Sunday sluggishness

[banzai]

Nice to enjoy the patio again without fear of random interruption from our landlord. It's been good to swap stories: our upstairs neighbors are enjoying the same relief, and one of our former upstairs neighbors dropped by and commiserated with us over beer yesterday

Comments

[rockinrn]

Pastor Kevin, our pastor at Third Reformed in Pella, said something like that in his sermon last week. You grew up around here, you know the stigma that Pella has and most have unfortunately embraced this. It's what you wear and what church you go to. Chuck and Lib chose this church when we moved to Pella three years ago. I still have issues with it's size. I feel that when you walk into your place of worship, you should feel "at home." Kind of like, wow, this is what I've been searching for my whole life. I don't get that there. I'm surprised that Chuck and Lib do. This is a church that requires $46,000 to run per week. PER WEEK!!!! It astounds me that a place to praise our Father could require that much money just to have the doors open to worship. Pastor Kevin has a good heart though. I like his sermons/teachings, usually. He has said several times in his sermons that we need to think about what it is that we come to church for. Is it to see friends? Is is to "show others" that we are religious? Is it to worship

[banzai]

Third Reformed was my church when I lived in Pella, too (1995-98), and they seem to have been growing and growing. There's lots to be thankful for in God's work in that, but there are costs to being so big that make me shy away from it in principle (though in practice, I think there's also something to be said for laying down my preferences in order to follow God where He's at work). I can almost hear Kevin saying that.

Sorry to hear of the church burn-that kind of thing too often drives people from God (or from the church, but generally speaking, I don't believe one can authentically love Jesus and reject His Body, Bride, and people-at best, that's a massively dysfunctional relationship). I'm really glad you're hanging in even when there's much to endure and much to forgive.

[unblinkable]

Here's my pet peeve right now.

People hanging in the lobby to chat once worship has started. Seriously, nothing gets me angrier. And it's really bad since I'm on stage LOOKING out to the lobby and SEEING THEM. I just want to shout "GET IN HERE!!! THIS HAS A PURPOSE!!!!" Of course, I also want to shout, "If I can get myself, my husband and our three children here at 9:00 in the morning to REHEARSE for the 10:30 service, the LEAST you can do is come inside and SING! Or LISTEN. OR PRETEND TO SING AND/OR LISTEN!"

But I digress. :|

[banzai]

barlow_girl and I talked about this yesterday morning-no doubt that the world, the flesh, and the devil all work together to keep us from worshipping God. When we serve the church during worship, we face not only our own attacks on these fronts, but also everyone else's. One of the best ways to have me sidelined from worship is to get me more preoccupied with my frustrations than with Him. But it's a tough battle, because those frustrations are my job, too

[unblinkable]

I think what bothers me most is the church's unwillingness to acknowledge this as not a good thing. I should say that ONE Sunday my pastor said something about challenging everyone to get to a seat three minutes early so that they can pray for the service. But it sounded more like a suggestion. The justice seeker in me just wants leadership to say, "Okay... what can we do to stop this. How about we talk to the welcome team and train them to encourage people to move on inside once the prelude starts? How about we we send out a blurb in our next newsletter that says something about the importance of corporate worship and everyone being together at that time? How about we have Kent shout in the microphone 'Okay, Chatty Cathies! Time to come inside