Mother-daughter team speaks at joint worship

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More than 6,500 Mennonites filled Nationwide Arena (July 2) for the joint adult and youth worship at Convention 2009 to focus on "Centered in the Spirit." Mother-daughter team June Alliman Yoder and Mandy Yoder Schrock used four images to talk about the relationship of the human spirit and the Holy Spirit.














June Alliman Yoder on the screen at Nationwide Arena for joint worship on July 2. Photo by Everett J. Thomas.

The first image, a relief pitcher, describes an emphasis on human ability. "You only need a relief pitcher if things go badly," Yoder Schrock said.

The second image, an Amish bench, describes a process in which Amish ministers decide only minutes before the sermon who will deliver the message. This approach attempts to leave everything up to the Holy Spirit, Alliman Yoder said.

For the third image, Yoder Schrock described the EPR paradox (named for physicists Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen) as two particles correlated at birth that, for example, spin the same direction at the same time, even if they are a million miles apart. "There's some form of communication in the universe that we don't understand," she said. And this reflects a kind of partnership that exists between humans and the Spirit.

The fourth image is the GPS, in which a satellite in the heavens sends signals to a receiver on earth. Humans have the choice of responding to the signal, Alliman Yoder said, and when they make a wrong choice, the GPS (or Holy Spirit) responds with, "Recalculating."
"The way we relate to the Holy Spirit is a collaborative affair," said Yoder Schrock.

Alliman Yoder asked, "What if the Spirit needs you?" She looked at the story in Matthew in which Jesus told his followers to pray to the Lord of the harvest to send workers into the harvest and Paul's statement in 1 Corinthians that he planted the seed and Apollos watered, but the Lord gives the increase. "The Spirit cannot do its help without our help," she said.

Yoder Schrock quoted Desmond Tutu: "The human being is the sanctuary of the Holy Spirit."

Ultimately, they said, the goal is to be centered in the Spirit. Both speakers named examples of people who live centered in the Spirit.

About 180 children from the children's convention performed several songs, and a youth and adult choir also performed two pieces.

An was taken to support the education of pastors at Iglesia Evangelica Menonita in Fort Meyers, Fla.

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