As the Bishop of the Arctic, part of my work is to help the church be a people of positive influence within society. Sometimes we forget who we are, where we came from and why we are here. In that, my job is to help people remember. I am to help learn the story and remember it. To recall the ancient story of God’s People while considering our Arctic Diocese’s own story of missionaries and catechists who worked together to lay the foundation that formed the corporation called the Diocese of the Arctic. Legally, our corporation is called “The Bishop of the Arctic”, but the Bishop of the Arctic is not a person, it is a people who have worked together to bring the Good News of Jesus Christ across the North.
As the one who holds the office of Diocesan Bishop, I am a member of the team. I am sometimes the watchman who sounds the alarm. I am sometimes the protector that closes the door to erroneous doctrines entering into our Arctic family. But most excitedly I am part of the team that God is raising up for such a time as this.
Jesus built a team and sent them two by two. After His resurrection, Jesus sent the Holy Spirit who encouraged Jesus’ followers to meet in homes and to help each other. As we remember our past we remember that in the Arctic, our missionaries included and encouraged Arctic peoples to be evangelists and disciple makers amongst their own people. Eighty years later, the Arctic was training and ordaining more Arctic clergy and recruited fewer from outside the diocese. But we did not train enough replacements for the 53 or more clergy who have died or retired in the past decades. So, part of remembering our roots – and honouring the memory of our early Inuit and First Nations clergy and catechists – means going back to pick up where we left off. Today we are diligently working to train and educate our congregations, their leaders , and the next generation of clergy.
In seeking to guide our diocese into the future the bishop’s ministry includes facing many difficulties. My time as bishop has meant leading the diocese through a time of much anger, confusion, and apathy. There is anger about Residential schools which tore families apart. People need to speak out about the trauma they experienced being ripped away from their family, community, and way of life. The idea of truth and reconciliation is good, but true reconciliation will take time. The truth of abuses coming to light is difficult to deal with. Often southern stories spill into the Arctic and our 49 communities are so spread out that we cannot gather to hear and understand our own story.
There is also much confusion caused by the many southern leaders in our denomination who have departed from the faith. They are dominating the news and especially our National Church newspaper, and their communications are creating much concern in our people. Many in the south are confused by this mixed-message and have lost trust in the church. Satan is the author of confusion and even though we renounced Satan in baptism he constantly tries creeps back into our lives through the doors of anger, mistrust, doubt and apathy.
There is no shortage of bad news, and though we are more “connected” with technology, people are more alone than ever before. What we need is the Good News, like the good news that God said he will never leave us.
This is when we must recall the ancient story of God’s People, and then remember our own story where many people from many communities, different people with different dialects and languages and traditions came together, united in evangelism and discipleship.
Yes, there are difficulties, and yes Satan often attacks. But I ignore that defeated fallen angel. Rather than fearfully meditating on Satan’s accusations that make sense in the world’s wisdom, I turn my focus on Jesus. I meditate on all of the Bible’s promises. I put faith into action by trusting that God is faithful. I take Him at His Word, expecting God’s promises to come to fruition.
How often do we listen to the devil’s lies and then turn around and echo the devil’s destructive and cursing words?
Words matter. God created with words, speaking the whole creation into being out of nothing. Do we believe God’s promises? Will we speak them over our families, over our churches, over our diocese, and over our communities? Or, out of a place of anger, mistrust, doubt, or apathy, will we instead echo the devil’s lies, using words that divide, distract, and keep us from believing that God will help us accomplish the work He has given us to do. This is not the ‘power of positive thinking’, it is the power of believing in God’s promises!
All hell may rise up against me (and sometimes it feels like it does), but God says that He will never leave nor forsake me or any Christian. The devil may say we do not deserve salvation. He may remind us of past sins and present failures and try to convince us of the hopelessness of our past actions, but this I have learned: athough the devil may persecute me declaring my unworthiness, I remember how God takes all those negatives and nailed them to the cross of Jesus.
This is the old, old story that we must remember. And then we need to remember our own story. Across our diocese, and in my life, and I’m sure in your life too, God is mercifully taking human failures and working things together for the good
of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28).
This is the good news: the good news that Jesus did not do this just for me but for you too and not just for every Christian Jesus did this for every human. Jesus died so that we could be forgiven. Jesus rose to give us life, ABUNDANT LIFE. People in the Arctic and people everywhere need hope. We all need the abundant life Jesus promised us in John 10. The thief has come to steal, kill and destroy, but I have come to give you life, abundant life.
Friends, Jesus has given me a heart for the ministry of reconciliation. Jesus has called me to introduce people to Jesus and to walk with them as they learn the unconditional agape love of Jesus. I know life is difficult. I know that we were all born in the midst of a spiritual battle. I know Satan is a real adversary. But I know Jesus has defeated Satan and every evil spirit. I also know that until the day of judgment when Satan and the evil spirit are cast into utter darkness that they still have the power of suggestion, the power to influence. Therefore, we the church must exercise greater influence.
To develop this greater influence, we need to know God’s will and plan. God wants to renovate our minds, to help us to think differently by learning to think as God thinks. God promises to do this by the Holy Spirit coming into our beings so that our human spirit, the part that hungers for God, may be turned on to the full LIFE which Jesus gives. Jesus told us our part is to seek Him and His Kingdom with all our being. God’s part is to come to live in us and empower our human spirit so it becomes like a generator fuelled by the Holy Spirit. God comes to lives in us when we ask Jesus to forgive us and invite Jesus into our lives so that our souls, minds, and body are begin to be led by our renewed human spirit, which after Jesus comes in we begin to live in harmony with God the Holy Spirit, God The Word (Jesus) and with God The Father. With the Holy Trinity we are given life to live according to God’s will.
It is crucial that the modern-day church understand what Jesus accomplished by His passion so that His Kingdom may come into us. Only then can we know His will and see it accomplished through us. Yes there is bad news, yes there are times any one of us might be angry, or doubtful, or feeling like nothing we do will succeed. But remember this is a fickle world. It is our nature to be negative, but God wants to take the negatives and turn them into positives. Like true reconciliation, the renewing of our minds after salvation takes time, just like renovating a building (and renovations always seems to take longer than originally planned!). But if we are willing God will renovate us.
The church is both organism and organization. The organism is imperfect and not completely operating under the governance of Kingdom of God. As long as this is true, we will not have the influence God desires for us to bring His Good News to those around us. We’re not looking for power, but as those who remember the story, and who remember our own story of working together for the glory of God, we’re seeking only for opportunities to keep telling that old, old story of Jesus and His love that can transform every life and give it an eternal purpose.
Inspired by Jesus’ prayer in John 17, I pray that the church will learn once more to work together as a team in the trenches of life to bring about true social change, to make our churches into hospitals for the healing of sinners, and as places of refuge for those feeling worthless and unable to continue. I know one person alone cannot do much – certainly, even a bishop is no good working alone. But, as I remember our story, I know that we can do much when we are united in Christ, bound together in the Spirit, and following the Will of God the Father, for with God all things are possible!
Bishop David Parsons