Lately my time has been taken up by a capital campaign to rebuild the church I pastor, St. Elias Orthodox Church.
About a year ago we discovered that three of the four trusses that hold up our building’s roof had completely collapsed.
Then, this past spring when we thought we were ready to start construction, we discovered that our walls weren’t up to code and also needed to be rebuilt.
In short, this all means that my community has been devastated. We haven’t been home in our own building for over a year now (though we are very grateful to Hillcrest Family Services for allowing us to use their chapel).
Nonetheless, we remain optimistic that we can raise the money we need, rebuild, and come home.
However, all of this has gotten me thinking: what does it mean when disaster strikes? Is God punishing us? If not, then what’s going on?
(This post was originally published in the Dubuque Telegraph Herald (Saturday, September 26th, 2015). To read the rest, please head over there now.)
Father, bless me, a sinner!
As alluded to, the Church is not a temple, but more. Is your community being punished? No. But this is the opportunity for your community to reach out to the community in a way it has not before. When we have parish buildings, we often become complacent. We show up to the Divine Liturgy, to Paraklesis, funerals, maybe some other services, and that is just about it. It becomes routine, comfortable, becomes like the encroachment of pews (which then get pads). First we have active worship, active community. Then we introduce a foreign element into our churches which allow us some comfort. The active-ness of worship declines. Then even those comforts are not enough, and we pad the pews, and stop coming to church regularly. At the same time, our parish outreach becomes the food festival, and we disappear from the wider community save maybe twice year. By this point, we have lost the interconnectedness of worship and community.
Your community has the God-given blessing of going out, and getting lost, in order that you may find yourselves and each other, and the wider community of Dubuque and NE Iowa. In this age, we make the church building the prison of the Body of Christ. But Christ commands us to go out and make disciples of all nations. Maybe it is God’s will you lose the building, but gain a Church for Him.
In Christ,
Adam
Adam,
May the blessings of the Lord be with you!
Thank you for your kind words. I think you’re absolutely right…this may be our opportunity to “gain a Church for Him.”
It also reminds me of the way the prophet Isaiah looked at Israel’s exile; Israel was exiled by God so that they could be what they were meant to be: a light to the nations. “I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth” (Isaiah 49:6).