One of my favorite cartoons from The New Yorker magazine has a guy with his arm draped over the pastor’s shoulder outside the church after worship. The church sign reads: “Easter Sunday Service — 11:00 a.m.” The cartoon caption reads, “You’re in a rut, Rev. Every time I come here you’re preachin’ about the resurrection.”
It’s an old joke, but I know the guy in the cartoon. He’s been a member of every congregation I have served. They are the folks who put in an appearance on the Christian high holidays and then complain to their friends about how boring church is.
Most of the time we clergy types just shake our heads and mumble, “What are you gonna do?”
Well, one year on the Tuesday after Easter I decided I needed to do something. So, I called Fred.
“Pastor who?” he asked, seemingly baffled that any pastor would call him in the middle of the week. “Oh, pastor!” The mental tumblers finally falling into place. “Say again, what did you want to talk to me about?”
“Church,” I said. “I want your opinion about church. Can I buy you coffee?”
There was a moment of hesitation, like he was recalling a time past when the principal asked him to come to the office for a “little chat.”
“Sure,” he said, finally. “How about we meet at the Starbucks across from my office, say 4:00. That work for you?”
“Fine,” I said, a little surprised that he accepted so easily. “Sounds good to me.”
It was good, actually. Not fun, but good.
Fred, you see, was in a rut. His dead-end job was making him crazy, but with an underwater mortgage, two kids in college and a dog with gout, he felt frustrated and trapped. Going to church on Christmas and Easter was mostly a nod to cultural conformity.
Seeking but not finding
Still, he was looking for something, hoping for something, maybe a face-to-face with the risen Christ, a spiritual release from the suffocating tomb that his life had become. What he got was me “preaching” about the resurrection, instead of a community “being” about the resurrection.
I thanked Fred for his candor. I hated to admit it, but he was right. Preaching about the resurrection is akin to pontificating endlessly about your spouse’s many virtues when all he or she really wants is a heartfelt kiss.
Somehow, the so-called Evangelicals seem to get the enthusiasm part right. There is energy among them. You’ll never see worshipers at Willow Creek or Saddleback Church mumbling the Apostle’s Creed while looking at their watches and counting down the minutes.
We are evangelical
So, what can we, boring ole Lutherans, do differently and still keep what is precious about our heritage?
To begin, let’s own who we are. As Donald McCoid said in the April 2011 edition of The Lutheran, “It’s important to affirm our Lutheran claim that we are evangelical. It’s even in our name: Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.”
He’s right. We are evangelical Christians, a description associated with people who get all excited by Jesus. In fact, we could get bumper stickers: “Lutherans: The OTHER Evangelicals!”
As Donald reminds us, “evangelical” means being about good news. Evangelical Lutherans not only enjoy a deeply personal relationship with the living Christ but also a deeply personal relationship with one another in Christ.
No one needs to hear another sermon “about” the resurrection of Jesus. What we all yearn for is a life-giving, perhaps life-changing, encounter “with” the resurrection, with the living Christ.
Revealed in relationships
Here’s the good news: We can find that in Christ-centered relationships with one another. St. Paul said it first to the Christians in Corinth, “You (all) are the body of Christ and individually members of it” (1 Corinthians 12:27). As such, “If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it” (v. 26).
What if Fred had walked into an assembly of Lutherans so resurrected from liturgical apathy that the place sparked with electric excitement?
What if he had been greeted in the parking lot, not with “Oh, Fred, see you finally made back to church,” but with “Fred! I have missed you, my friend. It is so good to see you! Our assembly is not complete without you.”
We can do this. We don’t need a rock band and multi-media extravaganza. But we do need the Spirit of Christ alive and at work among us.
We do need a sense of a living encounter with the resurrection.
We can do this on Christmas and Easter and every Sunday because we are the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
Dennis Smith is the pastor at Messiah Evangelical Lutheran Church, an ELCA congregation in Constantine, Mich.
Thank you, very well said!!! I will keep this in mind this Easter Sunday.
I like and agree that Lutherans should live more evangelically and reflect that we are people of the resurrection. I agree that sermons should not be simply about what happened then but how that proclaims what is happening now.
I think there is a dangerous line in which one replaces the Gospel of Christ with the gospel of what we do. Either in the form of the gospel is us being inclusive or us being joyful and welcoming or us doing God's work in the word. Whatever it is, we must always remember the distinction between the gospel inspiring action and making the gospel into our action.
Divorce rates are higher among conservative Christian Evangelicals than among the general population. This seems a startling statistic, but I wonder if there is a correlation.
Evangelicals of a certain sort seem to thrive on "electric excitement," and the energy generated by emotional enthusiasm.
Mature marriages are derided as boring and unromantic. For many husbands and wives, once the thrill is gone they will pursue it somewhere else. For some, the commitment to marriage is not about thrills and romance but about love; as much about taking out the garbage and paying the bills as wine and roses.
Mature Christian discipleship--the obedience of faith--is not sexy, it is not thrilling; but it is dependable. Mature Christian discipleship is reassured by God's promise to be faithful to us in sickness and in health, for richer, for poorer and not even death will separate us.
The author of this article is correct to lift up the value of authentic community, but let us see to it that such community is not fickle, based on thrills, but dependable; grounded in God's promise of love and fidelity.
This is my only real unhappiness with my chosen faith. I've grown up ELCA, and believe that ELCA is, well, the most right! The belief and my faith ground me. But I am *envious* of many people who attend the evangelical churches - they are friendly and enthused about being there; they look forward to "church night" not as a chore. And they *welcome* you to come, too.
We have a great, solid, well-thought out theology that has great depth; we want to live completely; we even have a church structure where every member matters and has a vote. But we are not always welcoming to those we don't know, or enthused about sharing our good news. I attended many different ELCA churches in my new city before I found *one* where the people greeted me without knowing me. And that's the one I joined.
"We don’t need a rock band and multi-media extravaganza" is exactly right - those are fun but not the heart. It's more like icing - but we already have the cake (solid theology, committed congregations)- we could decorate it a little.
We say that we are full of the joy of the Lord but sometimes we sure don't look full of joy!
An example of this is during sharing of the peace - do people really "move about freely" as they are invited to do? Do people shake hands and then look away?
A church relationship sure could be reflective of a good marriage - sometimes you have to have business and do the chores or the taxes - but a date shouldn't be rote and boring. Even the chores can be full of joy.
Another way to look at: isn't Sundays, communion especially, a meal with Our Lord and our family?
Disclaimer: when I say we, yeah, I'm including myself too :) I'm welcoming but I'm not so good at the outreach - I'm trying, though.
I really appreciate your thoughts. What transformed the lives of Jesus’ first followers was that they experienced the presence of the living, resurrected Christ in their own lives. We can’t create a similar experience for others or even for ourselves. It is a work of the Spirit.
Nevertheless, we can look for ways to open that experience of Christ to others by sharing what we have come to know with them. You are right that it takes relationships for that to happen. We hope that others will encounter Christ in us, through us.
I confess that I have observed many congregations whose corporate life and living faith seems to be lying fallow or dormant. It is by engaging and being engaged by the Word and entering into mission and service that we experience new life. Those who try to save their lives and their congregation's wind up losing and closing them. Those who loosen their grip on their lives in costly service to their neighbors find their own lives reinvigorated as well as that of their congregation.
Good thoughts, Pastor Smith -- and the comments your article has generated. My comments are directed to readers of your post, not you in particular: I have been energized this past year by subscribing to and really reading most of the monthly articles in The Lutheran. Every issue starts out with an inspiring one-page article by Rev. Peter Marty--on some very pertinent topics about Lutherans--on vocation for example in the March issue. Then comes the April issue, with a lead article titled "Who are the Evangelicals?" Since I read quite a bit of theology and am a regular reader/subscriber of The Christian Century, I kind of lost interest in reading our own denomination's monthly magazine. Well, now I'm back enjoying it! I recommend you read the copy in your congregation's library and if you think it's full of good stuff, help support their ministry with your subscription.
Susan Mitchell, Las Cruces, New Mexico
Susan, I have to admit I found the "Who are the Evangelicals" article a bit disappointing. But thanks for pointing it to those who had not but found this topic interesting enough to want to read more.