and so i took the question of works v grace before my bible study class last night. the concensus was the conventional: works follow faith, works are the expression of faith, the validator if you will. i'm still left with something a little uneasy in my heart.
i missed laura, the smartest woman i've ever met. although i know the joy of works and i know the joy faith <a product of grace> it seems i don't know it with much depth. ok, laura may not actually be THE smartest woman i've ever met, but she's up there with the one. her special gift to me it that she seems to have to ability to know not just what my questions are, but where they are coming from...and then she knows the language it takes to convey answers to me. laura wasn't in class last night. her father in law was diagnosed with cancer this past week and they have gone to be with him. we all missed her terribly.
the way the dynamic works in our class is...we read the chosen text, discuss it without much structure...if we get off topic...it's ok, we'll deal with whatever got us off and then go back. it seems to work for us all. what usually gets us off topic is some pereferial question i come up with. that's when the teaching begins. laura will begin to answer my question...whatever it is...she will seem to be talking to me, but really she's teaching the class.
we are concensus driven...we do everything by concensus. we rotate "leader's", and refreshment providers...each takes a turn though it isn't required. in the two and a half years i've been with this group we have never taken a vote or had any dissention. the informal, unstructured nature of this group, while not conventional, is the product of the personalities involved. we are incredibly blessed to have this blend of personalities that just seem to mesh in every way. the way each leads is very different, from highly organized <tom> to wide open <pj> and all in between. from these different methods comes a variety of perspectives. again, i've not seen one time when another perspective has been disrespected or denigrated. i have to say that i believe this to be very different then i've seen in other group dynamics. it's fun too! we have pat and dottie, late 70's, very conservative republicans...and we have karen, just gratudated pre-school teacher...and wild eyes liberal...and we have, not often, but it happens that politics comes into the conversation...views are discussed and agreement is finally made to disagree without animosity or predjudice, we move on while reserving the right to re-examine the question in the future. (i usually find myself quite close to karen and very distant from pat and dottie)
dottie is truly the church matriarch. not only is she among the older women, but she's easily the most influential. she can be found doing anything from taking out the trash to heading up the search committee for a new associate pastor. her service is based on need.
she is among a committee of ten of the most influential women in the chruch. they call it "circle ten". these women have no official function but have their fingers in about everything that goes on. after class last night dottie told me that one of the women in the circle is retiring and moving away...she asked me if i would accept a nomination to be her replacement. wow! would i!! and so i will be nominated by dottie and the circle 10 will then consider me: consider me to be one of the circle ten women. amazing. of course we're presbyterians, that's spelled "ultra deliberate". who knows when this all may happen, but to know that this chrurch is now ready to put my name into consideration for such a prestigious position is such a wonderful feeling.
don't knock christians, we can learn and we can grow.
