And the cycle continues

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9/14/09

So I’m sitting in a Pastor’s conference and I’m looking around and wishing we could just get rid of the whole church thing all together so that we could start it over.  It’s amazing how stereotyped the church has become – and I’ve spent so much of my energy (maybe not actual physical actual energy, more of the pretend emotional or mental energy) trying to break out of that stereotypical box.  Maybe it’s just another way that I seek approval, validation.

But here I sit now.  And the stereotype has swallowed me whole.  Everything I see and hear IS that stereotype.  Mediocre music.  Mediocre facility.  Talking in languages that really nobody speaks in – and sometimes talking about things that don’t really matter (when it comes to the actual cause of Christ).

And then the guilt comes.  The realization that I have become the judger.  I have decided that I am the one who should hold the scale because apparently everyone else around me is a moron.  

Ah.  There.  Now I AM the stereotype.   I have become the judgmental Christian.  That is the ultimate Christian experience – to get to the point where you know just enough to be better than anyone else.  Whether it be talent, opinion, looks, interpretation of scriptures; doesn’t really matter what it is – my way is better.  Although in my defense – I do have a few people that I really respect and look up to and see as trailblazers and mentors – and I enjoy my time with them.  It’s just that a majority of the time a I feel that I am trying to carry the dead weight around me lest I sink.  Only that I have done it under the guise of worship – I have done it under the guise of an offering to God.

Yes, I know that the attitudes of my heart have revealed how far from Him I actually am in all of this.

And yet I still think that worship to God should be the best that it can be.  In everyway.  Musically, spiritually, technically.  An worthy offering for a worthy God.

But really- this communication style – does it still work?  Suits and pious talk?  Really?   Does this person know or even care who I am and what my challenges are day in and week out?   Do we really still need to use the clichés and metaphors that I’ve heard a million times – so much so that I have lost the power of the image it was supposed to portray.

Ps – I don’t care how charismatic you are.  If you have to ask for an “amen,” what you said didn’t resonate.  So change what you say or how you say it.  I learned something from Rolling Stone a few months ago – it was an interview with AC/DC.  The guitarist said he didn’t want to ever have to feel the need to try and pump up a crowd,  He didn’t want to stoop to asking them to clap.  He wanted to play.  And he wanted what he was doing on that thing to illicit a response from the people.

I need to look again at what I do.  How I do it. 

Oh, yeah – and if you are a guitar player – please get a tuner.  For crying out loud.  It’s the best first step you could possibly take toward actually being a better player.