Great Frustrations... and some very little ones

It decided to rain like it was time to float the ark and Sunday morning was awash with wind driven and pouring storms -- so much so that gutters and catch basins were completely overwhelmed. On one wall of the Nave the wind had driven the water between the gutter and the roof and we had an unplanned water feature on the wall that holds the Stations of the Cross.  Some quick thinking folks took down the stations... Now, one more building issue to deal with...

Coordinating with the acolytes all the special items for the Easter services (Gospel procession, continuous distribution, Paschal Candle placement, etc.) was and always is a chore.  But, given all the limitations of their experience, they did very well and in nearly every case served with pious humility.  Perhaps we need to have more Gospel processions and the like just to make sure everyone gets what is going on...

I could say the same for the ushers who are not always sure what is going on but, generally speaking, have moved with the flow and caught on in time.  Every year I think we need more rehearsal and every year the time of Holy Week becomes too short to fit one more thing in... Oh, well, something for NEXT YEAR...

Our Cantor worked himself into a zombie between all the services, choir (singing Widor and Handel), rehearsing the brass, working with soloists, and still managing to shape each Easter hymn with diverse accompaniments that encouraged our voices to sing even more the praise of Him who died and now is alive.  I always regret that he has to work this hard (but, like me, it goes with the job/vocation).  I am so privileged to have him as a partner in this endeavor.

Now for the big frustrations...

I had several calls from Lutherans not from our immediate community.  They asked about service times and then, nervously, asked if we did anything unusual or, well, different on Easter.  Now here is the frustration.  On the one hand some said that they have been to Lutheran services on Easter and if you had not looked at your calendar, you would never know it was Easter by what took place in the Divine Service.  This is a problem.  The whole nature of the Church Year and the liturgical options is to provide a platform where the Divine Service and the Services of Holy Week are both peculiar to their day while at the same time sharing in common the structure of every Sunday liturgy.  Often it is just plain laziness on the part of the Pastor that he fails to note these options and these changes in rubric and form.  That is inexcusable.

The others were wondering something very different.  They wanted a liturgical service that was consistent with our Lutheran confession and identity and what they often got was pure strangeness and novelty for the sake of novelty.  Examples.  One family asked if I used visual aids?  What?  Well, it turns out that their Pastor had used a cooler full of fruit and a smoothie machine/blender in his Easter sermon a few years ago and ever since they had abandoned their own parish to visit a more, well, traditional one on Easter.  Another mentioned that they had come into the Nave on Easter only to find helium balloons tied to every pew end, to the chancel furniture, and streamers such as you might find at a Junior High dance.  Another mentioned how they had a "warm up" band that led "songs" for about 30 minutes, then a drama, another 15 minutes of music for the spectators, a Bible study (their term for what was the sermon), and a role play of how you might speak of the resurrection to someone who did not believe, and then they went home.  Now these happened in LCMS congregations.

Okay, so if you must do something weird, just don't do it on Easter or Christmas.  I know that there are the crowds you don't have at other Sundays but give some respect to the day and the message and think about those whom God has entrusted to your care.  They deserve more than cute or novelty -- they deserve the best liturgical practice and homiletical prowess a Pastor and the parish can muster.  It does not have to mimic a cathedral but it does need to be real and authentic to who we are as Lutheran Christians.  I just don't get the fascination with the cutsie stuff that some seem to love.  The more I listen, the more I hear people in the pew say they don't get it either.  We have a family moving to Wisconsin (job transfer) and one of the things they said they will look for is a home congregation in which the liturgy is honored, the Sacrament is weekly, and the sermon is passionately preached and faithful in its content.  As hard as it is for me to say this, that should be the minimum of all Lutheran Pastors and every Lutheran parish... but it is more the rarity than the norm.