Eleven Theses for 2011

At Sunday's Reformation Day service these were this year's theses:

Theses 10/30/11

1. The quality of a church is not defined by its number of members or financial status but by its faithfulness.
2. We are called to have faith and grant ultimate  authority to Jesus Christ, and no other power, civil or ecclesiastical, church or state. 
3. Our obedience is to the God who created us.
4. We have a specific call to live out in this specific place: our location, our context  is a call, not a circumstance. 
5. We have been given all that is necessary to live out our call. 
6. Our building is a means to the end of mission, not an end unto itself.
7. We are committed to reclaim, renew and restore this  building as we renew and restore our mission, our ministry, our witness...and ourselves. 
8. The church has too often been silent as economic systems and theories have been accepted as if they were divinely created, God determined and worthy of worship. We have accepted our systems as the way things are and will be without asking with God’s help, what could be?
9. As the greatest commanment is to love our neighbor as ourselves, we must live that out in our personal, church and political life. We cannot leave our children a future without hope. 
10. The doors of this church are and always will be open and be a place of welcome  to people of every ethnic, cultural, and national origin, those who are and are not citizens, people of different economic circumstances and sexual orientations, differing abilities.  All who would be partners are welcome.
11. At this church, love is love and marriage is marriage. 

We are West-Park. Here we stand. We can do no other. 

For last years' theses go to  (http://west-parkpress.blogspot.com/2010/11/on-steps-1018-first-day.html)