The podcast that the worship team at Discipleship Ministries produces is called Worship Matters. Yes, I got the idea from a worship planning team from a former church (thanks guys!) But it fits. Because that is what we are about: worship that matters and the matters that constitute worship. I invite anyone interested in listening to check us out. You can find us on Spotify or through our website (https://www.umcdiscipleship.org/content-library/tags/worship-matters-podcast). We just recorded our 41st episode of the biweekly podcast, so there are plenty to choose from. (And in case you’re wondering “biweekly” can mean both twice a week and every two weeks. Isn’t that confusing? Seems like we should have separate words for those two things. In this case, the Worship Matters podcast case, it means every two weeks. So, 41+ episodes (and I say 41+ because we did a couple “special editions” that weren’t in the episode count) is more than a year and half’s worth, so there’s plenty to listen to.
These last few episodes have been a mini series titled “In-Person” Worship. So many churches are returning to in-person after a year of virtual worship. Some are already back, others not yet, some are trying it short term, and others do a special in-person worship for Easter or another high holy day before returning to the virtual format. But the vaccine roll out and the changes in attitude toward the pandemic made us feel like it would be good to find out what matters when returning to in-person worship. We’ve had a great time talking with pastors and worship leaders and various folks about the process, both of moving to virtual worship and the shift back to in-person. One of our repeated questions is what did you learn? What did you learn about worship, what did you learn about your church, what did you learn about what really matters in all of this?
In most cases the answers came easy, even if the learning didn’t. It was a struggle for everyone, but I have been constantly amazed at the imagination and perseverance and buckets of hope that I have seen through this year long ordeal. Yes, there are some churches that won’t make it through, watch the church closure list at Annual Conference this year, it might be tragic. But at the same time there have been churches and communities of faith who have thrived and are looking to the post-pandemic era as a fresh start for a whole new vision of church. One element of this new enthusiasm is that the pandemic has asked us all to reassess what really matters.
This came to me during our latest podcast, which will be posted Monday, April 12th. We were interviewing the Rev. John Thornburg who works with the Texas Methodist Foundation and calls himself an encourager. I like that, and I think it is an appropriate way to describe not just his ministry through the Foundation, but his personality as well. But it was actually my colleague, Diana Sanchez Bushong who set my head spinning and this blog to begin to take shape. Diana is the Director of Music Ministries and has been helping churches and choirs and musicians of all sorts navigate the covid protocols with as much grace as possible. We were discussing the effect of the lockdown and the move to virtual worship, sharing what we learned, and Diana said “for one thing, we learned we don’t need the building to be the church!”
We don’t need the building? Now, just wait a darn minute. Those buildings are a source of pride and joy in the life of many a community. They inspire us and give us a sense of awe and wonder. For some they can be intimate and bring us a sense of the closeness of God. A church building can be an object of beauty and a hint of the glory of God. At the same time, especially for those of us who have worked in the church for most of our lives, a church building can be like home, a place of familiarity and comfort and belonging. How can you say we don’t need the building?
Because for a year we didn’t have one and we were still the church. Sure, there are those who don’t feel like it, who say the church has been closed down. Some are even angry about it, seeing it as an intrusive government keeping us from obeying our God to worship. Yet, there was no prohibition on being the church, only gathering in the building. Slowly we learned the building didn’t matter. Oh, it changed things when we no longer had the usual routines and the default position of “going to church.” But it made us rethink church completely. It made us and is still making us decide that when it comes to being the church nothing matters. Nothing external anyway. Nothing tangible. We can be the church, it doesn’t matter where, it doesn’t matter when. Nothing matters. We don’t need a building.
Ok, so now what? Do we tear them all down? Isn’t all that stuff we said still true? Don’t they inspire and all that stuff? Certainly they can and they do. But so do a lot of things. Part of what happens when we decide that buildings don’t matter, or even that nothing matters is that we find that everything is important. We begin to see that while nothing can keep us from being the church, being the body of Christ at work in the world, there are lots of things that can help us live that life. Nothing matters, but everything is important.
Matthew 6:25-34 "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? 28 And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. 30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you-- you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What will we eat?' or 'What will we drink?' or 'What will we wear?' 32 For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 "So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today.
That’s what I now hear Jesus saying in these verses from the Sermon on the Mount. Nothing matters, but everything is important. That’s how he is able to say to us, don’t worry, but pay attention. This isn’t about wasting time, about being idle. This is about being aware of the Presence in the most surprising of places. We are finding God outside of the church buildings for the first time in a long time. Not in the once-in-a-lifetime trips to the Grand Canyon or the Redwood Forest. But in our own neighborhoods, in the flowers that grow in the fields around us, and the birds that sing so loudly in the trees outside our bedroom windows. Their song is a hymn to the awakened, to the ones who are paying attention.
Then, once we wake up to the presence in the world around us, then we can begin to sense the presence in the people around us. First in those we know and love already, and then, if we try, if we resolve to trust in that presence, in the ones we can learn to love, the ones who are different from us, as different are birds from lilies and yet resonate with the presence of God. We don’t love them because we’re supposed to, we love them because they are important. Because we find our way to worship with them, through them, because of them. We wake up to every grain of sand and hue of skin, and are inspired by the beauty of each and of all. We don’t worry because we trust. We don’t worry because we sense God’s presence everywhere. We don’t worry because we are leaning in so that we might worship, in buildings and in the world. Buildings don’t matter, nothing matters in the way that leads to worry. But everything is important in the way that leads to worship.
Thanks be to God and to the church that has left the building.
Shalom,
Derek
No comments:
Post a Comment