Dear Epiphany,

Ten years ago, this church met in my backyard as a bible study with a handful of people, literally who we could gather from our block. Not long after that, we were gathering on Sunday afternoons at the King Street Pub, what is now the Bank Bar until the door opened up for us to meet where we are now on the corner of Monmouth and Sussex. A lot has changed since then, but one thing has remained remarkably consistent: by the grace of God, we have been given a real place in the life of Gloucester City.

Over the years, I have watched people come to Jesus for the first time, return to faith after decades away, and find a church home after experiencing real hurt in religious settings. I have watched friendships form, families get carried through hard seasons, people take risks in faith, and ordinary Christians discover that God really can use them.

Along the way, some things have become distinctly Epiphany.

We serve like crazy. There are seasons when we fed around 80 people a day for weeks and then finished the whole thing with a huge block party. We regularly give away groceries, help families in ways knowbody knows, support our local schools, and try to be the kind of church whose neighbors would actually notice if we disappeared.

We also really expect the Holy Spirit to move. We pray for healing. We make room for prophecy. We listen when people share dreams, impressions, and words they believe God may be giving them. We tell the stories when people experience healing or when God meets someone in a way they cannot easily explain. We are grounded deeply in Scripture and, at the same time, open to the living presence and power of the Holy Spirit.

We have also tried to keep our doors and our hearts wide open. You do not have to already think like us, live like us, understand all our theology, or have your life cleaned up before you can belong and be loved here We want to make room for seekers, skeptics, new believers, people returning to faith, and people whose stories are complicated. We want to love people even when they do not agree with us.

But openness is not the same thing as aimlessness.

Jesus welcomes us as we are, and then he calls us to follow him. That means all of us still have growing to do. We are learning to submit our lives more fully to the Word of God, to become more generous, more holy, more forgiving, more relationally healthy, and more willing to serve. We are learning to listen to the Spirit and obey him. We are learning, slowly and imperfectly, to become disciples.

That combination matters deeply to me: a wide-open heart and a serious commitment to discipleship.

And that is one of the reasons clarity matters.

When you open your heart wide, your world gets wonderfully big. There should always be room around Epiphany for neighbors, friends, seekers, skeptics, people healing from church hurt, and people who may never believe exactly what we believe. I do not need a membership list to tell me who I am called to love. Jesus has already made that clear.

But a church also has to know who is actually walking together in the mission.

Who is saying, “This is my church family”? Who is seeking to follow Jesus here, be present, serve, give, forgive, grow, and use what God has given them for the good of others? Who is not simply part of our wider world, but part of the smaller circle of people who are deliberately helping us make disciples and become a family together for the good of Gloucester City and beyond?

That is what covenant membership is meant to make clear.

For years, we practiced a fairly traditional “once and done” model of membership. Over time, the leaders of our congregation became convinced that it did not quite fit the reality of life. People change. Seasons change. Relationships deepen, become strained, heal, and sometimes need repair. People step forward, step back, wander, return, and grow.

So last year we began a different practice, and this October will be our second season of Covenant Renewal. (Please take the time to fill out your covenant renewal form here.) Just like other organizations I’m apart of, I am asked renew my commitment, to give, show up and align myself with (such as the Conservative Congregationalist Christian Conference which holds my credentials for ordained ministry), we have moved to a yearly covenant renewal model of church membership.

The goal is not control. The goal is clarity.

I would rather someone ask hard questions, tell me where we have gotten something wrong, or say they are not ready to renew than make a commitment they do not really mean. Covenant should be honest. It should make room for conversation. It should help us know who is really saying, “I am here, and I want to keep walking with you.”

The question I want hanging over this month comes from an unusual moment in 2 Kings 10:15. Jehu asks Jehonadab, “Is your heart right, as my heart is with your heart?” and then says, “If it is, give me your hand.”

I am borrowing the question, not everything about Jehu.

Is your heart with us?

I am not asking that because Epiphany is perfect. After ten years, I know better than anybody that we are not. I am asking whether, through the ups and downs, we are willing to keep following Jesus together.

When we get something wrong, will we make room to talk about it? When we sin against one another, will we repent and forgive? When faith is weak, will we let someone else carry us for a while? Will we allow ourselves to be known, challenged, encouraged, and served? Will we recognize that we need the body of Christ not just as an idea, but in actual people, actual relationships, and an actual local church?

That is what we are going to wrestle with together this October.

On October 4, we will begin with Ephesians 4:1–16 and talk about authority in the church. Jesus is the head of his church, and every form of authority among us exists under him. Elders lead and equip, deacons serve, and the saints themselves carry real responsibility for the life and ministry of the body. Especially for those who have experienced unhealthy spiritual authority, we need to understand the difference between biblical leadership and control.

On October 11, we will turn to 1 Corinthians 12:4–27 and talk about the gifts of the Spirit. The Spirit gives gifts for the common good, which means what God gives me is not meant to end with me. A Spirit-filled church cannot simply be a church where people experience God; it must also be a church where people use what the Spirit gives them to strengthen, encourage, and serve one another.

On October 18, we will talk about why we need the church at all and what happens when belonging becomes difficult. Colossians 3:12–16 gives us wonderfully realistic language: bear with one another, forgive one another, teach one another, love one another. The New Testament does not imagine a conflict-free church, and neither should we. I especially want to make room that Sunday to talk honestly about church hurt, disappointment, forgiveness, and what it looks like to pursue repair without pretending that pain did not happen.

Then on October 25, Covenant Renewal Sunday, we will come to Romans 12:1–13 and ask what all of this looks like in practice. In view of the mercy of God, are we willing again to offer ourselves to Jesus and to one another?

At Epiphany, we have tried to make that concrete through five simple commitments: to follow Jesus, grow in generosity, gather on Sundays, be relationally connected, and have a specific area of service. None of those things earns the love of God. None of them makes someone more saved. They simply help us describe, in practical terms, what it looks like to participate in this particular church family.

My hope for this series, This Is Us: What It Means to Be the Church, is that it gives us a chance to celebrate what God has built among us without pretending we have arrived. I want us to thank God for a church that serves our city, expects the Holy Spirit to move, opens its arms wide, and still takes discipleship seriously. I also want us to be honest about the places where we still need to grow.

And then, at the end of the month, I want us to be able to answer one simple question with integrity:

Is your heart with us?

If it is, give us your hand.

We have more walking to do together.

— Pastor Joe