Deviled tortillas...

I snuck into the Maundy Thursday service tonight at church.  Well, I went early so that I could get a handicapped parking space and then tucked myself into the corner of the back pew and set to reading my harmony of the Gospels.  Is it wrong to read in church?

Last week, I asked my pastor if he would explain the services to me.  Mostly, I figured that I would learn about them later, but he took the time to write a very concise, but rather comprehensive overview of what the four services of Easter are.  Or should I say Holy Week?  But that wouldn't include last Sunday, which I did not ask about.  Honestly, I could easily turn his email into a nice little brochure for those, like me, who are so very unfamiliar with the Church calendar and its whys and wherefores.

I also asked for him to pick a service for me—not Easter—to attend.  He suggested the vigil.  And I had planned on going.  Really, up until about 6:24 PM today, I was going on Saturday night.  But I kept thinking about how distressed I am about spiritual things, how confused, and something my pastor wrote me.

You see, I just don't understand how it is that I can crave and long to have the Living Word read to me, fill my ears and  yet be evermore certain about my lack of faith.  Talk about Jesus, and I am there.  Start speaking about how faith looks to, faith trusts, faith believes ... and I become awash in terror.  Where is the faith in my life that looks to, trusts, believes???

My pastor wrote that I should come because a desire to hear the Living Word is faith, even if it is at constant war with unbelief within me.  Am I crazy that reading there is a war within me was comforting?

I still was only going on Saturday, because he has not steered me wrong.  Yet there I was, sitting in the pew.

The service was not one of the five settings.  It started with corporate absolution, one I've not seen before.  There is this long bit that my other pastor changed up some.  That made following what was being said hard, since I did not have a text, but I did note that the changes he made were more Gospel-y.  Then there were the readings.  I felt like a dolt for not bringing my bible, having just the harmony with me because, for once, the readings were not in the bulletin.  There are pew bibles, but I find turing the pages in them near impossible.  So, I tried to do one of the fluency exercises that I used to use on reading remediation clients, echo reading.  As the pastor read, I echoed his words.  I got lost several times, but I tried.  Then a hymn I didn't know.  Then the sermon.

The sermon was about the Lord's Supper in a way I have never heard.  The pastor who is teaching  me was preaching.  I had my notepad ready and wrote down several rather interesting and, to me, astounding things.  But then the last two things he said about the Lord's Supper just terrified me and left me awash with deep, deep, deep sorrow.  Hot tears ran down my face.  Dare I say it felt like my soul was weeping.

One thing that weighed heavily on my mind were all the folk I watched walk into the church.  So many people.  So many people who equally need the care of our pastors.  Before the service started, after a while, I stopped reading and just watched.  Watched and prayed, wondering about them.  Going to the Monday evening services, I do not know anyone at the church.  I have no clear idea of how many people are regular members ... or strays like me.

And then ... at the end of the sermon ... I just ... well, I felt overwhelmed thinking that trying to learn that which so confuses me is not time best served by an undershepherd(s) with such a great flock.  And I felt ... devastated, maybe ... defeated ... or perhaps just plain exhausted by hearing that, really, I am back to square one on the Lord's Supper.

I was so caught off guard.
I came home and sat in the closet with Amos.
Later, I made deviled eggs and beefed up my stock of flour tortillas.

There really are no words for what I heard or what I think or what I feel.  Who would have thought that going to church would change the true color of the sky?

I got a package today.
I should learn to not open boxes that show up on my porch.


Lord, have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.