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Saturday, March 28, 2020

Covid Thrives Because Our Communities Dies

I know the title seems counter-intuitive, but if you let me explain, it will all make sense. Many of the issues we have with this pandemic are due to the fact that we no longer have communities. We have given up community life for a qazi-global outlook. Let's examine the reality of what happens in a dead community, but first, let's recap how it dies.

The first stage of death was retail. The small grocer, the mom and pop store on the corner. The corner drug store, the town hardware, the 5 and dime, they are all gone. Replaced first my the Supermarket, then by the Big Box store. Walmart, Costco, Target, Home Depot, the list goes on. All these big chain retail stores are easy to shop, easy to get all your things and get out. The drawback, the clerk doesn't know your name. The guy at the meat counter, if they don't have a meat counter or the produce department. They don't know you. Most people at these stores don't even go to a checker, they use the self check out. The small store couldn't compete with Sam Waldon's monstrosity and many of them are long gone.

The second nail is when we decided that the megachurch was the best way to do church. We go to churches of 500+ and they are getting rid of the things that use to connect us. Many of them are throwing away Sunday School, moving to small groups, which is simply the peer groups who are connected anyway. The Sunday school programs that survived are not done in a way that connects people. We sit in rows, watch things on a screen, are treated to a concert with lights and cool effects. We hear a message and we leave. Gone are the days of the small church that is under 100 that still has potluck. We can't afford to pay a pastor and purchase a building anymore for a small church, the community church has been priced out. Bigger is the only way to preserve the model of church we have in America. Unless we want to change the model, and church folks aren't good at change, the big and megachurch will be the only way we can pay for our buildings, pastoral staff, and utilities. With it, a little more community dies.

Much like the issues with the local church, gone are the neighborhood schools. We use to walk to school because there was an elementary school in every neighborhood. They are where the community met for PTO meetings, concerts, and parent-teacher conferences. When my children started school in town, they were in a small community school. That school is gone and now there is a big school which merged three schools together. It saved the district a lot of money, but it cost more of community. Now the gyms are packed out for concerts and appointments are made for conferences. It's become the same nameless sea of faces that church and stores have become. The big mass of people has taken away our chances to really connect with our neighbors because these are people from four different neighborhoods.

This building a bigger institution has wrecked our sense of community. Add to it the automatic garage door opener and streaming video services like Netflix, we don't sit outside. We stopped connecting and we are raising a generation who don't know how to connect. We have increasing sex trafficking and child abduction that we don't want our kids to talk to anyone we don't know. We don't know our neighbors, so we don't talk to them. We have become suspicious and the neighborhood watch is replaced by video doorbells so we can keep an eye on the neighbors. We don't come out of our sanctuary, we are so focused on our electronic devices that we don't know the people next door. We often lose connection with the people in our homes.

Now, when something like the Corona Virus, or Covid-19 hits, the breakdown of community because obvious in a couple of ways. First, we don't trust the people around us and we have to make sure we are taken care of. We don't stop to think about others as we buy every roll of toilet paper on the shelves. We don't consider others as we stock up for 6 months, and people who don't have the financial means or are unable to get out can't get basic necessities. We are so concerned about taking care of ourselves that we don't stop and consider others. Their faces never come to mind because we don't know them. We don't consider them, we don't care about them. We just want to take care of ourselves.

After we buy everything, we choose to do what we want, when we want. I saw a report on the beaches full of college students at Spring Break. They were asked why they ignored the quarantine, and they basically said they didn't care and just wanted to have fun and party. They only care about having fun, only care about themselves. More and more young people only care about themselves, they have no sense of obligation to the community. The reason is, they don't know anything about what community looks like. They have grown up shopping in a giant store, attending a giant school, going to a giant church and not knowing anyone outside of their Snapchat list. They are disconnected from the people all around them. Naturally, they don't care about these people, they haven't learned empathy or compassion. They are raised by the people hoarding toilet paper. They are raised by price gougers. They live in a world where slavery and sex trafficking is a real concern and fear. Society has stopped being civilized and community is gone. We have seen it play out when a crisis hit. You see it on the news every night.

Normally, this would be the time where I write a solution. Sadly I don't have one. We can't fix the schools or the churches, the small shops are gone and are not coming back. The world has changed and until our society comes to the point of self-destruction, it will stay this way. Perhaps Western Civilization will fall apart, much like the Roman Empire. Perhaps we will all reset and go back to a community lifestyle. Maybe we will exist in the Hunger Games or some other dystopian society will bring back a sense of community. Maybe something will turn us around, but on the track, we are on, I see little hope for us now. May God have mercy on our selfish souls.

Sunday, March 1, 2020

A Modern American Reformation? Maybe It's Time

     As I begin, you need to know something about me. I'm a nobody. I have no status or position. The church I'm currently a member of won't let me do anything. Almost 20 years of ministry experience, a seminary degree and I have volunteered for almost everything, and do nothing. The last church I was on staff at said I wasn't cut out to be a pastor. I wasn't tough enough, strong enough, and I probably should have gone through Basic Training to learn how to be a real man. I am currently a teacher at a small school in rural Iowa. I have no position. I have written books that no one reads, the fact that you are even reading my blog is pretty amazing. I'm a nobody. The fact I would be calling for a reformation is pretty laughable since it's pretty clear no one really cares much about what I think.
     I do have the unique position of being a fixture in the local church almost all of my life. I began serving on committees at the age of 16. I had my first employment at a church at 18. I was a pastor at 23, served as a pastor, youth pastors, associate pastor, college missionary, I've led worship (which was bad) and oversaw the installation of an educational building. I've done a lot.....

but

I'm an introvert. I struggle with depression. I never played football or baseball or hockey. I never served in the military. I don't yell or get really emotional. I question convention, I'm abstract, I don't always follow the status quo. I think if it's in the Bible, we should do it, but we need to actually study the Bible and not expect people to follow Jewish rules that fit our social ideology but ignore the ones that don't (tattoos and mixed fabrics). I can be stubborn, and I don't like to lose an argument. Moreover, I'm not dark and handsome (I'm sort of tall) and I don't have a voice that draws people in. I have the kind of face people can say "no" too. All things considered, I guess I don't have what it takes to be a Pastor in our modern church culture. I am willing to admit, my call for reformation may come out of the fact that I've been beaten up by the local church. Maybe it's just me being upset, or maybe the fact that anyone is beaten up by the local church is the problem.
    When I was serving in Arizona (with a great pastor who has similar struggles), I was fortunate to run a coffee house church that was in the evenings that had a specific goal. Provide a place for post-church people. These are people with a church background who left the church, because the church hurt them. There are lots of these people. Lots. What is worse than the fact the church is churning these people out by the truckloads is the church refuses to take any responsibility.
     The church is the manifest, incarnational representation of Jesus on the earth at this moment. If someone is seeking God, we tell them to go to church. At church, we are told that the people are the church, that the church is the body of Christ, the ambassadors of Jesus, the hands and feet. The church represents God. Then, the people in the church, the body, the hands, and feet, do something hateful and hurtful to someone. They are cruel and mean spirited. The person leaves the church, and the people of the church say "if you leave because of the people, you weren't really here for God". If they were at the church for God, but not the people, we would have another monastic movement (people becoming monks and living alone). I don't need a room full of people to find God, and the way the church talks about the people they damage is arrogant.
     I know, I know, your church is loving, right? I'm sure most of the churches believe they are, but did you know that restaurant wait staff hate working Sunday lunch? Do you know why? They say people coming from church are rude, impatient, entitled and lousy tippers. They say things like "I refuse to give God 10% and a waiter 15%". It's not isolated, and it's one of the big reasons that the church is shrinking. Outsiders hate the church, the people inside and their attitudes. People who use to be at church every week now can't set foot. They have anxiety.
     Remember that I said I have depression? I don't have anxiety, but lately, at church, I have anxiety. It has been incredibly difficult for me not to feel like I have been rejected by God. Maybe I have, maybe I am like King Saul and God has rejected me. The churches I have been active at in the city where I now live have told me I can't serve. I can sit there, be quiet and listen, but that is all. I'm not good enough to use all the things I spent my late teens, 20s and 30s learning, developing and growing. I'm not good enough to serve God in the local church. I'm not alone. A friend of mine who left a denomination he felt was not Biblically faithful came to our church. He was smart, he was articulate, and he had some issues with some things. He wanted to see a new reformation too, and he pointed out people in the church who were not following the teachings of the Bible. Needless to say, it wasn't long before he was no longer at church. I'll let you do the math.
     Let's be honest, the church in America has become about the church. Members of the church want to be happy and comfortable and not change anything. There are jokes all over the internet about churches who refuse to change. It's only funny 'cause it's true. I was part of a church that did a "reboot". It's pretty ironic if I reboot my computer, it turns off and then turns back on exactly the same way it was before. It doesn't change or upgrade because of a reboot. It just turns off and starts back up again, exactly the same. Sure, we have added some new tech toys, but the church doesn't change. It pretty much looks the same as it did in the time of Jesus when the Pharisees ran it.
     Now, I'm sure that several people, if they really read this far, are pretty annoyed. I'm sure I'll get called weak and soft and I need to suck it up, be a company man or a team player or a good soldier. It's nothing new, I've heard it all before. Like I said, I've been systematically rejected, and I'm a nobody. There are lots of nobodies like me who don't want to attend your churches anymore. We aren't impressed with your bands, your covers of the latest Christian songs from Klove. We don't need your trendy sermons. If I wanted good music and a powerful sermon, I have the entire internet at my disposal. I don't need good content. I have good content everywhere I look. I have books, podcasts, radio stations, smartphone apps. I need to be connected, and when you amputated me, then expected me to stay in proximity to the body and expect me to live. . . . . I think you get the idea. It's no wonder I'm feeling rotten. I don't want to go to church. I wanted to be the church, but I wasn't good enough for you. If the modern American church wants to change that, there are plenty of us who will be waiting.