An Abundant Life Center

"The thief's purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give life in all its fullness." (John 10:10)

The body of Christ is to be strengthen, built, and made whole within an abundant life center (Howard Clinebell). Christians are body builders for Christ, who worship for the most part within walls of facilities called churches. A church is most effective when body builders for Christ are providing abundant life ministries within and without the walls of the facility.

One such ministry is pastoral care. Pastoral care as a means of grace may be effective in healing and equipping body builders for life in all its fullness. At Metropolitan Community United Methodist Church in Harlem, New York, we are implementing various ministries through various aspect of pastoral care, one of which is pastoral counseling.

As a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and Fellow in the American Association of Pastoral Counselors, I acknowledge the reality of being a "wounded healer." (Henri Nouwen) My brokenness in human relationships has been as great as any human could face, even greater. In the same life, my connectedness with God is solid, and unsurpassed in human life. It is my unbroken faith and love in God that assures me daily of the future good for which I hope. Through therapeutic sessions the factors of healing and support are shared with others for their mental health and spiritual development.

Therefore, the leadership team in Metropolitan Community United Methodist Church has hope in the development of an abundant life center for our congregation and community. Psychic, mental, spiritual, and emotional factors in human well being guides our theological ethos. How do we obtain, sustain and maintain goodness in human relations? Pastoral care and counseling is a means of grace by which the will of God for human relations may be sought. Persons may call the church to become clients in pastoral counseling or trainees in lay care-giving. There are nominal fees for both. Call 212.289.6157 and ask for Victoria, who will schedule your counseling appointments or enroll you in training sessions.

Desirable outcomes of an abundant life center (Clinebell):

1. To liberate, empower, and nurture wholeness centered in the Spirit;
2. To foster spiritual formation and ethical guidance in human lives;
3. To utilize and integrate both psychological and theological insights regarding the human situation, and the healing of persons;
4. To be holistic, seeking to enable healing and growth in all dimensions of human wholeness;
5. To nurture wholeness at each stage of the life journey;
6. To effect a reparative ministry of pastoral counseling;
7. To develop a shared ministry of care-giving with the pastor and the whole congregation;
8. To develop short term crisis intervention methods;
9. To become trans-cultural in ministries of the local church;
10. To enable people to increase the constructiveness of their behavior as well as their feelings, attitudes, and values is crucial in the helping process;
11. To utilize the unique professional identity and role of ministers;
12. To use intuitive, metaphoric, imaging approaches integrated with analytical, rational, intentional, and problem solving approaches in whole person transformation;
13. To become more effective in liberating wholeness in both men and women;
14. To provide growth-oriented psychotherapies;
15. To provide pastoral care in all the diverse functions of ministries, including preaching, worship, and social action;
16. To be effective growth-nurturer. (Therefore, the congregation is encouraged to support the continuing education of the entire staff)

You may participate in the above development by attending our services, which are means of worship therapy, prayer therapy, music therapy, cognitive therapy, reality therapy, psychotherapy, medical therapy, marriage and family therapy, rational-emotive therapy, and much more.

Prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, equip me so as to be an instrument in the equipping of others to be body builders for Christ. Amen.

Plan The Work, and Work The Plan

Good planning and hard work lead to prosperity, but hasty shortcuts lead to poverty. Wealth created by lying is a vanishing mist and a deadly trap. Because the wicked refuse to do what is just, their violence boomerangs and destroys them. (Proverbs 21:5-7)

Rem is an outstanding school teacher. She places insights into the minds of young people. The retention rate of her children are high. Each improve in their skills above the next grade level of expectation, and excel in their required standardized texts. Ask the students why they learn from Ms. Rem, and they will tell you: "she is a good teacher" and they love her. "Because she loves us;" you will hear them say. Ask the same question of Rem and you come away knowing rules of faith.

Rem is a Christian, who begins each day in prayer. She knows to pray. She is aware of others who pray for her, so that she is never alone. She accepts and understands the love of God. She is loved by her Christian leader, family members, colleagues, students and their parents. She walks in the assurance of being loved with the hope of her students success. Each student receives what she teaches and gives back in the best of their knowledge.

Existence requires a walk of faith. A good walker understands that there are rules to follow on the journey. While learning to walk and jog in my youth, my parents encouraged me to pray, exercise and warm up my body eating healthy before taking off on the pathway to school. I continue the routine today on the pathway of life. Looking back over the years, 18 years beyond mid-life as promised, I note that good teachers such as Rem had what I term the rules of faith in common. In keeping the routines of their faith, they helped others and me gain success. What are these rules of faith?

One of my greatest teachers of ministry would say: "Luonne, plan the work, and work the plan." You may ask how is that taking a walk of faith? There is no "good plan" without God. Nothing in life is good without God. In fact, all of life would be good, if humanity would not turn away from God. You may argue the point, but pray and discover the reality. Within planning and working we find the rules of faith:

1. Trust your thoughts to be guided by God.
2. Trust your desirable outcomes to the will of God.
3. Trust your abilities to carry out what God has purposed you to do.
4. Trust the implementation of plans born from your thoughts and informed by your research.
5. Trust your methods of passing on the insights granted by grace unto you.
6. Trust your working each step of the plan of implementation with feasible actions.
7. Trust the results of your process to God.

In so living by the rules of faith, the wisdom writer affirms success and prosperity. Rem is an example of this truth. She soars. Let the wise follow suit by taking no shortcut toward the destination. Too many students of shortcuts are cut short on successful living.

Prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, teach us to trust the process you have planned for us, so that we may gain the prosperity of eternity. Amen.

Freedom

"... Go now, you who are men, and serve the Lord, for that is what you desired." And they were driven out from Pharaoh's presence. (Exodus 10:11)

There is freedom in obedience to God. Key to freedom is full compliance to the will of God. Charles Stanley, renowned preacher in Atlanta, Georgia, states: "Partial obedience is no obedience at all, if we are to walk with God, we must listen to what He says--all of what He says." Moses in response to the call of God led the children Israel out of Egyptian bondage. The Word reveals that God heard their desire to serve the Lord, and delivered them.

A newspaper in the South records: "Selling Slavery." Business people in the area are marketing the history of American slavery. Being as I am, it struck a cord of discord within me. I know why. My ancestors were victims of the inhumane system of American slavery. There were years of not being paid for labor on plantations. Today, ancestors of plantation owners appear interested in profiting from "selling slavery" in the market places where slaves were held in bondage to be sold at auctions.

A few blacks are on board with the projects. They are even getting some cash from the show. There are many ancestors of slaves, who are still waiting for cash from the historical reality of the profiting of Americans off the free labor of African slaves. The election of a Black male or female to the White House will be political progress, but changes little in freedom. Still it will not grant the economic freedom promised in "forty acres and a mule."

American freedom will never be freedom, until freedom is holistic. Partial freedom is not freedom at all, if we are to be free in America, we need to obey the Word of God, beyond the laws of the land. In the Word of God truth is to be found. A truth of justice and doing unto others as you would have them do unto you. True freedom would bring about reparations, so that America is guilt free and forgiven.

I am asking that we end the business of "selling slavery," and finish the business of "ending slavery." Peace without justice is no peace at all. Deliverence is not complete until America delivers on the promise of reparation. "Give us us free." Deliver the land and the means to cultivate it.

Prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, intervene and bring justice to all. Amen.