‘All the work we do is worshipful work’
Before celebrating closing worship on Wednesday, General Assembly committee leaders met in the Chapel at the Presbyterian Center ahead of catching their ride home
LOUISVILLE — During their final three hours together Wednesday morning, committee leaders for the 227th General Assembly met in the Chapel at Presbyterian Center.
Kate Trigger Duffert, director of General Assembly Planning, called the location “a helpful reminder that all the work we do is worshipful work.”
Duffert noted the 73 committee leaders “have spent this week in preparation together. You’ve learned about yourselves, the folks you’ll be working with and about General Assembly in general.”
They’ve also been developing a story together, she noted, calling storytelling “a sacred act of how we know and how we belong.”
“We know our values from our stories,” she said. “Whose stories are assumed to be true? Whose are questioned or not told at all?”
“It’s also how we know God,” she said, including “stories of Jesus and where we see God in the world around us.”
Then Duffert asked committee leaders: What stories about faith and hope do you hope to be able to tell? What stories might you tell if someone were to ask you about this week? What new shared stories have you formed with your teams? What stories do you want to carry with you into this General Assembly?
Duffert posed a question that drew plenty of replies: What story do you believe and hope will emerge during this General Assembly?
“That what we do matters,” said one leader.
“A story of joy and light and hope,” said another.
Other leaders offered these ideas:
“Stories of resilience and faithfulness.”
“A new beginning.”
“That we can be reformed and reformed and reformed and reformed.”
“Diverse voices making collective decisions.”
“Stories of good parliamentary procedure and also of fellowship.”
“To welcome as we have been welcomed, to prepare as we have been prepared for, and to welcome the Spirit.”
“Stories of surprises.”
“Glimpses of wholeness and shalom.”
“Taking care of one another.”
“Stories of justice.”
“Partnerships with other denominations.”
“That we will not lose sight we are the body of Christ and that each part is part of the whole.”
“Leaning more into hope and opportunities and less lamenting of who we were.”
“That we hear stories long silenced.”
“Stories of resilience and acceptance.”
“Stories of the people of Milwaukee and gratitude for all they’ve done.”
“A place at the table for everyone.”
“Perseverance as we continue to walk the path toward wholeness.”
“Stories of discovery along that path.”
“Stories of seeing the new thing that God is doing in our midst.”
“Stories in different languages.”
“The beautiful thing is you are able to make those stories happen, and you are not solely responsible for them,” Duffert told committee leaders.
“You have been preparing yourselves to lead committees, and that’s incredibly important to the Assembly. For Presbyterians, the ‘how’ is just as important as the ‘what.’ We order ourselves because of what we believe,” she said. “You are an essential part of that — and you are not alone.” Commissioners, resource people overture advocates will be present online for committee work. “You will have a lot of community to support you,” Duffert said. “Ultimately, God shows up. The Spirit moves. It’s not just us.”
“Thank you for walking through these stories with me and for sharing them,” she said. “Call them up when you’re thinking, ‘why am I here?’”
Leaders then met one more time in their committees before worshiping together.
On Friday, Presbyterian News Service will have a report on closing worship, which was led by the Co-Moderators of the 226th General Assembly, the Rev. Tony Larson and the Rev. CeCe Armstrong.
You may freely reuse and distribute this article in its entirety for non-commercial purposes in any medium. Please include author attribution, photography credits, and a link to the original article. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDeratives 4.0 International License.
