Ready or not, here he comes!

Friends,

It’s true! Whatever we have left to do, to create a meaningful and joyful Christmas for our communities of faith, our friends, and our families – no matter how imperfectly we get it all done: the Christ Child is coming! I am praying for you during these final few days of the Advent marathon, that you will find moments to open yourself to the hope and peace, love and joy, that the Christ Child brings, even in the midst of it all.

You have no time to read this now…but please bookmark it to return to you’ve had time to rest after all your hard work this season. 

LeaderSHIFT “save the dates” for the year 2024 are....

Daring Justice:
Uniting in Dialogue and Reflection, with Jane Dawson.

  • This six-session exploration will meet 1-4pm, Thursdays, beginning Feb 15, and closing on April 25. Details and registration will be posted to LeaderSHIFT's website soon.



Stewardship Webinar:
Narrative Budgets, Tuesday, January 23, 1 pm.

  • As you prepare for the annual meeting of your community of faith, come and learn the practice and wisdom of creating a narrative budget, to communicate more effectively the ministry and mission of your congregation. Offered by Vicki Nelson, Community of Faith Stewardship Support, and LeaderSHIFT. Registration for this free webinar will be available early in the new year.



Anti-Racism Work and Action
First Third Ministry Leadership Conference runs April 4-6, 2024 onsite at Vancouver School of Theology.



GUATEMALA PILGRIMAGE
for Ministry Leaders: NEW DATES – August 2-12, 2024.

May you be blessed with energy, creativity, and joy this coming week… and then have time to rest and savour the gifts of the season! You have surely earned it, and your efforts are appreciated by so many.
 
Faithfully,

Michelle

Words of Advent Blessings, this week of Hope

 

Dear Friends,

I’m writing this from the Pacific Mountain and Chinook Winds Regional Council Staff Retreat, at Loon Lake Lodge in Maple Ridge, BC. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to here – I highly recommend it if you haven’t. It’s a place of great beauty, stillness and hospitality.

I am reminded of the previous experiences I’ve had in this place which, as it happens, have all been as a participant in various LeaderSHIFT events over the last decade – including the Sowing Promise, Growing Leaders program with Peter Short, the Holistic Engagement for Missional Leadership with Tim Keel, and the Holy Ground: Sowing the Seeds of Wild Church just this February with Victoria Loorz. I’m so grateful for the intentional and careful work of my predecessors in LeaderSHIFT – Keith Howard, Treena Duncan, and Allison Rennie, for the many excellent learning and growth opportunities they shaped and provided.

Some of the gathered regional staff, with Winter Retreat facilitator Caitlin Frost, Loon Lake Lodge, December 2023.

During our time here at Loon Lake, I have been thinking about all the leaders that LeaderSHIFT seeks to serve. I’m especially mindful of you who are leading congregational and community of faith life during the season of Advent. This season can include greater pressure and expectations of ministry personnel – carol sings and cantatas, pageants and Christmas lunches, poinsettias for the homebound and Advent book studies, pastoral letters and Advent wreath candle-lighting liturgies, Messy Church and caroling, and so much more. I’m tired just from typing it all out!

Whether your faith community began Advent two Sundays ago, or just celebrated Advent 1 in yesterday's Sunday worship, I am praying for you – that you will be blessed by the Holy Spirit moving within you and the community of faith that you lead and serve. I hope you will make take for yourself, to savour this season as a traveler on the way to Bethlehem, as you lead your community of faith along the same road. In fact, why not start or end each day with a short Advent devotional to feed your own spirit? I’m going to use Kate Bowler's Bless this Advent devotional. Why don’t you join me?

I pray that you will be fed, strengthened, encouraged and blessed, even as you seek to provide the same to the people of your congregation and wider community. May God bless you richly in this season of anticipation, and may your longings be, somehow, miraculously, surprisingly, be fulfilled in the coming of the Christ Child.

an advent blessing when you need a little hope

We are saying Merry Christmas
but these are heavy days—
for our struggling earth,
for our countries and their leaders,
our friends and families,
and for ourselves.

Blessed are we with eyes open to see
the world as it really is,
who say: where are you God? and
where are your people?
the smart and sensible ones
who fight for good
and have the power to make it stick?

This Advent, we wait
for the world to be made right.

Oh God, help us
in our fear and confusion,
in our uncertainty and grief
in our despair and longing.

Infuse us with a hope that doesn’t make sense,
with a love that doesn’t add up,
and with joy enough
to endure the long, long nights,
as we wait in hope for thy kingdom come.
- Kate Bowler
 

May it be so, for you and me, and all of creation.
 

Blessings,

(Rev.) Michelle Slater


 

Yes, No, Maybe?! What a deep and rich Discernment Retreat Weekend in Calgary!

LeaderSHIFT and the Office of Vocation worked in partnership to provide a space for people to discern God’s call. Thanks to Vocational Ministers Brenda Fawkes and Kellie McComb, and LeaderShift's Michelle Slater, for facilitating this meaningful time together, and to the amazing 12 who showed up with open hearts, minds and spirits to listen for God's call!

Brenda, Michelle, Kellie ~ Facilitators

Some of the spiritual elders who have affirmed gifts within us... called into our presence as we gathered.