Sustainability: Roses and Kumquat
Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18 Philippians 3:17-4:1
(This sermon was a joint effort by Kate Nicol at Clark Memorial UMC, and David Nicol at Buxton and Elm Street UMCs)
There’s a significant difference between Roses and Kumquat. Roses are sweet smelling, and kumquats are a small, oval citrus from East Asia. While both roses and kumquats are often edible, and both have thorny stems, there is a major difference—Roses are flowers, beautiful, but not self-reproducing as such; kumquats are seed-bearing fruit.
Most folks cultivate rose-bushes for their beautiful flowers, but most folks cultivate kumquat bushes for the fruit. Roses are beautiful, but require constant maintenance and outside energy to maintain; kumquats are often cultivated like other citrus, but within each and every kumquat are seeds…seeds that can, and given the right environment, will grow, producing more kumquats!
Fruit produces seeds, and seeds produce fruit in a continually self-reproducing cycle. If we are to unleash the power of all by itself growth we need to produce sustainable ministries. Sustainable ministries are ministries that produce fruit not flowers. Flowers like the Roses need outside care, but once they die there is nothing left. Fruit contains the source of its own reproduction the seeds. When we look at the ministries of our Church we must ask ourselves: Does this ministry produce Kumquats or Roses, Fruit or Flowers? If all a ministry produces are flowers it’s time to change what we’re doing, or abandon it all together, because that ministry is life draining, and not life sustaining.
When we develop ministries, we need to be sure they produce fruit, not just flowers. According to Natural Church Development theory, we need to do three main things to assess whether our ministries are bearing fruit. First, we need to check every fruit for seeds. Second, we need to use every opportunity to train others. Third, leaders need to remember not to solve people’s problems, but to help people solve their problems on their own… All of these are vital to sustainable ministry!
Christian Schwarz, the theological mind behind Natural Church Development has this to say about checking fruit for seeds: “The less you follow the natural dynamics [of Natural Church Development], the greater the likelihood that the ‘fruit’ that you produce won’t have any bearing on the maintenance of your ministry. You might produce wonderful flowers, but when they begin to wilt you will be unable to find seeds in them.”1 In Churches we to often spend time pushing to sustain ministries that are life draining. Sometimes this happens because we are stuck in a rut and we cannot find our way out. Talking about doing something new is scary, it might not produce the results we have come to expect. This type of thinking most often occurs around fundraisers. We would rather go with the tried and true, rather than seek out new ways to create life sustaining ministries that produce all by itself growth, rather then life draining, but institutional maintaining ministries that provide more comfort then anything else.
Along with checking every fruit for seeds, we need to become adept at using every opportunity to train others. When the church is healthy, and functioning as it should, disciples beget disciples, teachers beget leaders, financial whizzes beget financial whizzes, leaders beget leaders, and so on. Training leaders by inviting people into leadership seems almost radical, especially when we take a close look at how we operate as a church. Only those who are willing to sacrifice life and limb, and the possibility of being expected to do everything are brave enough to volunteer, and only those who do it as it has always been done are really let into the inner power structure. But that is not the way God intended us to operate!
It is no wonder that few of us are as bold as the Apostle Paul to encourage others to follow our example! But, that is what God calls us to do. We are called to set an example in by how we live within the church, and in our personal lives. Our citizenship is in heaven. It is not of this world, let alone this country. If we have come to believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the world’s redeemer, our lives are to be examples of what God can do when we cease resisting His love and grace. When this happens we become better disciple-makers. We make disciples by living as disciples, and we make leaders within the church by inviting people into leadership, asking them to share leadership with us, and so producing fruit that contains the seeds that will make for more fruit!
Paul also gives us an example of how “not to solve other people’s problems.” Paul could easily have given the church in Philippi detailed instructions on how to live as Christians. Instead, he did something radical. In Philippians 3:17, Paul writes, “Join together in following my example, brothers and sisters, and just as you have us as a model, keep your yes on those who live as we do.” Paul set up a system that was both sustainable and natural! Disciple-making didn’t happen by sending people to a disciple training course, but in everyday life. Leader-making didn’t happen by sending folks to seminary or lay-speaking classes (as good as those things are), but by earning how to follow the example of other leaders!
We, in this place, are called to follow the example of Christ, and the example of those Christians who have gone before us, just as Paul called the church in Philippi to do! We are called to live lives so transformed by the Spirit that others want to know what makes the difference in our lives. We are called to empower others to join us in our ministries, showing them how to be teachers, trustees, shut-in visitors, peacemakers, caretakers, nursery workers, leaders…disciples of Jesus Christ! We are called to bear fruit that contains seeds that will produce more fruit! We are called to be kumquats and not roses, and to produce fruit with seeds, and not just flowers that wither! Will the kumquats please stand up?
1 Christian Schwarz, Color Your World with Natural Church Development: Experiencing all that God has designed you to be (St. Charles, IL: ChurchSmart Resources, 2005), 98.
(This sermon was a joint effort by Kate Nicol at Clark Memorial UMC, and David Nicol at Buxton and Elm Street UMCs)
There’s a significant difference between Roses and Kumquat. Roses are sweet smelling, and kumquats are a small, oval citrus from East Asia. While both roses and kumquats are often edible, and both have thorny stems, there is a major difference—Roses are flowers, beautiful, but not self-reproducing as such; kumquats are seed-bearing fruit.
Most folks cultivate rose-bushes for their beautiful flowers, but most folks cultivate kumquat bushes for the fruit. Roses are beautiful, but require constant maintenance and outside energy to maintain; kumquats are often cultivated like other citrus, but within each and every kumquat are seeds…seeds that can, and given the right environment, will grow, producing more kumquats!
Fruit produces seeds, and seeds produce fruit in a continually self-reproducing cycle. If we are to unleash the power of all by itself growth we need to produce sustainable ministries. Sustainable ministries are ministries that produce fruit not flowers. Flowers like the Roses need outside care, but once they die there is nothing left. Fruit contains the source of its own reproduction the seeds. When we look at the ministries of our Church we must ask ourselves: Does this ministry produce Kumquats or Roses, Fruit or Flowers? If all a ministry produces are flowers it’s time to change what we’re doing, or abandon it all together, because that ministry is life draining, and not life sustaining.
When we develop ministries, we need to be sure they produce fruit, not just flowers. According to Natural Church Development theory, we need to do three main things to assess whether our ministries are bearing fruit. First, we need to check every fruit for seeds. Second, we need to use every opportunity to train others. Third, leaders need to remember not to solve people’s problems, but to help people solve their problems on their own… All of these are vital to sustainable ministry!
Christian Schwarz, the theological mind behind Natural Church Development has this to say about checking fruit for seeds: “The less you follow the natural dynamics [of Natural Church Development], the greater the likelihood that the ‘fruit’ that you produce won’t have any bearing on the maintenance of your ministry. You might produce wonderful flowers, but when they begin to wilt you will be unable to find seeds in them.”1 In Churches we to often spend time pushing to sustain ministries that are life draining. Sometimes this happens because we are stuck in a rut and we cannot find our way out. Talking about doing something new is scary, it might not produce the results we have come to expect. This type of thinking most often occurs around fundraisers. We would rather go with the tried and true, rather than seek out new ways to create life sustaining ministries that produce all by itself growth, rather then life draining, but institutional maintaining ministries that provide more comfort then anything else.
Along with checking every fruit for seeds, we need to become adept at using every opportunity to train others. When the church is healthy, and functioning as it should, disciples beget disciples, teachers beget leaders, financial whizzes beget financial whizzes, leaders beget leaders, and so on. Training leaders by inviting people into leadership seems almost radical, especially when we take a close look at how we operate as a church. Only those who are willing to sacrifice life and limb, and the possibility of being expected to do everything are brave enough to volunteer, and only those who do it as it has always been done are really let into the inner power structure. But that is not the way God intended us to operate!
It is no wonder that few of us are as bold as the Apostle Paul to encourage others to follow our example! But, that is what God calls us to do. We are called to set an example in by how we live within the church, and in our personal lives. Our citizenship is in heaven. It is not of this world, let alone this country. If we have come to believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the world’s redeemer, our lives are to be examples of what God can do when we cease resisting His love and grace. When this happens we become better disciple-makers. We make disciples by living as disciples, and we make leaders within the church by inviting people into leadership, asking them to share leadership with us, and so producing fruit that contains the seeds that will make for more fruit!
Paul also gives us an example of how “not to solve other people’s problems.” Paul could easily have given the church in Philippi detailed instructions on how to live as Christians. Instead, he did something radical. In Philippians 3:17, Paul writes, “Join together in following my example, brothers and sisters, and just as you have us as a model, keep your yes on those who live as we do.” Paul set up a system that was both sustainable and natural! Disciple-making didn’t happen by sending people to a disciple training course, but in everyday life. Leader-making didn’t happen by sending folks to seminary or lay-speaking classes (as good as those things are), but by earning how to follow the example of other leaders!
We, in this place, are called to follow the example of Christ, and the example of those Christians who have gone before us, just as Paul called the church in Philippi to do! We are called to live lives so transformed by the Spirit that others want to know what makes the difference in our lives. We are called to empower others to join us in our ministries, showing them how to be teachers, trustees, shut-in visitors, peacemakers, caretakers, nursery workers, leaders…disciples of Jesus Christ! We are called to bear fruit that contains seeds that will produce more fruit! We are called to be kumquats and not roses, and to produce fruit with seeds, and not just flowers that wither! Will the kumquats please stand up?
1 Christian Schwarz, Color Your World with Natural Church Development: Experiencing all that God has designed you to be (St. Charles, IL: ChurchSmart Resources, 2005), 98.
posted by Rev. David Nicol at 11:00 AM
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