A note to the congregation prior to our annual church camp:
Pastors from CREC churches in the Pacific Northwest had a great meeting this week. Uri Brito from Providence Church in Pensacola, our Presiding Minister of the CREC, was out doing a camp for Trinity Church last weekend and offered to meet on Monday, so pastors from Washington and Oregon trekked to our house for lunch and fellowship. We discussed CREC theological, liturgical, and cultural distinctives. We grew a lot through Covid, but well before that our churches were flourishing. The unity and fellowship we are experiencing is an enormous blessing. The CREC Hotspot project, a channel for receiving inquiries and interest in starting a CREC church receives many requests every single day, and you can go to one of our 150+ churches across the world and find the same vision for worship and faithfulness, warmth and hospitality as you find on Sunday at Emmanuel. Pastor Uri grew up in Brazil and has experience in pentecostal, baptist, broad Reformed, and even noted that even (especially?) in Roman Catholic Churches you don’t see the kind of liturgical and cultural unity we currently have. We know these blessings don’t come from us and therefore we should be humbled by them.
It was an interesting discussion in part to consider the connection between doctrine and practice. Many pastors told stories about people who first came to the church and tolerated the psalms and hymns for a couple years (I know who you are!) but loved the hospitality and family-inclusive culture immediately. At the one year point after coming to one of our churches very few would say they stayed for the postmillennialism; I would guess that less than 5% could even define postmillennialism, and yet our optimistic culture is certainly driven by that doctrine (among others). It’s like a skeletal structure. You can’t see someone’s bones beneath their outward appearance, but healthy bones make for vital bodies. Henry van Til said that culture is religion externalized, and this makes sense in how people observe the culture of a church, family, or whatever organization without for some time understanding what creates it.
I’m really looking forward to having Joost Nixon at Camp. He is the kind of teacher who needs no microphone, though maybe we’ll give him one anyway. Joost and I went to the Philippines together two years ago but not this last time. He is speaking about what is happening in the global church. He’ll give two talks on Saturday, an informal discussion by the fire on that evening, and preaching on Sunday. With his busy travel schedule we are blessed to have him. Come with questions for him and make him tell lots of stories.