A New Anglican Province is Born with Great Unity

-
I know there's been a lot written about this already, but I wanted to relate my personal perspective on the events going on.

For me, this has been a witness of unity among different bodies of Christians that is rarely seen. I was fortunate to have been able to participate in that. The unity I saw was a very practical example of working together on specific tasks. To me, it's a model of how unity among Christians can be worked out.

It all began a couple weeks ago when I was asked to help coordinate the parking logistics for the event on December 3rd. From the very beginning, I was put in contact with someone from a different Anglican church who helped guide and advise me in this role. Our communication was very smooth and open from the beginning. I then came into contact with the Facilities Manager for the Wheaton Evangelical Free Church, which was hosting the event at their church building. Again, working with this person from a different church presented no problems, no underlying currents of disunity that I could perceive.

Then came the evening of the event. When I arrived, which was over 1 1/2 hours early, there were already a tremendous amount of people there and the parking lot looked pretty full to me. I began to get nervous and thought we should start directing the incoming cars earlier than planned. This is where the unity really began to show for me. I was eventually directed to the offices of the WEFC and talked to someone in the office about trying to start the parking direction earlier than planned. Well, this very nice gentleman stopped what he was doing and walked back to the foyer with me to personally connect me with the Facility Manager whom I'd never seen in person. On the way from the office to the foyer, I thanked this person for allowing us to use their facilities for the service. This person (I have no idea if he was a pastor of the church or what his role is) expressed in the most generous way possible that it was their privaledge and that they felt honored to be a part in what was happening. He genuinely seemed enthusiastic on our behalf. We were able to have a wonderful little conversation about inter-denominational unity and working together. He said, "It's about time and I'm so glad for what's happening here to promote that!" It felt really good to hear those common sentiments expressed between us.

Well, I managed to get all the volunteers gathered. There were about 6 or 7 of us and we were from at least 2 different local Anglican congregations. We then were briefed by the Facilities Manager of WEFC. In no time at all, we were working together very smoothly as a team - even though we were from 3 different congregations from 2 different denominations. Again, nothing too big, but (to me, at least) very illustrative of what can and is happening in the church.

So there I was out in the parking lot directing traffic. It was getting close to the start time of the service when I got to witness more expressions of unity. One of the cars stopped and rolled down their window. Inside was a sweet little old lady who was here for a seperate event taking place at the same time...

"Hi, we're here for the prayer meeting, is there any parking left?"

"Oh, umm, I'm doing parking for the Anglican thing tonight, but I think there's still some spots in the back."

"Well, we're praying for you guys tonight."

Wow! I was blown away by that. Here was this church that we have no relation to letting us use their facilities, taking up all their parking spots, and they were here to pray for us! It felt like all denominational bounderies were becoming rather thin at that moment.

On the way inside to the service, I mentioned this to Kevin (the Facilities Manager) and he said the pastor of the church has been talking this event up for several weeks now and was really excited about it. Wow!

Then, I go into the service, which has already started at this point. The sanctuary is packed with almost 1000 people from all over the country coming together to worship. On stage is the director of the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College. Bishop Duncan later says that all the different groups unanimously approved all the articles of the constitution. This unanaminaty allowed the constitution to go from "draft" to "provisional." This allowed us to actually be a functioning new church and actually come into being! Wow! The power of unity.

I believe this unity is a wonderful witness to the world of what the church is supposed to be like and the more we can exercise it, the more attractive it will be for those not in the church. But this unity is also powerful for me. Being in the service, watching grizzled old men, young mothers, business professionals, children, Africans, Americans, Asians all worshipping together, all taking it in, all declaring their common belief really does my soul good. It tells me that I'm not alone in this world. I'm really not crazy for believing in God. This really is good and right and true. It's just really re-affirming to me.

I pray that this new Anglican Province will do good not only for me and others like me, but for the country as a whole. I believe it will.
-