Today is Sunday.
There was a time when Sunday was a sanctuary. You went to church, and maybe you even enjoyed it. Sunday morning was a time for worship and dancing with God. He let you lead at first, but once you had found your footing and knew the steps, he gradually and gracefully took the lead and you began to follow.
It was an intricate dance and a heady time on the floor with him. Whether it was a classic waltz, or something brisk from your high school days or early adulthood that moved you as smoothly as butter on a hot griddle, you loved it. As the two of you danced across the floor, you picked up and considered new ideas, gained new perspectives, and wondered at new information.
Those Sundays at church were a personal golden age. Sunday was a time you could give from your own passions, and others would welcome it. You could lower the bucket into your own well of knowledge and people would drink. You poured out your heart for the sake of others, and Sunday at church was a place where that gift was prized.
Maybe it even was a time for friendship. Together with others at church you celebrated sacraments like going out for lunch after the service, or talking with one another in the hall while the preacher blathered on endlessly during the sermon.
Whatever happened during the week, Sunday morning was always fresh start. Church was where you belonged. The people there were your people. The tribe was yours. You enjoyed going there.
But that was before.
Somewhere along the way, something went wrong. It was bad. You stopped enjoying church but kept going out of obligation. Just getting there became a struggle, but you pressed on because of what it used to be, until one day you finally just couldn't anymore.
You stopped. It was over.
Now when Sunday rolls around, the only sanctuary you want is another hour in bed, and the most transcendent thing you touch is your pillow.
What did it? Were there predators loose in the sanctuary? Did people promise to stay with you all night, and then leave once it started getting dark? Did you look behind the curtain and realize that there was nothing there but an old man playing with knobs and levers? Did you give the church your treasure and then find it sitting on the curb on Monday morning, awaiting collection?
Maybe you were honest about who you were, or your friends were, and then the people you thought were your tribe proceeded to reject you because they didn’t want honesty after all. Or maybe after years of hearing people stress the value of integrity, you saw them turn on a dime and say we could wink at corruption and even cruelty if we gained control, and to your horror you realized that control was all that had mattered all along.
In the end, I suppose it doesn’t matter, does it? The point is, a place you needed to be safe, wasn’t. People who claimed to love and value you, didn’t. The place of belonging, wasn’t.
And now you're here. Alone, jaded, disappointed, more than a little bitter about the whole affair and even entertaining some brutal doubts about this whole God thing.
Who can blame you? I certainly don't. The way you feel right now is natural and normal after the betrayal you've experienced. And you're not alone, either. Look around and you'll see that the number of people with you in this dismal place are legion.
Like you they have been kicked and stepped on; abused, disbelieved and gaslit; used and exploited; ignored when they wanted to serve, told that in true complementarian fashion God made men to lead and women to follow; or just told to have faith in the leaders and not challenge them with questions. Like you they've come upon pretenders who claim to act with God's authority and have the gall to tell you that you're hurting God's kingdom when you speak out about what they've done.
Like you they've been driven out and pushed away, and told they weren't good enough, if they were told anything at all.
Like them, you're hurt. You need to rest. You don't know if you will ever go back. I hear you.
God is not disappointed in you. He doesn't hold it against you that you feel this way.
If all you can do this morning or today is to lie under your covers, then God will lie there next to you. If the only worship you can give is to stream Batman on Netflix, then God will sit and watch with you.
The failure isn't yours. Take all the time you need to, and when it comes time to move on, don't go back. Move forward.
The God you once believed in is not the god of the mighty and the pious, but the god of the outcast and the ragged. He drives along forgotten country roads in a rusty old Buick, past weather-beaten mailboxes, looking for those who have been chased away; and he hikes through undeveloped and even liminal places to find those who have given up.
Your church sucked, but you don’t.
Copyright © 2022 by David Learn. Used with permission.
