Felt Crushed, But I Got It

I preached at a Center for Spiritual Living last Sunday and I learned that the church has a serious image problem. I’m usually game to try and recover that image, to use my voice to gently prod the church in a direction that will offer good news in a way that can be heard, but this experience made me wonder if we can recover.

First a word or two about context. I’m a Presbyterian preacher; have been for 20+ years. Just to give you a sense of where I fit on the “theological spectrum,” one of the professors at San Francisco Theological Seminary once said he thought mine was “the most liberal pulpit in the denomination.” (I think he meant it as a compliment :-). I don’t know if that is true, and I don’t really care. That’s not the point; I’m not looking for that title. I mention it here so that you know I’m not the kind of preacher who says that Jesus is the only way to salvation. I might quote John 3:16, (in fact I did), but you can bet my interpretation of the verse won’t suggest that you either have to accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior or expect to spend eternity dancing around flames in the proverbial firey pit of hell. It’s not me. I’m not going to suggest that the Bible is the dictated Word of God. I assume the scriptures were written and edited over a couple of thousand years as various communities, in various historical circumstances, from within various worldviews, (none of them like mine), reflected on the nature of “God” and humanity’s interaction with God.

I believe that incredibly gorgeous conversation points us toward a stunning reality. We are not horrifying sinners in the hands of an angry God, as Jonathan Edwards said. No, we are each unique expressions of the love intelligence that has animated this evolving universe for 13.82 billion years. From the Big Bang to Shakepeare what Whitehead called the “gentle persuasion towards love” has interpenetrated creation, and does so now within us, expressing love through us. That’s who we are. Our work now is to become who we are.

The Bible, it seems to me, forms the parameters of the conversation we’ve been having for thousands of years. Each time I speak from a pulpit I am offering the next word in a conversation that has been going on for those thousands of years, and when I’m done I expect to hear a word back. In fact I do what I can to make sure I hear it right then and there. Before I left my most recent congregation, the way that worked was that I sat down after I preached and listened while one of our incredibly creative pianists (thank you John Steiner and Alan Choy!), “repreached my sermon” on the piano. Then I stood up and said to the congregation, “What did Spirit have to say to you today? Would you like to respond to anything?” Then the congregation and I would have a conversation reflecting on the nature of God and humanity’s interaction with God. We’d then have a conversation for 5 or 10 minutes before moving into a time a prayer.

I mention it because John Steiner asked me to come preach to his community as a guest last week. He’s a member of the Center for Spiritual Living in San Francisco. When I preached at the Center, we engaged in a conversation after I preached. What a privilege, and how painful it turned out to be too.

When I was done preaching and asked people to respond, the first woman raised her hand and absolutely tore me apart. She was appalled that I would stand there at the Center for Spiritual Living and sound off about how Jesus is the only way to salvation. She was furious that I could quote the Bible as though it was the only thing that could offer truth. That is of course NOT what I had said.

Then the next person spoke and he too took me to task for my narrow minded Christian ways. It was stunning.

Following those two comments there was significant diversity in the points of view expressed by the congregation. It was one of the most stimulating conversations I’ve ever had. In the end I was struck by one thing in particular, and that was that the people who had “mis-heard me” had been so hurt by the church, so shut down by what they had heard from the church in their lives, that they simply couldn’t hear me say something else. I was a Presbyterian Pastor and they were not prepared to hear any good news from me.

I got it. I’m not sure what to do about it, but I got it.