Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Rector's Study April 2008

From the Rector's Study ~

A season of new and renewed life is upon us, here at ECR and for Christians all around us and around the world. We’re energized, looking forward to a horizon drawing nearer. ECR’s leadership is well engaged in the renewal of our campus in order to manifest the Lord’s own welcome to those passing by and pulling in. New energy is coming in. When more people are able to park here and join in the worship and fellowship of our community, new energy will add itself to ECR all the more. It will be sure sign that our witness is growing, our effect upon the world around us for good and for God is growing.

New life is renewing us here, and we are renewing ECR for the present and for the future good of our families, friends, neighbors, and for those whom we don’t even know, but who someday will feel the faith and the love that we are growing here today. I am personally committed to seeing that ECR becomes a major Episcopalian witness at the center of Austin, in the heart of some of the most thriving neighborhoods of the city. I know that ECR’s leadership is committed, as well. I am committed to realizing this vision.


“Belief in the Christlike God has wide-ranging implications for the believer’s personal lifestyle and the style of society that she or he thinks is worth striving for.” So writes the late John V. Taylor in his book The Christlike God. Continuing, “The worshippers of a God who is essentially and eternally Self-Giver, Self-Given, and In-othered are committed to much rigorous re-assessment and self-examination.” Our faith in God who is revealed most intimately and fully in Christ Jesus calls for much from us. Our honesty about our values, our commitment to our principles, and our surrender not only to our faith in God but to God’s faith in us, especially when these differ widely from the values, principles, and secular idolatry at work in the world around us, are the building blocks and mortar of the Kingdom of God in our time. As we continue to respond to the implications of our faith in God, I must also respond in a personal way.
Over the last year, a renewed or new sense of vocation has emerged for me, and to say ‘No’ to this call would be a spiritual wrong. The Diocese of Texas is electing a bishop-coadjutor in May, and I will be a nominee. The bishop-coadjutor will work with our diocesan bishop, the Rt. Rev. Don Wimberly until he retires in June of 2009, then will become his successor as new diocesan bishop. It has been important for me to be sure that I respond to a true vocation and not to a personal ambition or some other lesser impulse. I have learned that, left to my own decisions, I have no desire to try to become or to be bishop. I could never fill such a role on my own. I could, instead be happy and energized right here with ECR for the rest of my vocational life, sharing in the wonderful present and amazing future that are opening up for us now. But I also must respond to what I somehow know I am called to do. In this and this alone, I have that peace that tells me this is the right path.

The practical likelihood is that I shall not be elected; but God’s will is still a mystery. And I am to be a nominee then I must aim to be elected. Should I not be elected, then I’m here as always, and committed to our mission and ministry. Should I be elected, then ECR will have a friend in the diocesan bishop unlike every before! Either way, ECR remains my concern, for the good of the parish and for the good of the diocese.

I ask your prayers, and I thank you for the support that many of you have already shown. Our main focus must remain on the ministry and mission of the parish, the diocese, and the Church. Everything is means to achieving these most holy goals. God gives us this season of new and renewed life. And what comes in here to ECR, is not only new energy in new folks; it is God’s very self, in the Christlike people of you and me.

God’s Peace. Jim +

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