Sunday School ABCs

Almost two years ago, Second Church asked me, “What’s next for Sunday School?” I've been considering it ever since. Then yesterday, in the middle of Presbytery Meeting, I was transported to the mountains of North Carolina.  Actually, I was transported to a specific instance in the mountains of North Carolina.  

Christian Educators, recreation leaders, pastors, and prophets  gathered at the Arts, Recreation and Worship Conference at Montreat Camp and Conference Center, May 2016.  We  played, pondered and prayed over how the future of the church will reflect the past and then move beyond it.  Every participant wrote down an aspect of church life that needed re-imagining. The words were written onto strands of material; then we put these silk wish-bands into a hat. Later in the worship service, every participant was given or drew out one. We were charged to envision “what’s next” for the concern we received.  I got “Sunday School;” the cloth strip hangs in my office for daily reminder/conviction/reflection.

This Montreat Moment came back to me during a justice themed Presbytery Meeting blessed by the presence the Rev. T. Denise Anderson, Co-Moderator of PCUSA. She was prophetically calling for systemic change in how the church teaches, leads and embodies justice. A bell when off in my head.  It is my strong conviction that systemic change works best from the foundation up.  This is also Biblical, I believe, as Jesus Christ is the cornerstone. I have been wondering for at least two years how we shall re-orient children’s education and formation to be the “Sunday School” of the future? Specifically, I wonder how can we contextualize initiatives grounded in Matthew 18:2? So, I asked. (Of course you did, says everyone who knows me.) In the midst of a 6 hour meeting about programs adults are doing for justice, “what about the children?”

Rev. Anderson’s response was wonderful, empowering, and permission-giving to my ears! She said that we must re-imagine Sunday School to empower the children and put them in the midst of the justice work for they are “amazingly gifted visionaries.” The decorum of the moment kept me from doing my happy dance, but my heart lit up! For I found myself, the church, and Sunday School at the A, B, Cs of  Beuchner’s proverbial crossroads of vocation. “The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet” (Frederick Beuchner, Wishful Thinking: A Theological A B C).  Perhaps not so surprising, my "Beuchner Confirmation Vocation Reflection Cross" hangs next to "Sunday School" on my bulletin board. 

So, two years into my work at Second Church, here’s our response (so far) to “What’s next for Sunday School?”

Workshop Rotation at Second Church has “Mission Workshop” as one of the core workshops.

Spirituality Center model is becoming a corporate “let us create” model to imagine how faith can be foundational for life lived in the world: The Maker’s Space. 

Sunday School is becoming a spiritual “time in” rather than a worldy “time out.”

Children plan the projects for their 45D Mission Club.

Rather than a virtual reality, I believe Sunday School is the “visionary reality.”  Children are not separate from the work of the church; they are included and set into the center. They can lead and they serve. You see, a Sunday School with programming which is integrated into the life of the church can be a greenhouse for the “ties that bind our hearts in Christian love.”  That is our vocation, in Sunday School and in life. It is how we are ALL called to be in the world. It,too, was hanging on the bulletin board.  Nouwen, Sunday School, and peace were all clustered together.  “In a world so torn apart by rivalry, anger, and hatred,” Henri Nouwen reminds us, “we have the privileged vocation to be living signs of a love that can bridge all divisions and heal all wounds” (http://henrinouwen.org/).

I’m not sure when or how to turn in my ARW assignment.  I guess I will have to take it to North Carolina next May, but I will be taking the whole of White Water Presbytery with me, and Rev. Anderson.  Trust me, you’re gonna love it!

Blest be the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love;
The fellowship of kindred minds is like to that above. (John Fawcett)