Let me say it this way...
Elementary school was great, for me, but I can hardly remember the details. It's like the TV shows I grew up watching during the late 70's...Romper Room, Captain Kangaroo and Night Stalker (yes, I saw one episode as a child and it freaked me out). Each show had main characters that I can recall but not the minor characters (I remember my teachers names from elementary school but not many students) and each show had a plot/point (we learned stuff in class but I can't remember a single lesson plan). I wasn't connected to these shows because I was too young to remember them thoroughly....
But, shows from the early 80's, when I was Middle School age....I remember everything about my favorites. Magnum PI for instance; I remember the red Ferrari, Higgins (the wealthy landlord), the Doberman pinchers that hated Magnum, TC, (Magnum's best friend) who flew a helicopter. I clearly recall the A-Team! Hannibal was the cigar smoking leader, who came up with most of the plans. Face, the the imposter who could play any role and got all the pretty ladies. Murdoch was the crazy pilot they had to break out of the looney house at the beginning of every episode. BA was the grunt, warrior who hated everyone and hated flying even more!
I could go on and on (Miami Vice, Matt Houston, Fantasy Island and World Championship Wrestling on TBS every Sunday evening, right after Jacque Cousteau). I say all of this to build my idea; there are some moments in life that leave an imprint on our hearts and some things we vaguely remember.
As I was walking the Middle School hallways during the parent walk around, I was instantly taken back to roaming the halls as a Middle School student myself. In Middle school, the one thing that most kids coveted to escape the boredom of learning was the "hall pass." This was every students "get out of jail free" card on the board game of Middle School. The destination usually resulted in a bathroom trip but that wasn't the only place to go! The hall pass was liberating. It came with power and mystery. How far could you go into the other areas of the school? How long would it take to make the rounds of your friends classes before it seemed you were gone too long?
I remember, by high school, the teachers were on to the tricks of the hall pass shenannigans and they had employed some rather slick tactics to cut down on the amount of freedom the hall pass gave a student. The best one I can remember, a teacher used the massive, classroom globe as a hall pass to prevent students from roaming. I can read your mind, "just ditch the globe and come back to claim
It before you entered class..." That had been tested and proven to not work so well...considering every time it was ditched, an encounter with the assistant principle was moments away.
When I entered college, I was impressed with the amount of responsibility placed on each student to get to class, on their own. I learned the consequences the hard way in my freshman year, with my first 8am class. The freedom to not have to go to class was thrilling and exciting! It felt great to make my own decisions about whether sleeping in was more important than attending a class...until I received a letter in my student inbox on campus that warned, "another absence from "introduction to Christian Education" would result in automatic failure." I was shocked, I was determined to give it my all, I failed!
But something happened my junior year of college that sticks with me to this day. The professor of my Creative Bible Teaching class was a very friendly and hands on teacher. All of the students loved him because he didn't believe in tests, rarely took roll, greeted everyone at the door with a hug or handshake and believed in class participation. He made the learning experience fun!
I had slept in on a Wednesday morning and felt just awful about missing his class. I worked up a good excuse, for 2 days, for when I saw him Friday, he would see how truly sorry I was for missing. When I approached the building and saw him standing at the door, I felt a swarm of butterflies multiplying in my stomach. I walked slowly to class, trying to word my excuse just right. I tried to walk in with another student, hoping to slide to the side and avoid eye to eye contact and a greeting, but he saw me...looked right into my eyes and said, "missed you on Wednesday." I immediately jumped into excuse mode, "sorry professor, I was up all night studying for an oral exam, baseball practice went late and I didn't get a chance to study until late, then I woke up a little late with the intent to come and I cut myself shaving....." And as I babbled on, he put his hand out, placed it on my shoulder and said, "I didn't ask you what you were doing and why you missed. I just wanted you to know that you were sincerely missed." ((((Pause))))....."thanks professor," I said, In embarrassment. I could have been picked up off of the floor with a doggy pooper scooper because that is how I felt!
You see, many of us treat church and church attendance on Sundays as a classroom setting...having to be there, begrudging every moment of it while looking for ways to escape and find freedom. We also use Monday through Saturday as our hall pass, the freedom to roam about as we wish, having it all planned out, just right, before we have to go back to class.
When someone actually gets up the nerve to say to us, "missed ya," as we try to sneak in unnoticed, excuses abound!
Can you relate? Have you ever felt that way in church? Is that your experience? If so, we have a Savior who doesn't need to hear our excuses, He knows what we were up to any way. Sometimes we don't approach the doors of church because of the fear of judgement and chastisement....and rightly so. They don't work to create a genuine experience with the living God. What does work? Love and kindness! Both of these create an acceptable conviction that speaks to the soul and the heart.
Romans 2:4 says that it is "Gods kindness, that leads us to repentance."
We are responsible for ourselves in getting to church...no one else is responsible for that. It's up to us, and we don't have to go. It's our decision to stay away, sleep in and create excuse after excuse as to why weren't there. If you are afraid of what someone may say to you, you may be at the wrong church! You need to be in a body of believers, a community of Gospel living followers who will look at you, when excuses fly out of the mouth, place their hand on your shoulder and say, "no excuses needed, just wanted you to know you were missed."
Do you have that?
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