On Sunday I was in church all day long

Sunday I was in church all day long. When I was an intern at what is now City Church in Madison, Wisconsin back in the mid 1980s, that was easy to do on a Sunday at a fellowship that large. There were two services in the morning and then a service at night. That left the afternoon to have some lunch and nap a little or spend some time with my then girlfriend (now wife) or, if duty called, be present at some pastoral function. But by the time I became a pastor here in Chetek, the evening service – as it has in most places these days – had gone away. In the twenty-some years I have served as pastor here in Chetek, we have used that time slot periodically for Bible study, a weekly youth gathering, a service of healing or other special services. Much to Linda’s delight, after all these years I no longer feel the compunction to fill up every night of the week with some ministerial function. But not this past Sunday. On Sunday, as I noted at the beginning of this reflection, I was in church all day long.

The day started early as it has every Sunday morning since my first year here. Even when I don’t have to preach (like this past Sunday) I like to be at our facility by 4:30ish to journal, pray, open my Bible, and generally prepare my heart for the morning ahead. I like the quiet of the building and the idea that I will be uninterrupted for the next four hours. On account of daylight savings time, I had overslept and didn’t get to our facility until sometime after five. What’s more, I spent more time on Facebook than I normally do. But given that I didn’t have to preach I was relaxed as I walked around the sanctuary praying for our gathering and the other worship meetings that would be happening in our city that day.

"Second service" was at  CUMC

I didn’t have to preach because we were going to join Chetek United Methodist Church at their 11 o’clock Praise Service to witness four men take “the Resolution” made popular by the movie Courageous. During the month of February three guys from CUMC and one from Refuge had met on four successive Monday nights working through the materials that the church that produced the film created to spur men on be the fathers and husbands that God calls us all to be. Sunday was “graduation” day and when Mike from CUMC, the de facto leader of the group, asked if we pick a Sunday other than the 10^th so that they could be present for Jim’s oath at Refuge, I had suggested that it would just be easier for us to come to them. And so that was the impetus of our joint worship gathering. We would convene at our regular time (10 a.m.), take care of our announcements, offering and spend a brief time in worship and prayer and then we would pause and drive the six or seven blocks over to CUMC and resume our worship there. Despite my pleading for everyone to go the distance and not bug out early, we did lose 3-4 families when we dismissed our gathering but the majority of our crew were on hand to witness the bold commitments and participate in this significant event.

Pastor Carrie brought the Word

There was a special presence of the Lord in the house. I chalk that up to the fact that like any good Father he likes it when his kids come together with a common purpose and in his name. Some of their worship selection was from the 20^th Century but the joy was palpable. Pastor Carrie’s children’s sermon was simple and direct (and, as if on cue, little Kenny from Refuge made some cute, spontaneous observation that Art Linkletter would have been proud of) and then she preached extemporaneously from 2 Corinthians 5:16-21 (NRSV):

¹⁶ From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way. ¹⁷ So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! ¹⁸ All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; ¹⁹ that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. ²⁰ So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. ²¹ For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Carrie could not know that one of the discussion points we had at our weekly Alpha! gathering the night before had addressed this very issue. A few from Alpha! were present and wrestling with shame over past sins. One had purposely stayed home feeling so dejected at some foible he had committed recently that they were persuaded they had disqualified themselves from our fellowship. And then Pastor Carrie called the four men up, Mike gave a little background on the ministry and his desire to see another course begin following Easter and then she and I led these four men in “the resolution.”

I DO solemnly resolve before God to take full responsibility for myself, my wife, and my children.

I WILL love them, protect them, serve them, and teach them the Word of God as the spiritual leader of my home.

I WILL be faithful to my wife, to love and honor her, and be willing to lay down my life for her as Jesus Christ did for me.

I WILL bless my children and teach them to love God with all of their hearts, all of their minds, and all of their strength.

…

And on we went, back and forth, through all twelve resolutions to which all four men promised in unison, “I will.” When it was done we thanked God with a clap offering and then entered into a wonderful time of prayer at which popcorn-style people – CUMC and Refuge alike – asked for prayer or offered it for another or gave thanks for what God had done or shared an encouraging word to someone who had shared a heartfelt prayer need. It was another example of what “church” is supposed to be.

Just a girl from here serving "there"

My third stop of the day came after the worship gathering. Our friends at Chetek Alliance Church had planned a soup-supper fund raiser for the three individuals from their fellowship that will be heading to Guatemala during spring break to serve at Destino de Esperanza (Destiny of Hope) orphanage where Anita, a recently “retired” woman from their fellowship, has committed herself to serving Jesus there. So, a couple of families from Refuge and some from CUMC drove over to Alliance and enjoyed fellowshipping together over either homemade chicken noodle soup or Joy’s chili. Even though there were perhaps only 25 people on hand, our banter was so loud it seemed like a lot more were there.

It's more than a place

Linda and Charlie caught a ride home with Christine and one of the girls heading to Guatemala promised to get Emma home so I drove from Chetek Alliance over to Barron to attend a board meeting of The Well, the ministry to the Somali refugees who live in and around the county seat, and my fourth stop of the day. During our meeting, as I looked again around the circle, I thanked God for the diversity of our governing board – two from Barron Foursquare, one from First Baptist Church of Barron, one from Chetek Alliance, Wade, who worships at Cumberland Baptist, and myself. On that day we added a new member to our team – Wade’s former classmate, Kue, a man of Hmong descent who sometime ago moved, as Wade and Jessica had done six years ago, from southern California to the Midwest. He is a member of the Hmong Menomonie Alliance Church and plans to drive up here from time to time for fellowship and to help in the ministry here. North, south, east, west – we had come together in our common desire to see the gospel penetrate this unreached people group living in our midst. It wasn't a worship gathering per se. It wasn't even a prayer meeting. It was purposeful conversation and an exercise in decision-making for the benefit of the Somali and the gospel workers who serve them.

Our gathering looks something like this

Following the gathering, I drove back home and laid down for a bit. My day in “church” wasn't over yet as Troy and Marie had invited Linda and I over to dinner. Troy & Marie are the hosts of our present Alpha! Course and every Saturday night 10-11 people crowd into their front room to break bread, worship, study the life of Jesus and pray for one another. Troy & Marie live in the trailer park on the “other side of the tracks” and ever since the Baptists vacated it to move into their new facility over ten years ago there has been no gospel presence in their neighborhood. Until now. While their home does not have a cross over it, it definitely has been serving as a house-church of some kind for the last two months. We were invited over for dinner as Troy's brother-in-law had some questions he needed answered. A month ago when he and his wife were in attendance when Troy and Marie had renewed their wedding vows, something I had said in my brief message had got him thinking. They have not been active at the fellowship they had affiliated with for a couple of years. So after dinner we spent some time sharing what “church” is all about and our need to connect regularly with a local expression of it in order to encourage us in the way of salvation. I was not pitching Refuge – I was stressing that he and his family needed to find a place and then put roots down.

When we came home that night, I was a little tired. Not only because of the hour we had lost that day due to daylight savings time but also because I had been on the go since early that morning. But it had been a good day doing good work - the best kind of work I know to do, worshiping and praying and breaking bread and joining together with different members of the body of Christ in our area all for the sake of the One who makes us one in Him. Because after all, church is not a place at all - it is a living, breathing community of faith and wherever a handfull of disciples gather in His name church is in service.