Worship as Surgery

     I have been listening to some old cassette tapes of worship services from a church in Charlotte.  I keep these tapes and listen to them because this church was created and shaped by the conviction that worship is vital.   The preacher was a man named H. Louis Patrick and he was exceptional.  He was, in  my opinion, the best preacher I have ever heard.  But not only was he a great preacher, he was also convinced and the church conducted worship as if it was absolutely essential.

     I remember hearing George Buttrick, another outstanding Protestant preacher in New York City, who once quipped that he would entertain "layman" Sunday as soon as they had layman surgery at Mt. Sinai Hospital.   I have quoted that before and been jumped by other preachers who suggested that liturgy was "the people's work" and so they should be involved.  It seems to me that singing hymns, confessing sin, saying what they believe in the creeds is a pretty heavy load for the layperson.

     But I think that what Buttrick meant and what Patrick believed is that worship is as important to the human spirit as medical surgery.   People do not causally decide to skip an appointment for their surgery.  They do not allow their games to cancel their surgery.  Medical concerns are number one concerns. They are a top priority.  Buttrick and Patrick both believed the same about the need for the human spirit for worship as the people of God. Worship is not a causal come and go affair. It is, as Anne Dillard suggested, humans playing with dynamite, when the Power and love of God might irrupt in the midst of the people.  Worship ought to be carefully and prayerfully planned and conducted.

      It is this attitude, this expectation, this view of worship that seems to be missing in so much of the Protestant worship that I have seen in retirement.  There is too much carelessness in what is done. There is too much focus on the activities of the announcements. There is too much "hail fellow well met". There is too much of a desire to have people "be happy."  There is too little challenge and demand of the gospel shared.   Probably too much psychology and too little good theology.  (I know there is too little Bible being used if what I hear from the religious speakers in politics. They either have a much edited smaller Bible or they aren't reading the one they have.)

     I am very lucky. I have a whole box of these cassette tapes that I can play when my "sin sick soul" needs surgery.  But I pray for the Christian faith in the USA.

Like a Penny

         I am not sure when it began. Somewhere a long time ago I got some coin books and apparently from time to time, I would put pennies in those books.  I did not give much attention to the penny collection for a long time. Then one day when my younger son and I were joking about the fact that he and his brother would have to clean out and dispose of all the stuff my wife and I had collected.  He responded that what he was looking forward to getting his hands on was my penny collection. Who knew?
          Since that time, in my retirement time, I have become much more regular in my searching for pennies.  Pennies minted in San Francisco seem to have stayed on the west coast.  After 1940 the only pennies I am still searching for are "s" pennies. That is the state of my collecting.
          Still the daily examination of another fifty pennies, (I look through one roll of pennies each day), constantly is a reminder of the great need for us to be kind to each other. Nobody knows the kind of life we have had to endure. "Nobody knows the trouble I've seen" are words from an old song, but they are the message I get each day from the pennies.
           I spread out the pennies and it is amazing the vast range of conditions of the pennies. It is not necessarily related to the age of the pennies. I have found pennies minted in 2010 that look like they have been hit with hammers.  There are pennies from the 1970's that look like they have been soaked in acid.  There are pennies from the 1960's that look brand new.  Every time I look at a penny the thought comes that this penny has a story to tell. Where it has been? What it has been used for; what it has had to suffer. Who knows how many times it has been put through a washing?  Who knows the kind of treatment that has been given to this penny. Was it put in a box and left, ignored?  But each of those coins is still a penny. Still worth one cent.
           If pennies are each subjected to a great variety of stories, so too are human lives and each person has different experiences, different pains, different opportunities, and different abilities.  If I could constantly remember that I would be a whole lots less eager to jump to judgments about another person. If I could remember my penny lessons, I would remember that despite all the varieties of people they are each a person and still worthy