What do you expect from your parish church? If a parish is going to be everything that it can be and should be, what would that look like? Let me try to answer these questions in a very general way, and very simply. While we want and expect a beautiful liturgy, sound preaching and teaching, and attentive pastoral care, at another, more foundational, level, we expect to be loved unconditionally. We don’t find that in the workplace and in other places in our lives, but we expect it of our parish church, not only for ourselves, but also for everyone who enters these doors. For while we may not be biblical scholars and while there are varying levels of involvement among us, from very little to fully involved, we all know that God is love, and that Jesus said that the greatest commandment of all is to love God above everything else, and to love our neighbor as we love our very selves.
How do we love ourselves? Unconditionally, of course. There are certain things we don’t like about ourselves, but that doesn’t get in the way of the love of ourselves (if we are mentally and spiritually healthy), and we know that that is the way the parish church should be. We expect that, as well we should.
Stephen Covey, in his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, tells a story that is instructive for us as we seek to love others unconditionally. “I remember a mini-paradigm shift I experienced one Sunday morning on a subway in New York. People were sitting quietly—some reading newspapers, some lost in thought, some resting with their eyes closed. It was a calm, peaceful scene. Then suddenly, a man and his children entered the subway car. The children were so loud and rambunctious that instantly the whole climate changed.
“The man sat down next to me and closed his eyes, apparently oblivious to the situation. The children were yelling back and forth, throwing things, even grabbing people’s papers. It was very disturbing. And yet, the man sitting next to me did nothing.
“It was difficult not to feel irritated. I could not believe that he could be so insensitive to let his children run wild like that and do nothing about it, taking no responsibility at all. It was easy to see that everyone else in the subway felt irritated, too. So finally, with what I felt was unusual patience and restraint, I turned to him and said, “Sir, your children are really disturbing a lot of people. I wonder if you couldn’t control them a little more?
“The man lifted his gaze as if to come to a consciousness of the situation for the first time and said softly, ‘Oh, you’re right. I guess I should do something about it. We just came from the hospital where their mother died about an hour ago. I don’t know what to think, and I guess they don’t know how to handle it either.’
“Can you imagine what I felt at that moment? My paradigm shifted. Suddenly I saw things differently, I felt differently, I behaved differently. My irritation vanished. I didn’t have to worry about controlling my attitude or my behavior; my heart was filled with the man’s pain. Feelings of sympathy and compassion flowed freely. ‘Your wife just died? Oh, I’m so sorry. Can you tell me about it? What can I do to help?’ Everything changed in an instant.”
The persons who come into the doors of the church bring with them a whole host of experiences about which we know little or nothing. Especially the newcomer may have come into the church because some trauma has brought that person to the place where he or she can be closest to God’s healing touch. How we treat that person, and how we treat one another, may indeed determine what that person will feel about the Christian faith from that time on, perhaps even for the rest of the person’s life. That’s why we need to be so very intentional about how each of us treats those around us with whom we worship.
As a result of our strategic planning process, we are beginning a program focusing on hospitality. You may have noticed some reminders in your bulletins that are new. Today’s reminder is “If you’re happy and you know it….wear your name tag.” Even name tags are a sign of hospitality. We don’t wear name tags for ourselves; we wear them for others.
The Church should be a place that evidences the unconditional love of God in everything that we do. We want everyone who comes into these doors to know the boundless love of God. If that is going to happen, each one of us needs to take responsibility for showing that love.