Being the Church
This fall, the sermon series has been talking about what it is to be the church—on Sunday as well as every other day of our week.
We’ve talked about being the church through congregational activities and opportunities—showing up for worship services, volunteer projects, and time with God, ourselves, and our community. We’ve also talked about being the church in the midst of distractions, pressures, and temptations. We’ve asked what it takes to be the church on our worst days as well as our best days and ordinary days. We’ve pondered how to respond faithfully as honest and authentic people on days when everything around us seems to change from what we’ve always known.
A common theme that has run through this series is intentionality. We’ve realized the effort that’s needed to keep ourselves from just going through the motions of a week or compartmentalizing ourselves from one day to the next. We are still us on Monday, so we should be the us we are on Sunday, then, too.
How do we keep that continuity? It takes effort sometimes, and practice, to remember who we are and what that means when the tasks of the week or the challenges of the world start to demand our attention and take over our focus. There is energy and action involved in changing our minds and trying to see where God may be at work in the world among all the emails and schedule conflicts and project deadlines.
God is there, though, working in that busy world around us. As a community of faith, we hope to notice and engage in that work ourselves—to be inspired and maybe even surprised by God’s presence within and around us.
That doesn’t always mean it’s going to be perfect—or that we’re going to be perfect. We are human, and we live in this world, and there are really awful days and seasons in that sometimes. We’ll need to ask for and extend forgiveness at times. Then we’ll need to try again with the grace that is offered to us and the humility of the lessons learned.
Through it all, we do our best to intentionally remember who we are, and we pray that we would find ways to be the church every day.
“Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise.”
- Deuteronomy 6:6-7 -