A PICTURE OF WHAT WE INTEND TO BE HERE AT THE FARMHOUSE:
“We proclaim that life is a gift — that the Divine breath of grace and love has been with us since our first breath. And we proclaim that everyone, including us, can be at the table — for we are sharers of this same gift.
To participate in the great retelling of the world, we embrace the journey of selflessness. Our path is one of descent: To give up our rights for the sake of our neighbors. We do not seek to be served, but to serve. We do not live and make decisions based on what we want, but what is best for our interdependent well-being with one another. We do not use others as objects for our gain, but we yearn to be in such relationships that nothing can stay the same.
We gladly pursue the good of one another.
We humbly recognize that we can keep learning, that we can keep pursuing change, and that we can become the only version of ourselves that we need to be. Our movement, our telos, is towards the center of Divine fullness.
Therefore, we promise to do no harm — to resist evil and injustice in whatever forms they present themselves among us and to renounce all forms of brokenness, all measures of unhealth, and all ways that do not reflect the Divine. We promise to do all the good we can — to bring peace and wholeness. To make God’s dream for the world real in this place. We promise to follow the way of Messiah — to learn of his nature and enact that reality more and more in everything we do.
We believe we are unfolding as human beings and building a better world — that our growth will bring forth transformation, that our creativity will bring forth authenticity, and that our roots will make the crucified love of Messiah expose what is possible. And we believe this kind of community begins by being real with each other — in our diversity, pursing unity; in our difference, pursuing integration; and in our wounds, pursuing healing. We yearn to let our scars tell our story, we embrace darkness so that we can move through it, and we acknowledge that we are better when we work together, for it is the Triune dance of self- transcendent love.
We desire to be present together. We desire to participate in sacred belonging as neighbors. And we desire to share our lives and gifts — as Adonai has been generous to us, we hope to share that irrational generosity with the world around us.
We profess that all creatures, even all of creation, are sacred — and we seek to uphold their life; for the smallest denomination of health is the health of all things, together.
We do not seek to get our way, but to give ourselves to the flourishing of all.And we believe this happens when we are broken and poured for the healing of the world.
We believe a healthy rural place, with a reimagined church, will put a dent in changing the world.We, therefore, exist to foster this health in our place through everything we do.
That our lives, our relationships, our families, our community, our social systems, our economy, our culture, and our ecosystem will be all it is created to be, that we will tell a different story in this humanity project, and that all things will continue on the holy adventure of being put back together again. May we love ourselves, our neighbors, and the God of the universe with every cell in our being — and may the world never be the same because we belong together in community, in Koinonia, such as this. ”
