Each year the law of the church — the Canons — require us to meet together annually.  Designated as the Annual Parish Meeting, there is little we are mandated by Canon to accomplish.  Therefore, each congregation goes about these meetings a little differently.  For me it is not only a time of business — hearing reports, discussion budgets, etc. — but it is a time of communal thanksgiving for our life together as the body of Christ.  As Paul writes this morning about the body of Christ, I am reminded that we don’t make the body of Christ.  God does.  We don’t provide the gifts which keep the Body of Christ alive and functioning and doing God’s work in the world.  God does.  We don’t define who or what belongs to the Body of Christ.  God does.  We are not to seek the will of God, or God’s wisdom, or God’s strength as a community of individuals but as a Body depending on one another to bring the gifts we need in order to manifest God’s love for all in our time and in our place.

This past year has been about that manifestation of love.  Much has been said this morning about the Emmaus Project — rightfully so.  It has been the defining task of this past year.  I simply want to say to the individuals that comprise the Emmaus Team that you have given unselfishly of your time and talents this past 18 months.  And in so doing you have drawn me into a deeper love and desire for the future of St. Catherine’s.  The long meetings, the laughter, the antics, the tears, the struggles, the disagreements all seem to pale in comparison to the deep spiritual nurture I have felt through this process.  I said to the team last Saturday at our last meeting that in no other group have I experienced the presence of God so regularly and reliably.  It is not an exaggeration to say that this group not only has reinforced my commitment to group process but has helped me see the profound capacity for such process to change our lives.

The coming years are filled with challenge.  Our goals will not be accomplished overnight.  We all know that intellectually, but there will be frustrations and times when their accomplishment seems to drag through the days, weeks and months ahead.  I would urge us all to be patient with one another.  It will take time.  But it will also take your willingness to participate.  These goals are not the property of the Emmaus Team.  They have written them.  The Vestry has adopted them.  But they are yours and they are ours.  They are -- too look at it probably a bit too simplistically -- your goals rewritten and presented back to you.  They come from your observations; they come from your longings to do God’s will; they come from your recognition of where we fall short.  Without your support, without your ideas, without your time and presence we might as well have the goals needle pointed, placed in a position of great honor, back lighted and then forgotten.

I have resisted focusing my remarks this year on the specific goals.  Such a talk leads to little else than you counting down the goals until I get to the eighth.  There is much I’d like to say to you about them individually.  Rather I’d like to make a series of general observations and leave the specifics to a series of sermons, or talks, or whatever feels right to us.
The goals are challenging.  Many of you have offered that observation.  They are broad and it is our intention to leave them so.  That is not to say, however, that their accomplishment won’t require details.  They will.  It will be our challenge that as we work with them that we will feel comfortable adding that detail. Some will lend themselves to that addition — we know how to do some of this — others won’t.  Encouraging intimacy or celebrating diversity or developing safe environments for ourselves and others will stretch everyone of us.  We are capable of such work, however.  The past 18 months prove our willingness to invite God to be with us and then to respond when the invitation is accepted.

There is no hierarchy of goals.  One is not more important than another.  Some though will begin to happen fast.  Establishing a program of leadership development, broadening and deepening our commitment to outreach, and developing a staffing and facilities master plan will happen pretty quickly I imagine.  There will be a temptation to say that this is because of a certain favoritism or agenda.  I hope that is not true.  In particular the staffing and facilities master planning goal will challenge us.  You’ve heard already this morning that some of that is beginning already with the inclusion in the budget funding for additional staff and a facilities planning committee.  This goal will challenge us because facilities (aka buildings) bring about great emotion in a congregation.  You either hate them or love them.  There doesn’t seem to be a lot of middle ground.

I believe that our ministry — not individuals — our ministry is calling us to do something with our facilities.  This includes new facilities and renovated facilities.  I hear broad and general agreement in the congregation on this point.  I have said over and over that good ministry — ministry that responds to demonstrated needs — should not be put on hold waiting for space.  If you come here between Sundays you will see good ministry at work.  The lack of adequate facilities is not holding us back from responding to some of our goals already as we add classes on Wednesday nights or a Young Family Ministry or additional staff.  We are forging ahead.  And it is my intent to continue to create and support new ministries where they are clearly needed.  But increasingly, our facilities or lack thereof are getting in the way.  Buildings are not the focus of our ministry — they are means to an end not an end in and of themselves.  This is my commitment to you.  Whatever is proposed will be needs based and common sense driven.  I believe I bring the gifts and the patience to lead us through this goal and I don’t think I’m the only one.  I hope you will be a part of this journey lending your voice, heart, and prayer to this goal.

These goals will both reinforce who we are and they will change us.  Where they will reinforce us and where they will change us only God knows as we sit here today.  But to be sure, God has placed each of these goals on our communal heart and has done so for reasons we think we understand, but the truth is we don’t.  Our task is to come to each goal in faith and trust that God will lead us to that place that is set aside for us.  It is an exciting time at St. Catherine’s.  I stood a couple weeks ago in the parish hall with almost 60 young family members.  The excitement in the room was palpable.  It happens, you know, this palpableness when you have 30 kids running around, screaming, some crying, others watching in stunned amazement.  I thought, wow!  What exciting times lay ahead.  Here are the goals we dream of.  Deeper maturity of faith, intimacy and connectedness, diversity, new lay leaders, a desire to reach beyond ourselves, a whole bevy of new needs, the need for more space and staff and financial resources, and the children we yearn to welcome.  In one room, there they were all of our goals.  And I was excited and I was affirmed.

It is good to be here among you the people of St. Catherine’s.  I celebrate my tenth year of ordained ministry in 2001 as we celebrate the 40th anniversary of this congregation.  I have had some tough times this past year as I’ve continued to discern God’s will for me in this place and at this time.  Over the past weeks, however, I’m beginning to see why God has brought me here.  And part of that reason is to be drawn out and built up and God’s child by the work that lies ahead of us.  I can’t wait to get started and I hope you can’t as well.

I want to thank my staff for their hard work and commitment to St. Catherine’s and to me.  Without them much would not happen.  Ginney and Rose keep our feet to the fire and on the many tasks that keep a large congregation going.  Edward and Martha work to provide good and enjoyable music even though, as Edward frequently reminds us, they are not working with a very good singing space.  Kim continue to inject excitement into the youth program even as she begins a new life as a mom.  Karolyn leads the PreSchool with new ideas and with energy so that their future continues to look healthy and exciting.  John and Ann provide pastoral counseling that meets a deep need in the midst of this place we call East Cobb.

Hazel and Judy are my colleques in our ministry.  More than that they are my friends.  Newcomers often comment on the joy they feel at the altar of St. Catherine’s.  That joy is real and deeply felt between the three of us.  We don’t always agree about what we are doing or how we are doing but we always respect one another’s positions.  I am thankful for their presence and continue to see them playing a significant roles in the accomplishment of our goals in the year and years ahead.

Lastly, I want to thank Joan.  In this the tenth year of my ordained ministry and the fortieth year of St. Catherine’s, Joan and I will celebrate 30 years of marriage.  For fifteen of them now, Joan has supported me as I’ve come to know and live into God’s purpose for my life.  It really amazes me to say it -- half our married life — I didn’t really think about it until I wrote these words.  She has seen me through the leaving of a career and people I cherished, the return to school, ordinations, and three churches.  All the while she was the bread winner during seminary, she moved from Tennessee to Illinois to Georgia looking for jobs more times than anyone would wish, she finished her Bachelors in Business at night school, worked full time, and raised two wonderfully alive children.  I love Joan because although she will tell you she’s still trying to decide what she will be when she grows up, she’s clear about what she is not.  She often tells me — you’re the one that’s ordained — not me!  And that brings balance and joy to my life.   I thank God for her.

Thank you for calling both of us to share this ministry with you.  I remain your servant in Christ.