"Sorry Pastor, we're out of pie."
"Pastor, the toilet is clogged."
"Look at this incision for my hernia surgery."
"I'm sorry I haven't been to church for a long time."
"My kid doesn't go to church, but she is really nice."
I have my reasons for cringing at all of them and most of the time I'm happy to speak up or make gagging sounds. It's the last one that I've never figured out the right way to respond.
I see absolutely no correlation between being nice and going to church. The super nice people are the ones I trust the least in church. I always imagine they're hiding bodies in their freezers and the niceness is just a facade so I don't go looking in their freezers.
Sometimes I think about telling people there are actually lots of assholes in church so if she really is nice she might want to stay away.
Church isn't about becoming better people; it's about becoming people who live in community.
Church has something to do with figuring out how to live as the body of Christ so we need all kinds. We are one body and the goal is not to achieve niceness, but some sense of real community:
- knowing each other in our messes and gifts
- confessing when we've hurt others
- forgiving what stands in the way of relationship
- being honest about our limits and gifts
- taking risks
- offering hospitality and compassion
- having boundaries
- laughing and crying together
- opening our tables
- taking turns unclogging toilets and taking out the trash
Maybe I just don't want my faith to be about niceness because I find my nice moments to be my least authentic and often the ones that stir some resentment. They are the moments when I put on a mask and create some distance.
Maybe it's because being nice makes me feel a bit like a doormat where I forget to be alive and try to always care and tend for others.
I had a long list of "shoulds" today. I suppose that's different than being nice but they are wound up together in my mind. I've learned that I cannot be compassionate and loving if I don't take at least four to five hours and wander the woods on my day off. It's hard to check out for that big of a chunk of time, but I have to.
Today I got to experience a beautiful day and place with one of my good friends. We got to be the church knowing, confessing, and laughing. It was a kingdom moment and I might have missed it because I was thinking about what I should do.
You can tell me your kid doesn't go to church, but please follow up by telling me where they or you find meaningful community, where do they find places to be themselves confessing and forgiving, loving and being loved? I'm not sure it always happens in our churches, but if it's not happening anywhere in your life then I don't care how nice you are, it sure sounds like hell to me.
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