I’m tired of Lent.
The worship team hatched this clever idea of trying to ‘destabilize’ our regular worship pattern during Lent as a way of asking how much is Enough? How much can we strip away and still have a Holy encounter? What if we mess up the chairs and make it all chaotic and/or force people to set up their own place? Does God still meet us there in between the ducks and the community basketball game? Do we feel Her move?
What if we change around the order of service and move Communion before the Conversation? Does it still provide us with us with a mysterious encounter of enough?
I want to say ‘Enough’ to our exploration of ‘Enough’. I think we have been too successful at our own plan of destabilizing, which makes me appreciate again the precious nature of the space we create on Sunday morning. We may meet in a Rec center. People may interrupt us with phone calls or dribbling balls or shaking the snack machine.
But it is still a thin place. A threshold of the Divine. And all this destabilizing has left me a bit disoriented, hungry and wanting of God. And that is a Lenten place.
But still, I’m sick of Lent.
I like to snuggle up next to God, and to feel held, wanted, and inspired. And last week I just really wasn’t feeling it. I just wanted to sit there and watch the ducks in the rain. But instead we had these disorganized chairs. And beautiful and HARD scriptures to wrestle with. And so I said some things. And we talked a little. But I worry many of us left feeling a little off. (Note: If you did not feel off and had a beautiful experience, I totally affirm that as I know the Spirit has the power to move in mysterious and differentiated ways).
Ross says he comes to church every week he’s in town because some days something incredible happens, and you never know which day it is going to be. And this raises the question, what do we do with those other days? The not incredible ones? How do we make sense of them?
They serve to remind me that Something (or Someone) is there below the good or easy worship feelings. There is a presence to be sensed just in the rhythmic breathing of a few gathered souls. In the tending to our children, in the openness in their faces. In the watching of the rain, together. It is enough. Even when it isn’t.
So all this feeling of ‘offness’ makes me really primed to get the parable of the prodigal son and the desire for grace that it so beautifully describes.
The sensory details are what get me about this parable: A stoic patriarch who leaves behind the social constraints of his day to run out and gather a lost child into his arms. The weight of a robe of quality fabric draped on the dusty shoulder of a weary traveler. The smell of grilled meat prepared and shared with all the neighbors. The taste of bile in the older son’s mouth, and the tender response of the Father-“There is more than enough.”
This life is not a zero sum game.
So we keep walking through Lent. One week at a time. One story at a time. Join us tonight for some spaghetti and good company. 6:30 Casa Semrad108 South Rosemont Ave. 214. 233-4605 for more info. And join us Sunday as we seek God’s dynamic center even in our own imbalance.
peace,
Courtney
PS All Church Meeting this Sunday at 10am. Contact Ross or Kristin for more info.