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After a bit of a traveling frenzy and a family health emergency, I've been back at work about a week and a half now. No longer do I need credentials to get to my work space. The docket controlling my time isn't found on PC-Biz. Affinity groups are no longer seeking my attention. Instead, this is what was waiting for me upon my return:

• Families in distress, either due to medical emergency, job loss, or ongoing situations
• Three letters: VBS!
• Staff members who wanted to talk about such theologically nuanced issues as painting bathrooms and waxing floors.
• Two funerals, and a wedding -- all in the same week!
• Planning for the ice cream social.
• Casting this November's dinner theater.
  
• Discussing the Christmas mission project
  
• Studying upcoming sermon texts.
  

If, as Tip O'Neill is reported to have said, "all politics is local," then these are the top issues confronting my congregation in the next sixty to ninety days. This is where Jesus is calling me to get into the boat. And I guess that means, as important as General Assembly is to our church, we really need to keep our eyes on the issues at home. That does not mean the broader issues of the church are any less important. But it does suggest that the strength of our denomination is not at the top of the structure, but at its base. For it is from congregations that the church learns how to push forward. We must rise every day, with the words of the doxology on our lips and reminder that the "Great Ends of the Church" are a mandate for local and global mission. The Great Ends of the Church are, by the way:

• The proclamation of the gospel for the salvation of humankind.
• The shelter, nurture, and spiritual fellowship of the children of God.
  
• The maintenance of divine worship.
  
• The preservation of the truth.
  
• The promotion of social righteousness. And,
• The exhibition of the Kingdom of Heaven to the world.

Let's strengthen the base.