OF PEWS, ROBES, AND BULLETINS

“I don’t even know what church looks like anymore,” said the voice from across the table in the Board Room.  By his count, the Board had done 7 things to de-church the church:  ending Sunday night and Wednesday night services, stop taking an offering, got rid of the organ, took out the pews, packed up the choir robes, and now, doing away with the bulletin. He was savvy enough to know that 7 is the biblical number of completion.  So he felt “biblically” justified in the pronouncement of the church’s demise. From his point of view, the last vestige of the “church” was gone.  All that was left was just a group of people and a building.

Church of the Immaculate Conception,
the chapel for the Sisters of Providence
of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods, Indiana.

Every item on the list of “Holy 7” was painfully deliberated.  But, not one of those decisions changed the essential or biblical nature of the church.  It certainly changed the North American model of church which has reigned nearly 200 years. And yet, his voice echoed with the pain of others who have experienced the loss of the security of sameness that mere religion doles out so readily to its’ followers.  There is more comfort in the vestments of pseudo-sacredness than in something that is actually sacred.

No one would ever say out loud, or even admit to themselves the possibility that these things approach “idol” status.  We all know better.  We've read the stories.  We all know that idols are carved statues, right?  But one look at the visceral reaction that many people have had to these types of changes and you know the heart is involved.  The church had American Idols way before Fox network.

This is a symptom of an affliction which infects many of us from time to time.  We so strongly desire a “visible” quality to our “invisible” spirituality that we will accept almost anything.  We are generally uncomfortable with the metaphysically mysterious.  We seem bound to find something material to validate the reality of our spiritual existence.  Something isn't real until we can see it or touch it.  We want these various objects; pews, robes, and bulletins, to be the evidence of our spiritual status.  We want them to silently affirm our relationship with the Almighty; that we are OK.  Has our spirituality become so pathetically inert that we have settled wood, cloth, and paper to encourage us in being the church?

Maybe, just maybe these items are doing quite the opposite.  They may be the very witnesses against us that we have lost the heart of what it means to be the church.  The Apostle Paul suggests that one of the marks of the last days is “having a form of godliness but denying its’ power.”  Have we been pretending to be spiritual giants by parading about with sacred clothes, furniture and paper?

Moses asked the best question ever.  “What will distinguish us from all the peoples of the earth other than your Presence God?”  No amount of tents or trunks or candlesticks or bread loaves will do.  Only the Presence of God Almighty would make the difference.  It is alone the distinguishing mark of identification. 

Now I am all for pillars of smoke and fire.  I could be really jazzed about a heavenly cloud forming in the ceiling of the sanctuary.  Hey, even a self-ripping tapestry would be very cool.  But all of those sights could be cleverly manufactured by creative humans.  All this may have already been done in some sanctuary near you. To my way of thinking, the indisputable manifestation of the Presence of God is a transformed life.   A transformed life that then finds a home in a group of people who are being continually transformed.  Together they learn to “un-naturally” love one another and the world around them.  Clearly, a God is thing.

But, I appreciate God’s sensitivity to us tactile types.  He knew there would be those of us that needed something we could see, taste, and touch to really understand the message of His Presence and work among us.  So, He gave us the sacraments (ordinances, if you prefer) of Communion, Baptism, and Foot Washing.  These external manifestations are a tangible reminder of His work and presence with us and in us.

So, please don’t start burning pews and robes and bulletins.  There is nothing inherently evil about them.  But neither is there some inherently sacred about them.  What we must do is re-examine our measure of what makes a group of people the Body of Christ. 

What can we strip away from the church still be the church?  Why aren't we?

Or maybe, I’m just sitting in my own pew.