seminarians, and students shared rich plenary addresses, helpful workshops, and five rich and varied worship services.
Four hundred Presbyterians from around the country gathered in Minneapolis’s Westminster Church on November 6-8 for the 2008 Covenant Conference, “Covenant: God Is Faithful Still.” Pastors, elders, seminarians, and students shared rich plenary addresses, helpful workshops, and five rich and varied worship services.
The three plenary addresses and four principal worship services are available on CD or cassette tape through our e-store.
In a deeply thought-provoking address, “Summoned to a Dialogic Life,” Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann discussed God’s twin covenants – a “unilateral and unconditional” covenant with Abraham and a “bilateral and conditional” covenant with Moses. God’s continuing fidelity to both of those covenants requires a “dialogic” relationship in which God’s people “remain open for new gifts and new commandments.” (Both the 
Presbyterian News Service and the Presbyterian Outlook reported on this address in detail. Here is a précis.)
Princeton theologian William Stacy Johnson offered two complementary addresses, “‘I Will Be Your God’ – but how?” and “‘You Will Be My People’ – but where and when?” He considered the promise, “And I will walk among you and will be your God, and you shall be my people” (Lev. 23: 12). The covenant, he said, “ is played out among us in the unfolding of a . . . divine and human drama of three things: God for us, Christ with us, and the Spirit among us.” And most “audaciously,” God chooses to work with and through people: “God has determined not to be God without us.” (The News Service and Outlook reported on Dr. Johnson’s first talk. An excerpt from his second is in our Winter newsletter.)
(Both Dr. Brueggemann and Dr. Johnson plan to rework their remarks in future publications. If you want to enjoy them now, order a CD!)
Led by young clergy Camille Cook and Dan Vigilante, who have been wonderfully effective YAD 
accompaniers at recent G.A.’s, nearly three dozen college students and young seminarians gathered throughout the conference as the Young Adult Caucus and presented a short video in the last plenary session.
In the opening worship service, enlivened by music by the combined choirs of Westminster and House of Hope Presbyterian Churches, Diane Givens Moffett described “A Comprehensive Covenant.” The question for Paul and Barnabas, said the pastor of St James church in Greensboro, NC, “is how to include the Gentiles in the covenant and not how they can be saved. They assume salvation is already there because of the Gentiles’ belief in Jesus.”
Friday morning, accompanied by the Bread for the Journey folk ensemble, worshipers heard Eily Marlow of Macalaster College compare GLBT Christians’ struggle to believe they are included in the covenant with Jacob’s. In “An Unfamiliar Dawn,” a direct encounter with God may confirm their inclusion in God’s promise and plan.
The Twin Cities Gay Men’s Chorus sang during the communion service on Friday night. Union Seminary’s Professor of Preaching Barbara Lundblad showed God’s surprising embrace of both eunuchs and foreigners in 
the covenant as she recounted Jesus’ meeting with the Canaanite woman in “Crumbs and the Covenant.”
Saturday morning began early with a service in the Celtic mode, with Celtic harp, flute, bagpipe, guitar, and drums. Liturgists led a renewal of baptismal vows as members of the Young Adult Caucus sprinkled the gathered worshipers with water from pine branches.
The closing worship featured the outstanding male a cappella ensemble Cantus. In his sermon, “By Any Other Name,” John Wilkinson, pastor of Rochester, NY’s Third church and a Covenant Network founder, reflected on the meaning of “Covenant” in our theological heritage, our church, and our organizational name.
During a Friday afternoon plenary, Covenant Network directors explained the significant legal ground gained by the two new Authoritative Interpretations of ordination standards and processes adopted by this summer’s General Assembly. Several presbyteries have already considered candidates’ “departures” and accepted them as minister members. The Network’s new Guidelines for Examination of Church Officers were distributed to all conference goers.
National Organizer Tricia Dykers Koenig laid out plans for organizing and working for passage of Amendment 08-B, which would replace the current language of G-6.0106b with a much more faithful and less arbitrary call to discipleship. Conferees pledged to work for passage in their presbyteries and to engage in intentional conversations with those who may have different views about inclusion in the covenant community.