From December 2015 Bethel Bell Tower newsletter
And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.
~ Romans 12:1-2 [NLT]
Sometimes we tease ourselves and fellow Christians and say “Yep … we’re different alright. We come to church, sit in uncomfortable seats without armrests, sing songs that aren’t like what we sing the rest of the week, and find ways to argue about stuff.” Is that who and what we’re called to be as children of God? Do we minimize our role in carrying out God’s mission if we reduce ourselves to this kind of minutia?
The church really is a place we gather and do stuff that we just don’t do anywhere else. I once heard a story about a congregation where two of the greatest friends in the high school youth group were the most popular football player and the most awkward geek. What wouldn’t have worked at school, worked at church because we’re called to be a different kind of people. I’ve seen this play out in our own church, too. Think about the people you talk with and may even hang out with. In some cases, if it wasn’t for the church, would you even know each other or have opportunity to connect and build a relationship with each other?
Yes, sometimes relationships get strained in the church … tell me where that doesn’t happen. This is also where we get to show who we are and do something different–in the church, we love and we forgive. That’s just what we do. Whenever you gather a group of people together, there are bound to be differences of opinion and differences about how we understand the Bible and the world around us. Here again is where we get to show who we are–in the church, we are obviously concerned with ourselves, but we focus on God who lifts us up to see our lives and our world in a different light. We do things differently like sing praises to God. Elsewhere, we may sing “Happy Birthday” or “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” but think of what it does to us when we sing praises to the God of all Creation!
We do things differently like proclaiming that Jesus is the Son of God who “did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness” (Philippians 2:6-9). In this simple proclamation that most of us can rattle off virtually without thinking about it, we claim a truth that is unfathomable … that God became human, lived among us, taught, healed, raised people from the dead, suffered, died, and rose from the dead. This is something that’s just not done anywhere else.
And yet, culturally, there are fewer Christians attending worship in the United States. There are fewer Christians who put themselves in a place where we do stuff that doesn’t happen anywhere else. And, when there are fewer Christians putting themselves in these places, there are fewer people doing these things that don’t happen anywhere else
As we enter this season of Advent, this is a season of waiting and of preparation. It is a season in which we proclaim the light of Christ in the midst of the physical darkness of winter and the spiritual darkness of our lives and of the world.
This is what we do in the church – a place where we do stuff that you just don’t do anywhere else.
In Christ,
Pastor Jeff
Epicurious Lutheran 