Finding a Church

Tenth Monday after Pentecost

First, my thanks to Joe for a really perceptive comment and questions. I'll talk about it on Friday and think about it until then. Do make sure to read Joe's comment.

We left off in last Monday's faith journey narrative blog with the Wilsons in Greensboro in the summer of 1983 adjusting to new jobs and looking for a church. What leads to people to decide on one church over another? It's a myriad of different strokes for different folks. Here's something of a standard sort of list:

1. Good preacher--someone whose theological thinking is in the same range as mine, who plans and preaches his or her sermons well.

2. Good program--especially important if you have young children

3. Good music--music I like, I relate to, and inspires me, played and sung well

4. Good doing--has not just giving to help the needy but doing. Habitat is a prime example.

5. Good people--folks we can make close friendships with, unfortunately that too often means people who fit almost exactly the same social demographic as your own.

6. Good architecture--a structure that is both inspiring and comfortable

7. Good feeling--if it were a restaurant, I would use the word ambience. 

You could doubtless think of others. You would rate some things in this list higher than others and perhaps some things as not important at all. Let's keep this list in the background as I move forward in this phase of my faith journey.

I was a United Methodist College Chaplain, but I had no responsibilities for a Sunday service. I was still not entirely over my Episcopal urges, but it would be highly advantageous for me to be involved with a UMC. Let me explain that an ordained UMC clergy cannot be a member of a church, only a member of an annual conference. A spouse can be a member of a church.

We visited four United Methodist Churches. Within three months we had decided on Christ. Christ was a church plant, seeded by West Market Street, at that time the third or fourth largest church in the Western NC Conference. Ground was broken for Christ in 1954, so it was already an established congregation, though still thought of as a new church. Part of that thinking may have been due to the striking modern architecture of the sanctuary. One particularly smart thing the Christ Church founders did was to secure a lot of land. The church would be able to expand for many more buildings and for limitless parking. Like most such churches, it started with a Fellowship Hall, which was also used for worship, and then had the next big expansion in the building of a sanctuary. The demographic was almost entirely white, college educated, professional people, many of whom had considerable financial means. Diversity seemed hardly to be even a word back then. 

The pastor was Gene Little, who had previously been the much beloved pastor of Ardmore UMC in Greensboro, the church I grew up in. Gene had all the skills. He was not spectacular, but was rock solid in this most generalist of professions, a profession that demanded a large variety of skills, not all of which flowed one from another. Alas, Gene retired the following year. 

My best of the ministerial skills is teaching. At Christ Marianne and I went first to the largest young adult Sunday School class (yes we young then, under 40 in fact). The class was taught by the Associate Minister, who wasn't that good at it and not that interested in it. One Sunday, he announced that he would be out of town the next Sunday and asked if anyone would be willing to teach. My hand shot up! Very few people in the class even knew who Marianne and I were at that point. The Associate Minister looked around for someone else but no other hands were raised. I taught the next Sunday. Reviews were quite positive. He taught the following Sunday. At the end of class, he asked me to wait for a minute. Then he told me that he wanted to quit the class and asked me if I would be the permanent teacher from then on. He would give me time to think about it. I took the time--like about half a second--and said an enthusiastic YES!!! I taught the class for the next 18 years. 

Faithfully,

Christian