Easter Sunday
I've been thinking for the last 2 days how I wanted to write about this, knowing from the moment it happened that I needed to write about it.
I returned to church this Sunday, Easter Sunday. I went because it was Easter Sunday and because we were visiting my husband's family and I felt the obligation of going with family to an Easter Sunday service and the desire to not be left alone in a home that is not mine with no real ritual or tradition on Easter Morning. I also had this voice in the back of my head that whispered "How bad can it be?"
To tell you the truth it wasn't that bad. Sure I had theological disagreements with what was being taught from the pulpit. Someone said something that sat the wrong way with me and I smiled and nodded (and tried not to roll my eyes) while taking another sip of my coffee. I bit my tongue in places where, if situation or timing had been different, I might have said something.
But the whole time as I sat there, staring at the words of songs I used to sing without a second thought, listening to a sermon before I would have gulped up, I kept thinking about words that felt like they had been spoken over me earlier that week. This wasn't about me.
In an excerpt from a sermon I'd read earlier this Holy week Pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber said "God did not become human and dwell among us as Jesus to save only an improved, doesn't make wrong choices kind of people... So go ahead. Don't wait until you think your motivations are correct. Don't wait until you are sure you believe every word of the Nicene creed. Don't worry about coming to church this week for the right reasons. Just wave branches. Shout praise for the wrong reasons. Eat a meal. Have your feet washed. Grab at coins. Shout 'Crucify Him' as the cock crows. Because we, as we are and not some improved version of ourselves... we are who God came to save."
This gave me permission to walk into a church on Easter Sunday with all of my doubts and theological differences and questioning and deconstruction and enjoy breaking bread and drinking wine with the church. I even felt old, familiar desires to sing praises rise up in me, and so I did (When I found the one song that I actually knew and didn't sound completely wrong to my ears).
I was reminded that even though we vary so vastly on such big issues, we all make up the Body of Christ. Me and the old woman next to me and the woman who would only address me by my husband's last name and the man who married us and the little children who gathered at the front of the church to bang drums and shake shakers without a second thought of where their theological convictions fell on the wide scale of people who follow Divine Love.
And then I went back to my in-law's and ate Easter dinner and played games with my family.
I thought after Lent was over I would have a conviction one way or another whether or not I was going back to church. But I don't. I'm not convinced that I will never go back to church as a regular attender. But I can say right now I have no desire to go back. Even after my Easter Sunday church experience, while there are things I miss and love about the church, I know that its not for me.
I've learned so much since leaving church. I have found so much freedom and space to sort through issues and tribe. And I'm loving this un-churched life while still whole heartedly following the leading of Divine Love.
I returned to church this Sunday, Easter Sunday. I went because it was Easter Sunday and because we were visiting my husband's family and I felt the obligation of going with family to an Easter Sunday service and the desire to not be left alone in a home that is not mine with no real ritual or tradition on Easter Morning. I also had this voice in the back of my head that whispered "How bad can it be?"
To tell you the truth it wasn't that bad. Sure I had theological disagreements with what was being taught from the pulpit. Someone said something that sat the wrong way with me and I smiled and nodded (and tried not to roll my eyes) while taking another sip of my coffee. I bit my tongue in places where, if situation or timing had been different, I might have said something.
But the whole time as I sat there, staring at the words of songs I used to sing without a second thought, listening to a sermon before I would have gulped up, I kept thinking about words that felt like they had been spoken over me earlier that week. This wasn't about me.
In an excerpt from a sermon I'd read earlier this Holy week Pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber said "God did not become human and dwell among us as Jesus to save only an improved, doesn't make wrong choices kind of people... So go ahead. Don't wait until you think your motivations are correct. Don't wait until you are sure you believe every word of the Nicene creed. Don't worry about coming to church this week for the right reasons. Just wave branches. Shout praise for the wrong reasons. Eat a meal. Have your feet washed. Grab at coins. Shout 'Crucify Him' as the cock crows. Because we, as we are and not some improved version of ourselves... we are who God came to save."
This gave me permission to walk into a church on Easter Sunday with all of my doubts and theological differences and questioning and deconstruction and enjoy breaking bread and drinking wine with the church. I even felt old, familiar desires to sing praises rise up in me, and so I did (When I found the one song that I actually knew and didn't sound completely wrong to my ears).
I was reminded that even though we vary so vastly on such big issues, we all make up the Body of Christ. Me and the old woman next to me and the woman who would only address me by my husband's last name and the man who married us and the little children who gathered at the front of the church to bang drums and shake shakers without a second thought of where their theological convictions fell on the wide scale of people who follow Divine Love.
And then I went back to my in-law's and ate Easter dinner and played games with my family.
I thought after Lent was over I would have a conviction one way or another whether or not I was going back to church. But I don't. I'm not convinced that I will never go back to church as a regular attender. But I can say right now I have no desire to go back. Even after my Easter Sunday church experience, while there are things I miss and love about the church, I know that its not for me.
I've learned so much since leaving church. I have found so much freedom and space to sort through issues and tribe. And I'm loving this un-churched life while still whole heartedly following the leading of Divine Love.
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