daniel's ordination

May 28, 2006 (See photos) Charge to the Candidate By Patti English Grace and peace to you my brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus from the community of faith gathered at Fredericksburg Baptist Church. Thank you for inviting me to be a part of this service at College Park Baptist Church. It is my privilege to be with you tonight and to celebrate this sacred experience in the life of this church and in the life of one of the servants of God. I have known Daniel Ingram for the past 18 years and it has been a joy to journey with him at some important points in his journey. Daniel was completing his seventh grade year of Middle School when I was called to serve in ministry in Virginia. He has allowed me and many others from Fredericksburg Baptist Church to be a part of helping to nurture him in the faith, and he has blessed our lives as we have grown in faith together. As an adolescent, Daniel was one of those extremely involved youth who was always present for every study, activity, mission trip, camp, and conversation. Daniel was one of those youth who constantly asked deep and theologically challenging questions. I loved the ways he and his brother Christopher and their peers challenged me to think, question and grow as we studied together. When Daniel was nearing the completion of his college education at Virginia Tech, he began sharing with me the sense of calling with which he was struggling and he began exploring the possibilities of seminary education and serving in ministry. As I look around this sanctuary and see Tim Brock, I recognize that Daniel also shared with others who helped guide him in the decisions he faced at that time. Those conversations and the opportunities for me to hear about some of the important touchstones in Daniel’s faith experience allowed me to participate in informed praying for his continued growth, spiritual maturation, and exploration of God’s call to him. A few years later as I began Doctoral studies at Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond, Daniel was in the first course in which I enrolled. It had been a long time since I had been in a seminary classroom as a student and even with the sense of excitement with which I began the course, I confess to feeling a little anxious about it too. As the classroom began filling up on that first day of class, Daniel Ingram walked into the classroom and sat down beside me. Our professor, Dan Bagby had us introduce the person beside us after we had taken a few minutes to get to know one another. When it was our turn, Daniel said, “This is Patti English, and I have to sit beside my youth minister!” Daniel served as a hospitable minister of introduction to me in that class and helped me become acquainted with many folks with whom I would study in the next few years. I was very thankful for this gift he shared with me. A few years later, it was my privilege to serve as a marriage celebrant at the wedding ceremony of Marnie and Daniel. In years since, our paths have crossed in places like Passport and as Daniel and Marnie have visited with their family in Fredericksburg, and each time I see them, my life is blessed by the stories of the spiritual journey that they are experiencing! I am thankful for you, this church family in this place and for the ways you have challenged Daniel, encouraged Daniel, blessed Daniel in other ways and especially on this night as you choose to bless him in this service of ordination! The important teachings of the apostle Paul that Marnie just read for us, are words that have encouraged the identities and the character of the people of God in general and especially those who serve as leaders of the people of God since the early years of Christianity. Daniel, it is my responsibility on this night to offer a charge to you and based upon the teachings of this passage, it is my prayer that you will continue to struggle with the touchstones of faith development in ways that will call forth continued growth in your life and in the lives of others around you! The instructions of this passage, are to take every part of our lives and make them an offering to God. I like this challenge Daniel, and I see this gift in your lifestyle as well. You have always been willing to explore what it means to do the things you do with and for others as an offering to God. You have been willing to ask what it is that others around you need and how through God’s grace-gifts to you, you may respond to those needs. You have been willing to explore the ramifications of the decisions with which you are faced and to strive to make choices for good and for God. Often rejecting the choices of culture just because they are the easy and popular choices you might make, I charge you to continue seeking the will of God in your life and seeking to recognize the face of Christ in others around you as you serve. Daniel, you do have many special gifts from God which you use in serving God and serving with the people of God all the time. As long as I have known you, your willingness to use your analytical mind and to ask tough questions (questions of me, questions of scripture, questions of church polity and relationships within the church, deep theological questions, and so many more questions) – not necessarily having to have answers to every question, but being willing to grow and allow others around you to grow simply by posing the questions, has been a gift that you bring to the body of Christ that is the church. Your willingness to use your gift and your love of music and your gifts of leadership helped us through youth mission trips when you sat out on a church lawn with inner-city children in the heat of a Norfolk Summer week of Backyard Bible School, and as our youth group sang on the beach. Your ability to understand computers and to develop cool and interesting ways to share information is a gift that Paul would never have thought of, but which you certainly use in your daily life! Daniel, you are also a wonderful listener! You have the ability to listen to the words someone uses and to raise good and healthy questions that really help to get at the true meaning of what they are trying to communicate. In so doing, you often communicate care and concern as well as the challenge to grow through the experiences with which someone may be struggling. These are only a few of the gifts I know you bring to ministry. I am thankful for the willingness and creativity with which you share these grace-gifts! Our instructions in this passage are to take the gifts with which we have been blessed by God and to use them in community! In community with the people of God! In COMMUNITY with the people of God in our everyday lives…in our everyday activities…in all that we do! The gifts that God has given to each one of us are not meant to be hoarded up or to be used to the exclusion of the rest of the Body of Christ. They are not meant to be used to make us look better as individuals, but to help all of God’s creation in COMMUNITY to be about the sacred task of becoming more the people that God created us to be and that God continually calls us to be. Daniel, I charge you (and I am certain that this local community of faith joins me in this charge to you) to continue to listen for the beckoning call of God in your life. Continue learning and discovering the gifts with which God continues to bless you throughout your life, and continue using and celebrating those gifts in COMMUNITY with the PEOPLE OF GOD! Paul’s charge to the Romans was that they be transformed – changed from the inside out – by fixing their attention on God. This transformation isn’t just in one’s outward appearance or in one’s ability to DO, but in one’s very character –one’s being – one’s nature! Our model is Christ and the goal to which we must aspire is to be people who reflect the image of Christ and who strive to continue the incarnate work of Christ in the world today….in ALL that we do – the ordinary and the extraordinary! What a challenge! We are all called to this holy task, and in this congregation, the People of God have recognized your ability to strive for these things and they have prayerfully decided to set you apart for this holy task. Not that you are perfect and not that you will achieve perfection in this lifetime, but that they and we recognize in you, a willingness to strive to lead by example and to live your life in response to the high and holy call of God. Daniel, our charge to you is to keep on keeping on, keep the faith, live the faith, share the faith as you live your faith before others! May you be found faithful in the journey!