October Newsletter

Just a little dream,
who can blame a person for dreaming.
Wishing on a star
what are stars for anyway?
Walk beneath the stars
Hold your love close to you
Put your dreams upon a strong heart, they'll come true
(opening verse of “Just a Little Dream” by Connie Kaldor)

We people of faith are called to be dreamers. We are called to dream of and hope for a world that is changed. And if we don't have a dream than what are we looking for?

This weekend at our Presbytery meeting we asked folks to talk about a number of questions. This was one of them:

If your dream for your faith community came true what would it look like 3 years from now?

It is a challenging question isn't it. But I wonder what we would say. How would we, as individuals and corporately, answer that question? What do we hope our community of faith will look like in 3 years? And of course the follow up is to ask what we are going to do about making the dream a reality.

I dreamed a dream in time gone by
When hope was high
And life worth living
I dreamed that love would never die
I dreamed that God would be forgiving...
...I had a dream my life would be
So different from this hell I'm living
So different now from what it seemed
Now life has killed the dream I dreamed.
(from “I Dreamed a Dream” in Les Miserables)

But hope is high. Life is worth living. Love will never die. God has been, is, and will be forgiving. Life may not be what we dreamed it would be. The world changes in ways we don't expect, and sometimes don't welcome. But does that have to kill our dream?

If your dream for your faith community came true what would it look like 3 years from now?

I have dreams, hopes, ideas. I have thoughts, vision, wonderings. How will we continue to be a faithful and faith-filled community? How will we not just continue but grow in our faith? There is not space for all of that here, but I will share one idea....

I want us to do another worship service. An evening (possibly mid-week) service once a month. And here is the catch. This service would be intentionally different than Sunday morning. And each month would be different from the month before. There would be no box, no template to it. It would be our chance to offer something different to the community.

You may say I'm a dreamer

But I'm not the only one

I hope someday you'll join us

And the world will be as one

(from “Imagine” by John Lennon)

Now as with most dreams, this can't happen without help. So who is out there who wants to share in my experiment? It might work, it might flop a few times, but we only know if we try. That is how we make dreams come true – by experimenting, by taking risks.

Who is with me? Who wants to share their dream?