jones, was asked about his response to the article in an interview, and had this to say:

I’ve read that post, and there are some really good points therein. There are also some naive misconceptions about the publishing industry … In the early days, many of us were committed to publishing everything for free on the Internet. But, at this point, that is just not feasible.

Apparently, however, no one sent that feasibility memo to one of the publishing industry’s oldest and most respected names: Harper Collins. Here’s what the tech-news blog Mashable has to say about it:

HarperCollins will be offering free electronic editions of some its books on its website. In an effort to increase book sales, HarperCollins is adopting a web-based “try before you buy” approach to book promotion, both for online and on the iPhone.

If a profit-driven company can see the wisdom in doing this for good business practice, how much greater would it be for those of us in God’s Kingdom to do it for the sake of spreading the message, the ideas, and the stories that are at the heart of our mission?

And if award-winning author Neil Gaiman can let his fans vote on which of his best-selling novels to put online for free, shouldn’t Tony Jones (or Brian McLaren, or Doug Pagitt) at least be open to considering the idea, rather than dismissing it as naive and infeasible? Surely at least one of Emergent’s three different publishing partners is forward thinking and/or courageous enough to give it a shot?

I had seriously hoped that Emergent, as innovators crying out that “Everything Must Change” could have led the industry on this one and set a bold, generous, example for the secular world. Now my hope is that we can at least not be the last ones to change, as so often happens in the church.

Ah, well. At least Harper-Collins was founded by a Presbyterian. He must’ve had naive misconceptions about the publishing industry…