Nancy Beach

One More to Go in the UK

I have one more day of teaching in the UK, in London on Saturday.  I just completed two days in Bristol, England.  Yesterday as I concluded the final session with arts leaders here, I realized all over again the wonder of connecting with men and women from other parts of the world who share my same passion for unleashing the arts on Sunday mornings, for doing all we can to ennoble and inspire church artists and teachers.  At least half of the pastors and arts leaders present yesterday serve their church entirely as volunteers.  That obviously means that all week long they labor at another job in the marketplace, and then lay on top of that the work of the ministry.  That truly inspires those of us who are freed up to spend the best hours of our days serving in the church.  I am rooting for the churches in Europe – these folks are fighting battles much more challenging than the ones we face in the States.

I must say I am ready to see the sunshine again as the typical dreariness of England is starting to wear on me.  I ate Yorkshire pudding last night, and love the tea and biscuits.  So I better stop writing and go get a good workout…

Inspired By the Wesley Brothers

  I’m in Bristol, England, which some will recall was the center of the English slave trade portrayed in the film Amazing Grace.  But there are other parts to this city’s history, including a visit to a chapel where John and Charles Wesley based their ministry.  I spent some time this afternoon being inspired by the story of these brothers and the impact they had both here in England and also in America.

John Wesley, of course, spent most of his ministry “on the road.”  He logged over 250,000 miles on horseback and on foot, delivering over 40,000 sermons in his lifetime!  Wesley liked to read while riding his horse, which caused him to fall down at least seven times on his journeys.

Above the simple chapel are the rooms where John Wesley slept perhaps 500 nights in his life, and a small windowsill where he always stood to write his sermons.  John believed that he could concentrate better and do stronger work if he did not sit down.  His amazingly prolific brother Charles wrote over 7,000 hymns.  Just think about that for a moment.

Susannah Wesley, mother to these outstanding leaders, gave birth to 19 children, with 10 of them surviving past childhood.  She was a woman devoted to Bible study and prayer, and is given credit for shaping her sons in a significant way by her example.  Perhaps because of his mother, John supported women pastors in the pulpit, and in the early years of the Methodist churches, women preachers were fairly common.

Perhaps the most remarkable fact I learned is that during his lifetime, John Wesley gave away 30,000 pounds – the equivalent of quite a fortune.  He died a pauper, determined to hold loosely any earthly goods.  As I stood behind the pulpit where Wesley often preached, I was deeply inspired by the legacy of both John and Charles.

 How amazing that the same city where thousands of Africans were paraded in the town square after an unimaginable journey across the ocean, then purchased for a life of slavery to perpetuate industries such as tobacco, is also the place that launched the ministries of the Wesleys and so many other eager young preachers who lived life full out for God.  History has a great deal to teach us, if only we will pay attention.

Josefin, 5 Years Old

In Stockholm on Saturday, I facilitated a workshop for women in church leadership.  The women who invited me knew that I would be exploring how leadership gifts are typically quite evident in very young children.  So these creative women started one of our sessions with a video crafted to celebrate the obvious leadership gifts of a young girl in their church, a five-year-old named Josefin.  With permission to film at the little girl’s pre-school, this team captured a delightful moment when Josefin was organizing her classmates according to height.  With a kind but decidedly bold spirit, Josefin actually asked her friends to take off their hats so she could measure height accurately.  This little girl has spunk!  All of the women laughed as we watched her in action.  I was reminded of similar moments in my own childhood.  When I was in first grade, my mother allowed me to invite all the girls in my class to come over after school for a birthday party.  To her surprise, she looked out the window and saw me marching them in a straight line down the block to our house.  I guess leadership is part of how some of us are wired.

My day with the Swedish women was such a gift to me.  I had wonderful conversations with young women who are just beginning to figure out how to embrace their gifts, and wondering how they will make life work with young children and church responsibilities added to everything else.  But their eyes are shining, and I see such incredible potential.  Only 1-2% of Swedish people attend church on any given weekend.  There is much kingdom work to be done.  What a privilege it was for me to invest in these leaders, hoping they will increase their impact as they build more vital churches.  Now I’m in England, preparing to serve women here for two days and arts leaders for another day.  Who knows how many Josefin types I will encounter here…

Thinking About Deborah In a Hotel in Stockholm

Now Deborah, a prophet, the wife of Lappidoth, was leading Israel at that time.

Judges 4:4

I’ve been reading lately in the book of Judges (just seemed like a good choice since I haven’t touched those pages in a very long time).  I came across the verse above in chapter 4, a verse that stirs me as I sit in a hotel room in downtown Stockholm, preparing to invest in about 170 Swedish women church leaders all day tomorrow.  The verse is so simply stated – Deborah was a prophet, and was leading the people of Israel at that time.  What sounds so simple has, in reality, been a complicated journey in the church for centuries right up through today.

When I wrote the book Gifted to Lead, I naively thought I could just write the book and return to my focus on arts and worship leaders.  I never intended to teach about women in church leadership, partly because I really never wanted that to be a point, or to be perceived as some kind of flag waver.  But one of my good friends and a prophet in my life, Rory Noland, challenged me to understand that perhaps God was leading me into another arena of influence, one that I should at least be open to.  I didn’t like hearing that from Rory!  But he proved to be right on track.  I can’t seem to ignore the crying need of women in church leadership – in my country as well as in places like Sweden and England where I’m going next – to be understood, affirmed, and guided as they seek to use their gifts and work alongside our brothers in the faith.  I am finding that many women leaders in the church feel very alone.  I am humbled to have the opportunity to ennoble and encourage them, to stretch them and to identify with them.  I need to draw courage from Deborah, who led boldly and with grace, who used her gifts to make an enormous impact.  If you think of me, pray for me in the next week as I meet both with women in leadership, and also with some worship/arts leaders of both genders.  But more importantly, pray for the churches in Europe, that God would breathe new life into the leaders who toil here, that the kingdom would advance against great odds in this increasingly secular part of the world.  Thank you…

The Inauguration Through a Certain Lens

Like the huge majority of Americans, I watched the ceremonies in our nation’s capital with a tremendous feeling of pride, anticipation, respect, and even wonder at what it all means and the hope we share during these perilous times.  I was more ambushed than I expected by the moment when our new President took the oath, as he loomed large on the large screen in our church auditorium where I sat expectantly with several staff members.  One of our African American team members let out a huge whoop – and then broke down weeping.  I walked over to give him a hug and share the experience with him – though I don’t pretend to fully understand the depth of what this all means to him and the African American community.  What a glorious day…

While I observed the events as a citizen, I also can’t help watching anything without the perspective of an artist and communicator.  It’s a curse at times, when it’s almost impossible to turn off the part of the mind that analyzes more of the choices, planning, and execution of an event.  I know I’m not alone in this!  So my question for you is, what did you think?  How did you feel about the music selections (I personally LOVED the John Williams piece played by that magnificent quartet), the poem, the prayers, and, of course, the speech itself?  As a communicator I was so impressed by our President’s delivery, let alone his content.  If he didn’t memorize the speech, I could never seem to catch him looking at a prompter – WOW!  I also deeply appreciate the challenge of all the logistics for that event including the seating chart, the large Jumbo screens everywhere, the sound, etc.  At least no one worried about lighting with such a glorious sunny day!  I am curious what you thought about the artistry and speech yesterday – please weigh in.  I’ll let others chat about the fashion (though I personally delighted in Michelle’s choices).  Looking forward to hearing from you…

Our Church and Martin Luther King Weekend

Beginning several years ago, our church decided to devote part of our weekend services connected to Martin Luther King day toward inspiring us toward greater racial reconciliation.  So this past Sunday, we did just that.  It was a glorious service which inspired us to continue to be, as our pastor Bill Hybels often says, the first people to walk across a room and bridge any kind of racial or ethnic divide.

In the early portion of the service, a young African American girl delivered a monolog about her older brother.  It wasn’t evident until the very end that the brother she was describing was Martin Luther King, Jr.  The script was written by one of our writers, based on biographical information.  I was delighted to see the performance of this young girl, augmented by visuals on the screen.  Then one of our vocalists sang a beautiful song, Bright Morning Stars, and Pastor Hybels led us in a guided prayer time.

The sermon this weekend was brought by Dr. Richard Allen Farmer, a long-time friend of our church and also of the Willow Creek Association.  Dr. Farmer has been described as a Renaissance kind of man.  He’s a professor and a pilot, a superb communicator and a gifted musician.  Speaking from his perky Apple computer perched on the podium, Dr. Farmer challenged all of us with a powerful word – confluence.  This word represents the merging of forces, such as the spot where two mighty rivers come together.  He inspired us to leverage our affluence (all Americans, essentially, are affluent compared to the rest of the world) and our influence toward confluence.  We need to make the kinds of choices that will not only tolerate others who are different, but celebrate our uniquenesses and seek to honor, respect, and ultimately love others of different races and ethnicities.

As we stood for closing prayer, I looked around the room at our church which is becoming increasingly diverse.  What a joy to see the young and the old, the Anglo and the African American, the Latino and the Asian both on our platform and in the seats.  We have a long way to go toward achieving the dream described by Dr. King.  But with the inauguration ceremonies tomorrow and the attention paid in our houses of worship toward building bridges, I think we have reason for great hope.

The Power of Collaboration

As I sat in a creative meeting yesterday for our church’s weekend services, we began, as we always do, by evaluating the previous Sunday service.  We realized how much stronger the entire experience was for our congregation largely because of one key word – collaboration.  This word gets thrown around rather casually, and may have lost some of its power along the way.  But the reality of genuine creative collaboration is truly a wonder.  Let me describe 2 specific ways in which our creating together improved some of the key moments in our church’s gathering.

First, we experienced a video created to expose the hand-written prayers of some of our church’s young people.  These were very real prayers, quite simply stated, such as “Please help my father find a new job…a fourth grade student.”  The video team had been working on this video piece, and the previous Wednesday, they brought it to the creative team for feedback.  With a few days to go before Sunday, the wider team suggested a slightly different visual approach and also made some suggestions for the music.  The result was that the video’s power increased at least 20%.  We all agreed it could have worked without those changes – but would not have been as strong.

We also had a drama scene in the service.  When the script was first read to the creative team, it was in the form of a monolog.  Now obviously sometimes a monolog is the optimal choice.  But many of us felt this particular script would be stronger as a combination of a scene and monolog – with occasional direct addresses to the audience.  The script features a father who regrets some of his destructive patterns as he relates to his 10 year old son.  The writer went back to the drawing board, adding a son and a wife to the script.  The result?  A much stronger experience in this case.  And the interesting thing was that our drama director originally hesitated to make these changes because he felt the monolog was so strong.  He told our team that he was grateful for how we weighed in and offered a different perspective.

What is absolutely essential for collaboration to truly work?  Humility.  I celebrate how these artists – all very gifted and intuitive individuals – open themselves to feedback week after week.  Their attitude is simply one of, “Can this be any stronger?”  And together we dialogue until we believe we have arrived at the best possible approach.  Yes, sometimes collaboration is extremely difficult and even messy.  But teams who fight for it, with team members who are open-handed and open-hearted and walking as best they can in the Spirit, will ultimately create the most powerful experiences for those we are seeking to serve.  God smiles when we collaborate well.  And everybody wins…

Last Week in Orlando

I had the joy and privilege of leading a gathering of what we call the “Arts Champions” or, their favorite moniker, The Justice League, down in Orlando for a couple days last week.  This is a group of over thirty men and women who steer and guide the movement of ennobling, equipping, and connecting church artists all over the country.  Each one of them leads in their own churches, while also contributing a percentage of their time to connecting with and encouraging other church artists.  I absolutely love being with this group of remarkable individuals!  This year we added two new members – Tony Kim from Newsong in Irvine, California, and Christopher Durso from Christ Tabernacle in Queens, NY.  They both contributed great energy, innovation, and leadership to our movement.

We first reminded one another what we exist as the Willow Arts Movement to do.  It can be summed up in 4 key verbs that we seek to provide for church artists:  Ennoble.  Connect.  Equip.  Refresh.   Then we spent a lot of time strategizing as we look at the next 3-5 years for how we can best accomplish that mission.  We are obviously all quite sobered by the economic downturn and how it will affect the ability of churches to train their leaders, teachers, and artists.  Certainly 2009 will be a challenging year.  And yet I was delighted to see the very high level of enthusiasm for the planning of this year’s annual event and its potential.  The June conference just looks fantastic!  We rallied our thinking to imagining ways that this event can be possible for many church artists and pastors to attend in spite of the financial realities we all face.

My flight home to the ice and snow tundra of Chicago wasn’t until late Friday night – so in the afternoon I sat outside with my face to the sun for a couple hours, drinking in the warmth and Vitamin D.  That was a tremendous gift before I headed home in my flimsy jean jacket to about 10 additional inches of snow and frigid temperatures.  But I guess in spite of that, there truly is no place like home.

Homeless In The Front Row

Sunday morning I had the privilege of bringing the message for two Sunday services at Parkview Community Church in Glen Ellyn, Illinois.  It was a delightful experience – what a wonderful community of faith!  Pastor Ray Kollbacher and Worship Pastor Steve King had let me know about their church’s weekly ministry to the homeless.  Each Sunday morning, volunteers from their church pick up homeless men and women who are leaving a local PADS facility at 7 am with nowhere to go.  These faithful servants bring the homeless folks to Parkview for a meal and for the church service.  Pastor Ray let me know that sometimes the homeless like to sit in the front row, and occasionally they will get up and leave for a few minutes in the middle of the service – he didn’t want me to be startled or think someone necessarily hated my teaching.

Parkview is located in a wealthy suburb of Chicago.  What a privilege to witness how people at every end of the economic spectrum worship there together.  I was reminded of Jesus’ words, telling us to bring to the banquet those who are lonely and hungry, those who are forgotten, those who are not invited to most gatherings and celebrations.  The believers at Parkview paint a beautiful picture every week of genuine compassion and inclusivity that inspires me.  It was a little glimpse of heaven on earth…

Movies, Movies, Movies

On the day after Christmas, my two daughters and I did a movie marathon – we saw three films with a little eating in between – but the whole experience took nearly 11 hours!  We started with Marley and Me, moved on to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, and finished up with The Tale of Despereaux.  Then later over the break, I also saw Doubt and Slumdog Millionaire.  I still have several on my list to see, but those 5 were a terrific start.  My favorite, if you push me, would have to be Slumdog Millionaire because of its highly creative concept and the gift of immersing myself in a culture so different from my own for just a couple hours.  I highly recommend all the 5 films I mentioned.

So here’s my question – what films did you see over the holidays and what was your reaction?  We have a wealth of options these days, including Frost/Nixon, Valkerie, and the recently released Revolutionary Road.  A true feast for all artists and communicators!  The common denominator of the best films, of course, is a compelling story.  I never get tired of great stories, and there are unlimited human dramas filled with intrigue to be told.  Let me know what stories on film have struck you recently, even if it was in the privacy of your home on DVD.  When a person is stuck in the dreariness of a Chicago January, the movies provide a welcome escape!