Keeping a Holy Lent: Day 10

In a session today at the Mission Gathering conference, we were asked, "Where is it you commune with God?"

In Los Angeles county, only 17% of people report going to church.
And yet, 68% report having a spiritual experience.

Which makes me think the church maybe ... just maybe ... isn't doing her job.

Isn't the church's job to help people have a spiritual experience?
It's not that people aren't hungry for God; it's that they're not finding God in our churches.

So I got curious.
And I asked on Facebook the same question, "Where is it you commune with God?"
One person said, "At church."

The others all said somewhere else.
If I were honest, most of the time when I genuinely feel a connection with God, it's not at church.  Sometimes, yes, but not often.
Oftentimes I find God in other ways.
I find God in the sweat of a good, hard workout.
I find God over a cup of coffee with a dear friend.
I find God in a lively conversation about the Divine mystery.
I find God at the ocean.
I find God in the eyes and the hands of a preschooler.

But maybe that's not bad news for the church.
Maybe that just means we need to rethink what it means to be church.
What if we stopped asking people to dress up and sit in a hard pew at 11 am on a Sunday?
What if we held worship instead somewhere meaningful to people?

Would that really be so bad?

What if we found new ways to be church together?
Ways that helped us experience God in fresh new ways.

Would that be so hard?

And perhaps the more pressing question is

Wouldn't that be worth it?

Wouldn't it be worth it to have people in search of a spiritual existence WANT to be with us?  Wouldn't it be worth it to give up something that feels familiar and comfortable to you so that others could join you on this journey?  Wouldn't it be worth it to make a difference in the lives of people?

I hope the answer is yes.