Ms. Crumbliss, my beloved high school history teacher, first introduced me to Studs Terkel, one of America’s best-known oral historians. Terkel’s long and twisting career in radio and writing found focus in the mid-1960s as he published his first book of oral interviews and stories, Division Street America, which chronicled the thoughts, feelings, and stories of seventy disparate people living in Chicago. From Division Street America’s publication until Terkel’s death in 2008, he would spend 40 years listening to the stories of Americans, from across all political, economic, cultural, religious, and educational spectrums, trying to capture people’s stories and, in turn, the larger story of America. Terkel was once quoted as saying, “People are hungry for stories. It is part of our very being. Storytelling is a form of history, of immortality, too. It goes from one generation to another.
“Over the next year, CBFGA is going to be telling stories. Our theme for the coming year is “God’s Story, Our Story, Your Story.” Each of us has a story: a story of life, love, faith, discipleship, belonging, and grace. But our individual stories will indeed die with us if they do not find a home in a broader communal story. The congregational partners that make up the CBFGA each have stories, but together those stories form “our story,” the larger story of the work, partnership, and connection of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of Georgia. Our collective story is situated in the broader, grander story of God’s redemptive, reconciling Good News for the world.
You will see the focus on story emerge in several ways over this next year. First, the staff and I are committed to telling YOUR story to the broader CBFGA family. When we are at our best, we connect the many congregational partners around our state to each other and to God’s bigger work in our state and world. When CBFGA hosts events or when we are on the road, we hope to capture some of your story about the good work God is doing in your communities, churches, and beyond, and then share those stories with our Fellowship.
Second, our communications, publications, and methods will be changing. In 2023, Visions will be published three times instead of its previous quarterly time frame. These issues will also move away from the predominant “advertising” of upcoming events that often fill these pages. Instead, we hope to focus on telling the story of congregations and individuals in our state and beyond who are living into God’s story in their very communities. While we will try our absolute best to find these good stories of faithful discipleship, missional service, and life-giving fellowship, we need your help! When your congregation engages in this kind of work and witness in our world, let us know. We value the chance to tell your story to our Fellowship.
Third, our monthly email, Re-Visions, will become our primary way to communicate time-sensitive information such as upcoming retreats, mission opportunities, disaster response possibilities, and registration or engagement for events. If you do not receive Re-Visions, go to our website, www.cbfga.org, and sign up now so you will not miss any of the good programming planned for 2023 and beyond.
Finally, we are putting much of our communications energy into our social media work. If you do not follow us on Facebook or Instagram, connect with us right away: Facebook —@CBFGA, Instagram — @cbfofga. Both platforms are becoming essential ways for us to tell the story of CBFGA and the stories of our partners.
Frederick Buechner wrote in Beyond Words: Daily Readings in the ABCs of Faith, “It is absolutely crucial to keep in constant touch with what is going on in your own life’s story and to pay close attention to what is going on in the stories of others’ lives. If God is present anywhere, it is in those stories that God is present. If God is not present in those stories, then you might as well give up the whole business.
“Stories matter. Your story matters. Our story matters. God’s story matters. As we begin a new year in our lives, in our churches, in our fellowship, may we continue to tell the old, old story of Jesus and his love.