Church - A Motley Crew

Sam Hamstra | Sep 23, 2009

A friend recently pointed me to The Holy Longing: The Search For A Christian Spirituality by Ronald Rolheiser, a contemporary Roman Catholic author who writes for those followers of Jesus who struggle with following Jesus. In this book, Rolheiser, among other things, writes about the current struggle with spirituality, as well as some of its essentials. In the process, he pens a chapter entitled "A Spirituality of Eccesiology." In this chapter, he speaks to my situation as the pastor of a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multi-generational, multi-everything kind of a church by challenging the assumption that the weekly gathering of a local congregation should be a fellowship of like-minded individuals, coming together on the basis of mutual compatibility (pg 114). "Gathering as church," writes Rolheiser, "has little or nothing to do with liking each other or finding others with whom we are mutually compatible. The group of disciples that first gathered around Jesus were not individuals who were mutually compatible at all. They came from very different backgrounds and temperaments, had different visions of what Jesus was all about, were jealous of each other, and were, as scripture tells us, occasionally furious with each other. They loved each other, in the biblical meaning of that phrase, but they did not necessarily like each other... and that is what it means to be church."  Rolheiser continues:

Too often we are disappointed in church because we find there such a diverse and motley collection of persons, some of whom do not like us and whom we would never pick to be our friends. We go to church looking for friendship or ideological soulmates and, often, do not find them. This does not necessarily mean that there is something wrong with the church, merely that we have false expectations. To be in apostolic community, church, is not necessarily to be with others with whom we are emotionally, ideologically, and otherwise compatible. Rather it is to stand, shoulder to shoulder and hand in hand, precisely with people who are very different from ourselves and, with them, hear a common word, say a common creed, share a common bread, and offer a mutual forgiveness so as, in that way, to bridge our differences and become a common heart. Church is not about a few like-minded persons getting together for mutual support; it is about millions and millions of different kinds of persons transcending their differences so as to become a community beyond temperament, race, ideology, gender, language, and background (pg 115).

As Living Hope Church, a diverse-by-design congregation, celebrated its first anniversary this past Sunday, I witnessed some of what Rolheiser writes about. The unique collection of individuals that God has brought together to be his localized bride is a motley crew. Our small congregation claims at least nine nations of birth and people from various parts of this country. It includes multiple races and generations, rural, urban and suburban folk, college and non-college educated people, white collar and blue collar workers, those raised in a church and those raised outside of the church, those who are married and those who are single, and the list goes on. 

What unites us in authentic community, we pray, is not our "mutual compatibility," to borrow words from Rolheiser. Instead, we are united by the Holy Spirit at that moment when we gather for worship in the name of the Lord. It is by the Spirit that we are God's temple. It is by the Spirit, who speaks to us through the Word even as we speak to the Lord with our prayers and praise, that we hope to transcend our differences and experience the authentic community prescribed by God for his people. 

Comments

Dan Lugo said:

I’m with Rolheiser on this one.

I love that I am made to interact with others who are nothing like me on a weekly (or mid-weekly) basis. We have nothing in common, save for that we worship the same Lord. And it’s amazing how our common faith is just enough to maintain that relationship.

Granted, these relationships may not be as dynamic as some with common interests, but they are genuine. And they are windows in the world to what the love of heaven is like.

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