Church Crisis cont...

Normally I use this space for milder things, sometimes humorous things, sometimes family things. This time I am going to use this space to put a call out to go to war. Its time for the members of my church (Crosspointe Community Church) to put on their armor and pick up the sword. Brothers and Sisters, its on.



If the story that follows seems irreverent, I apologize in advance, but I am ticked and it will likely show.



I am a member of an LCMS church. That is Lutheran Church Missouri Synod. I was warned about the Lutheran branches before joining Crosspointe, but I just couldn't find any of what I was being warned about. The reason I couldn't find it was because its not there. Crosspointe is not your typical Lutheran church and its not at all typical of your LCMS. Our pastor follows the teachings of the discipline, but the church does not feel like or function like your typical LCMS body.



If you would please, please, please read the information linked in the below post so that you understand what is taking place before indulging me further in what will likely become an incoherent tirade.



This past Sunday our pastor asked us to come to a sister church, King of Kings LCMS, for a reformation rally because the President of the Ohio District was going to be the speaker. This person has some influence over the dilemma that our church finds itself in, being president and all. This so called president has not returned a myriad of phone calls and has refused meetings with representatives of Crosspointe on more than one occasion. This president has never even been to our area before now so his presence was a timely occurrence and rare opportunity. Our pastor decided that this was too valuable and too 'coincidental' to not take full advantage of. Let me provide the briefest of explanations on the history of Lutheran.

Martin Luther presented something called the 95 Thesis on this date. These Thesis pointed out inconsistencies and corruptions that were taking over the church and silencing the gospels. He stood up in protest of these corruptions and called out the leadership (the Popes) and eventually caused the dismemberment of the church (Roman) as it was known at the time.

I give this excessively brief and generic explanation only to point out that this reformation rally provided a unique opportunity to 'protest' against the current corrupt state of the LCMS in relation to its financial arm called ODLCEF. (Ohio District Lutheran Church Extension Fund) So, as requested by my pastor I attended the Rally.

Problem one, I don't always listen real well. I was not requested to attend the rally, but simply the protest held by our congregation outside the rally. Oops. No problem it just meant that I had to sit through one more church service on Sunday, no biggy, right?

Wrong--O.

(this is were my obvious irreverence starts, sorry)

So I enter the sanctuary 20 seconds ahead of the start of the service, nice timing. I observe my surroundings carefully, as I always do when in an unfamiliar, or potentially hostile environment. I am in a church sanctuary,how hostile can it be. Well, that was clue number one to myself that something is just not right here if I have been here less than 60 and have already gone on full paranoia alert, identified my exits and sized up the men in my general area to read the threat level. (no I am not kidding, yes my paranoia meter went nuts)

As I continue to scan my surroundings an usher dutifully observed that I did not have a program, ( a program? what do I need a program for?) and presented me with one. With the exception of the message, every word uttered for the next hour was carefully written down for my reading pleasure. ( this is not worship, its lemming training)

I observed that this service, this church, is everything I dislike about religion, rolled up into one nicely robed and tasseled package. (backwards collars included) This is everything I was warned about being Lutheran. It was everything I was warned about LCMS as well.

The dirges ( Lutheran German Hymns) began about now. My eyes are still darting back and forth uncomfortably. This is church but it feels like I am an extra in an "OMEN III" movie or some other bad horror flick of the the 70's or 80's.

"Oman Domino's................. Pepperoni............. with Cheese"

Or something like that.

It might be time to exit before my skin begins to rash up.

Well at some point, 3 dirges in, and a long, long, long responsive prayer. (the responsive prayer is where the pastor reads a sentence, or paragraph in this case, and the congregation reads the next paragraph, back and forth about 6 times until at the end the pastor and the congregation read together.) The president takes the pulpit and begins by trying to be personable. He doesn't do a bad job, but his timing is a little too rehearsed if you know what I mean. Once this guy gets going I find myself wanting to hear him but struggling to focus on what he is saying. I decide that I should take a moment and offer up a prayer of my own, I am in a church ( I think) after all. So I pray a very specific, though extremely selfish prayer. I bow my head and pray Lord, please open my ears and let me hear and open my eyes and let me see what is really going on here. Lord help me to discern Your will and obey as your servant. Lord show me what is true so that I may not be deceived and let me see that which is good and that which is evil. Amen.

Well I raised my head hoping I would see bright lights and peaceful wisps fluttering above the congregation. I hoped to maybe see an Angelic sword toting giant guarding the entrance to the sanctuary. I thought I might even see a dark twisting stormy patch or two hovering in a corner or looking in a window. (I know I know) But alas I saw nothing new when I opened my eyes. Oh, well, cant blame a brother for asking. This is not a gift for me to have and that's okay, but I can ask cant I?

The message goes on.

The president goes into great detail about how the church needs to get the gospel out there, and the gospel should not be silenced, and we need to bring people into the church through the message of the gospels. He is actually doing rather well in covering the basic 'what makes a church body' stuff from his perspective. He even mentioned that the church suffers from a lack of new, "young" people. ( and Methuselah in the front row said Amen, as did his parents and his parents parents because they were all there. Average age in attendance was someplace between 70 and dead, closer to dead) All in all it was the message you would expect on a reformation event.

There was one more thing I observed however and its important that I share it will you. During the entire service, the stand up, sit down, stand up, sit down, put your left foot in, take your left foot out, put your left foot in and shake it all about service. The hymnal dirges, the bell choir, ( insert eye roll here) the message, the offering, the lemming training er, uhm, responsive reading, the gospel reading, the old testament reading, new testament reading, and dinner recipe reading. During the entire hour-ish I was there, I had two young boys about ages 4 and 5 sitting in front of me with their dad ( I assume) This two boys were too young to understand or do much so dad had the good foresight to bring something quiet for them to do to keep them occupied and quiet during the entire service. Kudos to dad for thinking of it, and kudos again for actually pulling it off, they made nary a peep the entire hour.

What did dad bring? He brought some really cool (sarcasm implied) pop up books for them. With each turn of the page some paper thing would rise up out of the center of the book. If they opened the book slowly, it rose slowly, fast and it would almost jump out of the book. The boys paged back and forth in this book at different speeds and paces for an entire hour. The book only has something like 10 pages so it is obvious they are fascinated by it. Neither one is really old enough to read much, but the books needed little in the way of words as each new adventure crawled or lept off the turn of the page. What is the title of the book you might ask?
" Who will you find on Scary Street?" Page one, a witch and her cauldron with a frog leaping from it, page two, a werewolf with a mail sack, page three, a spider with items in each hand, page four a Aztec looking gateway with ghouls, skulls, bones, and reaper like imagery bouncing up from the page, page five, Frankenstein, page six a bottle labeled 'spirit potion', page seven, the same bottle only now its open with wispy ghostly strands running from it with ghoulish faces at their ends. My thought at the time was that this was not exactly appropriate material to be thumbing through during a church service, but we move on.

Once the message was over and the crowd began to head for the line to glad hand the president I made a quick left out the side rear exit, skirted the masses and made it out the door unscathed and unspoken to and I belief unobserved. I made it out to the parking lot and took my place with my congregation. I was informed that during my absence from them, while in the service, the trustees of this church had threatened to have them arrested if they (we) entered the church. (nice huh) What were they (we) doing that was so offensive. Well, we were handing out information on a little yellow card that said save our church, don't silence the gospel. Hmm, terribly threatening and offensive, particularly to another church. We had on t shirts that depicted Luther hanging the thesis on the church door along with a little heart that said 'living thesis number ( 1,2,3 whatever)

We hung around and tried to pass out our pamphlets and be as discreet and unobtrusive as possible, per our pastors instructions. We were told speak love and truth only, do not be offensive or belligerent, and we were not. After some time our pastor managed to bring the president out to speak with one member of our congregation and hear her story in hope of reaching his heart, gaining his favor and obtaining his influence. He came out and listened to her story and then answered that there was nothing that he could do, it wasn't his issue and we needed to take care of things ourselves. He then added that, and I quote ;" I wish I could wave a magic wand and make it all better for you"

DING DING DING DING DING ..................

I finally got it ( I think)

I prayed Lord let me see, let me hear, I should have let Him know I am a bit slow too.

The picture book tied into the magic wand and told me a story, a story only I would piece together this way. He answered my prayer. ( If any of my brothers or sisters would like to help me discern this differently, please please do so, Charlie.... that means you)

I now know what the trouble is, and better yet I know we will fix it.

When I look at the congregation at Crosspointe I see folks who know how to put their boots on.

I see folks who know to put on the chin strap with that helmet.

I see folks who are not afraid to put on a breast plate or pick up a shield.

And most importantly I see people who have held the sword with great skill in the past and are willing to wield it again.

I know now the battle is one and I must join in with my sword as well.

So let me leave you my brothers and sisters with this...........

Damn demon I fear you not, know my name, I will not let you destroy this place and you will not and cannot defeat me because I stand with my brothers and sisters and the Lord stands with us. In the name of Jesus leave us be to worship our Father,

Dear Lord guide us and lead us and let me serve Your will. Amen.



Brothers and Sisters please pray with me, with us, and Praise be to Him whose Grace is all and everything.