March 9, 2022
It is said that it is a curse to be living in “interesting times.” Curse or not, these interesting days we are living in certainly have a strong gravitational pull on our attention. It is hard not to find ourselves following one story after another about the invasion of Ukraine, the economic instability and food insecurity of so many in our world—including our nation, the current state of the virus around the world, and the health of democracy here and abroad. And we haven’t even gotten to sports yet!
When we claim that Christ is Lord, we claim that Christ of Lord of all things, including all those listed above (and then some), as well as our attentions. This is where worship comes in. The goal of worship is actually not to grab your attention. It is to direct your attention to God. We don’t want you to attend the worship service, but to attend through our worship service to God. An important part of this is not seeing those who lead worship as the ones who are worshiping for you or providing something to you. Instead, we who lead are leading all of you to worship our God through the worship service of that day.
One way this happens is by having elements in our worship that become a comfortable way of expressing our faith, familiar words, songs, symbols, and gestures become a means of self-expression. Being familiar, they become our words. But if everything is familiar, and nothing is new, we lose interest, or it otherwise becomes a rote, thoughtless habit. For this reason, we have elements that are both new and familiar in our worship. This past Sunday we started something new by having our confirmands light the candles on the Altar-Table to mark a transition from the world that demands our attention to the God who deserves our attention. And at the end of the service, they extinguish the candles, but not before capturing the flame to remind us to carry the light of Christ out into the world. Over time this will become familiar as well.
We have familiar patterns that are unique to each liturgical season that we just expect. Think of the way we “deck the halls” for Advent and Christmas, and how odd it would be not to have those familiar decorations for those seasons. In Lent, we are now beginning our service with a confession of sin and an appeal to, and celebration of, God’s mercy. There are traditions that have been part of Lent for centuries, such as “burying the alleluia.” This means we do not use the word “alleluia” during Lent, making its generous use on Easter a marker that the practices of Lent have ended and the season of celebrating the resurrection has begun. We mark our seasons with familiar elements and new elements together to help us turn our attention to God through worship, to better attend to serving God in the particularities of the days we find ourselves in.
As we journey through Lent together as a church, let us consider what God is calling us, individually and collectively, to do to forward God’s reign on earth. Might we begin each day reflecting on the psalm you are provided? Might we give ourselves the time and space to participate more intentionally in our worship services? Might we offer our attention to God for that hour as we offer our voices in prayer to God, even as we listen attentively to God’s words to us? This will help us discern a way forward in these most interesting times. Might we be a blessing to the world in these days that at times appear to be cursed?
While I have your attention, I wanted to remind you that there will be a Memorial Service for our departed sister, Bonita Blake, after our service this Sunday. It will begin about 11:20 with a reception to follow. Any memorial gifts made in Bonita’s Memory will be collected and given to her niece who is shouldering all the expenses associated with Bonita’s death and settling her affairs.
Please note this Sunday will arrive quickly, as we move our clocks forward Saturday night to Daylight Savings Time.
May God’s blessings be upon us all in these challenging days,
Pastor Todd