Butler Newsletter for April - May 2010

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Dear Friends in Christ,

 Please read the following, excerpted from Chuck Colson’s March 10, 2010 Breakpoint Commentary, and then re-join me; I’ll wait for you at the bottom of the column.

The COUNTERSIGN

By Mark Earley|Published Date: March 10, 2010

When catastrophe strikes, what can we Christians offer? We can offer a countersign. I’ll explain

What if your daily job were to work among the very poorest people in the Western Hemisphere? What if that job involved taking food to people [who lived in the] “most ferocious slums”? Or routinely collecting bloated corpses from an unsanitary morgue? Or helping the victims of kidnappings, shootings, abandonment and even much worse?

If that were your job, how would you survive without emotionally or spiritually shutting down?

One man, Pastor Rick Frechette, has not only survived, but thrived. Having worked in Haiti for over two decades, Pastor Rick deals with horrors most of us couldn’t imagine. … He functions by hanging on to his sense of humor and, even more importantly, “to his faith in a God that orders the universe even amidst the apparent chaos.”

Pastor Rick [believes] that the most concrete way he can … [help Haiti] is to offer “countersigns” of grace—that is, to do something right for someone when everything is going wrong.

Pastor Rick tells the story of a boy that he saw set on fire by thugs. Before he could reach him, the boy was dead, but he got buckets of water and extinguished the flames anyway. Then, he says, “we put him in the back of the truck, and do what we always do -have a prayer right there - to make a counter-witness by our own behavior.”

...The boy’s mother—even overwhelmed by grief—was grateful for this act of love. “It made her able to live with it,” Pastor Rick says. “It’s like God sent someone to help her, like it restored her faith in humanity again...I call it the countersign.”

 

Back again? Thanks for reading all the way through.

 

Countersigning. It offers a fresh angle on remembering our mission, doesn’t it? When everything is going wrong, Christians do something right for someone. We give a countersign to “the way things are.”

 

Friends, we hear constantly about our churches’ failure to grow and to prosper in their mission. The litany of loss is loud and clear. But, what if we shared countersigns to the lament that United Methodism is dying as a vital spiritual force in the land?

 

I’m very serious about this. It is a matter of repentance with me. Face facts, yes, but don’t give an inch to creeping gloom! Starting next issue, with your help, we’ll add a new feature to our monthly News flow – a “Countersign Posting.” You send the stories; we’ll post them.

 

Did an alcohol-addicted man from your church AA group make the journey “upstairs,” sit down in worship, and in time ask to be baptized as a new Christ-follower? TELLS US ABOUT IT!

 

Does your tiny congregation extend a giant helping hand with a weekly soup kitchen? SHARE IT!

 

Did your church members decide to pay their Mission Share in full, even though behind by $9,000 in November - and in a few short weeks they raised the funds? DON’T KEEP THAT TO YOURSELVES!

 

It’s not bragging. Send us your countersign stories - however small (or large) in size. They show that we continue to do something right when everything is going wrong. We’ll edit as necessary and post them for mutual encouragement. Watch for the COUNTERSIGNS! column next issue!

 

What? You expected an Easter message?  Good friends, this is an Easter message! Our power to practice countersigns comes from EASTER! Resurrection is God’s countersign to every death, every lie and every dis-integration of life that happens on earth. We’re just following Christ’s lead.

 

Happy Countersigning (Easter!) Church.

 

Pastor Dean D. Ziegler

 

Note: All three examples above are real Butler District Church stories.