(1) Hard times is when we sorely FEEL our need for God.
But in good times, too, the need is great but this is hard to feel.
(2) Cover illustration of the church bulletin is a pen-and-ink drawing of a New England clapboard church with a rising sun with prominent rays and a small group of silhouetted people moving toward the front doors. My mixed impression: Great Intentions and High Hopes, but very little follow-through or fulfilled actions when heading home again a few hours hence. In other words, words and music raise us up, but it is up to the individuals to provoke, invite, then encourage and support to make any results of those good intentions.
(3) The essence of Grace: Matthew chapter10 tells about "offering a cold cup of water" to a person.
Not premeditated, not calculated for self-glory, not a big expense of time or money or discomfort.
Substitute a kind word, a knowing smile or an understanding look in a person's eye for similar effect.
Fulfilling the teachings is a fluid and quenching thing like the Cup of Water; it's not Rule Conformity.
It is direct, personal and mindful; not impersonal and business-like, indirect or conceptual, or unthinking.
As such this expression of oneself into the path of another person is dialogic (not one-way communication) and includes the possibility or risk of oneself being changed as a result, too. It may work like a "peak experience," a formative moment, or function something like the temporary "imprinting" stage of hatchlings when they truly open their eyes for the first time and what they see before them becomes the most important thing to pay attention to. In sum, the image of offering a Cup of Water to a person embodies what Grace (karitas) is: Love for another person, expressed in a direct and personal way –nothing more, nothing less.
(4) Early worship service on week 1 and 2 numbered about 30 in the vast worship hall, but now in week 3 only a scant dozen spread themselves here and there among the church pews. As such it was impossible to "blend in" or proceed in praise "on autopilot." Worship with such small numbers made the whole undertaking more deliberate and fresh, maybe like the small numbers of Christians in venerable but mostly empty houses of worship in Western, Central and Eastern Europe; or in the house churches of China. In short the separation blurred between worship leaders "on stage" and those spectators respectfully sitting in quiet attention. With such small numbers the experience was personal and every voice was heard and every person was felt.
Thinking about a definition of a culture, the main elements go from the material environment to the social structures and manner of talking, as well as the intangible matters of style, ideals and mental categories or felt connections between things. In a word, culture is what shapes our lives. It defines what does and does not matter. To speak of Christian culture could mean the ideas, customary relationships and actions during the day, year and lives that are Christ-like. But as creatures of our historical horizon and national environment it is easy to blur what is American and what is modern life what is Christian. To be clear, though, some of the things we see and do and imagine as belonging to the Bible, the relationship to our Creator and Word Made Flesh are not exclusively Christian; there are values and customs that may overlap or intersect Christ's Ways. Filtering out our modernism and our Americanism gives a truer grasp of the things in our traditions that do belong to The Son of Man.
Nowadays: Are the teachings of Christ and the relationship to God background to we as protagonists living out the lifestory we have? Or instead is it God's Will that is the active force and we who are the background to that story; we who conform, react and respond to The Way in order to fit in its wake? To "be" a Christian under these circumstances involves filtering out the many distractions and glut of material wealth that floods our attention and stewardship instincts. Somehow individual persons become placeholders, 2-dimensional cardboard cutout tokens, or less urgent a call on our minds than bills, deadlines, paperwork, online hotlinks and voicemail messages.
Civil War aftermath (c1870-1890): Mass consumption and production of the industrial infrastructure and its connected markets. Perhaps the preoccupation of people professing and pursuing Christianity was, like today, divided between those concerned with the Show (looking proper and reproducing the outward appearance of A Christian Life) and those concerned with the Tell (disregarding outward appearances in favor of hearing God's Voice and Speaking His Will). In other words, there were Mainline Churches run like corporate bodies with officers, minutes and committees. But there were also searching souls alone or together who did not cleave to the Mainline Church routines and benchmarks. Lots of great hymns date from these days, as well. So the shared experience of worship under a roof or at a revival tent must have been powerful enough for the Vale of Tears then. To "be" a Christian under those circumstances would be a struggle between The Word powerfully brought to life by skillful speakers and the visual pomp of Polite Society that many took to be the mark of Respectability in God's eyes and in one's Neighbor's eyes.
Frontier times west of the Mississippi (c 1885-1920): Small habitations and so many uncertainties (hostile and aggravated Native Americans, distant federal services and fashions; weather and growing animals or plants for sale, multiple ailments and ways to meet early death) may have made families, strangers and individual souls feel less cultural padding or comfort to separate themselves from The Creator. To "be" a Christian under those circumstances must have involved a degree of "make do" resourcefulness; do it yourself Rites and readings, and so on.
