Pastor Steve's Recent Weekly Letter
Pastor Steve's Weekly Letter for Thursday, June 4, 2020
Every cloud has its silver lining. I’m sure you’ve heard that old saying. Honestly, the opposite is also true. Every silver lining has its cloud. The silver lining for our church is that we will hold an outdoor service this Sunday, June 7, at 9:00 a.m. in our parking lot. I’m excited about meeting together in person! Still, there is a cloud that goes along with this. The cloud is that not everyone in our church family will be able to attend. We fully understand that those with health concerns will need to stay home for their well-being. Or even if you have no health concerns, you may decide to stay home so that you can still provide in-person care for someone who has health concerns. We also understand that some of you may still feel uncomfortable gathering in a large group—even if it is outdoors with appropriate social distancing. We respect your decision. Part of me would like to wait to gather until all of us are able to participate. However, that time could be months down the road. Thankfully, you can still participate from home. Our online worship video will follow the very same order of service we will use at our outdoor worship. We will send an email tomorrow (Friday, June 5) with all the details for the outdoor worship service.
Today, I would like to help you prepare for our worship this Sunday, June 7. As we gather before the Lord on Sunday, I believe our worship must address the injustice and violence that has once again reared its ugly head in our nation. Our service will proceed along the lines of lament, confession, instruction, and praise. Let me comment briefly on each one of these aspects.
Lament is often the missing element in contemporary evangelical worship. We like to focus on praise, and this is understandable since we have such a great God who is worthy of our praise. Yet lament is part of the language of worship. The Book of Psalms makes this clear as it includes both psalms of praise and psalms of lament. An African-American pastor-friend in West Chicago commented this week that lament allows us to sit with those who grieve and to express this grief to God. Matthew Jacoby writes in Deeper Places: Experiencing God in the Psalms, “If any person is to love God, he or she must be prepared to grieve over the things that grieve God.” Thus, we will begin our worship Sunday with lament for the systemic racism in our nation that has led to disproportionate acts of violence against African-Americans—the most recent of these being the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. We will express our lament through Scripture and prayer.
Confession is another important element of worship, and I am grateful that we regularly incorporate prayers of confession. I will pray a prayer of confession on Sunday for our past and present failures to challenge structures and call out attitudes that promote injustice. Such confession has biblical precedent. Remember that the Israelites in Nehemiah’s day “confessed their sins and the sins of their ancestors” (Nehemiah 9:2). May we all come before the Lord with a heart of humility.
As always, our worship will include a time of instruction when we look together at the Word of God. I plan to preach Luke 19:1-10, and the title of the sermon is “What Jesus Said to the Oppressor.” Our sermon series for the month of June is Timely Words from Jesus. We will also play a brief clip from a message by Charlie Dates, a pastor serving on the south side of Chicago. I believe it’s important that we hear the biblical grief and hope expressed by a Christian leader in the African-American community.
We will end our service on a note of praise. We serve a great God, and there is hope because he is in control, he is loving, he is good, he is patient, and he is at work in all things for the good of those who love him. Our plan is to express our praise with a closing song. Understandably, there has been concern about the safety of singing in the current pandemic, since singing can propel droplets of moisture further than talking can. However, given that we are in an outside setting, we believe we can do this relatively safely. Finally, I am very aware that we will be dealing with difficult issues on Sunday. But I am confident we can do it in unity and with grace, love, humility, and a spirit of bearing with each other.
On the family front, my granddaughter Halle (3) was upset with her mom yesterday. Halle expressed her displeasure by saying, “You are not a girl because I’m mad at you. You are a boy!” However, she brought a flower to her mom today. It was a nice gesture even though she picked it out of the flower garden her Nana (Priscilla) had planted! Thanks for reading. I’ll see you on Sunday or sometime soon!