Sunday Net Roundup

Bishop Timothy Cravens of the ICCC

Later in the week I will have a few photos from the Ozarks and a couple of devotional pieces on the Assumption, but today I have a few pieces from around the internet.

First, from Thoughts at Large from a Bishop at Large, an excellent sermon from last Sunday by Bishop Timothy on being a living tabernacle.  Here's a snippet:

Through the power of the Spirit, and by the indwelling of Christ, we are then “rooted and grounded in love”.  We cannot hope to have any lasting fruits of our faith if we are not deeply rooted and grounded.  Too many Christians go about, their actions goofy and ungrounded, because they have not taken the time to pray, the time to be still and know that God is God, the time to allow the love of God root them and ground them.  It is only as we experience this rooting and grounding in love that our actions can begin to blossom forth, and bear witness to the love of God for a sinful and suffering world.

Continue reading.

 At Rumney Marsh Ruminations, there are two pieces by Bishop David on polity and being a small church.

In Thinking Small, he writes:

What I like about the small church is that we are like mom-and-pop markets. Our communities are small; our programs are smaller and may not include everything that everyone could possibly want or need.   But, everybody knows everybody else's name—we are able to know each other well enough to love each other as Jesus commanded us.

 In a second piece taken from the Rumney Marsh website, titled A Fellowship Called Rumney Marsh, he writes: 

Originally a local church was a very small "grouping" of a single parish [in the city] and its missions [on the outskirts of town]. Each local church had its own overseer—επίσκοπος [which some translate bishop]—who was responsible to pastor the members of this local flock. This bishop would be assisted by deacons [and in some cases by priests/presbyters].

According to this understanding of Church polity (governance), many, many local churches existed throughout the Catholic (Universal) Church. Each local church was united under a local bishop as the Universal Church was united under the headship of Jesus Christ. 

This is the model—with some refinements appropriate to the modern age—that the Rumney Marsh Fellowship seeks to recreate. The current Rumney Marsh Fellowship sees itself as a "local church" under the pastoral care of our bishop who resides in Chelsea, Massachusetts. Our parish and its mission are located within a day's drive of each other. Unlike the model, however, we also have two missionary priests serving in "far away places" by the ancient standard—although not that far away by modern reckoning.