This has been an interesting week for me as a result of one
small suggestion from God. As I was considering how “wide open” my future
presently is, I suddenly felt the inclination that he had something particular
in mind for me. I was thinking about the possibilities available to me after I
complete seminary, some require a little more schooling, others I could do
right away. Since starting seminary I have thought about being a teacher, a
nurse, an occupational therapist, a career musician, a professor, and numerous
other options. Interestingly, I realized that I had not ever thought as deeply
about being a pastor as I likely ought to. Funny how we seminarians operate.
The word
that came to mind for me as I was considering all these other options was
“settling.” There is nothing at all wrong with being a teacher, nurse, or
whatever, but for me, I may very well
be settling. I have had a great many moments in which I have been seriously
unimpressed with the church and usually these moments correlate with thoughts
along the lines of, “how can we do better” and “how can the church look more
like Jesus” and “what did they expect this message to communicate other than
the antithesis of the gospel?” As something of a prophetic mind, I find myself
operating as the critic over and over and have not, lately, found myself in the
reformer/creative/implementer-of-change’s chair at all.
I love the
Church with all my heart, and with how poorly I see it operating all around me
my gut reaction is to say, “Hope is lost, nothing can be done to save her, all
we can do now is try to bow out gracefully and go do guerilla Christianity
elsewhere.” So much of my soul wants to duck out of the church and pass my time
with a few friends who believe hard and see the same issues going on that I see
going on. The appeal of what I call guerilla Christianity is it makes you responsible
to a few people for maintaining a relationship with the most high, without
having to sit through sermons that are neither inspiring, nor formative, nor
informative and without having to sit through worship that feels shallow and
redundant.
I love the
Church with all my heart and I want to see her “walk” what she is “talking.” We
say God is infinite, so why are we repeating so many things (sermons, songs,
ideas, mistakes) if there is, literally, infinitely more to say. That is
infinite “talk” followed up with numerically insignificant “walk.” If God is
truly infinite, I should never have to hear the same sermon twice, let alone
dozens of times. Often it seems underestimations of God are the cause, other
times it seems an excessive commitment to people pleasing is the cause, and
still other times incompetent leaders seem to be the cause. But no matter the
cause, it seems we still sell ourselves short of what we could do when God is with us.
And then
all of this ends up looking like a gun sight narrowly focused on me and
demanding, “so what are you going to do about it?” At first I think I cannot do
anything, so I bow out; I’ll go do my faith thing over here and see what
happens. Yet, lately, it seems like, as I feel the sight focused on me, I have
to say, “Well, I guess I can try and do it the way it should be done. I do not
know what that is, but I’ll commit to trying to figure it out and do whatever
it seems it is that we are supposed to do.”
This
relatively recent feeling of a “call” to the church is uncomfortable,
impractical, and also more “right” feeling than most I have experienced in my
life. I do not want to work in a church because I know that I will, if I am
true to myself and to God, fight so many uphill battles. If I am a pastor
people will be angry, people will be offended, and people will question what
they believe. And I think the Church should be angry, offended, and questioning
much more often than we are, we accept simplification so easily.
I wish I
remembered the exact words of a highly valued friend as he encouraged me on my
23rd birthday. It was something to the effect of, “Kendrick you
offend me, but you force me to ask more questions and to dig deeper.”
May we all,
myself wholeheartedly included, dig a little deeper.
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