Nathans View: The floors are rubberized and they reverberate the base in the worship music. This was a worship service where the primary form of communication was Sign Language and the hearing had an interpreter. It was an environment where awkward silences are the norm. Where there is a "Culture" not necessarily of my own. Aside from a different worship environment, not to mention the separation from the rest of the congregation, the sermon intrigued me a great deal. To sum it up in one sentence...ah how I love to generalize...it would be this. We choose whether we want to stamp Jesus on our foreheads...and once we do you better not act up or when you die and can finally cash in on your holy life insurance policy...God might say "too bad so sad...it wasn't good enough"...and you will be stuck with all your high school buddies in hell!! Kind of like an eternal high school reunion eh? This is a perfect example of my frustration with this school of thought. They pitch the "Walk the Talk" however, it seems rarity in the world I run into on a daily basis. They encourage everyone to be "saved" and be "born again" and then after the holy firework show is over it seems you are left with a scarlet letter for the rest of your life...the new is worn off and you go back to what is truly human nature...routine!! Then you are left going through life opening doors for old people at the grocery store in an effort to be more Christ like. The pitch for today's sermon was to open our eyes to a whole new reality, a new way of living, which theoretically should change the way you interact with the world you live in. The "I" is erased by the interconnectedness of humanity and the world all around us. This is a fantastic idea...and one...frankly...I am into. But here is where it starts to get muddy. Christianity would suggest this can only be achieved through Christ. Buddhism is very similar, when I compare them, in this concept of understanding "Gods Presence". It would be considered a state of Nirvana and to be Enlightened. The only difference is the enlightened don't consider the Buddha a God...rather it is an example of how far one can go in the pursuit of understanding. Maybe I am missing the point of Jesus and trying to merge two religious entities but I believe there is something to be learned here. It seems to me that the overall message Jesus was trying to portray is the internal relationship YOU are fostering with God overshadows this world. To approach your world with reverence of every living being including the blind, the deaf, the leaper. Perhaps I am wrong...but Jesus was leading a revolution away from a world where money and status defined who made it to "heaven". He fought to eliminate that caste system and instead, set forth the idea that the "meek shall inherit the earth". Is it me or was Jesus trying to say once you see how beautiful and fulfilling understanding can be...riches do not matter...social status does not matter...your life situation does not matter. But in the message given today at church, a time frame clouded that idea with a healthy fear of Hell and a public call to speed up your understanding of this intensely difficult concept because "if you where to die tomorrow...where would you spend eternity?" So we force it...maybe even fake "it"...and secretly keep looking for "it" hoping no one will notice. Perhaps I have stumbled upon a fantastic possibility. It seems to me the stick that trips a Christian in this world has always been the Devil...dare I suggest that his residence, Hell, is the very thing that keeps the Christian Industry alive, deeding its multi billion dollar industry. What would Jesus think about that. Perhaps Hell is helping to blind Christianity from a deeper, more powerful existence on this earth. I have gone down a very muddy road here but I will end with this...imagine there is no Hell...no fear of losing or coming up short...no walls...no barriers...no expectations...just you, the world around you, and God. What is your purpose now? And perhaps more importantly, does the answer to that question give you peace?
Ashley's View: I'm enjoying having Nathan blog first in these, because he always seems to give me more fodder to write about. It's interesting that this time, instead of him critiquing the church, he really ends up focusing on the sermon. And thus I'm reminded as to why we're doing this in the first place. We want to be pushed. We want to be inspired. We want to be, dare I say, "enlightened." We want to grow and be challenged and find the good out there, not just pick apart a church that members call home. Nathan's rant above gets me excited--because the wheels are turning--conversations are started as soon as we get in the car and we're getting fired up talking about things. If ultimately this brings us closer to God, then regardless of whether we agree with the sermon or the church, I feel this is all worthwhile.
Now, going to my view of the church. It's funny to hear how Mel and Nathan were uncomfortable in this setting, while I felt alive in it. It was very charismatic and 'churchy' like what I've been to before, but watching all of the signing and understanding it--it got me excited like I used to be when I was in school. I got an Associate's degree in American Sign Language Interpreting, and I haven't really been around any signing since. I've plan on raising all my kids fluent in ASL, and Clara knows a lot already, so I was eager to have her see a whole room of people signing. I was especially thrilled about signing during praise and worship. As much as I'm not for the more charismatic churches, I contradict myself because the singing is what always brought me closest to God in a church setting. And what I always wanted to do was sign while singing. In most settings, that would have been odd, but here it was the norm. So, that was fun.
We met the pastor, Brian, as soon as we walked in. However, I'm not sure if it was a warm greeting, or more an awkward standing next to each other that finally got him to talk to me. And...other than one guy signing to me that I could go in a side room to calm down a screaming Ellie during service, no one "talked" to us at all. Kinda disappointing since I was all eager to brush up on my signing skills. Out of the three churches so far, the FUUN church was definitely the most welcoming! Going to the info center at the main Baptist Church here, I didn't feel welcomed as much as I felt a full on sales pitch, complete with about 50 brochures on how you can get involved 24/7 in this mini-world they call community. And hey, if you're 10 minutes late for service, you can go in the other sanctuary and watch the whole sermon on the 11 minute delay in hi-def. "It's just like he's standing up there in person!" Yikes. Not my cup of tea. This place was all about community, but not in a warm welcoming way--seemed like it was nothing or it was a sales pitch.
Just to add my two cents on the sermon part...I like what Nathan has to say above, as this has been a soap box of mine for a while--that evangelical Christianity seems to me to be focused more on heaven and hell than on what you do now--it's all about x+y=z and you better play your cards straight or else. I want to live my life the best way I know how to honor God, but I'm doing it because I feel it's the best way and I love my life--not just to get the ticket to heaven. If heaven/hell weren't real, I'm not going to be mad because I missed out on murder and adultery. Darn.
The sermon was two-fold. There was the whole talk about us being getting the "seal" by God, of his owning us and how we should respect this body He has lent us...but then he had to backtrack, almost, to explain that although when you rent a car you don't care and don't take care of it as well, even though we're "renting" this body and God owns it, we should treat it well....yep, starts to get a little confusing. I'm thinking that he was going on the understanding that he can't assume that everyone respects stuff that isn't there's. Speaking very generally here, some deaf people tend to fall into the same bracket as some people on welfare--just waiting for the handouts and taking for granted things that they "borrow." So he went back and forth in his sermon--some of it I recognized as catering specifically to deaf people. I appreciated this, and also see how someone like Mel and Nathan can be left going what the...?
Bottom line, Mel stated in the previous post about how Christ Church Cathedral seemed to cater to people looking for a personal experience...well, I'm with Mel in that I am looking at church for community. I'm very into the personal experience with God, but when I go to a traditional institution like a church, I'm going not to stand isolated but to find others to commune with. This church, both the little service we went to and the big one that engulfed it, seemed to be brimming with people and we were like specks on the wall. Basically, if you're looking to get involved, go to the sales rep at the info booth and schedule your meeting to get with the "in" crowd. Otherwise, hasta la vista.
Melissa's View:
Forgive me for taking so long to blog...and because of that I have really forgotten the details of the service, but I do remember the feeling so I will go based on that...I don't know that I had much of an opinion (much unlike Nate) but more of an experience. I enjoyed being part of a world where people have found joy in what some may say is a handicap. I can't imagine the world without being able to hear and these people were happy and ready for praise and worship. I thought it was so cool to be able to feel the vibrations in the floor as the music played. It was a little hard to follow the sermon, seemed a little choppy. There were some things he talked about that I thought were right on and was looking for more depth or expanding on the topic, but then he would just switch gears and made it hard to follow. Overall I was more overcome with joy as I watched Clara stare at the others in the room and move her little fingers. She has been learning sign and you could tell she was soaking it in and excited to see others doing something she had been learning about!
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