day forty

"generous in love—God, give grace! huge in mercy—wipe out my bad record.
   scrub away my guilt,
      soak out my sins in your laundry.
   i know how bad i've been;
      my sins are staring me down."


you're the One i've violated, and you've seen
      it all, seen the full extent of my evil.
   you have all the facts before you;
      whatever you decide about me is fair.
   i've been out of step with you for a long time,
      in the wrong since before i was born.
   what you're after is truth from the inside out.
      enter me, then; conceive a new, true life. "


"going through the motions doesn't please you,
      a flawless performance is nothing to you.
   i learned God-worship
      when my pride was shattered.
   heart-shattered lives ready for love
      don't for a moment escape God's notice."


~ psalm 51.1-6 & 16-17, the message


merciful God,
     i confess that i have not loved you with my whole heart.
we have failed to be an obedient church.
i have not done your will,
     i have broken your law
     i have rebelled against your love
     i have not loved my neighbors
     and i have not heard the cry of the needy.
forgive me, i pray.
free me for joyful obedience,
through Jesus Christ my Lord,
     amen.

this is the prayer that united methodists pray as part of our holy communion ritual.  i love this prayer.  although the prayer is written for a congregation and uses "we" instead of "i", as i sit in the pew and pray the words i always change it to the personal, individual tense.

because i fail daily.
heck, i fail hourly.
i fail all the time.

when was the last time (before this lenten study) that i stayed faithful to a spiritual practice?  when was the last time i served others that had nothing to do with my job?  when was the last time i went to a local church, other than the village church here on campus?  it's been at least a year. (unless you count going to church with my parents when i was in ohio.  then it's been since christmas.)

because the local church has failed me.

there, i said it.  the church has failed me.  i have always been a strong believer in the united methodist church and all it stands for.  i have accepted its faults, just as i accept the sometimes annoying little habits of some of my dearest friends, because when you love someone or something you choose to take the good with the bad.  these faults though...they've really taken a toll on me.

like the lack of hospitality.  we wonder sometimes in the umc why our young people are running away by the hundreds.  it's because we just don't care enough.  in general, churches do such a great job with programming for children and youth.  sometimes they even do a great job with parent groups and middle-aged and senior adult ministries.  but what about the young professionals?  the people who aren't popping out babies yet.  the ones who need the family of the church the most.

how was it so incredibly easy for me to walk away from the local church 2 years ago?  because they didn't truly care about me in the first place.  or at least that is how it felt (and continues to feel).  i know for a fact that the greater umc absolutely cares for its young adult constituency, but they continue to struggle with how to put hands and feet to that sense of care.  the church recognizes that it will die soon if it doesn't do a better job of caring for this generation of people they have ignored for so long, and they desperately want to fix the issue not because they selfishly don't want to die but because it breaks their hearts to know that these people are hungry for a fellowship of believers who go about the work of Christ in true and honest ways but simply haven't found it yet. 

so what do we do?  develop singles groups which die out in two-year's time because everyone ends up dating each other and breaking up?  create modern worship experiences that are visually and audibly appealing but require minimal participation and no intellectual or spiritual stimulation?  design new churches specifically for young adults that provide no longevity or intergenerational connectedness for its members?

what do we do?

i think we start with the prayer above and ask for the Maker of our hearts to break them open to notice the people in our pews, that God might use us to reach out to them in honest and pure ways that they might become an absolute part of our faith family.