Two Sundays, Two of Jon's Churches!

While we were France, we were able to attend two of the churches Jon had attended as a child and of course where his parents worked. As I know they will want to see some of the pictures of the people we saw (because we can't remember their names!) here they are!

Massy:

 (This is the front of the church, which was Jon's dad's first church in France)

(The older couple babysat when Jon was a baby; the man on the right remembered when the Jerdans announced he was coming!)

(The church is in like a half-basement type - here's Jon with the sign)

(Jon's pastor in high school)

Montpellier:

(Very lovely people who miss the Jerdans! Jon looks very tall)

Churching II

The other thing that's stuck with me since church this past Sunday was seeing a family file in a few rows ahead of us as the service was starting. As they got to their seats, the young girl (I'd say elementary-school-age) quickly climbed up onto the chair to be picked up by her daddy. And as she overlooked the congregation from that vantage point leaning her weight onto her father who was holding her up, with her arms wrapped around his neck, she had a huge, cute grin covering the bottom half of her face. She later did the same with her mommy. She looked so happy to be in her parents' arms.

I look forward to when Sara & I can be in the same position as those parents. What a blessing!

Churching

This morning, pastor Chris preached on Romans 12:1-2, which includes "Do not be conformed to this world..." (and also referencing Ephesians 4:17-24).

As he was talking about how the church is not to conform to the culture, he mentioned that in the parlance of today's youth, Christians are to be "hipsters," although in my mind that term carries additional connotations of unhealthy pride and self-absorption in knowing better than "them."

What struck me more was what he said about different kinds of worship service styles. In particular, the Bible church style, or maybe more so what I find a lot of churches that don't have the word "church" in their names do: exciting music praising God, stirring particular emotions, impressive visual aids grabbing the congregation's attention, etc. I normally have the impression that is a way of conforming to the culture: "This is what (young) people like these days, so let's do exactly that, and even more, or else there's no way we'll reach them." So although I wouldn't say that there's no redeeming factor in that, it has not attracted me as a helpful habit for Christ's local body. But Chris pointed out that to some people, some parts of our society, that kind of worship goes against everything they know and it is counter-cultural.

That was good food for thought. After all, in some other people's eyes, the fact that we use a drum kit in the church's music is a sign of conformance to the surrounding culture.

That said, I do still think certain worship service styles are much richer than that mentioned above, even if they may not be as quick to grab the attention of some segments of the population.

I was blessed to have grown up in churches that had intentional, thought-through liturgy that better covered the breadth of the Christian walk. It was not just because that's what had been traditionally done. It was meaningful and purposed. And it follows scriptural examples. As an example, when the Israelites gathered as a people upon leaving Egypt, they first joyfully praised God for who He is what He has done and His amazing goodness; then as they came to meet with the Lord, He revealed the way things are, what He wants and expects of His followers, and thereby putting a mirror to the sin in their lives; so they repented of theirs sins, and they recommitted themselves to the Lord; then they were better able to follow God's leading.

As that's what I was raised with, I saw all that as normal. That was how churches prepare hearts to listen to the sermon, to better build one another up to go back into the world, to which we do not belong, for the week ahead. That is how church functions, through reading the Bible, prayer, the different steps emphasized with fitting songs, in preparation to hear the main message clarifying God's word for life in our current situation.

There are of course a variety of ways to practice this in its details. However it reminds me of my first real church search when I left home for college, and Sunday after Sunday I was shocked by how easy it was to go to what felt more like a praise music event (or maybe a Christian music and prayer event) with a message from the pastor thrown in. I'm sure many of these establishments do wonderful things for the Kingdom of God, and their members can have a faith that is on fire, but going there on Sunday morning, I'd feel like I missed church and would be disappointed that so much of the wealth of the Christian experience that was thrown out of the service and ignored.

This is all mulling around in my mind, as we are starting to look for where we will move to next, which is intrinsically tied to our next search for a church family, with which we can grow into the man and woman, and family, God created us to be.

Thank you Ancient Ireland

Last weekend, we finished the book How the Irish Saved Civilization by Thomas Cahill, which we had been reading to each other while on the road. 2 out of 2 Restonians enjoyed and recommend it.

In brief, it talks about how the Roman Empire crumbled (for a lot of reasons, including the fact that it was no longer in touch with its real position in the world and its society had become complacent), and one man named Patrick felt called to evangelize the wild hordes that populated the island of Ireland at the time (one of the first missionaries we have records for who went outside the "civilized" Romanized world), bringing along literacy as well. He thus transformed the local culture, starting a long-term fascination for both Christianity and copying literature from the continent, without which Latin culture would most likely have disappeared, along with large portions of Greek culture and some Hebrew culture too. And this people's love of their new religion spread like wildfire and brought many people to leave their beloved homeland and re-evangelize lots of Europe, and even humbly reach out and care for the needy when the established church, who had risen in power in the security of the last centuries of the Roman Empire, preferred staying close to political power rather than meet people's needs.

It's a fascinating story!

In the conclusion, the author made the point, which has been sticking in my head, that ultimately history is not changed by those who represent power on the world's terms, by the big names of each age. History is rather shaped stealthily by nobodies in remote corners of the world who die to themselves and live out what absolute love looks like to those who are least loved by the world. To quote the end of the book, "if we are to be saved, it will not be by [the rich and powerful] but by saints."

That gives me great hope.

Remember when we were nostalgic? Good times!

Our church doesn't commonly use a very wide range of traditional hymns (at least not those I know), so I particularly enjoyed this past Sunday when, I think it was for the offertory, Seek ye first was played. That's one of those church songs that I really like because I've been singing it pretty much my whole life. And I still know the French version very well, which I went ahead and sang in my head:

Cherchez d'abord

le Royaume de Dieu

et sa justice

et toutes choses

vous seront données en plus

Allelu- alleluia

Well, then we actually sang the hymn as a congregation, which was very nice. If we had done another verse, I'm pretty sure I would've switched to French. The French versions of such songs are such sweet treats to my ears, as that's what I grew up with for years and years, but I no longer get opportunities to hear them.

To top it off, this Sunday also served as a sending-off of a missionary family who has been at RPC for the past couple years. The Kawachis had previously served in Senegal, and are now going to Quebec to minister to the Canadians, with an emphasis on reaching out to the growing Muslim population. Well, since Satoshi Kawachi is an ordained pastor, he was invited to give the benediction, so he blessed us with:

Que l'Eternel veille sur vous et vous accorde la paix! Que l'Eternel vous bénisse et vous protège! Que l'Eternel vous regarde avec bonté! Et qu'il vous fasse grâce!

(Numbers 6:24-26) It was beautiful! I normally take benedictions and exhortations rather seriously, but when Sara looked up toward my face, she could see a pretty big smile stretched across it.

Members

In the morning, we will be welcomed as new members of Reston Presbyterian Church, where we've been enjoying great spiritual nourishment for the past 7-8 months.

Sweet Fellowship

Today was church at RPC. It was with some hesitancy that I agreed to keep going there. Moving to Northern Virginia, I was hoping to find - in short- a "cool" church; one that was liturgical, yet modern, or with a strong social justice mission married to concrete theology. The church we settled on doesn't quite fit in any of those categories. It is a Presbyterian church, about 150 members, that is honest and real in it's teaching, old-school in it's music selections, and with the normal array of middle-schoolers sitting in the back, children crying during the service, and older people who are still very much in love. And we feel normal and welcome there, which is good.

We also are getting plugged in very very quickly with good friends. We are meeting people through-out the church and I feel like we are forming a true community of people who can laugh and play together, while also being honest with struggles, doubts, and disagreements. Today we met with a few other people who are branching out the young-adults group, as it is getting larger. Afterwords we ended up hanging out and watching a football game with a glass of wine. It was tremendously refreshing and I'm glad for it.

It's interesting to begin to find what you are looking for in a place where you least expect to find it, and I'm glad for our normal church.