having church in the most unlikely places
I just finished listening to this Johnny Cash song. I've heard it before, but for some reason the lyrics hit me in a new way today. I experienced one of those moments (or, more accurately, a bunch of those moments) when all different kinds of things come together.Well, I woke up Sunday morningI am working on the lesson for the teen's Sunday School class tomorrow (why do the words "Sunday School" make me cringe?), thinking about the moments in which I saw God in the rest home last night, and processing words and ideas from this book I'm reading. And I can't shake the thought that somehow I'm off-target with my version of God and church and Christianity.
With no way to hold my head that didn't hurt.
And the beer I had for breakfast wasn't bad,
So I had one more for dessert.
Then I fumbled in my closet through my clothes
And found my cleanest dirty shirt.
Then I washed my face and combed my hair
And stumbled down the stairs to meet the day.
I'd smoked my mind the night before
With cigarettes and songs I'd been picking.
But I lit my first and watched a small kid
Playing with a can that he was kicking.
Then I walked across the street
And caught the Sunday smell of someone frying chicken.
And Lord, it took me back to something that I'd lost
Somewhere, somehow along the way.
On a Sunday morning sidewalk,
I'm wishing, Lord, that I was stoned.
'Cause there's something in a Sunday
That makes a body feel alone.
And there's nothing short a' dying
That's half as lonesome as the sound
Of the sleeping city sidewalk
And Sunday morning coming down.
In the park I saw a daddy
With a laughing little girl that he was swinging.
And I stopped beside a Sunday school
And listened to the songs they were singing.
Then I headed down the street,
And somewhere far away a lonely bell was ringing,
And it echoed through the canyon
Like the disappearing dreams of yesterday.
On a Sunday morning sidewalk,
I'm wishing, Lord, that I was stoned.
'Cause there's something in a Sunday
That makes a body feel alone.
And there's nothing short a' dying
That's half as lonesome as the sound
Of the sleeping city sidewalk
And Sunday morning coming down
I was thrilled to receive this book as Christmas gift, and even more anticipatory when I read these words about the author on the front flap: she "has always been interested in discovering God in the places people say God isn't supposed to be". I feel like that's a silent, personal challenge that I instituted a while back: to discover people and places where GOD is the only possible explanation for someone acting a certain way or being in a certain place, or even saying certain things.
And, as I allow myself to get more and more involved in the messiness of other people's lives, I find that I see God more there than I do in a Sunday morning service. Last night is a good example. I really, truly did NOT feel like going to the rest home where the heat is on too high and the air always seems to carry scents of various bodily fluids. But I slowed down enough to allow my mind's eye to be filled with the visions of a crooked-tooth Donnell and a smiling Sheila, whose hair seems to be permanently in rollers. And I knew where I had to be that night. So I drove down the backroad to the building which seems to be quietly, patiently waiting for its own demise, much like those who are unfortunate enough to occupy the beds contained within.
I arrived to find the residents dutifully waiting for me. They had already turned off the television and some were rifling through the dusty hymnals, in search of their first request for the evening. Several of the women greeted me by name and welcomed me with hugs, and we entered into "church", as the residents like to call it. An amazing thing happens when I sing with people whose hearts beat stronger and more sincerely than most others that I know: my voice finds an undiscovered strength, and I surprise myself sometimes to hear notes that I otherwise am unable to reach. The music seems to somehow play itself through my often incapable fingers on the keys of ebony and ivory. And we laugh and share stories about our weeks, and I wonder why I was ever thinking about not coming. I go through this process every week, but I am always surprised by the incredible newness of how God somehow reveals Himself to me through these seasoned veterans of tears, laughter, and life.
My ideas and notions of who God is change through these experiences, as He grows larger than the boxes and compartments in which I place Him. This process sometimes hurts quite a bit, as quite often it involves re-examining my priorities. Lately I have felt like an overgrown plant on God's pruning table, and it hurts like anything to watch helplessly as God cuts away the people that I love, my ideas of what my life should look like, and the deep sense of personal right to which I hold.
I recently read the following words from Rob Bell, and I find myself really relating to what he says when speaking of the Eucharist:
"God's gift to us. Our gratitude. The Eucharist is where the body is broken and the blood is spilled, Jesus on the cross ...
And so we're a Eucharist for the world — we break ourselves open and pour ourselves out so that others may be fed. No wonder we're tired, deep-in-the-soul tired, sometimes. When someone has been fed, someone else had to have been broken and spilled — that's how it works ...
I break and spill with words and ink, others are broken and poured out in other ways. So there have to be these times when we let what's been broken be put back together and what's been spilled be poured back in. Cuz that's how we roll."
Somehow all of these different things come together to make me think of church, and God, and what that all looks like. Or what it should look like. Every day, everywhere I go, I am representing God and His church. I am pouring myself out in an effort to feed others, and sometimes it freakin' hurts. I run into men stumbling around in their "cleanest dirty shirts", and -- as a Christian -- I should be somehow bringing something useful to those men. If we're doing what we should be doing, there shouldn't be people around us feeling lonely, or hungry, or empty. Whatever we do, whether that be playing piano and singing with a crowd of elderly people, or stopping to buy coffee for a homeless man on the street, we have within us the ability to "have church". The Kingdom of God is something that we carry with us, all the time. When we break ourselves open and pour ourselves out, what should be flowing out of us is God and the hope that is found only in Him.
Right now I'm in the "what's been spilled is being poured back in" stage, and it hurts a whole lot. But I know that when I am filled back up again, somehow there will be more of me to give. Somehow I will carry even more of the Kingdom with me, and I look forward to more and more church services in new and unlikely places.
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