All Fired Up

Thanks for all your comments on Profile Change; they were very helpful. My logic for posting the following is that it happened in front of a lot of people. I mean, you can't really "go public" with something that happened in public, can you?

I've posted before that I lead worship for one of my church's services. It's a small service. Only about 30 of our 100 members attend and although we call ourselves contemporary, we're not. We're more of a traditional service with electronic media and a couple of praise songs thrown in the middle, but we do our best.

In our sanctuary we have two candles on the altar on either side of the cross. That's not unusual - you'll find that setup in most Christian churches in the U.S. In our tradition, we light the candles to symbolize the presence of the Holy Spirit- a living, active God present with us here on Earth. Important note: we don't think God's presence depends on the candles or anything, it's just a symbol. It's one I really like though, because I like a visual reminder that God is with us. I gotta be honest, if God just shoved us out onto the path alone I probably couldn't do this Christian thing, not even in the hit-and-miss fashion I manage now.

At the later service, the acolytes "bring in the light" wearing white robes and carrying these long goldish, lighter thingies with wicks. (They have some fancy name, but I don't know it.) At the end of the service, they also carry the light out, symbolizing our duty to carry God's light out into the world.

We're less formal at the earlier service, so the ushers do it. They've been forgetting lately, and two Sundays ago I had some time before the service started. I noticed the candles weren't lit, so I lit them, and made a joke to the pianist. I smiled and said, "I've figured out exactly how Methodist I am... I'm just Methodist enough that it bugs me when the candles aren't lit." We had a little laugh and got on with worship.

Sermon time came around, and the pastor listed all the things we turn into idols and worship instead of God. Then he said, "For instance, we don't worship candles, we worship a living, moving God." Then he really layed into the whole candle thing. He told a story about how the Holy Spirit is producing signs and wonders in Africa, and the African people don't worry about things like candles. They don't have a beautiful building like we do, but they worship with more joy than most of us Americans can muster.

Since I lead the hymns and liturgies, I sit facing the congregation. Unfortunately, when I get really really mad, I cry. I couldn't stop tears from sliding down my face. The whole time. I tried to spin it as spiritual, but it was pure anger. He mentioned lighting the candles two more times. He seemed to be circling around and tying all the points of his sermon together with those blasted candles. When we missed a scripture and he went back to it, he turned to me and said, "That's how Methodist we are." Nice.

At the end, I got up and led the closing hymn that he chose. When the last two words of it were "eternal flame" he felt compelled to speak again before the benediction to remind us that we don't worship an eternal flame, we worship a living God. I guess he couldn't have the centuries-old hymn of the church giving me any comfort.

The funny thing is, that whole "living God" thing - it's the whole reason the candles mean something to me. It's a reminder of exactly that! I don't think that God is absent when the candles aren't lit anymore than I think I'm not married when leave my ring at home because I took it off to knead the biscuit dough. It's just a symbol of something that's always true.

I admit, lighting or not lighting candles is a pretty insignificant thing to argue about. Ironically, I totally agree with the point of his message. However, there were kinder ways to convey that message than throwing me under the theological bus in a setting where I couldn't comment.

Bottom line: I like to worship differently than he does. That does NOT automatically make my worship style wrong.