O' Church, Have We Lost Our Way?
A Reflection on Sunday Morning
What you are about to read is from a moment in time. Please do not universalize these thoughts. This was a reaction to a very specific experience on a very specific Sunday morning.
Early Christians would not recognize what we call church today.
After a couple of invitation from friends we love, we decided to try a church we had never visited before. This was a church that was in the news. It was hip and had a fair amount of buzz in our local religious zeitgeist… and beyond.
To say it made me sad would be an understatement. From my limited vantage place and with my admittedly small brain, I was flummoxed. The global-historical pillars of the gathering on resurrection day were nowhere to be found. The sign outside said “church.” The bulletin betrayed it was a church. The overall energy and anticipation of the room said, “church.” Then the service began.
Where was sign and symbol. Where was the sacredness, scripture and sacrament?
Acts 2:42 They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
Again, maybe I am just confused. But instead of these simple words from the beginning of the church gathering… instead, on this particular Sunday morning, we were subjected to little more than a two-hour pageant of personalities. Two Hour!
Here is what I experienced…
Instead of blessed sign and symbol (table, cross, candles)— those living stories intended to be physical echoes of unseen realities— instead the “stage” was a white void, populated by nothingness save a giant see-through object that looked like something out of Woody Allen’s "Sleeper." One of the pastors, and I am not making this up, bragged that the church didn’t use candles.
Instead of sacredness (silence, reflection, historical prayers, global story, confession) we endured a more than hour-long sermon, where self-aggrandizing stories of how the preacher has been a Christian superstar since childhood were shoved inside us, lubricated by faux self-deprecation: “I was so religious that no one invited me to the school dances.”
Instead of scripture (“the apostle’s teachings”)? Truth be told, there was a lovely and innocent reading of 5 verses from the gospels, beyond that the preacher proclaimed multiple times that we should “hold onto our seats” because of all the scripture we were going to be given. In truth, he little more than passingly referenced a few boilerplate, first-year-of-bible-school passages that were not even directly about the topic at hand. Ironically, the sermon’s topic was professed to be “prayer” and yet the pastor couldn’t manifest passages that directly addressed his proclaimed thesis.
Instead of sacrament, there was no bread, no wine, no absolution. The historical purpose of the gathering and the ministry of the elders, among others, is to bestow the miracle of grace upon the gathering of the family. I, more than anyone, need to hear that I am forgiven. I long for the reminder that I am loved and that the living story of a Creator who became the Created and suffers on our behalf both in time and beyond time is manifest and aspirationally true. I need to hear it, see it, touch it, smell and taste it. (I learned later that communion is sometimes served in smaller settings… but what about the Resurrection Day gathering?)
Instead… we were served a two-hour pageant of personalities, jokes, entertainment, self-congratulatory stories and two very talented sets of musical numbers from a diverse band.
Does anybody know what we are doing?
Post-script: I recently returned to these words. My heart is not to disparage any specific gathering. I have tried to obscure any specifics that would expose this church’s identity. Please do not try to guess or ask me to reveal.
I am also sure that this was a very limited, even narrow experience of what I know to be a GREAT church, full of fantastic Jesus-people, saints far holier, more devout and more beautiful than I. My heart is to bounce off this one experience and ask the question:
Dear church, have we lost our way?
I have been curious about why we often feel the need to return to the Acts model or example of church. This seems to often be the true church. However, it was not one prescribed by Christ. Jesus never discouraged temple worship, just maybe what the temple had become. I, along with Mike Dean’s comment, wonder what it is that is referred to as “the way.”
With that said, I do think our often personality driven services and church is missing the mark. But I don’t see a going back but rather I see a new context emerging. The church, and Sunday morning gatherings, continue to evolve. They have since the beginning of time. People groups find new ways to worship. I am not sure if one is right and the other is wrong.
Nevertheless, with preaching centric contexts it is easy to make the worship about the personality rather than our creator. It is something I think about every week as I prepare our services. My hope is that whatever we do might bring attention to God rather than me.
Not surprisingly, but sad to say, yes. We (along with a few thousand years of family who've gone before us) have lost our way. From ancient Israel to Jesus's disciples, to Constantine and beyond, maybe its in our spiritual epigenetic to keep missing the point. This new version just has lights and Instagram. Thankfully there are always the prophets issuing a counter-narrative - urging us to repent and come back home.
A wonderful read as always. Love you, friend!
Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy.