This Isn't Walmart, This is a Church!

My wife Laurel has a story she tells that I just love.  It is about growing up in Beechview, a suburb of Pittsburgh, and working at Wendy’s when it first opened.  Yes, we are old.  In any event, when she started working there, the manager told them enthusiastically about Wendy’s, what Wendy’s was about, what their mission or strategy was.  They weren’t going to be just like the other fast food restaurants, they were going to focus on a few simple areas.  They would sell hamburgers, chili, French Fries and Frosty’s.  That was it, they would concentrate on their niche, and do it really well, and leave the variety to the other fast food restaurants.  If you wanted one of those four items, great, if not, that was OK, you could go somewhere else.

Of course, if you go into Wendy’s today, you can see that this philosophy has changed dramatically.  Gone are the days of only selling these four specialty products, now you can get virtually any food group at a Wendy’s, it has morphed into any other fast food restaurant. 

As the war wages on for customers and cash, virtually all companies are selling and providing whatever product and service they can provide to win business.  Starbucks is test marketing selling alcohol, movie theaters are serving meals and alcohol (I think I see a pattern here), and Walmart sells anything and everything to gain more revenue and market share. 

Laurel and I tried to think of companies who stick to what they are good at and don’t veer from that course.  We thought of Waffle House, which we thought was completely crazy, but think about it.  They have greasy eggs, greasy ham/sausage/bacon, greasy hash browns, and even greasy waffles, but that is the basics of their breakfast offering (you can tell I really like Waffle House).  Five Guys for the most part offers cheeseburgers and fries, and a few other minor options.  I’m sure there are some others but so many companies will do anything for a buck, they find their niche, they find what they are good at, but then they determine they need to offer more and more, sell more and more, to increase market share, increase earnings, increase their presence to improve their return on investment.  Nothing wrong with that, we all have to make money, but is this the best way?

I remember the old story of four people discussing where they wanted to go to dinner.  One wanted steak, one wanted seafood, one wanted Italian food, and one wanted Mexican food.  Since they couldn’t decide, they went to a buffet, so they all could get what they wanted.  Instead of going somewhere where you could get a good meal, where it was someone’s specialty, everyone got what they wanted, but it was crappy (my apologies to all of the buffets out there).

Now, let’s take this a step further to modern day religion and churches.  We have invoked the Walmart mentality on our worship.  We give everyone a litany of options, a virtual cafeteria or buffet of decisions for people on what or how they want to worship.  I can just imagine in the near future a little checklist we can fill out on what we believe or how we want to believe.  Would you like the Bible as a part of your worship experience?  Virgin birth?  Jesus as the Son of God?  God as man, woman, neither?  Do you like Paul’s writings?  If not, we can just leave them out.  Old Testament?  Too harsh?  We can leave that out too.

Of course we have given everyone a plethora of ways to worship.  As an example, the church I attend has a traditional service mainly geared to the “old people” (I’m real close to this, not quite ready for this service yet!), a traditional service for the middle aged, a contemporary service for the middle aged, a contemporary service for the young adults and a contemporary service for the youth.  We have splintered the church off into various segments, trying to gear the service and the sermon to the appropriate audience, trying to reach everyone in the way we believe they want to be reached.  We also have the children off somewhere else worshipping and getting lessons geared to their age bracket.  The problem I have with this is, are we a church or many pockets of mini-churches within the church?  I never see children anymore, I never see young people, I rarely see young adults, I see a few older people, I only see those people who fit into my proper age category, 35-60 years old.  I talk to friends from church, and I hear about their children, but it’s been years since I’ve seen any of them.  If they walked up to me on the street, I don’t think I’d know who they were. 

Bear with me for a moment as I reminisce, but I think back to a few stories from my earlier years in the church:

•  I remember sitting in the back of the church, I was ushering that Sunday, and I looked at the church bulletin, and when I saw the date, I just thought out loud, “Wow, time is flying by”.  Sitting next to me was this old, white-haired gentleman, Larry Hadlock, one of the nicest guys you would find, and he said, “Tell me about it”.  He was probably 80 at the time, and I’m sure time had flown by for him.
•  I remember a service near Christmas, it was when Megan was little, she was probably three or four years old, and I remember holding the hymnal for her, and inching my finger along the page, helping her see the music, see the notes.  She was too young to understand, but that’s how children learn, by watching us in worship.  As a side note, I remember picking her up at the end of the service, and she wrapped her legs around me, and unfortunately, I had one of those musical Christmas ties on.  Just as the church went silent for the closing prayer, you could hear “Jingle Bells” coming from my chest.  Those things don’t shut off either.
•  I remember the Youth Services from past years when the seniors from high school would give the sermon before going off to college.  I remember watching kids like Alan Dyer or Breanna Shell giving the sermon and wondering when did they grow up?  How did they go from that child I watched in the nursery or taught Sunday School or watched worship in the sanctuary with their parents into a mature young adult so quickly?

As noted, we are trying to gear our services to the proper demographics so much anymore, we lose the family in Church Family.  Gone are the days of reminiscing with the older generation, gone are the days of watching young families grow together in the church, gone are the days of watching children grow up in the church.  Just like the secular world, we have to give everyone what they want, the way they want it, even in a church setting. 

I do understand that churches, just like the secular world, are competing for dollars.  They need money to keep the doors open, I get that.  But should we be competing for people’s souls?  Wouldn’t it be better if we all said, this is what we believe, and this is how we are going to worship?  I know a lot of people criticize the Catholic church for being too stodgy, but they have held true to what they believe and how their worship services are structured.  You know what you will get when you go into virtually any Catholic church.  And by the way, they are one of the few denominations that is growing. 

I think back to the old movie, “Miracle on 34^th Street”, and the scene where the department store Santa Claus (who of course is the real Santa Claus) tells shoppers where they can get toys cheaper down the street.  While the store manager was furious, what he found was it built customer loyalty.  What if we referred people to other churches that met their needs, instead of trying to morph into something we’re not and stray from our niche, or what we’re good at?  Better yet, what if we helped them find that church that met their needs, what if we connected them with the pastor of that church?  Isn’t that our mission as Christians, to bring people to God, not to bring them to our church?  You want liberal theology?  There’s a great church down the street that is much more liberal than ours, let me contact the pastor there for you.  You want a really energetic contemporary service?  You have to try Grace, it’s phenomenal.  I’ll contact the pastor for you.

OK, I know I’m crazy, this type of scenario only lives in my fantasy world.  But think about it again, we’re talking about people’s souls.  Should this be a competition?  Shouldn’t our goal be their salvation, no matter what?  This isn't Walmart.

In The Name of Love, Yes

The PCUSA had a major vote at its General Assembly this year to recognize and embrace same sex marriage.  The vote was fairly lopsided (61%-39%) to allow clergy to perform same sex marriages, and also approved an amendment to the denomination’s constitution to define marriage as between two people rather than a man and a woman.

While this was the most controversial of decisions made at the General Assembly, and the one that has many people and churches fleeing the denomination, this is the decision that I strongly agree with the PCUSA on, and, I applaud them for their strength and vision in making this decision.  When decisions are made out of love as the overriding reason, you really can’t go wrong, and the PCUSA didn’t go wrong here.

Over time, many churches and denominations have danced around this issue.  Some have condemned homosexuality and homosexuals, some have embraced them, and many have taken the US military approach of “don’t ask, don’t tell”.  The PCUSA has been the denomination who has stepped to the forefront and chosen love and embracing all children as God’s children.

I’ve often wondered how people can be so unforgiving on this topic.  I’ve seen so many Christians, who can forgive people for just about any sin, except for the “sin” of homosexuality.  While some view homosexuality as a sin, and some do not, what amazes me is that some who believe it is a sin seem to find it as the only unforgivable sin.  I sometimes wonder if murderers, adulterers, rapists are in their Heaven, but Heaven forbid, no homosexuals would ever be in their Heaven. 

On the other hand, I also struggle with the “don’t ask, don’t tell” approach.  It’s OK if you come and worship with us, just don’t flaunt it, don’t let us know that you are gay, let us just assume you are single.  We don’t need to know, we don’t want to know your sexual orientation.  Church is supposed to be about community, about relationships, how can you have community and relationships with others if you aren’t willing to really know them, know about their life, what is important in their life, who is important in their life?

I have to admit, I haven’t felt this way all my life.  When I was younger, I took a much harder stance on this issue, not nearly to the level of feeling it was the only “unpardonable sin”, but I was certainly opposed to the homosexual lifestyle.  Over time, I started realizing that we are dealing with people, it’s easy to take a stance, to hold a view, when it’s a theoretical concept rather than flesh and blood.  When you start putting faces and names to it, it’s much harder to look at someone and say, “I don’t like you because you’re gay”, or “I don’t want you at my church because you’re gay”.  Maybe that’s why so many like the “don’t ask, don’t tell” approach, they just don’t want to know, it’s easier to deal with it that way.

I’ve had a few life changing moments along the way that have really changed my views.  I’ve had various friends and colleagues from work who have acknowledged they are gay, which did have an impact on me, but I’ve had two major points in my life that really changed me radically. 

One may sound silly, but it was at a Small Group retreat from church.  One of my friends, Dave Carr, showed us a documentary on children who have announced to their parents that they are gay.  Just like with anything in life, some of the stories were beautiful, some were not so beautiful.  In some cases, the child told their parents they were gay, and while the child had so much fear and trepidation about doing this, the parents simply said, “I love you no matter what”.  Those stories were so amazing, so inspiring, I wish I could be such a great parent in a situation like that.  Then, unfortunately, there were the stories where the child would announce to their parents that they were gay, and they would find all of their worldly possessions on the front doorstep.  Their parents had disowned them, disavowed them, treated them as if they didn’t exist.  It was incredibly painful to watch those stories in the documentary, I can’t imagine how any parent could rip a child out of their lives, rip out the heart of one that they loved, I’m sorry, I just don’t understand.

The second, and the first helped me so much with this, I give Dave Carr so much credit for helping me grow as a person, came when my son Patrick was going through an upheaval in his life.  Patrick thought he was gay, and eventually he came to realize through counseling, that he had been sexually abused, which led him to that conclusion.  He has subsequently determined that he’s not gay, but he has waged a difficult war against the trauma of sexual abuse, which is a different story.  In any event, when Patrick approached us, again with great fear and trepidation, and told us he thought he was gay, while it was a difficult situation and potential reality for us, we told him simply, “Just as God has never started loving you, we have never started loving you, our love for you has no beginning or end, and this will not change that.”  I think or I hope that this helped Patrick understand that a parent’s love is eternal, just like God’s love is, but I do know that he, along with many others who have struggled with this situation, wonder how they would be received or accepted at their church.

Recently I attended a service at a Presbyterian Church in the area, and the title of the sermon was, “Is This the Hill We Want to Defend?”.  Basically, it was shortly after the vote at the PCUSA General Assembly, and as noted, there is a great deal of turmoil caused by this vote.  The sermon was given by a Youth Pastor, but I was amazed at her wisdom and discernment of the issue.  Basically, her point was, “is this the topic we are going to let divide our church?”.  Seriously, are we going to put a stake in the ground over this?  While it’s obvious I have a great deal of issue with the PCUSA and their politics, I believe they have come down on the side of love and what Jesus would want in this case.  We are all God’s people, and we are called to love each other, not just the ones we like or agree with, but love everyone.   

I would challenge everyone, if you haven’t been through what I’ve been through, just imagine it.  Your son or daughter comes home, and tells you he/she is gay.  What do you do?  Do you love them?  Do you hide them?  Do you want them to feel welcome in your congregation?  Would Jesus welcome them?  Would Jesus love them?  Even if you believe it’s a sin, what would Jesus say?  I think He would say, “He who is without sin among you, be the first to cast a stone”.  Amen.

What Is Wrong With Me?

OK, it’s a rhetorical question.  I don’t expect anyone to have the answer, or if they did, I probably wouldn’t like the answer.  I’ve struggled mightily in the last few months in virtually every respect. 

• My running has been awful, I struggle to make it five or six miles at the moment, my legs are completely dead, they have nothing in them.
• I have writer's block, I've found nothing interesting to write about since my last blog post about six months ago.
• My classes at GGC this past semester were probably the worst I have had in my four years there.  I can’t blame my students, I could blame the weather, we lost several class days due to the weather, but it was more than that.  I wasn’t at the top of my game.
• My faith is lukewarm.  I still believe in God, I still love Jesus Christ and am so thankful daily for what He did for all of us, but I’ve lost the passion, I don’t get up each day excited to listen to my praise music when I run, and worse, I really don’t get excited each Sunday to go to church.  I could blame my church for some of the changes that have taken place over the last year or so, but it’s not the church, it’s me.
• Worst of all, I’ve lost my compassion for my fellow man.  OK, maybe that’s an overstatement, I’m just not where I was or where I want to be.
• To summarize, I’m barren, I’m a wasteland, I’m broken right now.  

Now that I’ve thoroughly depressed everyone, including myself, let me just say, this isn’t the end of the world.  I can, and will, get through this.  And to be clear, no one should feel sorry for me, and that’s the last thing I want.  As I’ve noted, I have an incredible life, there are very few who have been blessed with the gifts I’ve been given, I have no reason to be in this wasteland, but it’s where I reside right now.  And I really don’t need any help, there is only one person (with God’s help) that can fix this, and it’s me. 

Last year when we were going through the worst year of our lives, I remember reading in one of the books we used for small groups about prisoners of war, who struggled after being freed because they had gained such an incredible closeness with God during the captivity.  They couldn’t recreate that after they achieved freedom, the closeness with God had dissipated.  While I would never demean what prisoners of war went through by comparing our situation to theirs, we went through a deep crisis last year, and through that, I/we grew very close to God. 

So why in the world did He move away this year when we started recovering?  Of course, I’m joking, as those Hallmark cards or pictures always show, God never moves away from us, we move away from Him.  Believe me, it’s not been intentional, I didn’t set out to separate myself from God, but there is no doubt, I have. 

So is all hope lost?  So am I fixable?  As people at work know, my favorite saying is “beats the shit out of me.”  I do have faith though, I haven’t lost my faith.  I’m fairly confident, my body will heal.  I think at some point, my writer’s block will disappear, and the words will flow again.  I’m taking a much-needed break from teaching this summer, I think this last semester kicked my ass, and I need some time to re-energize and remember why I love to teach so much.  The faith side, the passion, the compassion?  I have a great deal of confidence in God.  While this whole experience has been disconcerting, I’ve spent many days, saying to myself and to anyone in earshot, “what is wrong with me?”, I do have a great deal of confidence that God has a plan, no idea what the plan is, but He has a plan.  Last week when I asked this question to Allen Hoskyn, our Associate Pastor, he gave me an unbelievably inspiring answer.  Essentially to paraphrase, for us to reach a deeper intimacy with God, we need to reach a deeper level of emptiness.  As Allen noted, it’s painful and disorienting to go on an unknown journey, but it’s necessary.  I sure hope he’s right.

So as we meet on this journey that we are all on, I ask you to have a little patience with me at the moment.  Please don’t pity me, please don’t look down upon me for not starting each day with that fire in my heart and belly that anyone with the gifts I’ve been given should have.  I am not who I was, I am not who I want to be, and I’m not who I should be right now.  But, at some point, I will be back, and I do believe, I’ll be better than ever.  I can fix myself, with God’s help, and I can be the man that God wants me to be.

Epilogue:  As the one or two of you who read my blog posts know, I love prologues and epilogues.  I sent this to John Ey, one of my most trusted advisors, and he said, “it sounds like you’re depressed”.  To be honest, while it may sound that way, I’m really not, or at least I don’t believe I am.  I’m waiting for God, and I don’t mean I’m waiting for Him to fix me, I’m waiting to see what direction He will take me.  I love the line from Hillsong United’s Desert Song, “I know I’m filled to be emptied again, the seeds I’ve received I will sow”.  In my case, I’ve been emptied to be filled again, or maybe I’m not quite empty yet, but I know, I will be filled again.  It’s just a matter of when.

Out of the Desert

Prologue: I tend to write my blog posts in my head when I'm out for my morning runs.  As noted before, I always listen to inspirational Christian music when I run, and I happened to be listening to Mystery when I was writing this blog post in my head.  As I heard the refrain, "Christ has died, and Christ is risen, Christ will come again", I wondered if God was telling me something.  This revelation will become clearer in the end.

I awoke last Friday morning to a text from one of my former students, Wendy Ferguson, "Oh no, I just got the e-mail that Canon passed away.  This really has upset me.  He and I both struggled with our studies, but we hung in there.  I hate it that it was all for nothing.  He was thankful that you dedicated so much of your time to us.  He was my study buddy, and I will really miss him."

I was in disbelief, shock, Wendy and I exchanged a few more texts, and I ultimately went to the Gwinnett Daily Post website and found out Canon had drowned in Lake Lanier.  The website listed the normal information when someone dies, Canon was a Lawrenceville Police Officer, seven year veteran, and was only 32.  He died swimming in Lake Lanier, no information on how he drowned, I'm sure they don't know.  It's funny, your life can be distilled down to so little, but there's so much more.

I first met Canon in the Spring of 2013, he took my Financial Accounting class.  I'm not sure if you can tell from the picture, but Canon was very imposing, tall, shaved head, very stern look all the time.  He always sat in the back of class, and just gave me these harsh stares.  I figured he thought I was an idiot, the worst teacher in the world.  Periodically, he would talk to the person next to him, laugh a little, and I figured, yeah, he thinks I'm an idiot.

Then, when I started tutoring, I always like to offer tutoring throughout the semester, Canon would show up.  I was kind of surprised, but he'd show up every time I offered tutoring, he didn't always understand the concepts completely, but he worked his ass off to learn it.  Every single time, at the end of the tutoring, he'd thank me and tell me how much he appreciated me taking the extra time to help him.  And so it went throughout the semester.  It wasn't that he was sitting back there thinking I was a complete idiot (or at least I hope not), most of the time, and he'd even tell me in tutoring, he'd be saying, "I really don't have a clue what you're talking about."  It wouldn't be appropriate for me to say what grade he earned, but he earned a very good grade, and it had nothing to do with innate understanding of accounting, it came from pure sweat equity that Canon put in.

In the Fall of the same year, Canon signed up for my Managerial Accounting class.  Same regiment, he sat in the back, scowled at me, laughed with the person next to him periodically, but at least now I knew who Canon was and what he was like.  When I offered tutoring, again, he was always there.  I even got to the point, when I scheduled my tutoring that I'd ask Canon when he could make it, I wanted to make sure he was able to come.  He really worked hard, and he really appreciated the extra help.  He struggled a bit more in Managerial, he didn't quite achieve the grade he wanted, but as I told him, if I could give anyone a grade they deserved rather than the one they earned, it would be him, but I wouldn't bend my standards, even for him.

The viewing was last Sunday night.  I had no idea what to expect, I knew Canon was single, didn't have children, and knew he was a police officer.  As a side note, I never knew he was a police officer until about halfway through the Managerial class.  One of my students, Brittany, told me, she said that he didn't like people to know, he was worried they'd feel funny around him.  Laurel and I got there around 6, the start time, and the place was already packed.  There were police officers everywhere, it was really an incredible event.  I handled it OK at first, I kept praying to God, give me strength, his family needs a kind word, a gentle word at a time like this.  I held up pretty well for a while, I handled talking to his sister, we even talked about the accounting classes, it seems that Canon had shared what a struggle those were for him.  But then, I got to his Mom.  And I broke down completely.  Thankfully, I had my Rock with me, Laurel, and she handled it beautifully, telling Canon's Mom how I knew him, what a great student he was, etc.  I simply stood there blubbering, with Canon's Mom holding my arm, she was the strong one rather than me.  I finally did get out what a great young man he was, and what an incredibly hard worker he was, that was about it.

I got an e-mail from Wendy that she went to the funeral on Monday, I was out of town on business, and she described how amazing it was. 

"The procession from the church to the gravesite was approximately 15 miles and there must have been 100 cars and bikes with lights and sirens. We passed many people standing on the side of the road with their hand to their heart. Upon entering the cemetery we drove under a Fire Department ladder truck displaying an enormous American flag. At graveside the flag from his casket was folded, saluted and held to the heart of several of the Officers then presented to his mother. A call came over a Police radio for Badge #143, the call was not answered, the badge was then taken out-of-service and retired. A radio dispatcher announced the loss of the fallen Officer, stated how much his service was appreciated and how much he would be missed by all. He received a 21 Gun Salute and Taps were blown (and there was lightning in the background). It tore me up. I think we were luckier than we realized to have known him- Canon was a dedicated, strong, kind, talented, well-liked, loved, Christian man."

So I go back to what Wendy said in her text to me earlier, and I'm not picking on her, but to me, it's one of the key points in all of this. This was not all for nothing. There's a saying, and I know I'll butcher it, but the gist of it is that our lives aren't measured by the money we earn, the positions we have, the wealth we accumulate, our lives are measured by those we have touched along the way. If we simply carve out everything else that Canon did in his short 32 years on this earth, and we look at his life as a student at GGC, there's at least two people, Wendy and me, and I'm sure so many more, that he touched. As I always say, if I can just touch one life each class I teach, then I feel like it's all worthwhile. He touched at least two lives, and I'm sure many more.

While I hate that it took a death to snap me out of my half-year long funk, it did. I'm posting my blog entries out of order, I have one coming titled "What Is Wrong With Me?", which I wrote a few weeks ago, and you'll see the desert I've been roaming in the last six months. Canon's death finally snapped me out of it. His death reminded me who I am, what I am, why I am who I am. My love, my compassion for my fellow man had been mysteriously locked away for a while, and unfortunately it took a death to remind me of my intense compassion for those around me because of the Grace that God has shown me.

Finally, this all helped remind me of my faith, and what I believe, but also how I believe. Too long, I've been falling into the safe haven of "It's God's will, you have to just accept it and realize that God has a greater plan." While generally speaking, I agree with this, there is so much more to faith than just that. I remember years ago, Sandy McConnel delivering a eulogy for a baby that died, and saying, "It's OK to be angry with God right now". Yes, it is OK to be angry, and as I've often stated, the first thing I'm going to ask God when I get to Heaven is how can you possibly let a parent bury a child? I think that has to be the most devastating thing a person can go through, and that is why I struggle so much in these situations, and how I couldn't maintain any composure when I got to Canon's Mom. God, how can you make a parent suffer like that? While I still don't know the answer, and I'm still angry and will continue to question it, I do wonder if God was sending me the answer as I wrote this in my head and listened to the words of Mystery. No, I still have no answers, just questions. But, I will continue to have faith that God does have a plan, a much greater plan than we can imagine, and somehow Canon's life and death is weaved into that plan somehow.

Thank you Canon. Thank you for being such a great student, although I'm not supposed to have favorites, you were one of my favorites. I hate that it took your death to bring me back to life, but you did. I'm out of the desert thanks to you, and I'm ready to start paying it forward. I was empty, but I'm filled again.  The seeds I've received I will sow.