A Christian church should resemble a recovery meeting more than a pep rally

The season of Epiphany | This week along the way

I don’t know about you, but in the recent week since the inauguration, I’ve noticed the cultural vitriol has cranked itself up to a fever pitch. This is no surprise. But here we go again with everyone running to their ideological corners of the internet for another four-year battle against “the other side.”

It’s too much for any individual human soul to take the brunt of this digital onslaught of information designed to pluck the strings of our lizard brains to grab (and profit from) our attention.

Though it seems new, the story remains the same. We are collectively fractured. And think about it…

Any collective is made up of individuals who are - in and of ourselves - fractured. Separated. From others, God, self, and the created world.

As subjective beings, we’re all restless as we circle various landing strips looking for a return ‘home.’ And shortly after we touch down and think we’ve ‘arrived,’ we’re faced with that dreaded familiar feeling that this just isn’t it. Any ideology, any community, and collective creed or dogma or schema is just not enough to make us whole.

We are fractured and therefore, our collective is fractured. This is the tale as old as time. Only now, our fractures are encouraged, egged on, and monetized. Our economy is fueled by our fractures. We saw the ones who profit most from our fractures standing behind the President on Inauguration Day. And things are only going to get more accelerated, radicalized, polarized, and… Weird. (Scary?)

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I know that many have left the church - and many for good reason (I’m one of them who returned fairly recently, actually). But I can’t think of a place more vital to our individual and collective healing than church in our current moment.

But a quick word of pastoral concern is required here…

If your church resembles your social media algorithm,
you’re better off scrolling through your phone at home on Sunday.

Seriously, sleep in. Save your money. Why make the trip across town if your church mirrors what your phone screen does?

I’m of the opinion that a Christian church should resemble a recovery meeting more than it does a pep rally. The potential gift at hand from church is to give us a different narrative than the one that has a grip over the world at large. To give us something different than an us-vs.-them posture toward the world.

Jesus’ message will always be countercultural. It will always challenge us before it comforts us. Jesus finds the lines we’ve drawn against “the other” and invites us to step across it in ego-emptying love.

How terrifying.

The algorithm fills our minds with people “like us.” It gives us an echo chamber. A digital community of like-minded people (which has its place, don’t get me wrong).

But in church, we have the holy opportunity to sit next to people who are not always like us. Church assemblies often cross lines of class, race, age, and gender. We come and confess in front of the same loving and eternally forgiving God. We pray for each other. We drink horrible church coffee together and hear each other’s stories. In short, we do a couple hours worth of life together each week. And we do it in the well-worn rhythms of the liturgical season that keep us grounded in a narrative bigger than our own.

What’s unique about Jesus is that we come together, not in our wholeness, but in our fractured state. We worship a crucified God.

Our fractures are what we all have in common. We are all cracked in various ways. But Jesus, the crucified God, is the one who reveals that these cracks are where God does the most miraculous work. In Jesus, our cracks and fractures aren’t monetized or manipulated. They aren’t seen as problems to overcome in seven easy steps or with a simple monthly subscription. They’re not seen as our deficiencies. And they’re also not ignored or downplayed. In Jesus, they’re generative. We receive new life out of our deaths. Over and over again.

In that light, I can look at the fractures in our collective body not as a hopeless situation. But as a vast opportunity for God to pour into and create something new. Even though I don’t always believe it. Even though I need Jesus’ faith now more than ever, this is the epiphany I’m trying to lean into these days.

So, in closing…

A blessed Epiphanytide to you and yours wherever you are. Now here are a few of my random musings for you to chew on (and I owe you a couple homilies which are below as well). Until next time, as always…

Grace and Godspeed,
Jonas

Recent Homilies

Notes of the week