At last Sunday’s baptisms I said that “the guy dressed in white along with the altar guild that heated the water and the organist and choir who led the hymns, and the faithful of the church who promised to support each child are involved in a vast conspiracy to transform that child of the culture into a child of God who can become a disciple of Jesus Christ.”

 I am struck lately by the power of this simple sentence: “I am a disciple of Jesus Christ.” This doesn’t point to a person who thinks she is special, but to a person who has finally figured out that only in following Christ is there sanity and peace.

Everyone follows someone—even if it is the internalized voice of secular American consumerism.

The role of the Church, as theologian Will Willimon puts it, “is not to illuminate what people already know, but rather to form them into a way of life they could not have known without Christian formation.”

Next time the church school needs a volunteer imagine they are speaking to you. Next time a program of adult formation is offered imagine how it could help you find and follow Christ.

Peace in Christ,

Bill