Mary Cosby tells the story of writing in her journal that Gordon "sauntered into his 80th year with a new call." One might think that at 80 you would spend your time tying up loose ends, bowing out gracefully, keeping things on an even keel. But maintaining the status quo has never marked Gordon or Mary's life, and it obviously won't begin to now.
Gordon has said many times during this "jubilee" year of Church of the Saviour's history that the world, the city of Washington, D.C., even the neighborhoods where so much of their ministry is centered are no better off now than when they started. Honestly, Gordon insists, the situations are largely worse. The gospel must be lived into and expressed in new, effective, life-giving ways, now more than ever.
The "new call" Mary refers to has been labeled Zacchaen Economics. Jesus' lunch with Zacchaeus in Luke 19 birthed a whole new economic formula into which Gordon is tapping. For many years, Gordon has carried the burden of an increasing awareness that much of the source of poverty in our nation is the result of an economic formula that requires a "haves and haves not" outcome. While the suffering of poverty must be dealt with on an individual basis, ultimate change will never come until the economic system changes.
Who has the answers? Who should be the catalyst and architect to issue a challenge to these structures? The answer for Gordon is that the church must be the voice of this vision--new forms and new structures birthing economic equality. The answers to economic justice would not come from a political or corporate ethos, but rather from the biblical models that are the heritage of the body of Christ.
The Zacchaen Economics project has begun with classes at the Servant Leadership School in Washington, D.C., which establish the language and perimeters of this new economics. The classes include a Common Good Business Academy that is training people at street level how to live into and create new economic and business models. By placing people as the bottom line rather than profits, Common Good Businesses are an alternative to the current emphasis on monetary profits as the only legitimate goal for business. Other classes include an exploration of economic issues in the New Testament, the causes of inner-city poverty, economic models in the United States vs. progressive models from other nations, and unbridled consumption. The classes seek to ask the question as to whether new economic models can flourish within a market economy.
In addition, The Friends of Zacchaeus program seeks investors who will commit to this church a minimum of a 5 percent return on an investment of at least $5,000. For example, if someone had a $10,000 investment that returned 10 percent a year, they would give the church a minimum of $500 to distribute responsibly to the poor through Common Good Businesses. It is to create this new community that Gordon is laboring at the beginning of his ninth decade.
This is how Church of the Saviour has always operated: A called person--someone with a sense of how to live out their piece of God's dream for creation--will move in an unlikely faith to create transformative structures, to express God's love for all of us, to offer an alternative culture that some call the Reign of God. Jesus is still looking into sycamore trees and calling, "Come down." Indeed, it may be a sauntering, but it's a holy sauntering.
DAVID WADE is pastor of The House of the Lord church, affiliated with Church of the Saviour.
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