Easter, more so than Christmas, challenges a pastor in understanding those individuals who choose to only attend worship on that day of celebration. Now, this isn't referring to those who are visiting from out-of-town to be with family. I'm talking about those folks who live locally, claim such-in-such church as their home, and make the choice to only worship on Christmas or Easter. Now, why is it harder to for the pastor at Easter than Christmas, since both these times tend to be irregularly high attendance moments?
The reason for this is simple. At Christmas, we celebrate the birth of Jesus. It can be experienced in its fullness at a one-time event, just like most any other birth. But Easter.... Easter is different. One cannot at all understand the Resurrection unless having experienced the life in Jesus in ways that can't be done outside of community.
I have seen and heard and experienced real life stories all the time of people who were spiritually dead, with spiritual obituaries, with spiritual death stories, and God put new life back into them. That is also what Easter is about and I hope and I desire so much that if you are considering Congress St. UMC to be your church home that you make the decision this year to be involved in something offered beyond Easter Worship. Am I talking about being present in worship EVERY Sunday? No. Heck, I won't be there EVERY Sunday. But there are new things starting and Congress Street's vitality can only be as strong as those who want Congress Street to be a vital, alive, breathing, world-changing church! There are regular, small groups (and these have VERY diverse offerings) throughout the week where you can offer your voice in the spirit of community. Your thoughts, ramblings, stories, musings, experiences can only have significant value when shared.
“Most likely.” No, that is not a strong enough phrase. “Inevitably,” there will be people in attendance Sunday who are spiritually dead or who are so close to being spiritually dead, you would never be able to tell that they were alive. Looking at them and talking with them, you feel that they are spiritually comatose. You put a spiritual stethoscope on their religious heart and it would go (repeat slowwwwwly), “boop…..boop…..boop…..boop.” You think that their hearts are almost dead; at least, their spiritual hearts seem dead; they seem to be in a spiritual coma. Too busy for things of Ultimate Reality. Too preoccupied making their daily bread, no time for spiritual bread. Too busy running in circles and God is not part of their circle. “Boop…boop…boop… boop.”
For some, your spiritual life is as dehydrated as the dry bones described in the book of Ezekiel. Your life is relatively unaffected by spiritual things. On Thursday, how much will you be contemplating Jesus' final hours? Experiencing the community of communion, prayer, servitude? On Good Friday, how will you be spiritually experiencing Jesus being nailed to the cross?
The monitor of your brain, the line of your brain waves, is almost flat, and you'll barely remember Jesus on Good Friday, and you probably won't experience the community of Congress St. for Holy Thursday / Good Friday service at 7pm on Thursday (See? We have one service to help make your week a little easier.) and you will barely allow Jesus to enter into your daily decisions in life. The study of Scripture, theological conversation, spiritual story-telling, and daily prayer are beyond your world of comprehension. Spiritually – little frightens you and little attracts you. This life is so all-consuming for you and your brain. And deep down inside, in all honesty, you may – as people would say – not give a rip about God or Jesus or life lived under and with the Divine daily. Oh, you may pray when in a jam, just like about everybody else. Oh, you may believe in the “Man Upstairs,” (which I should add, God doesn’t have a sex and God isn’t upstairs – God WANTS to be within you, among you, and beyond you) but that daily authentic walk with God, as understood through the incarnate Jesus – for Christians – is not part of your life. “Boop…boop… boop…boop.”
So, attend your Easter worship service, but don't kid yourself into thinking God and the World doesn't expect more from you. Through new initiatives happening at Congress St., through a new journey group program, through a new evening prayer service, and through community outreach and increased emphasis on the spirit of volunteerism, there is a place for you beyond your obligatory, lackluster, self-appointed incarceration known as, "I attend church on Easter."
