{"id":3051,"date":"2023-10-06T07:46:58","date_gmt":"2023-10-06T11:46:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=3051"},"modified":"2023-10-06T07:46:58","modified_gmt":"2023-10-06T11:46:58","slug":"reverence-and-relevance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2023\/10\/06\/reverence-and-relevance\/","title":{"rendered":"Reverence and Relevance"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast,\u00a0<\/em>click here<\/a>
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According to the traditional American sports calendar, this is baseball\u2019s big month.\u00a0
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Falling leaves and pumpkin patches have always been associated with the World Series.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
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\u201cBaseball, hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet,\u201d according to the automaker\u2019s famous commercial jingle, represent the heart of America \u2013 so seamlessly interwoven into our lives that baseball became known as the National Pastime.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t long ago that virtually every kid knew which teams were hot, which teams were not, and which stars were poised to make history in October.
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But that day has come and gone.\u00a0 Football, basketball, soccer, and lacrosse are now the \u201ccool\u201d sports at most schools.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
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Baseball\u2019s playoffs used to be a simple, dramatic World Series showdown between the respective champions of the American and National Leagues.\u00a0 Nowadays, each league generates six post-season contenders.\u00a0 Can you name all 12 of this year\u2019s playoff teams?\u00a0 Even for sports junkies, it\u2019s not easy.\u00a0
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Compared to a half century ago, baseball has faded from the national conversation.\u00a0
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My three sons are all sports fans, and they each played a variety of sports as they grew up.\u00a0 But they never became baseball fans.\u00a0
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OK, before you tear up my Dad Card, you should know that I tried really hard.\u00a0 \u201cWatch this,\u201d I would say as we fixed our eyes on a TV broadcast.\u00a0 \u201cThe pitcher is holding the runner on first base.\u00a0 He\u2019s thinking, \u2018I wonder if he\u2019s about to attempt a steal.\u2019\u00a0 The runner is thinking, \u201cI wonder if he\u2019s going into a long windup, which will give me time to go.\u2019\u00a0 The catcher is thinking, \u2018I\u2019ve got to be ready to throw down to second base.\u2019\u00a0 And the batter is thinking, \u2018If he throws me another fastball, I\u2019m going to poke it behind the runner into right field.\u2019\u00a0 All that\u2019s happening at the same time.\u00a0 Isn\u2019t that fascinating?\u201d
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\u201cNo, Dad,\u201d they would say.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s really boring. Everybody\u2019s thinking<\/em>, but nobody is doing anything!\u201d
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Apparently a lot of moms and dads had similar conversations with their kids.\u00a0 Younger generations have largely turned toward other kinds of sports entertainment \u2013 games that move more quickly.
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Baseball finally responded.\u00a0 Pitchers are now \u201con the clock,\u201d incurring penalties if they don\u2019t throw the next pitch soon enough.\u00a0 If a game should go to extra innings, each team begins with a runner on second base.\u00a0 These adaptations seem to be working.\u00a0 The average game is now almost 30 minutes shorter than previous years.\u00a0
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Will baseball win new fans, as well as win back some of those who drifted away?\u00a0 That remains to be seen.\u00a0
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In the meantime, some of the sport\u2019s faithful defenders are lamenting the changes.\u00a0 Pitchers no longer have to appear at the plate.\u00a0 Both leagues now mandate a designated hitter who doesn\u2019t have to take the field.\u00a0 What will happen next?\u00a0 Will baseball\u2019s overlords go too far and do something that will compromise the very soul of the game?\u00a0
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In a number of ways, church attendance has become a bit like baseball attendance.\u00a0
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Church used to be a \u201cgiven\u201d in American culture.\u00a0 The primacy of our cultural Christendom was such that Sunday was widely regarded as off-limits for shopping, drinking, and public sporting events.\u00a0 Religious affiliation was a cherished national pastime, and was central to workplace and neighbor-to-neighbor conversation.\u00a0
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But those days have faded from view.\u00a0 Worship attendance is now just one of many weekend options.\u00a0 Polls show that church involvement is in a long, slow slide.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
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From one perspective, this is a welcome development.\u00a0 Followers of Jesus have no entitlement to preferential religious treatment.\u00a0 Christians are called to influence our culture as salt and light, not to dominate it to the exclusion of other ways of thinking and living.
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All the same, church leaders are wondering how to respond.
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Some congregations are doubling down on their creeds, rituals, and traditions.\u00a0 There is evidence that younger generations are looking for something \u201colder than their grandparents,\u201d and are drawn to the Good News as revealed in the beauty of Catholic and Orthodox liturgy.\u00a0
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Other churches have chosen adaptation.\u00a0 They are endeavoring to become landing places for spiritual searchers, and are open to adjusting things like music style, sermon length, and even their brand of coffee to become more attractive.
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Brett McCracken, the senior editor and director of communications for The Gospel Coalition, notes that this strategy is marked by many challenges \u2013 including issues that go right to the heart of the Gospel.
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Western culture is still captive to the consumer revolution that exploded after World War II.\u00a0 This is the Age of Authenticity, says McCracken \u2013 a time when being spiritual means to accept what rings true to my deepest self.\u00a0 That means I\u2019m on the search for a congregation that really \u201cgets me,\u201d a place that will help me succeed in my personal quest to experience the best possible life.\u00a0
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And that\u2019s a problem.
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Those coming to worship may be thinking, \u201cI need this church to meet me where I am.\u201d\u00a0 But the church\u2019s essential mission is different.\u00a0 It\u2019s to help people meet Jesus where he<\/u> is<\/em>.\u00a0
\u00a0
The inherent flaw with the search for the perfect church is even more basic than that: I don\u2019t really know what I need<\/em>.\u00a0 I may have strong preferences about the kind of people I\u2019d like to meet, but in the Body of Christ there will always be men and women who will drive me crazy.\u00a0 And those people \u2013 the people of God\u2019s<\/em> choice \u2013 may turn out to be the very traveling companions I need more than anything else.
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No church will ever be perfectly tailored to my desires.\u00a0 If its preachers and leaders are faithful to God\u2019s Word, it won\u2019t be long before something they say bothers me.\u00a0 Or flat-out offends me.\u00a0 A faithful church\u2019s job, after all, is to call out the idols that are dominating my life, and to show me how I can find freedom.\u00a0
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There can be only one Lord.\u00a0 That will either be Jesus or my personal spiritual journey.\u00a0 A healthy church will call me to give up the latter in order to seek the former.
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And for some people, that will be seriously unpopular.\u00a0 As McCracken notes, \u201cChristian discipleship is not consumer-friendly.\u201d\u00a0
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The temptation for a church to make peace with consumer preferences by downplaying, or downright surrendering, its core identity will always be present.\u00a0 But as baseball diehards remind us, we must not \u201cchange the rules\u201d for potential \u201cfans\u201d to such a degree that we end up compromising the very soul of what we have to offer.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0
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It really comes down to this:\u00a0 Should the church be relevant<\/em> or reverent<\/em>?\u00a0 The good news is that we really don\u2019t have to make that choice.\u00a0
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That\u2019s because the most relevant thing a gathering of God\u2019s people can ever do is sustain a deep and uncompromising reverence for Christ.\u00a0
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Sure, that\u2019s easy to say, and it\u2019s no easy thing to live out.\u00a0
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But just resolving to make that our mission is nothing less than a grand slam.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast,\u00a0click here\u00a0According to the traditional American sports calendar, this is baseball\u2019s big month.\u00a0\u00a0Falling leaves and pumpkin patches have always been associated with the World Series.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cBaseball, hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet,\u201d according to the automaker\u2019s famous commercial jingle, represent the heart of America \u2013 so seamlessly interwoven into our lives that baseball became… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3052,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[642],"class_list":["post-3051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-relevance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3051"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3051\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3053,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3051\/revisions\/3053"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3052"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}