Sabbatical Sunday June 22

The anxiety began the night before.  I don't have to do this do I?  Good grief how does anyone go to church for the first time on their own?  I'm a church professional and I don't want to go to some mystery church where I don't know anyone.  What should I wear?  Will the people be weird?  Do I tell anyone who I am?

I went to bed without setting an alarm on purpose.  I wanted to rest.  I woke to discover it was 9:00.  Good grief, I've slept longer than I wanted, oh no, I missed my chance at the 9:00 service, am I really going to do this?  OK, there is a 10:30 at the Foursquare church, I'll go to that, after all the pastor used to play baseball for the Seattle Mariners!

What to wear?  No tie obviously.  All the good golf shirts are in the wash.  Button down white shirt, kakis  and Toms for shoes.  Should be unremarkable enough.  I depart with just enough time to park and enter with a few minutes before worship starts.  The entrance is pretty obvious but no signs.  A woman hands me a half page piece of paper.  On one side is an announcement on the other are what appear to be sermon notes.  (No order of worship, not surprised and envious.) Coffee!  Everyone has coffee, then there is the sound, ooooh an espresso bar!  Bonus! But there is a line and the screens in the sanctuary seem to be counting down  . . . 3:17, 3:16, 3:15 and fog!  They have fog machines, this is going to be cool.

The band starts up and they rock out some song that seems somewhat possibly familiar.  I count about 150 in the sanctuary and realize now is when the people are coming in.  Soon the sanctuary is so full I can't count 300? 400?  Many casually entering in with their coffee (dang, I should have gotten some, I wonder if they would take plastic?)

During the second song.  I notice the monitor on the back wall counting down so those on stage could see it. 5:20, 5:19, 5:18.  The final song is followed by a video testimonial which is touchingly done.  The pastor comes up to give an announcement about an upcoming event, two more announcements come across the video screen and then another pastor introduces the offering.  At this point I realize everyone on stage has been male.  We saw one woman in the testimonial and one woman give an announcement for a moms group.  Hmmm.  As the offering plates finish going around the pastor comes up and begins his sermon.  I look at the clock 25:00, 24:59, 24:58  . . .

The sermon is OK.  Some interesting tidbits from the sermon got me thinking which is always a good sign.  One was an unsurprising statistic stated but not quoted with sources that "The last thing new Christians do is give financially to the church, the first thing they stop doing is telling their story."  Yup.  I was especially impressed when he continued talking about sharing our stories and he said "Don't try to convert me, care for me."  We have a winner!

The service ended quickly with a prayer that included an invitation to renew your relationship with Jesus, the band leader young adult came up and said thanks and see ya, that was it.  Boom out, service time 55 minutes.

I was struck by the pastor's teaching about conversion.  "No one wants to be 'converted!"  Yet there was a clear call to share the story of Jesus and listen to other people's stories.  This is an evangelical call that I hope Wesley could engage in as well.  Our distinction in how we share the story may still be in how we read scripture and make use of reason, traditions and experience.  We may be more comfortable with some questions.  We are likely more "liberal" in how we look at social issues.  However, there is a core desire that we share, we want people to know they are God's loved children.