It Is What It Isn't

Christianity obviously suffers from a lot of things. I know. I'm in it. I've even contributed to it, but I think that one of the most frustrating things about Christianity is that each generation expects they've reached the end of what faith and Christiainity is. Faith can't change beyond what we know. So if I think church is broken, obviously it's a spiritual issue of obedience that I'm dealing with.

But really?

Is it?

Or is it that people continuously change the way they interact with the world? Is the model of the fifties and sixties church just not effective anymore? Was church broken before that, and we just found out now? Maybe we've been trained to think that today's idea of a formalized church is something to be pursued. It kind of reminds me a little of the beginning of the Reformation.

Martin Luther decided that the Roman Catholic Church was wrong when they said you could pay to get your sins taken away, so he nails these 95 theses to a church's door essentially saying, your model of doing things is corrupt and broken.

People like Tyndale and Wycliffe changed the way everybody interacted with the Bible after centuries of only a select few with the proper education being able to read it...because the system was broken. And still we think that if we shake the worm eaten pillars of the modern church, we're heretics...but weren't the founders of the Reformation? Wasn't Paul a heretic? And Peter? And James? The problem is that we hold tight to opinions while the rafters fall all about us. Church should be in a building, there needs to be a sermon and singing. What about the community? Well, obviously we need to tack on small groups to our programming. That way people experience true community.

But what if it's wrong? What if it's wrong to spend more money on matching our carpets to our pews than to help the needy? What if it's wrong to pay the church's heating bill when we have twelve people in our "congregation" without the means to pay their own heating bills? What if the argument isn't should we sing hymns or the newest praise choruses, but how can we actually love our neighbors? How can we move from the idea of traditional church to the idea of effective Christian community?

I think the heart of the problem is that the majority of us have stopped inventing. We've grown comfortable with the way church is and so church has stagnated. The status quo is sufficient. Punching our spiritual time cards on Sunday is a no effort exercise. And if that's enough, why explore what church should become. It is what it is, right?

But what if it isn't?

Skim milk, with it's condensation beaded around the edge of the glass, nothing like it my friends. Nothing like the ice cold wash of ice cold milk poured rushing down the gullet and swishing and swirling in the stomach. It's almost like heaven on a hot hot day...except, today is overcast and 54.

I'm dying. Slowly but surely, I'll be dead. As far as I know, I'm not dying any faster than anyone else. I don't have any terminal diseases that I know of. I've been told that genetically, my heart may not be the best, but beyond that, I'm the spitting image of health's younger brother. And yet, the fact remains...that I'm dying. Slowly by slowly. Inch by cautious inch my skin is folding, collapsing in on itself. Soon enough my muscles will sag and turn flabby, my jowls will dip, my hair will turn on it's neon vacancy sign and I'll be dead. And we all will.

This isn't news. You wont see "We Are All Dying" as a New York Times headline. We know it. But we ignore it. Because it's easier to live when you aren't going to die. It's easier to believe the string of life will last forever. But life is never real until that string is cut, until it ends. When we realize how short life is, it becomes important. It matters. There's meaning to it.

Fully sated and obese, I sit.

We just had a staff lunch which was full of enchiladas and other myriad Mexican delights...like miniature Snickers.  Who was the wise guy who came up for the title of that candy bar anyway?  Were they throwing out some absurd suggestions like "Nougarama" at the end of a long day of brainstorming when everyone was giving half humored chuckles when someone grabbed the incandescent bulb above their head and with full forced shouted "Snickers!  We should call them Snickers!"  Or maybe it was the privately held nickname of their CEO who never even came close to cracking a smile.  It'd be fittingly ironic.  Candy normally doesn't encourage a somber demeanor.

Regardless, I find myself with a pound or so of the finest American Mexican cuisine that you could find at Eastern Hills Bible Church around one in the afternoon, and find myself with nothing really to ponder.  I mean, I imagine I could force a ponder or two, but that'd be disingenuous and I am anything but.  Your sweater is ugly, by the way.  I know you were wondering.  I guess I just miss updating.  I miss having something to update about.  And I don't like feeling like I have to become a superficial spiritual guru to add something.  

Also, I don't like long haired cats.

Jesus was made of styrofoam

I had communion for the first time in maybe two years yesterday.  I had forgotten about communion.  Not that the knowledge of the ceremony had vacated my mind, but I had forgotten how purgative...how restorative it could be.  It's one of the few times that I am actually able to tame my erratic, media blown mind to focus on the misery of who I am and the glory of who God is.  It's a big thing for me.  Pride runs through my veins like stretches of Wallace plaid and with it comes a convenient forgetfulness of my flawed state.  Communion demands that you stop and look deep into yourself and ask yourself the questions that make you want to hide from the ebony pall.  

As a Christian I have found I'm still afraid of the dark, it's just that now I have made my own shadows and I'm afraid to look into them.  I am afraid to sift through all of horrific evils I've inflicted on God, on my wife, my family, my friends, the world.  That's what Easter is for, right?  There's an old hymn that's called "Calvary Covered it All" and somehow deep inside, that's Easter and Communion in one package.  The reason that we can join together in this grand experience, or commune, is because Jesus took it all.  It's the reason that when the plates came around with the "body of Christ," styrofoam wafers trying to pass themselves off as unleavened bread, and His "blood," a tiny sip of grape juice sufficient only to make you want more, that I was able to focus on how Jesus made light of my darkness and performed a brutal assault on the filth of my life.  I was able to sit next to someone I that I've never known and probably never will see again and hold hands with them during prayer because we share in the sacrifice of Christ.  This is our communion.