“For All The Saints...”
I stayed up too late last night. Perhaps not the kind of admission you were expecting from your priest in their weekly reflection. But it’s true. I stayed up well past my bed time, past midnight even, in a week where there is a lot going on and I could really use some rest.
Why? Baseball. The World Series.
Now, I could have gone to bed and watched highlights in the morning. I could have carved out time later when things slow down to watch the game in its entirety. I could have gotten up and read some of the fine prose put together by writers who have spent their lives telling the stories of America’s past time. But that wouldn’t have been the same.
And its not because the production is perfect. The announcers seem to always say the wrong thing, the production value leaves you frustrated when you want to see the replay they won’t show or miss the emotional reaction from the player.
But there is something about the collective emotion of thousands, millions of people engaging in the unexpected together. No one predicted an umpires call might swing the whole series, no one predicted that the batter who had barely hit all playoffs would come up with the clutch 2 run home run. And no one can really say when, but at some point the spirit moves and it stops being ‘just a game’ and starts being a moment, a spiritual encounter, a story you will tell your kids.
So I stayed up too late. And I’m glad I did.
Now Baseball might not be that thing for you. It might be another sport, or music, a concerto or a jazz quintet. It might be a book, a poetry reading. It might be a walk in the woods. These things aren’t always exceptional, sometimes they are just ordinary; but sometimes they become divine.
Church is like that. There is a desire right now to have every experience be a highly emotional, over charged moment. Everything needs to be highly curated and instagrammable. And some churches cater to this - creating a very emotional, exuberant (but extremely predictable) experience for those show up. But all that does is create a false sense of who God is and a false sense of who we are as a people.
God is not predictable. And Worshiping God is not always something that fits nicely in an Instagram post or greeting card. Worshiping God requires being in relationship with God. We say our prayers every day. We try and read scripture at least a few times a week. We come together on a Sunday to break bread, pray, study and commune with each other. It is a practice that gets better and richer with time.
The act of worshiping God is a lifetime spent practicing. Sometimes we yell at God - like I yelled at the TV when the umpire made that call. Sometimes we thank God - like when Strasburg struck out Altuve with runners on. Sometimes we rise up in righteous anger - like when Dave Martinez got ejected for arguing with the Umpires. And sometimes we shout out in joy - like I did when Rendon hit that ball out of the park.
But we only do these things; We only know to do these things; We only feel comfortable doing these things; if we are in real relationship with God. If we have practiced. And the joy of practicing is that when a big day comes, like the World Series, or All Saints Sunday, we are ready for the moment.
All Saints Day, November 1st, is a day when the Church celebrates all the saints who have come before us in the faith, those who have inspired us personally and who have collectively lifted up the Church in times of trial and in moments of joy. This is a GREAT day for the church, and a moment of joy for those who have been ‘practicing’ for some time.
But is also a moment of great evangelism. Because it is Church at its best. We all come a little more attuned to Jesus’ presence and newcomers can feel that excitement, they can sense the tension as the atoms in the old walls start to shake with the memory of our forebearers and with the anticipation of what is to come.
So join us this Sunday. Stay too long. Forget the other things. Ruin your plans. And come practice worshiping God. Remember the Saints who have come before you and remember that God does indeed want you to be one too.