Creative Adjustments

As we “dialed up” Waze to navigate our way up north last Thursday evening we immediately noticed that a creative adjustment had been made to our usual route.  I am sure it had to do with the influx of Memorial Day travelers on I-75 and the lane restrictions south of Flint.  The creative adjustment sent us up North Avenue, across through Armada, to I-69, then I-475, and finally, just north of Flint, to I-75.  The trip went so well that we just might travel that way again even if it’s not being recommended.
 
However this adjustment was no match for the creativity I witnessed on Sunday morning.  Pastor Gladden (Saint Thomas Lutheran, Eastpointe) did something at the church where I served for a few decades that I had never even dreamed about.  And he did it masterfully.  He included the baptism of a child as a part of his sermon!  As an illustration to a point he was making, he brought the family forward, baptized the little one, and then warned the organist that he was not yet quite done with his sermon.  I think it is something the family – and the congregation – will remember for a long time.
 
Then I heard something Wednesday (from what I consider a reliable source so I believe it is true) that told me more about the creative adjustment that took place on Sunday.  It turns out the baptismal family arrived at church an hour before the service with the request that the child be baptized that morning.  Sometime prior there had been an initial conversation about the possibility of baptizing the child, but no formal arrangements had been made.  So, what did the pastor do?  He made the creative adjustment to minister to the family in such a way that can only help to grow their connection to Jesus and his people at STL.  That is what I define as a congregation living out its mission, which at STL is stated “Connecting People to Jesus and to One Another”
 
For Monica and me, our mission on Thursday evening was to get to the cottage.  We took a slightly different track, but we got there all the same.  Growing up we would say that “there is more than one way to skin a cat” (where in the world that expression comes from I have no idea – and I think perhaps it may be viewed as inappropriate in may circles today).  The mission of STL – Connecting People to Jesus and to One Another – is accomplished through Word and Sacrament ministry.  However, this, rather than closing the door to creativity, opens it wide open for creative adjustments as we search for appropriate ways to connect the Gospel of Jesus Christ to people living in today’s changing world.
 
An, lest you think this is something new, I reference St. Paul:  “For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant of all, that I might win more of them.  To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews.  To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law.  To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law.  To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak.  I have become all things to all to all people, that by all means I might save some.  I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings.” (1 Corinthians 9.19-23)
 
Of course, the first ever creative adjustment was made by our gracious God in Genesis 3.  Moses writes, “Then the eyes of (Adam and Eve) were opened, and they knew that they were naked.  And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.  And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garde.  But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, ‘Where are you’?” (Genesis 3.7-9)  And it is because of the creative adjustment out Lord God right there, you and I are saved.
 
Thus he still keeps coming to us today, ever seeking to draw us out of the bushes and back into his gracious presence.  We zig off course, he makes the adjustment.  We zag in a new direction, and he comes up with another creative solution.  “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!  And that is what we are.” (1 John 3.1)

And, if he is willing to do all this for me (and you), it gets me asking myself what kind of creative adjustments would he like me to make “for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with (many others) in its blessings”?