Dear God, I was listening to the Holy Post podcast this week, and they were talking about technology making it easier and more convenient for people in the church to break from community and choose to take in Christian content in isolation. Even podcasts like theirs are a threat for some people to decide to make the Holy Post hosts as their pastors without ever having to engage with them. They were discouraging this, of course, and encouraging people to encage in church community, and maybe even consider a smaller church as opposed to a larger one so that relationships, both the comfortable and the uncomfortable, might be formed.

All of this made me think about a quote I had heard someone say Eugene Peterson said once. It was something to the effect of, ” The best way to find a church is to go out your front door and walk to the closest one.” I went looking for that quote this morning, and I found this from a City Church in Baltimore, Maryland:

For years, I’ve enjoyed reading Eugene Peterson. Peterson is best known for his books and for The Message, a unique translation of the Bible into modern speech. What has fascinated me most about him is the fact that he was a pastor for one local church for 27 years. A 27-year tenure for a pastor in one church is a rare commitment in today’s culture.

Just the other day, I listened to a podcast called “On Being.” This particular episode featured a conversation between Krista Tippett and Eugene Peterson, “Entering What Is There”. By now, Peterson is in his late 80’s and attends a small, 80-member church in a rural town of Montana. He now has had ample time to look back on his pastoral career. Towards the end of the podcast he offers advice to those looking to pick a church.

PETERSON: Go to the closest church where you live and the smallest. After six months, if it isn’t working, go find the next smallest church.

TIPPET: What is it about small rather than big?

PETERSON: Because you have to deal with people as they are. You’ve got to learn how to love them when they are not loveable.

I’ve worked in three different size churches; small, medium, and large. Each has had its strengths and weaknesses, its beauty and its flaws.

I now pastor the smallest church I’ve ever been in. Certainly, we hope to grow in our number, influence, and depth. But there is something beautifully communal about small church. For better or worse, we know each other’s names, strengths, weaknesses, and idiosyncrasies.  We know well and are known well.

Our culture is one of isolation, independence, and anonymity. We deeply desire community, but are afraid to let people in. We play this tug-of-war with community in our hearts.

Maybe, a little small church is just what we need.

When my wife and I started attending the local Catholic church, one of my criticisms was that we could get in and out of mass without talking with anyone. There is no adult Sunday school so we couldn’t build community that way. Thankfully, within a couple of years, they started couples groups, and we joined one of the two inaugural groups. There are six other couples, and the age spread is just about perfect. When we started 11 years ago, the spread was from about 30 to 65. My wife and I were 43 at the time and right in the middle. I am grateful that 11 years later we are still a group with all of the original couples. We have seen each other through different difficult times. We’ve also celebrated great things like the births of children and grandchildren. We’ve annoyed each other. Hurt each other. Forgiven each other. Blessed each other. In some cases, we’ve even worked together for community projects to impact our neighbors. I think it’s been an imperative part of our church experience over this time. I don’t know where I would be getting this kind of community without it. In fact, it’s given me my best friend.

I substitute taught at a different church’s Sunday school class a week ago. That church is going through a difficult time over the ordination of LGBTQ+ people. The denomination approved it, and the local church’s members were in disagreement. When I walked into the class, which I have taught a few times before, I noticed that there were noticeably fewer people in the room. Maybe as much as 40% fewer. It was Mother’s Day and there were also college graduations happening which might have taken a few people out, but I couldn’t help but wonder how many had decided to go with the new church that one of the former associate pastors of the church started as a result. It made me sad. As I talked to them about Peter baptizing Cornelius in Acts 10 and then having to answer for it to the angry Jewish believers in Jerusalem in Acts 11, I found myself wishing that we could be humble enough to realize none of us have you completely figured out and that there will be things we disagree on (e.g. women teaching in the church, drinking alcohol, infant baptism, guitars and drums in church, etc.), but we are united in our worship of you.

Father, thank you for the small couples group you have led me to within the large structure of the Catholic church. Thank you for growing me and stretching me my limiting me and challenging me through this group. Thank you for the love I feel from this group. Thank you for caring for my wife and me over the trials and successes of the last 11 years through this group. Thank you for the friendships. Thank you for the anger and frustrations. Thank you for the forgiveness. Thank you that you have provided this “Ruth” to my “Naomi.”

I pray all of this in Jesus and with your Holy Spirit,

Amen