A City Weekend

We had a “city weekend,” which included a play by Isabella Allende on Friday, a memorial service for a Dr. Vernon Grounds on Saturday, and an urban church on Sunday.  Up in the foothills where we live, the golden aspen leaves have mostly fallen, the mountains visible through our windows are freshly coated in white, and the bull elk rest quietly in meadows or under trees, exhausted by their annual ritual of sparring and mating.  Squirrels and chipmunks are storing up seed for the winter, and the birds have narrowed down to those species brave enough to endure a Colorado winter.  Three times this weekend we left all that behind and drove to the city.

I had met a pastor who told me about his church in Denver which holds to a strong evangelical theology but is “welcoming and affirming” of the gay community.  (I know that any time I mention this issue I open the floodgates to vitriolic responses from people who have way too much time to surf the Internet and post stern pronouncements on homosexuality.)  I deliberately avoid taking a firm position on most of the nuanced questions on homosexuality and the church for a couple of reasons: 1) It is a complex issue, not nearly as black-and-white as either side thinks, and 2) I believe our primary charge is to demonstrate God’s love, which is most difficult when a relationship is mainly characterized by heated argument.

Recently the novelist Anne Rice, outspoken about her conversion a few years ago, announced, “I quit being a Christian…I remain committed to Christ…but not to being ‘Christian’ or to being part of Christianity.  It’s simply impossible for me to ‘belong’ to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group.”  She mentioned Christians’ hatred of gay people as a major factor.

More sardonically, the gay activist Dan Savage said, “All gays and lesbians want from evangelical Christians is the same deal the Jews and the yoga instructors and the atheists and the divorced and the adulterers and the rich all get: full civil equality despite the going-to-hell business.  (And isn’t hell punishment enough?  Do we have to be persecuted on earth too?)”

I read both these quotes in a newsletter the very morning I attended the welcoming and affirming church.  I must say, it was a relief to read this church’s approach as printed in their bulletin:

Married, divorced or single here, it’s one family that mingles here.
Conservative or liberal here, we’ve all gotta give a little here.
Big or small here, there’s room for us all here.
Doubt or believe here, we all can receive here.
Gay or straight here, there’s no hate here.
Woman or man here, everyone can serve here.
Whatever your race here, for all of us grace here.
In imitation of the ridiculous love Almighty God has for each of us and all of us,
let us live and love without labels.

The service followed the format common in modern evangelical churches: praise songs led by a band onstage, a sermon, more singing, and communion.  During the singing, small children danced in the aisles before being ushered into another room for the children’s lesson.  The sermon, centering on the story of the widow who attracted Jesus’ praise by giving two small coins, “everything she had to live on,” was as rich, insightful, and eloquent as any I’ve heard in months.  Indeed, nothing struck me as notably different about this church unless I looked around and noticed the homosexual couples scattered through the congregation.  (That’s not quite true: the variety of hair styles, dress, tattoos, and piercings marked this as a distinctively urban church.)

My visit did little to resolve the questions I still have about evangelicals and homosexuality, but it did make me grateful for a church that courageously welcomes those who would feel judged or excluded from many other churches.

From there I went to a barbecue celebration of Metro CareRing, a nonprofit organization that provides food for Denver’s hungry.  The organizers had predicted a turnout of 300, but a cold, drizzly rain kept attendance down to less than half that.  A number of churches had sent representatives, and I agreed to say a few words and to give away signed books to anyone who gave a donation of any size.  The Denver Broncos were playing in another state, but it occurred to me that 60,000 screaming fans would gladly have paid to sit through miserable weather for three hours had they scheduled a home game that day.  Instead, a cause like hunger attracted a small group of churchgoers, idealistic college students, and street people who always seem to know where food is being served.

I learned an important principle by studying the motley collection of characters who populate the pages of the Bible: God uses the talent pool available.  In the sermon earlier that day, the guest preacher mentioned her initial discomfort with the story of the widow who gave all she had.  Why did Jesus simply praise her, as an object lesson contrasted to the rich people who proudly made large contributions?  Why didn’t he do something to address her state?  Her conclusion: “God leaves the justice issue up to us.”  I pondered that statement as I stood in the rain and watched a small crowd of volunteers unloading food donations while a soul sister belted out, “His eye is on the sparrow.”  For all its faults, the church still soldiers on; it is, after all, the talent pool available to do God’s work.

© 2010 by Philip Yancey