The Church is a strange thing. It's like an electron, where it's here one moment and then another moment it's gone, but it's never actually gone. The church's ability to break paradigms, to show up in unexpected places, to show up in expected places, and to give hands and feet to a spiritual reality is its greatest strength.
Jesus said it this way, "The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit." (John 3:8)
Basically the Church has a spiritual existence, which isn't necessarily always visible, but it also has a physical presence. If I were stranded all alone on a desert island, I could be comforted by the fact that I was still part of the church, a part of the Body of Christ. I wouldn't be any less a member of the Church than when gathering with others on a Sunday morning. At the same time, the Church has the ability to take on this amazing and unpredictable embodiment whenever its members gather together in the Spirit. BOOM! It shows up suddenly, like an electron jumping from place to place around a nucleus, giving substance to the entire atom! Energy is present in a new way. The church becomes EMBODIED.
In our culture we tend to focus on knowledge, ideas, and beliefs – these concepts are usually differentiated, but have similar implications as far as how we live our lives. In the church this focus on mental ascent can lead us to frown upon or downplay bodily experiences – pleasure, feeling, sensation, joy, physical presence, or connection. We separate our existence into spiritual, mental, and physical realities, when being human entails a complex interaction between these realities. God himself testified to the importance of embodied truth when he sent Jesus Christ to the world, and the WORD became FLESH.
In my opinion (and personal experience) the emphasis placed by the mainstream church on having all the "right" beliefs is one of the reasons many people are abandoning institutional church and other Christian gatherings. After all, if having the "right" beliefs is more important than living meaningful and authentic lives of faith and community, then what's the point of going to church or gathering with others? As long as I have the right beliefs, then I have everything I need. Following the same logic, if I can't find a church that believes everything I believe, then what's the point of participating?
I think we underestimate and shy away from admitting how important experience is to living out meaningful human lives. We are physical and spiritual beings. Besides just knowing and believing things, we need to experience and feel things. The power of gathering on a Sunday morning is the experience of hearing the music, singing songs, seeing and participating in worship with other believers in unity, taking communion, listening to someone share their testimony, holding someone's hands in prayer, and sharing hugs with other brothers and sisters in Christ. These experiences are just as important as what we learn and know from books, sermons, and podcasts.
TASTE and SEE that the Lord is good.
As people, we crave experiences. This isn't a bad thing. We learn, remember, and hold on to embodied experiences. It is all about finding balance, learning and living what it means to be fully human. We experience God's love as we love others, we fully learn truth when we act it out, and faith becomes real when we make ourselves vulnerable to others.
Kierkegaard put it this way, "Take a thinker who erects a huge building, a system of thought, one that encompasses the whole of life and world history. Turn your attention to his personal life and you will discover to your astonishment, like among so many others, the appalling and ludicrous fact that he himself does not live in this huge, high-vaulted palace, but in a shack next door."
Admittedly, an institutional church gathering on a Sunday morning is only one way to gather and just the beginning of what it means live as the Body of Christ. Still, a Sunday gathering remains a valid and important way to gather when done so in faith. If we don't gather in faith, we inhibit our ability to experience goodness, because we return to a limited mental construct of what is possible.
Allow yourself to taste and see that the Lord is good. When you gather, expect the unexpected. Believe that anything is possible. Rest in God's love so that you can worship the one true King with others, free from comparisons or judgements. Look for God's image in everyone you meet, anywhere you go, and be prepared for God's love to show up in new ways.
Jesus said that true worshipers worship Him in spirit and in truth. Paradoxically, when we do so, we allow God to meet us in person, wherever we are.
In my opinion (and personal experience) the emphasis placed by the mainstream church on having all the "right" beliefs is one of the reasons many people are abandoning institutional church and other Christian gatherings. After all, if having the "right" beliefs is more important than living meaningful and authentic lives of faith and community, then what's the point of going to church or gathering with others? As long as I have the right beliefs, then I have everything I need. Following the same logic, if I can't find a church that believes everything I believe, then what's the point of participating?
I think we underestimate and shy away from admitting how important experience is to living out meaningful human lives. We are physical and spiritual beings. Besides just knowing and believing things, we need to experience and feel things. The power of gathering on a Sunday morning is the experience of hearing the music, singing songs, seeing and participating in worship with other believers in unity, taking communion, listening to someone share their testimony, holding someone's hands in prayer, and sharing hugs with other brothers and sisters in Christ. These experiences are just as important as what we learn and know from books, sermons, and podcasts.
TASTE and SEE that the Lord is good.
As people, we crave experiences. This isn't a bad thing. We learn, remember, and hold on to embodied experiences. It is all about finding balance, learning and living what it means to be fully human. We experience God's love as we love others, we fully learn truth when we act it out, and faith becomes real when we make ourselves vulnerable to others.
Kierkegaard put it this way, "Take a thinker who erects a huge building, a system of thought, one that encompasses the whole of life and world history. Turn your attention to his personal life and you will discover to your astonishment, like among so many others, the appalling and ludicrous fact that he himself does not live in this huge, high-vaulted palace, but in a shack next door."
Admittedly, an institutional church gathering on a Sunday morning is only one way to gather and just the beginning of what it means live as the Body of Christ. Still, a Sunday gathering remains a valid and important way to gather when done so in faith. If we don't gather in faith, we inhibit our ability to experience goodness, because we return to a limited mental construct of what is possible.
Allow yourself to taste and see that the Lord is good. When you gather, expect the unexpected. Believe that anything is possible. Rest in God's love so that you can worship the one true King with others, free from comparisons or judgements. Look for God's image in everyone you meet, anywhere you go, and be prepared for God's love to show up in new ways.
Jesus said that true worshipers worship Him in spirit and in truth. Paradoxically, when we do so, we allow God to meet us in person, wherever we are.
YES YES YES! "Anything Can Happen!"
ReplyDeleteThe experience is such an important piece to this Christian walk! You are so right that we can't underestimate its important. Change happens when we come together. We even absorb the truth better when we learn and experience it together. Great post!!