Responses from Chicago Organizations

It has been just two and a half weeks since the horrible death of George Floyd in Minneapolis at the hands of a now-former Minneapolis police officer. I am sure that you, like me, have in these last two and a half weeks received dozens of emails from brands and organizations denouncing what happened in Minneapolis (and to Breonna Taylor in Kentucky and too many others), stating their solidarity with their Black constituents and the Black community at large, and in most cases, describing their intended action steps.

As you all know, even though I currently live and work in Miami, I have deep roots in Chicago and still consider it my home. And Chicago is no stranger to racial injustice, so organizations there have the lived experience from which to process these newest chapters in the continuing tragedy that is racial injustice in America. Thus, I made a point to read in detail those communications from some of the Chicago-area organizations where I was formerly affiliated and/or am currently still a supporter. I have linked to them below, in the hopes that they might be useful to any readers who are part of developing their organization's response, or merely that they might provide some useful lines of thought as you continue to process.

One other thought: there is no such thing as a perfect statement, or a perfect response. If there was, the problems themselves might actually be resolved. The point is to add our voices to the chorus of individuals and organizations promising to listen, to learn, and to leverage whatever resources each has to move the needle in some way in our spheres of influence.

As many commentators have said, this time it feels different. May God make it so.

• Calvary Memorial Church of Oak Park, in addition to several pastors speaking to racial injustice in the last few Sundays' sermons, provided a list of resources (I grew up at this church and was a staff member for several years until I moved to Florida)
• Chicago Symphony Orchestra issued a statement along with a list of current programs that it intends to enhance in terms of diversity, equity, and inclusion (I financially support this orchestra, and while living in Chicago volunteered in several capacities including a term on the young professional organization's executive committee)
• Chicago Voyagers issued a statement that includes a list of planned actions (I financially support this youth development organization, and my uncle is the executive director)
• Wheaton College made public its senior administrators' message to students and employees and in days since has made digital programming available (I financially support Wheaton College, am an alumnus of its Conservatory of Music, and was a staff member for several years until I moved to Florida)

With Thanks

By the end of the month, I will have fully completed the season of transition from my life and work in the Chicago area to my new life and new work in Miami. If you missed my reflections on what led to this transition, see this essay. I spent a few days in Miami two weeks ago, including two full days in the office with my new colleagues, and am very happy to say I really like my new team already, received a very warm welcome, and am excited for the point when I can devote my full attention to my new assignment.

But in the midst of packing and finishing projects at my soon-to-be former jobs, I would like to offer several words of thanks, to Calvary Memorial Church, to Wheaton College, and to Chicago. I am sure I have forgotten many important aspects of my experiences with each but what follows it what comes to mind as I reflect at this juncture.

First, to Calvary Memorial Church, where I have served on staff for over six years and where I have attended, with brief pauses when I was in term in college, for twenty. I am thankful for the communities I found in my junior high and high school youth groups and then later in my young adult small groups and friend groups. I am thankful for the opportunity to apply my music degree right away as orchestra director and then acting head of worship ministries and then ministry associate of worship and music, and then the opportunity to learn essentially a whole new profession through service as church administrator and then director of finance and administration. I am thankful for the enduring support and encouragement I received from the leadership, especially Pastors Caleb, Gerald, Jonny, and Todd. I am grateful for the members of the orchestra who gave me the gift of being their director for six and a half years, which to date is the professional role I have held the longest.

Second, to Wheaton College, where I completed my undergraduate education, met the woman who is now my wife, and have served on staff for over five years. For the rest of my life I will carry special memories of my undergraduate years, and I am grateful for all the lessons I learned both formally and informally, and including the ones I had to learn the hard way. I am grateful for the lifelong friends I made there among my roommates and others. I am grateful for the opportunity to serve as a staff member in the Conservatory, the same department in which I studied. I am grateful I was part of the move to the Conservatory's new home, for the inauguration of President Phil Ryken, for the beginning of the CSO at Wheaton College series, and for endless unique and enjoyable concert productions. And I am grateful for my colleagues, my boss Tony Payne, my dean Michael Wilder, and for the many students I was able to formally and informally mentor and support.

And finally, to Chicago itself. I would not trade the experience of growing up and spending the first decade of adulthood in Chicago for anything. I am honored that I can call myself a native Chicagoan and Chicago will always and forever be my hometown. Chicago has institutions that are among the world's best, including the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, where I was pleased to offer volunteer hours for several years, and given its annual visits to Florida, I know I can continue to be an active patron. And it has been a very special last few years to be a Cubs fan. I will be bringing my small collection of 2016 World Series Champion-branded swag with me to Miami, no question. Of course, Chicago is not perfect. No city is. But Chicago, you have incredible potential. You do not have to be defined by the heartbreak and frustration that has plagued you and that comprises most of your national and global reputation. There are so many people, seen and unseen, working hard every day to make Chicago a better place, and I am glad to have been part of that place for my first thirty years. I look forward to visiting as often as I can, and in between I will be ordering those frozen Lou Malnati's pizzas to be shipped to Miami!

So thank you.

Administrative Professionals Day

Today is Administrative Professionals Day in the United States, a day to honor and recognize the work of secretaries, administrative assistants, receptionists, and other administrative support personnel.

I am blessed to have SIX administrative professionals as colleagues across my two jobs.

At Calvary Memorial Church, we have Cindy our office coordinator, Janet our administrative assistant, and Soo Ai our executive assistant.

At the Wheaton College Conservatory of Music, we have Susan and Janice our office coordinators and Michelle our administrative assistant.

All six have been in their roles since before I assumed my current role with each organization, and I find their experience and institutional knowledge extremely valuable.

Make sure you thank the administrative professionals in your own workplace today!

Thankfulness

On this Thanksgiving Day, some of the things for which I am most thankful (and surely this is an incomplete list):

• Naomi, my wife (pictured below)
• Ed and Becky, my ever-supportive parents
• Paul, my brother, Velia and Dorothy, my grandmothers, and my entire family
• Gerald, my boss at Calvary (and Todd, his boss and our senior pastor), and Tony, my boss at Wheaton (and Michael, his boss and our dean)
• Ana, Cassidy, Cheryl, Cindy, Collin, Danielle, Ellie, and Madison, whom I have the privilege of having as direct reports at Calvary and Wheaton
• My colleagues at Calvary and Wheaton, too many to name for fear of missing someone
• The privilege of serving on the staffs of these two organizations, and for all the invaluable kingdom-building work in which I can take part
• The provision of new facilities for the Conservatory of Music
• Friends from my college days with whom I can still talk by phone every so often, and the encouragement those calls are
• First-time visits to four states in the last year (Hawaii in January, South Carolina and Oregon in May, Vermont in July)
• The privilege of serving on the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Overture Council Executive Committee with Erika, April, Danielle, Elliott, Haley, John, Jonathon, Kristin, Belinda, Claudine, and Jessica and our ongoing growth and success
• The generosity of many people, some of whom are at most second-degree connections, taking time to provide professional development advice
• Timely and helpful words of wisdom and counsel from Derrick and Gayle and Kirk
• The many thoughtful, reasonable voices, even with whom I disagree, speaking with charity and humility and using their platforms to inspire hope and determination in the midst of so much divisive, negative rhetoric
• The relentless, limitless, abundant, and undeserved grace of God

I'm thankful for Naomi, my bride of 15 months and counting, this Thanksgiving

Beauty in the Broken

The last week was a difficult one for my colleagues and me at Calvary Memorial Church, and for much of our congregation as well. Two Friday nights ago, Gillian Lundgren, a fifteen-year-old daughter of one of our staff, took her own life. I did not personally know her well, but I did know her, and found the news an utter shock, not least as someone who works with students in my other and previous jobs. Not 36 hours later, our senior pastor, Todd, in a breaking voice shared the news with the congregation during our Sunday services.

Then came Monday morning. It quickly became clear to me that all of our employees, the majority of whom might not even be fully aware when we host memorial services, were not only devastated by this tragedy but already going above and beyond the call of duty to prepare for the Thursday evening visitation and Friday morning memorial service. There was a communal dedication and attention and effort given to this task that I have never before experienced.

Needless to say, all of us dearly wish we would not have had that work to do this past week. On this side of eternity, however, our task is to be the hands and feet of Jesus when (not if) tragedy comes. And I think that is just what we saw this week: the redeeming power of the Lord Jesus energizing our work. It was the Holy Spirit driving our collective accomplishment of hosting over two thousand guests for the visitation and the memorial service, allowing the Lundgren family and hundreds of Gillian and her parents' friends and peers to mourn the loss and yet hope in the promise that she, to quote her obituary, "is now whole and in the presence of her Heavenly Father."

In the midst of this awful tragedy, the grace of God flowed and was manifested in our staff community's rallying to the cause to support our colleague and friend.

This coming Monday will likely be a "normal" day at work for us staff. There will be emails to read and write, meetings to attend, sermons and lessons to prepare, congregants to meet and visit, programs and events to plan, bills to pay, and more. But there's the grace of God in that, too. The grace that redeems our brokenness, sanctifies our work, and enables us to minister to those who are still grieving and to proclaim the power of gospel, bringing the only real hope we have into a dark and broken and yet beloved of God world.

"He has made everything beautiful in its time."

Ecclesiastes 3:11 (ESV)

Lunch with Kent Hughes

In 2015, Calvary Memorial Church marks its centenary. We celebrated this milestone with four days of events stretching from last Wednesday to today. Wednesday was a special worship service, Worship Through The Ages, with a message from our most recent former senior pastor, Dr. Ray Pritchard. Friday evening was a celebration program and reception. Saturday morning we hosted a 5k to raise funds for our outreach ministries. And today after services we had an all-church cookout. It was a very full and very successful time of celebration. Four very different events, but all centered on the theme of celebrating 100 Years of Making Jesus Christ Known in Oak Park & Around the World.

I think the most significant part of the last few days for me was not at one of the events, but at lunch on Friday. For Friday evening's program, our senior pastor, Todd Wilson, invited his mentor and former senior pastor, Dr. R. Kent Hughes (author and senior pastor emeritus of College Church in Wheaton), to give the charge to the church. Todd and five other Calvary pastors and directors and I had lunch with Dr. Hughes earlier in the day.

Dr. Kent Hughes (center) at lunch with Calvary pastors

Led by Todd, we all picked his brain over the meal. I mostly listened, because it was a special treat for me to just hear what he had to say about leadership and ministry. I found what he had to say valuable and wholly applicable to my service in the local church but also to my work in arts management, teaching, and many other pursuits, both current and desired.

There are three pieces of wisdom in particular I would like to highlight here.

1. God made you to be you, so live your passions

2. Hire people superior to you.

I would generalize this to simply surround yourself with people superior to you, for situations where one is in leadership but not necessarily an employer

3. Take your ministry seriously; don't take yourself too seriously

Again, I would generalize that to say take your calling or profession or work seriously; don't take yourself too seriously.

It was a really great conversation with this elder statesman of the evangelical church, and a privilege to have Dr. Hughes for our celebration this weekend.

Holy Week and Easter 2015

I am sitting at home, reflecting on a very satisfying Holy Week and Easter Sunday. As always, I spent a lot of time at my church, Calvary Memorial of Oak Park, over the last few days. I did not myself take any pictures, but I have plenty of images and moments from the last week in my mind. A few to share with you...

Last Sunday, Palm Sunday, we had the annual palm parade, with all of the children's Sunday school classes marching around the Sanctuary waving palm branches during the singing of Paul Baloche's "Hosanna." From my position in the audiovisual control booth, I saw every child walk past, all looking so excited to be part of the service.

Wednesday evening was dress rehearsal night for this weekend's services. We had a full schedule, and it was a very successful evening. I felt very good about the coming services at the end of the rehearsal. It is always satisfying just to see all the musicians come together in rehearsal and get a teaser of what the services will feel like.

Thursday evening was our Maundy Thursday service, a relatively new service for Calvary (this was only our third year celebrating Maundy Thursday). Seminary student and lay worship leader Erik Johnson prepared the songs and led our time of singing, and Nate Friedrichsen, our pastor of community engagement, gave a message focusing on the two cups: our cup, the cup of God's wrath, that Jesus drank for us, so that we could drink his cup, the cup of the new covenant. As I reflected with a friend afterward, I had never thought of it that way, and the image was helpful. The Maundy Thursday service had a great "family" feel, as it should. We celebrated communion at the service, and because we only had one service for that occasion, it allowed for informal and non-curtailed mingling afterward. I found myself at Red Mango with a few friends from the young adults' group after the service!

Friday evening we had our Good Friday services. I was the worship leader for the service, guiding the congregation through a liturgy of Scripture reading, corporate singing, and songs offered by the Sanctuary Choir. Gerald Hiestand, our senior associate pastor (our equivalent of an executive pastor) gave the evening's reflection, "Acquainted with Grief." It was a service of contemplation and commemoration, and I was privileged to have that leadership role in it.

Saturday, for me, was a work day. It was the day a few of us staff are at church, very busy getting ready for the following day. The redecorating and setting up for Sunday did not take long at all though, and only heightened our excitement for Sunday.

And then there was today, Easter Sunday. With my alarm set for 5:00 AM, I woke up instead at 4:45 AM, and found myself at church by 6:00 AM. I completed my walk-through and got everything open and powered up and before long the band, choir, and orchestra arrived for our warm-up rehearsal, and then it was time to celebrate!

It was, on the whole, a very good morning at Calvary. Everyone was in a good mood, the congregational singing (of classic Easter songs both old and new) was robust, the snacks were delicious, and by the time we reached mid-morning the sun was shining, dispelling the early morning cloudiness. God was praised for his victory in Christ. The resurrection, as Senior Pastor Todd Wilson said in his sermon titled "This I Believe" from 1 Corinthians 15, is God's "authenticating signature" on the life, teaching, and death of Christ. And we celebrated that signature in joyous fashion.

Such a great week. I was so blessed to be part of it. And, by the grace of God, I did not find any of it stressful or even draining, really. All by God's grace. Soli Deo gloria.

From Meadowgate Farm

This past weekend, members of Adelphoi, Calvary Memorial Church's young adult community, gathered at Meadowgate Farm (the retreat home of one of our elder's in-laws) in North Central Illinois, for our winter retreat. There were seventeen adults and three children, and we made good use of the home's nine bedrooms and plentiful common areas. A relaxed schedule of games, conversation, and an almost constant flow of food was the order of business for the weekend.

Meadowgate Farm, outside Orangeville, Illinois

Saturday morning sunrise over North Central Illinois

Kirk Baker, who with his wife Amy leads the young adult ministry, led our group devotional times. His topic for the weekend was, simply but profoundly, growth. He challenged us young adults to think 20, 30, 40 years into the future: would each of us be more mature in Christ at that point? We are always and constantly responding to something, to some situation or another, he observed, and it is the sum of those responses over time that either make us more like Christ or less. This is the process of sanctification, essentially.

The next question Kirk had for us was what role does the Cross have in our sanctification. It has a crucial role, we agreed (I use the word "crucial" intentionally as it has as its root the Latin word for cross). On his handout, Kirk had written about the Cross: "Through Christ his out poured grace we experience comfort, cleansing, and the power to change." In our Saturday evening devotional session we looked at two passages from Paul's writings (Galatians 2:20 and Romans 8:9-10, to be specific), which describe this concept. Our discussion further led us to the conclusion that not only does the indwelling of the Spirit allow us to have godly responses to temptation and difficulty situations and circumstances, but it allows us to receive grace and have the courage to continue when we fall and do not have godly responses.

Thanks, Kirk and Amy, for leading our time of rest and reflection over the weekend!

About half the members of my small group were able to attend the retreat. In the back, from left to right, are Jill, Jason, and me, and in the front are Adriana, Matt, and Charlene.