Yesterday was one of those "pastoral duty" experiences. It was my turn to lead the afternoon worship experience at a local assisted living facility. If my tone here is less than pastoral, let me hasten to reassure that my negativity implies no denigration of the residents there, nor on the service the management of the facility provides. I deeply revere the residents in this and other care centers, and by my observation they are, at least in this particular facility, well cared for.
It's just that worship there is – and I mean this with all pastoral sensitivity – a little slice of Hell. For one thing, the location for the weekly services has been itinerant over the past few years. Once held in a lounge area removed from everyday traffic, that space was transformed into a dining room and worship was relocated to the "activity room" – read: TV room. Housed there, the worship leader's first order of business was to negotiate a temporary black out with the residents who were ensconced in front of the giant screen watching a Lawrence Welk rerun. Assuming success in that bit of diplomacy, the service could proceed with only occasional interruptions.
But now, alas, that space has morphed into the therapy room, so "worship" has moved to a "dining room", which in reality is a wide space in a hallway where tables are pushed aside to temporarily accommodate the chairs and wheelchairs of worshippers. But life, in that hallway/dining room, does not pause. Visitors and staff alike must make their way through on their way to the elevator or other parts of the building; carts are routinely and clatteringly pushed through the area with food or water or medicines onboard; and of course there are preparations for the evening meal. In the midst of the Pastoral Prayer – I'm not making this up; my source is my wife who first heard the screaching marker and then opened her eyes to identify the distraction – a staff member came in and wrote out the evening's dinner menu on the whiteboard located just beside the communion table.
"Worship" (and I use the term charitably) is clearly an afterthought here – an obligatory social activity to list among the residential amenities, but hardly an experience respected or dignified with any deference. But there is, I suppose, some benefit to those who attend. While they may not experience anything remotely reverential, they at least get to be the first to learn what's for dinner.
3 comments:
Remember that what to you may seem a terrible place to deliver a message may turn out to be a profound place to receive a message. Maybe to be received by a resident, or maybe even by a staff worker, pushing a cart of clanging bedpans past as you read John 3:16.
I know that the people who delivered most of my life changing faith lessons had no idea how profound their words were to me at that particular moment.
Is it possible that with a divine sense of humor, God has put you in a Hell on Earth to for the purpose of enhancing the faith of another individual, and you will never know when it takes place?
I was there. Every week to push aside tables and set up chairs, to prepare communion, start some music while residents wander in, many come 30-45 minutes early. They help get the hymnbooks out making sure that everyone has one. They wait (as life in a nursing facility is--just waiting) with expectation and joy knowing that their churches care about them enough to come. And they can say "that's my pastor, my church". And when you offer special music and fine messages, the residents can forget the noise in the hallway, the carts, the institution for those few moments.
You see, these people are all once loved and once active church members. They share stories about the things they used to do to help in their churches. And when you come, Tim, they don't hear the squeeking marker or the carts in the hall because they are "in church" receiving the hope and love of God by your willingness to come and share, to bring your gifts and members of your church. These residents are nearing the ends of their lives and you remind them of God's love, presence, promise, hope, joy, escape from their now institutionalized lives, and more.
Remember, you aren't coming "into hell", but to the gateway to heaven.
Thank you for those gifts.
Chap. Linda
Your two comments offer a much better perspective than my own. Thanks for offering a very different, more helpful view.
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