Showing posts with label Story. Show all posts

As the title says, here's "Another Communion Story" for you. I have bunches of them after 11.5 years of serving here in Girdwood. This one gives you a hint into what goes on in my mind during communion.

I have said here that we get wonderful communion bread from Girdwood's own "The Bake Shop." We are so accustomed to those delicious, rectangular loaves of mild sourdough (really more like a wheat in flavor) that our communion service at 10 AM really revolves around it. Just recently we were given a new communion set so we could have a rectangular plate that would hold the bread perfectly.

I understand that bread. When it comes time to serve, I know just about how far it needs to "stretch" depending on the size of the congregation that day. So, when more people are there, the kids don't get quite as large a piece. But, when the crowd's a little slimmer, I can afford to be much more generous.

I understand that bread. I know how it breaks in nice, firm pieces, just right for dipping into the grape juice. Sometimes I'm surprised by the tear and a person gets a larger piece that expected. But most people are very happy with a larger piece.

Last Sunday, Girdwood's "The Bake Shop" was closed. That meant that we needed to get our communion bread from someplace else. It was good bread, don't get me wrong. One of my theories with communion is that, if you're not going to use real wine you should at least make sure you have good bread and real grape juice. This was bread from another bakery in Anchorage and was a great loaf of bread. It was dense. It was round. But, it was mysterious.

I didn't understand this bread. It was heavier than I was used to. It was a different shape. And when I started breaking off pieces to serve the gathered congregation it broke in odd shapes. Usually I don't have to think much during communion. I just get to enjoy and bask in communion. But this past week I had to think.

The bread, as usual, was broken in two pieces at the start of communion. And, more or less, each half should feed one half of the church. However, as I finished with that first half of the loaf, I wasn't yet done with the first half of the church. Thereafter the pieces were smaller. And I felt bad for the kids who were coming up, eager to get their "big piece" and I couldn't provide.

God still provided. We've never run out of bread during Holy Communion and we weren't going to start last Sunday.

However, it is interesting what goes through the mind of an officiant at the communion table as we try to fulfill our responsibilities in serving a congregation with the body and blood of Christ.

Being trained in the school of Stanley Hauerwas, where the role of the church is to set up an alternative culture that shapes people in ways that counter the ways that culture shapes them, I found the following at NextReformation.  I thought it was helpful this morning as we prepare for another discipleship class after a week where prayer has been emphasized.

If culture is a cultivating force, then the assertions follow:
1. we are always being discipled. The only question is what or whom is forming us.
2. we will not effectively maintain a discipleship “program” or curriculum without addressing the larger context of formation (the dominant culture)
3. an effective discipling movement must succeed at some level in generating an alternative culture.
4. The Church is intended to be a discipling movement, and therefore, is intended to be an alternative (kingdom) culture.
5. Culture is maintained by language and practices. An alternative culture must have a unique linguistic fund — a grammar of its own. It must also maintain shared covenant practices.

There ya' go.  

So, how do we provide alternative languages and practices in the church to make Christian disciples as opposed to more disciples of the dominant worldly culture?

Image by humancarbine via Flickr

“Spiritual theology, using Scripture as a text, does not present us with a moral code and tell us, ‘live up to this’; nor does it set out a system of doctrine and say, ‘Think like this and you will live well.’ The biblical way is to tell a story and in the telling invite: 'Live INTO this — this is what it looks like to be human in this God-made and God-ruled world; this is what is involved in becoming and maturing as a human being.'

“When we submit ourselves to what we read in Scripture, we find that we are not being led to see God in our stories, but our stories in God’s. God is the larger context and plot in which our stories find themselves.” (43-44)

via

I shared one of my favorite children's stories Sunday at church.  I changed what I was originally going to do because I got distracted by a squirrel climbing on on one of our outdoor beams.  So, I told this story instead.

A pastor was leading a worship service talking about "God the Creator" and he wanted to help the kids appreciate some of the animals in the world around them and talk about how God created them.  He started off this way:

"I'm going to see if you can guess what it is I'm thinking of.  This is an animal that is sometimes brown and sometimes gray.  In many parts of the US it has a bushy tail....."

No hands go up.  The kids stare blankly.

"Well, this thing I'm thinking of likes to climb trees and bird feeders and, sometimes, even homes and churches..."

Nothing from the kids.

"This creature likes to collect nuts and store them away for the winter...."

There was a long pause.

Finally, a little girl raises her hand.

"Yes, Mary," says the Pastor.  "What is it I'm describing here?

"Well," says Mary, "I'm pretty sure you're talking about a squirrel, but I know you want me to say "Jesus."

Or, I came across this funny Facebook dialogue which talks about Jesus:


How often do we, as Pastors or Christians over-spiritualize events or conversations, making them be about Jesus when really they don't need to be...or may be about something else entirely?

How often do we try to make great theological lessons out of the mundane...only because we feel we need to do it?  Or because we're trying VERY hard to evangelize?

I know as a pastor I can jump to the gun and look for opportunities to bring Jesus into a situation that, really, is out of place.  I'm sure that I have a tendency to pontificate and get "all religious" when dealing with folks. It's partly an occupational problem.

What do you think?  Do you over-spiritualize?