Here's a scenario:
Bob and Mike meet.
They soon discover a mutual interest in following Christ.
They decide that they should partner up and do this together.
So they meet regularly, bringing their wives and their kids all together to talk about Jesus.
They read their Bible. They praise God, often in song or poetry.
Over time, their gatherings grow and a few other friends and families begin to attend as well.
They don't write up a statement of faith or anything, but they never get into any weird, unorthodox stuff.
They begin a few traditions, a few standards (think: meeting every other Saturday afternoon, favoring discussion over a sermon, using recliners instead of pews, singing a capella because no one's a musician, no age division, laser lights, arm-wrestling, an occasional post-church stein-hoist). They've got a culture of sorts.
Maybe some of their customs and traditions and methods are unique, or even a little strange. So much so that it might not feel like church to a church-going outsider.
So what is this gathering? Is it a church? Is it the church?
What does it mean if we call Bob and Mike's as-yet-unnamed gatherings "church?"
We're past the point of assuming a church is a building, right? Lots of churches start and meet in people's basements. We'll call their gatherings a church.
So if it's just a couple of dudes and some friends gathering weekly to follow Christ, unusual traditions and all... does this thing, suddenly a "church," immediately get lumped in with the rest of the church (or churches) as a sacred institution? Are they part of the Holy Priesthood, entrusted with the Great Commission, held accountable for all of its blessed finances and how they spend every penny? Holders of the talents while The King is away?
Is every church subject to scrutiny as a sacred institution, or can a church simply be a community of people seeking Christ with their own customs, much like any other earthly, human
community - chamber of commerce, moose lodge, Boy Scouts, sewing circle,
carving club - except focused on following Christ? Are there sacred churches and non-sacred ones? Where do you draw that line, and what separates them? Rigidly structured organization?
I ask these questions because I have often, in the past, been a bit of a church cynic. "Can't believe they spent money on that." "Why aren't they doing (insert thing I suddenly started thinking was deathly important while in college)?" "What's a "liturgy?" "Why is there no liturgy?" "They should really talk more about (insert thing they didn't talk about the week I was there.)"
I am beginning to think that maybe it's no big deal for a church to have some customs that I don't really identify with, or to lack some that I really do, or to use their money in ways that I wouldn't immediately think to, and simply trust that they probably know what they're doing and don't need me to get all teenage-angsty about it.
I suppose I pose those questions in defense of weird churches.
In the end, there are far more important things to consider about a church than how much money they put into their multimedia, or what the worship team is wearing. For example, what its members are doing the other six days of the week.
Showing posts with label church. Show all posts
Showing posts with label church. Show all posts
September 17, 2012
August 18, 2011
Anecdotal evidence
Yesterday I got a call from Pastor Gary at Rush Creek Bible Church, the church I grew up in and the one I still consider my "home church," though I've been gone for years, it seems. Since tonight is the Men for Missions Steak Fry, they asked me to come and share a short story about what God has been doing in Puerto Rico. I told him sure, I'd be happy to - After all: Public speaking is no longer a big deal for me. (Sidenote: Public speaking is still a big deal for me.)
And so I immediately started to think about what I would share. I get one story, one anecdote from the summer, and I need to make it count. And as I cycled through my memories from my time so far in Puerto Rico, I started to realize that most of my big impressions have to do with my personal growth. I need to get up in front of these guys and share something about the ministry, a story about where I saw God doing big things in the lives of the kids, counselors, others around the ministry.
And the thing is...
I'm struggling to come up with one.
That doesn't mean God didn't do big things. It just means I didn't see a lot of them firsthand. Maybe there's a disconnect somewhere. I know our counselors have some big things they would share, and I wish they could be here to do it. As a program director, especially in my first year, I spent a lot of time planning, putting out fires, preparing the next thing, processing the last thing, recovering, sweating, cleaning, thinking. And that doesn't leave a lot of time to be actively involved in the present. In other words, not a lot of time in direct heart-to-heart perfect-for-a-story-back-home ministry. I spent a lot of time trying to make sure everything was right for others to do that, but not a whole lot doing that myself.
To some extent, that is the job of the director - you're supposed to make sure that the goals are met, let others handle the tasks. I would be a terrible micromanager. But I still think that somewhere along the way, I would have gotten a pretty good anecdote to share.
There are anecdotes. There are naughty kids, crazy games - and confusing ones, the kid who puked during Fear Factor, the darnedest things kids said, and other summer camp anomalies. Generally, the stuff that goes wrong makes for better stories. It's low-hanging fruit when it comes to reflection. But it doesn't always make for inspiring stuff for the folks back home.
And so I think, in the 2-3 minutes I get, I won't be sharing just one small touching anecdote, but one big one - that we had a good summer, that kids learned that they need to live fearlessly as followers of Christ, that a few made decisions to turn their lives to Him for the first time, and that they had a lot of fun doing it.
And, of course, that nobody got seriously injured in the process.
And so I immediately started to think about what I would share. I get one story, one anecdote from the summer, and I need to make it count. And as I cycled through my memories from my time so far in Puerto Rico, I started to realize that most of my big impressions have to do with my personal growth. I need to get up in front of these guys and share something about the ministry, a story about where I saw God doing big things in the lives of the kids, counselors, others around the ministry.
And the thing is...
I'm struggling to come up with one.
That doesn't mean God didn't do big things. It just means I didn't see a lot of them firsthand. Maybe there's a disconnect somewhere. I know our counselors have some big things they would share, and I wish they could be here to do it. As a program director, especially in my first year, I spent a lot of time planning, putting out fires, preparing the next thing, processing the last thing, recovering, sweating, cleaning, thinking. And that doesn't leave a lot of time to be actively involved in the present. In other words, not a lot of time in direct heart-to-heart perfect-for-a-story-back-home ministry. I spent a lot of time trying to make sure everything was right for others to do that, but not a whole lot doing that myself.
To some extent, that is the job of the director - you're supposed to make sure that the goals are met, let others handle the tasks. I would be a terrible micromanager. But I still think that somewhere along the way, I would have gotten a pretty good anecdote to share.
There are anecdotes. There are naughty kids, crazy games - and confusing ones, the kid who puked during Fear Factor, the darnedest things kids said, and other summer camp anomalies. Generally, the stuff that goes wrong makes for better stories. It's low-hanging fruit when it comes to reflection. But it doesn't always make for inspiring stuff for the folks back home.
And so I think, in the 2-3 minutes I get, I won't be sharing just one small touching anecdote, but one big one - that we had a good summer, that kids learned that they need to live fearlessly as followers of Christ, that a few made decisions to turn their lives to Him for the first time, and that they had a lot of fun doing it.
And, of course, that nobody got seriously injured in the process.
May 6, 2011
On Public Speaking
I got asked to speak at a church.
Or maybe, the program director at Campamento del Caribe got asked to speak at a church.
Or maybe, the guy who was sitting in that desk at that time got asked to speak at a church.
Either way, I was the guy sitting in the desk, the program director at Campamento del Caribe, the one in the right place at the right time.
Pastor Michael told Theresa he needed someone to speak for the National Day of Prayer yesterday. And since I was right there, he asked if I'd want to do it.
"Like, speak? For how long? About what?"
"About Prayer, dummy." (He didn't call me a dummy. But I probably should have guessed the topic.) "About 30 minutes. With someone translating, you'd need to speak for about 15 minutes."
"I... I guess so." I tried to stammer, to sound non-committal and give him time to give me a chance to back out. I'm not a pastor. I don't really speak, like a public speaker or a motivational speaker or a pastor or something. Only to crowds of 8 year olds in chapel at summer camp, and they're decidedly easier to impress than grown-ups.
He didn't give me the way out I wanted and when our conversation was over, I had pretty much committed to speaking to a crowd of grown-ups at a church service.
This is not the kind of thing most people go out of their way to do. Many people are genuinely terrified at the thought of it. And indeed, there were flashes of terror.
I would be lying in bed, in that beautiful moment between waking up and deciding to get up, when everything and nothing is fantasy and serious all at the same time, and I would think, "What do I have to do?" and the reminder would come, usually sounding something like this:
OHMYGOODNESSONTHURSDAYYOUHAVETOSPEAKINFRONTOFABUNCHOFGROWNUPS
ANDNONEOFTHEMAREGONNALIKEYOURTHEOLOGYBECAUSEYOUDIDN'TGOTOBIBLE
SCHOOLWHATMAKESYOUTHINKYOUCANDOTHISANYWA-
Does that sound panicky enough? Because it was panicky. And it happened pretty much every morning between when I committed to speak and when I finally spoke. It didn't last, though, and I'd eventually snap out of it. No sense in being terrified. You've got time. Man up. Get out of bed.
Some people have brains that can stay on topic, that can just pull a bunch of stories by category and fit them together neatly with a nugget of wisdom, and they make great public speakers. My brain doesn't do that. I don't know if it can learn to do that. It was my acceptance of this that led me to say: If I'm gonna speak, I need to write it all out. My mind wanders too much. In fact, at any given point in time, I am probably not paying any attention to anything. I think I have a screen saver or something that lets me think about nothing. So I had to think about it all ahead of time.
And so I thought. No, I didn't go to Bible school. No, I don't give sermons. No, I don't feel qualified for this. But I do have a set of experiences, which at least gives me something to say about prayer. So I wrote it all out, word-for-word. 2200 words worth, from "Buenas Noches, everyone" to the well-worded final sentence that adequately summed up my point and sounded very much like an ending. Starts and endings are hard. It's the middle stuff that's easy.
Of course, I wrote it all a few days ahead of time, so I had plenty of time to second-guess it. Is this me? Or is it God? Is this deep enough? Is this what they want? If I'm worried about being embarrassed or failing, does that mean I have a problem with vanity and that I'm not letting the Holy Spirit speak? In the end I decided that, unless God gives me something else, what I put on the paper must have been from Him already. I told Him that he could change it if he wanted to.
Last night, I spoke it. Spake it. Unto them. I even ad-libbed a joke at the start. The one about speaking to 8 year-olds. Yeah, already re-used it on you. It was that good.
Once you begin, you wonder what all the terror for public speaking is about. Forgetting your lines? Not having enough to say? If you have a piece of paper and can read it without sounding like you're reading it (I'm not saying I did) then you should be fine. Of course, that doesn't shake the curiosity of whether or not everyone in the audience is scrutinizing your every word, harumphing at your foibles (am I nose-breathing into the microphone?) and breaking down each element of logic in your argument (that didn't sound heretical, did it?). I understand on a much deeper level now why Pastors ask for amens. It pumps them up and affirms them. It shows that they're not just standing up there alone, appealing to a bunch of skeptics or, even worse, a bunch of bored church-goers. Don't be afraid to give the guy speaking an amen.
I have no idea how long I spoke for. Something like 30 minutes. Before I started planning it out, I wondered how I was going to occupy a half hour with what little wisdom I had. But it evaporates quickly with all of those eyes on you. When I was finished, people told me it was good. The pastor gave me a thumbs up. I felt relieved.
I'm glad I did it. I could have said no, could have backed out or deferred to someone else, but I didn't. Next Sunday, I'm visiting a church in Guaynabo where I have "1-2 minutes" to speak about camp. No problem for this guy.
Or maybe, the program director at Campamento del Caribe got asked to speak at a church.
Or maybe, the guy who was sitting in that desk at that time got asked to speak at a church.
Either way, I was the guy sitting in the desk, the program director at Campamento del Caribe, the one in the right place at the right time.
Pastor Michael told Theresa he needed someone to speak for the National Day of Prayer yesterday. And since I was right there, he asked if I'd want to do it.
"Like, speak? For how long? About what?"
"About Prayer, dummy." (He didn't call me a dummy. But I probably should have guessed the topic.) "About 30 minutes. With someone translating, you'd need to speak for about 15 minutes."
"I... I guess so." I tried to stammer, to sound non-committal and give him time to give me a chance to back out. I'm not a pastor. I don't really speak, like a public speaker or a motivational speaker or a pastor or something. Only to crowds of 8 year olds in chapel at summer camp, and they're decidedly easier to impress than grown-ups.
He didn't give me the way out I wanted and when our conversation was over, I had pretty much committed to speaking to a crowd of grown-ups at a church service.
This is not the kind of thing most people go out of their way to do. Many people are genuinely terrified at the thought of it. And indeed, there were flashes of terror.
I would be lying in bed, in that beautiful moment between waking up and deciding to get up, when everything and nothing is fantasy and serious all at the same time, and I would think, "What do I have to do?" and the reminder would come, usually sounding something like this:
OHMYGOODNESSONTHURSDAYYOUHAVETOSPEAKINFRONTOFABUNCHOFGROWNUPS
ANDNONEOFTHEMAREGONNALIKEYOURTHEOLOGYBECAUSEYOUDIDN'TGOTOBIBLE
SCHOOLWHATMAKESYOUTHINKYOUCANDOTHISANYWA-
Does that sound panicky enough? Because it was panicky. And it happened pretty much every morning between when I committed to speak and when I finally spoke. It didn't last, though, and I'd eventually snap out of it. No sense in being terrified. You've got time. Man up. Get out of bed.
Some people have brains that can stay on topic, that can just pull a bunch of stories by category and fit them together neatly with a nugget of wisdom, and they make great public speakers. My brain doesn't do that. I don't know if it can learn to do that. It was my acceptance of this that led me to say: If I'm gonna speak, I need to write it all out. My mind wanders too much. In fact, at any given point in time, I am probably not paying any attention to anything. I think I have a screen saver or something that lets me think about nothing. So I had to think about it all ahead of time.
And so I thought. No, I didn't go to Bible school. No, I don't give sermons. No, I don't feel qualified for this. But I do have a set of experiences, which at least gives me something to say about prayer. So I wrote it all out, word-for-word. 2200 words worth, from "Buenas Noches, everyone" to the well-worded final sentence that adequately summed up my point and sounded very much like an ending. Starts and endings are hard. It's the middle stuff that's easy.
Of course, I wrote it all a few days ahead of time, so I had plenty of time to second-guess it. Is this me? Or is it God? Is this deep enough? Is this what they want? If I'm worried about being embarrassed or failing, does that mean I have a problem with vanity and that I'm not letting the Holy Spirit speak? In the end I decided that, unless God gives me something else, what I put on the paper must have been from Him already. I told Him that he could change it if he wanted to.
Last night, I spoke it. Spake it. Unto them. I even ad-libbed a joke at the start. The one about speaking to 8 year-olds. Yeah, already re-used it on you. It was that good.
Once you begin, you wonder what all the terror for public speaking is about. Forgetting your lines? Not having enough to say? If you have a piece of paper and can read it without sounding like you're reading it (I'm not saying I did) then you should be fine. Of course, that doesn't shake the curiosity of whether or not everyone in the audience is scrutinizing your every word, harumphing at your foibles (am I nose-breathing into the microphone?) and breaking down each element of logic in your argument (that didn't sound heretical, did it?). I understand on a much deeper level now why Pastors ask for amens. It pumps them up and affirms them. It shows that they're not just standing up there alone, appealing to a bunch of skeptics or, even worse, a bunch of bored church-goers. Don't be afraid to give the guy speaking an amen.
I have no idea how long I spoke for. Something like 30 minutes. Before I started planning it out, I wondered how I was going to occupy a half hour with what little wisdom I had. But it evaporates quickly with all of those eyes on you. When I was finished, people told me it was good. The pastor gave me a thumbs up. I felt relieved.
I'm glad I did it. I could have said no, could have backed out or deferred to someone else, but I didn't. Next Sunday, I'm visiting a church in Guaynabo where I have "1-2 minutes" to speak about camp. No problem for this guy.
April 9, 2011
The Hip Church in Puerto Rico part dos
(I wrote about a recent church experience HERE and this post is a continuation of it.)
The service was over and my feet were hurting me. We started to file out and a friend asked me an inevitable question: "What did you think?"
I'd have asked the same question if I had brought a guest with me, so I knew it was coming. But they didn't realize how heavy their question was. I had already begun to feel a little bit guilty about forming all of these reactions to a church service. I certainly hadn't gotten what I hoped out of it. And from that came this deep self-examination - yes, it matters what I thought about church, but that reaction says a whole lot more about me than it does about the church. I hate the thought of me being a church critic.
Such a simple question really didn't require us to jump into a discussion where we'd probe into my cynicism and spiritual guilt. So naturally I told them it was difficult for me because of the Spanish. This wasn't a lie, but it was a cop-out. I told him I'd been to services a little like this in the States.
He said this was a brand new concept in Puerto Rico, that they were changing what people think about church. Kids here, they don't really want to go to church.
Boom. Confirmation that my whole blog-about-how-uncomfortable-and-cynical-I-am-in-church-thing is entirely misdirected. It might be amusing, but it is misdirected. I was humbled. I had thought plenty about how the church was trendy and trying hard, and that churches shouldn't be concerned with trends. But that whole time, it wasn't the church that was concerned with trends. It was me.
Here was a place that was meeting people where they were at, moving with the Holy Spirit, connecting and transforming people in a place where they felt welcomed, comfortable, alive. And I had spent my time there thinking about communion cups and Raisinettes and my sore feet, drawing comparisons between this church and others I'd been to years ago.
My friend painted a picture of a Puerto Rico for me where the kids don't want to go to church. It's boring, it's traditional, it's stuffy, and as a result they don't have any interest in Christianity. But this place was new, fresh, appealing. And not far away from a college. I thought about how youthful the church was. The pastor was young, the band was young, and the majority of the congregants were really young, too. Something good was happening here. Puerto Rico needs more places like this.
As for me, I wonder what I'm supposed to do with myself when I bring my exhaustion into church with me. All I wanted to do was sit down for a while and hear a preacher, but I didn't get it.
On the way home later on, I made a comment about how tired I was and that I never really got to sit down and hear preaching like I had hoped. I sounded like an old man.
"This was a worship service, Jim. The whole point is to pray and worship. There's not supposed to be a lot of preaching anyway."
Yup. I definitely didn't get it.
The service was over and my feet were hurting me. We started to file out and a friend asked me an inevitable question: "What did you think?"
I'd have asked the same question if I had brought a guest with me, so I knew it was coming. But they didn't realize how heavy their question was. I had already begun to feel a little bit guilty about forming all of these reactions to a church service. I certainly hadn't gotten what I hoped out of it. And from that came this deep self-examination - yes, it matters what I thought about church, but that reaction says a whole lot more about me than it does about the church. I hate the thought of me being a church critic.
Such a simple question really didn't require us to jump into a discussion where we'd probe into my cynicism and spiritual guilt. So naturally I told them it was difficult for me because of the Spanish. This wasn't a lie, but it was a cop-out. I told him I'd been to services a little like this in the States.
He said this was a brand new concept in Puerto Rico, that they were changing what people think about church. Kids here, they don't really want to go to church.
Boom. Confirmation that my whole blog-about-how-uncomfortable-and-cynical-I-am-in-church-thing is entirely misdirected. It might be amusing, but it is misdirected. I was humbled. I had thought plenty about how the church was trendy and trying hard, and that churches shouldn't be concerned with trends. But that whole time, it wasn't the church that was concerned with trends. It was me.
Here was a place that was meeting people where they were at, moving with the Holy Spirit, connecting and transforming people in a place where they felt welcomed, comfortable, alive. And I had spent my time there thinking about communion cups and Raisinettes and my sore feet, drawing comparisons between this church and others I'd been to years ago.
My friend painted a picture of a Puerto Rico for me where the kids don't want to go to church. It's boring, it's traditional, it's stuffy, and as a result they don't have any interest in Christianity. But this place was new, fresh, appealing. And not far away from a college. I thought about how youthful the church was. The pastor was young, the band was young, and the majority of the congregants were really young, too. Something good was happening here. Puerto Rico needs more places like this.
As for me, I wonder what I'm supposed to do with myself when I bring my exhaustion into church with me. All I wanted to do was sit down for a while and hear a preacher, but I didn't get it.
On the way home later on, I made a comment about how tired I was and that I never really got to sit down and hear preaching like I had hoped. I sounded like an old man.
"This was a worship service, Jim. The whole point is to pray and worship. There's not supposed to be a lot of preaching anyway."
Yup. I definitely didn't get it.
April 8, 2011
The Hip Church in Puerto Rico
"Is this going to be one of those three hour services?" I ask. My feet hurt and I'm sunburned and not especially interested in a marathon church session.
"No, probably just an hour and a half."
Good. I'm not one for lengthy church services, even in English. I feel a little guilty about it. Shouldn't my soul always be up for praising Jesus, listening intently, singing whole-heartedly, ever an empty sponge for soaking up the Holy Spirit? A long church or worship service shouldn't be a big deal. Still, I can't seem to muster the enthusiasm for them.
We're going to be late, probably by half an hour. We'll miss the bulk of worship, get there for announcements, I'll settle in and hear a preacher speak in Spanish and, if anything, give my ears a little practice hearing Spanish but probably not get a whole lot else from the teaching. Then another song. Shake some hands. We'll leave. Simple and painless.
It takes a while to park. Jon drops us off at the door and we go in to the old theater where they meet. There's a sign with a non-church-sounding name and a table where they're handing out Raisinettes and bookmarks. I think back to the days when I was visiting churches in St Joe, where they wooed people with gift bags and coffee mugs. Church-searchers should never run out of coffee mugs. I take my Raisinettes and bookmark and we go in.
I survey the scene: Pretty simple set-up, Movie theater seats, Blank canvas by the stage with markers where people can come up as the spirit leads and write stuff. There's an over-qualified band on stage leading a worship tune. The lead guitarist is a gangly guy in skinny jeans, Vans and a plain V-neck tee. He has an underbite and a messy hairdo. He's probably in another band. In my experience, most hip churches have this guy. I've seen it all before. The come-as-you-are, hip church might be new in Puerto Rico, but it emerged as I was in college (at the height of my hipness) so I knew it well. They were trying hard to break out of the stuffy church mode, and actually doing a pretty good job of it.
We wait in the back for Jon while he parks the car. I'm hungry and they gave me Raisinettes, so I try to get them open, but they're in the sort of plastic-packaging that cannot be torn. There's no sawtoothed edge at the top. It's gonna be a fight between me and the packaging to get to the candy inside. It would be ideal to get this done now instead of later when the preacher is speaking. But after a solid effort at tearing them, I'm getting nowhere. So I stuff them in my pocket and picture myself futzing with them during the sermon, pulling hard until they tear open and I throw an elbow at some poor person next to me, and the candy goes flying, rattling noisily down the floor, interrupting the pastor and drawing all attention squarely on me, the guy who couldn't wait for the Raisinettes, instead of the pastor and His Boss.
Jon arrives as they end the song and we find seats next to some friends of theirs. Someone comes up to pray for Libya and Syria. She prays for a long time as they flash images of destruction on the screen and the band plays ambient, serious-sounding chords behind her. I'm trying hard to pay attention and focus on prayer, but the Spanish makes it tough. I think and translate about every other sentence, trying to keep up.
Then, another guy gets up and preaches a little, but we're all still standing and the band is still playing behind him, so it all has this kind of brief, temporary feel to it. This isn't the real sermon. He's saying something about family problems. Lots of people go forward, then people from the band and more established congregants go up to pray with them and lay hands on them. One guy puts his hands across the backs of people's necks and I feel like it's kind of weird. My feet are starting to hurt.
He finishes and the band starts playing a Spanish version of a David Crowder Band song I know. This gives me a little bit of energy, and I sing the parts I know in English. They get to the chorus, and it takes on this improvisational, long, emotional feel to it, and people are singing it over and over again. Eventually the PowerPoint person gets lost and puts up a 360 degree pan of the cross at sunset. This goes on for a really long time, and the lead guitarist drops to his knees and begins to weep while the band and congregation sing the chorus over and over again. All said and done, the David Crowder song probably lasted about 19 minutes.
My feet are really sore now and I'm starting to feel kind of exhausted. We've been there about 45 minutes it feels and they still haven't wrapped up this whole integrated worship-prayer thing they're doing and gotten to the preaching. It's not going to be a 90-minute service. I think about sitting down but I convince myself that if I do, people will think I'm having some intensely emotional and spiritually repentant experience, crying out to God for mercy and compassion, when really I'm just tired and starting to disengage from it all. Instead, I stand and start to think about blogging about all of this.
Then, the preacher comes up. The band steps away from their instruments, except for the guitarist who keeps playing ambient chords and mouthing lyrics while the pastor speaks. People sit down. Phew. I get out the Raisinettes because now I have a plan. I poke a whole in them with the threading of a key-ring in my pocket. I'm in. Sweet sustenance. No flying elbows, no noisy distraction. It's good.
The speaker talks only for a few minutes, and gives an invitation. I don't know if it's an altar-call or just an invitation for prayer about something, but lots of the same people come up again, and lots of the same people who laid hands on them before come back up. Throughout the service, I always knew pretty well what they were talking about, just not what they were saying. There was some standing and sitting and raising hands and stuff. Since I wasn't entirely sure what was going on, I went with the status quo to be safe. I didn't want to commit to something, to identify myself with something that wasn't true. I'm a little confused, and it's a humbling thing to be confused in church. People who come for the first time probably understand that fairly well.
They serve communion in little pre-packaged juice cups with communion wafers shrink-wrapped into their lids. It was very convenient, moreso than breaking bread and pouring wine (or Welch's) and having to pass two plates. We all stand for this again.
When he finishes, the band returns to their instruments and the worship leader says something about "a final song." I am cautiously optimistic. And as they launch into this last worship hymn, people around me start to gather their things. The end is near. Sweet relief. They wrap up, but not before one final encore tag-ending to the last song.
(Continued tomorrow)
"No, probably just an hour and a half."
Good. I'm not one for lengthy church services, even in English. I feel a little guilty about it. Shouldn't my soul always be up for praising Jesus, listening intently, singing whole-heartedly, ever an empty sponge for soaking up the Holy Spirit? A long church or worship service shouldn't be a big deal. Still, I can't seem to muster the enthusiasm for them.
We're going to be late, probably by half an hour. We'll miss the bulk of worship, get there for announcements, I'll settle in and hear a preacher speak in Spanish and, if anything, give my ears a little practice hearing Spanish but probably not get a whole lot else from the teaching. Then another song. Shake some hands. We'll leave. Simple and painless.
It takes a while to park. Jon drops us off at the door and we go in to the old theater where they meet. There's a sign with a non-church-sounding name and a table where they're handing out Raisinettes and bookmarks. I think back to the days when I was visiting churches in St Joe, where they wooed people with gift bags and coffee mugs. Church-searchers should never run out of coffee mugs. I take my Raisinettes and bookmark and we go in.
I survey the scene: Pretty simple set-up, Movie theater seats, Blank canvas by the stage with markers where people can come up as the spirit leads and write stuff. There's an over-qualified band on stage leading a worship tune. The lead guitarist is a gangly guy in skinny jeans, Vans and a plain V-neck tee. He has an underbite and a messy hairdo. He's probably in another band. In my experience, most hip churches have this guy. I've seen it all before. The come-as-you-are, hip church might be new in Puerto Rico, but it emerged as I was in college (at the height of my hipness) so I knew it well. They were trying hard to break out of the stuffy church mode, and actually doing a pretty good job of it.
We wait in the back for Jon while he parks the car. I'm hungry and they gave me Raisinettes, so I try to get them open, but they're in the sort of plastic-packaging that cannot be torn. There's no sawtoothed edge at the top. It's gonna be a fight between me and the packaging to get to the candy inside. It would be ideal to get this done now instead of later when the preacher is speaking. But after a solid effort at tearing them, I'm getting nowhere. So I stuff them in my pocket and picture myself futzing with them during the sermon, pulling hard until they tear open and I throw an elbow at some poor person next to me, and the candy goes flying, rattling noisily down the floor, interrupting the pastor and drawing all attention squarely on me, the guy who couldn't wait for the Raisinettes, instead of the pastor and His Boss.
Jon arrives as they end the song and we find seats next to some friends of theirs. Someone comes up to pray for Libya and Syria. She prays for a long time as they flash images of destruction on the screen and the band plays ambient, serious-sounding chords behind her. I'm trying hard to pay attention and focus on prayer, but the Spanish makes it tough. I think and translate about every other sentence, trying to keep up.
Then, another guy gets up and preaches a little, but we're all still standing and the band is still playing behind him, so it all has this kind of brief, temporary feel to it. This isn't the real sermon. He's saying something about family problems. Lots of people go forward, then people from the band and more established congregants go up to pray with them and lay hands on them. One guy puts his hands across the backs of people's necks and I feel like it's kind of weird. My feet are starting to hurt.
He finishes and the band starts playing a Spanish version of a David Crowder Band song I know. This gives me a little bit of energy, and I sing the parts I know in English. They get to the chorus, and it takes on this improvisational, long, emotional feel to it, and people are singing it over and over again. Eventually the PowerPoint person gets lost and puts up a 360 degree pan of the cross at sunset. This goes on for a really long time, and the lead guitarist drops to his knees and begins to weep while the band and congregation sing the chorus over and over again. All said and done, the David Crowder song probably lasted about 19 minutes.
My feet are really sore now and I'm starting to feel kind of exhausted. We've been there about 45 minutes it feels and they still haven't wrapped up this whole integrated worship-prayer thing they're doing and gotten to the preaching. It's not going to be a 90-minute service. I think about sitting down but I convince myself that if I do, people will think I'm having some intensely emotional and spiritually repentant experience, crying out to God for mercy and compassion, when really I'm just tired and starting to disengage from it all. Instead, I stand and start to think about blogging about all of this.
Then, the preacher comes up. The band steps away from their instruments, except for the guitarist who keeps playing ambient chords and mouthing lyrics while the pastor speaks. People sit down. Phew. I get out the Raisinettes because now I have a plan. I poke a whole in them with the threading of a key-ring in my pocket. I'm in. Sweet sustenance. No flying elbows, no noisy distraction. It's good.
The speaker talks only for a few minutes, and gives an invitation. I don't know if it's an altar-call or just an invitation for prayer about something, but lots of the same people come up again, and lots of the same people who laid hands on them before come back up. Throughout the service, I always knew pretty well what they were talking about, just not what they were saying. There was some standing and sitting and raising hands and stuff. Since I wasn't entirely sure what was going on, I went with the status quo to be safe. I didn't want to commit to something, to identify myself with something that wasn't true. I'm a little confused, and it's a humbling thing to be confused in church. People who come for the first time probably understand that fairly well.
They serve communion in little pre-packaged juice cups with communion wafers shrink-wrapped into their lids. It was very convenient, moreso than breaking bread and pouring wine (or Welch's) and having to pass two plates. We all stand for this again.
When he finishes, the band returns to their instruments and the worship leader says something about "a final song." I am cautiously optimistic. And as they launch into this last worship hymn, people around me start to gather their things. The end is near. Sweet relief. They wrap up, but not before one final encore tag-ending to the last song.
(Continued tomorrow)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)