I Love This Church

The church at its best

Sitting in Sunday school one morning. A pleasant surprise. First a confession from a leader named Bob. Then the spontaneous response.

Bob’s been through a lot in the last year. The sudden death of a young mother within his extended family. Painful and scary health issues for him and his wife and their adult children.

In addition, he and a few of his cousins have decided to take a road trip to visit some places with special connections to their childhood. They all agreed that it would be best if Bob would organize it. He’s excited about the trip, but putting it together is a big job, and he feels kind of lost as he tries to figure out the details regarding where and when and how.

Today, as expected, he opens the class with greetings and announcements. Then, unexpectedly, the confession. He’s struggling with all the stresses in his life right now. He’s feeling small and and weak and overwhelmed. With drooping shoulders and a weary expression on his face, he asks for our prayers.

Next the spontaneous response. Sylvia stands up, pulls an empty chair out from a table, and tells Bob to sit down. A group gathers around him and places their hands on his head and shoulders. They take several minutes to pray out loud for him. After the final “Amen!,” I turn to the friend next to me with a hint of tears in my eyes and say, “I love this church!”

We’re not a charismatic church or class. Some hands are raised during the worship service, and once every few years we lay hands on someone to pray for them, but most of us express our love and gratitude and dedication to God more calmly and quietly.

Personal prayer requests tend to be limited to concerns about health issues, jobs, or travel safety. The externals, not the internals. When I’m praying at home, I have to remind myself to extend my intercession to include the spiritual side as well as the physical.

This morning we’ve broken through a barrier that prevents us from sharing more deeply. A leader in the class has admitted his weakness by asking for prayer for his emotional and spiritual needs. He had the courage to make himself vulnerable to accusations from the evangelically correct: If he was really a good Christian, he should be strong enough to handle all this. If he was really a good Christian, he should trust God better.

And we didn’t respond in judgment. We didn’t rush to assure Bob that God is in control, so he should just accept the situation and be happy. Our hearts were open to his pain. We valued his spontaneous confession. We surrounded him with love and understanding and prayers.

This is the church at its best.

The foundation

How did we get here?

Church leadership has a lot to do with it. Our head pastor sets an example. He’s real. Human. We know that he faces the same struggles as we do.

Recently, a friend and I were talking about the strengths in our church. Without going into the specific details, she told me that several years ago she had asked Pastor for guidance regarding a problem within her family. Over time it became clear that his advice was pretty bad.

She went back to him feeling disappointed and a bit angry. He freely admitted that he was wrong and humbly apologized. No attempt to justify himself or to place the blame on her.

During the time that I’ve been going to this church, I’ve seen Pastor grow spiritually and in his ability to communicate more compassionately. I don’t know that I could say that about any other pastor in any other church that I’ve belonged to.

The age of my Sunday school classmates might have something to do with it, too. I’m in my mid-sixties. More than half of the class is older than me.

Several have lost spouses and adult children. Many have chronic health problems. A few are experiencing financial difficulties. Some grieve over children who are abusing drugs or alcohol or who’ve strayed from the Truth. At least one has had to face the trial of seeing her son sent to prison on drug-related charges after years of attempts to get him through rehab successfully.

Suffering tends to either drive people apart or draw them together. We tend to respond to it in one of three ways: by denying the pain, by doing the opposite and constantly griping about it, or by working through our sorrow with the support of those around us.

In my experience in the past, many church members who were hurting either left or felt pressured to pretend in order to continue attending. I don’t know if there’s been a shift among evangelicals in general or if my church is an exception to the rule, but more people here seem to remain through the tough times as they draw together and reach out for support.

Maybe we can be trusted with our leader’s vulnerability because we’ve been in his shoes and we’re willing to admit it.

Room to grow

As good as it is, my church has its shortcomings, too. Some of the teaching is shallower than I’d like it to be, but it’s better than other churches that I’ve been in. In spite of our concern for each other, as demonstrated this morning, it can be difficult to build deep relationships.

One of the biggies that grieves me is the lack of children in the Worship Center. They call the service “big church.” As if it’s only for big people. As if they don’t belong there. They worship in their own groups with others their own age.

What will happen down the road when they graduate out of those groups and their only choice of where and when to worship at church is in the main sanctuary, with people who are all older than they are? Will they be mature enough to appreciate worship that doesn’t focus on the needs and preferences of a narrow range of ages? Or will they simply walk away?

So my church isn’t perfect. But I love it anyway. I pray that we would continue to follow God faithfully and to grow in Him. And that He would protect us from the attacks of Satan as we do that.

 

 

Slow Learners

Jacob’s fear

I’m a slow learner. How many times have I read about Jacob/Israel in the book of Genesis? How many times have I listened to biblical teaching about him? And yet it’s taken me all these years to really see the enormous change in his life that takes place in Genesis 28-33.

Jacob is a slow learner, too. God Himself appears to him in a dream as he’s fleeing from his older brother Esau. The Lord declares that He’s going to give Jacob great blessings and bless the whole world through him. This is the covenant He made with Abraham two generations earlier.

God is telling Jacob that he’s been chosen to be the recipient of all those covenant promises. In addition, He says He’ll be with Jacob and watch over him and bring him back safely to the land he’s leaving.

Could God’s grace get any bigger? Jacob just deceived their father, Issac, into granting him the blessing that should have gone to Esau. Now the Lord is freely bestowing on this liar and cheater and manipulator totally undeserved blessings that far surpass anything Isaac could possibly give him.

Seems like such a vision and such a promise and such grace would instantly erase all of Jacob’s fears. But for twenty years, he still lives in anxiety. Even when God speaks to him (again) and personally tells him to go back to the land he came from, reassuring him (again) that He’ll be with him, Jacob is terrified. Terrified of both Esau and his father-in-law, Laban.

Instead of being honest with Laban and witnessing to him about how God’s spoken to him, Jacob deceives his father-in-law and sneaks away from him, taking his family and possessions with him. Laban pursues him, and they end up making a covenant of peace.

The next challenge to face is Esau. When Jacob finds out that his brother is on his way to meet them with four hundred men to back him up, he carefully places his herds and wives and children and servants ahead of him, so they’ll run into Esau first. Partly to try to soften his brother’s heart. Partly to let the leaders of the group sound the alarm so the rest, including Jacob, can turn and run if Esau is still angry.

Jacob has seen God in visions. He’s been chosen to receive the Abrahamic covenant. He’s been promised repeatedly that God will take care of him. He’s experienced God’s provision ever since arriving at Laban’s home in Haran. But he’s a slow learner. He’s still afraid.

Jacob's faith

And then everything changes.

After sending his family and possessions across a stream (the Jabbok), Jacob is alone. A man appears and wrestles with him all night. Jacob is winning. But he won’t let the man go until the man blesses him.

The man wrenches Jacob’s hip, then changes his name to Israel, meaning wrestles or struggles with God. Jacob realizes that this isn’t just an ordinary human being, saying later that he “saw God face to face.”

He and his family continue on their way. Jacob is now limping. He must be exhausted from spending the entire night wrestling. He’s more vulnerable than ever. And yet, when he once again organizes the crowd, this time “he himself went on ahead.” He’s no longer afraid. He’s finally trusting God.

All those years of hearing His voice, listening to His promises, and seeing those promises fulfilled in many blessings, didn’t change him. He was still Jacob, meaning deceiver. It wasn’t until he wrestled with God that he believed Him.

Slow-learning disciples

In Matthew 14 and 15, Jesus feeds five thousand men (plus women and children) with a few loaves and fishes. He sends the disciples ahead while He dismisses the crowd, then walks on water to join them as they sail across a stormy lake. After getting into the boat, He calms the wind. His followers respond by saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.” When they arrive on land, He amazes everyone by healing “the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute and many others.” Miracle follows miracle in a short period of time.

Then the people run out of food (again). Jesus tells the disciples He wants to provide for all four thousand of them. These twelve confused and faithless men reply, “Where could we get enough bread in this remote place to feed such a crowd?” As if they’ve learned nothing from His recent actions.

I’ve heard some speculation that there was really only one supernatural feeding. The details are slightly different, but that happens in eyewitness accounts. The speculators question why the disciples would respond the way they did when Jesus offers to repeat the same miracle. Surely they’d get the message the first time. Surely they wouldn’t experience any doubts in the same situation just a few days later.

But Jesus Himself says in Matthew 16:9-10, “Don’t you remember the five loaves for the five thousand, and how many basketfuls you gathered? Or the seven loaves for the four thousand, and how many basketfuls you gathered?” Two different feedings. Two different stories. He knows that slow learners need repeated lessons. He graciously provides for them spiritually and psychologically, as well as physically.

I’ve also heard that the Sermon on the Mount, starting in Matthew chapter 5, is the same event as that recorded in Luke chapter 6. Again, the details are slightly different, but why would Jesus bother presenting the same information twice? Wouldn’t once be enough?

Then a pastor suggested that they’re actually two different situations. One on a mountain (“he went up on a mountainside”). One on a plain (“He went down with them and stood on a level place”).

Why bother repeating His teaching? Because Jesus knows that the disciples are slow learners. They need to hear it again. They also need the reassurance that God understands slow learners.

Other slow learners

Look how long the Lord put up with the Israelites in the desert on the way to the Promised Land. He performed great miracles before freeing them from bondage in Egypt. He supernaturally produced manna for them for forty years. How could anyone question His love and grace when it was so obvious?

And yet they grumbled and doubted time after time. God judged them for their lack of faith. But even that judgment was proof of His existence and His righteous character. He punished them, but He continued to forgive these slow learners and He remained with them as He led them into a land flowing with milk and honey.

The author of Hebrews calls his readers “slow to learn” (vs. 5:11). Based on the length of time that they’ve been Christians, they should be able to teach others. Instead, they still need to be taught even the most elementary truths “all over again.” Hebrews was written to meet that need.

In Galatians 3:1, Paul exclaims in exasperation, “You foolish Galatians!” The gospel has been explained to them so clearly and so carefully. They’ve obviously accepted it. They should know it by heart. And yet they still have to be reminded that salvation is by grace, through faith, not by human effort.
 
A wise teacher

The bad news is we are all slow learners. The good news is we are all slow learners. I’m not alone in this struggle. The people in the Bible weren’t any better or worse than I am. And the Lord handled their doubts and fears graciously, presenting the same lessons over and over again. Like Jacob/Israel, some of them finally got it.

God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He’ll deal with me in the same way as He dealt with all those foolish, slow-learning examples in His Word. Patiently. Compassionately. Maybe with discipline, but always with grace. Like a wise teacher reaching out to the most hopeless cases. And I just might finally get it, too.