WWJDWTC Week 3...uh...4?

So the 30 day WWJDWTC challenge is coming to a close in a few days, except for me.

• Week 1 I was too sick to participate.
• Week 2 I did what I was supposed to do
• Week 3 I was out of town at Off the Map and didn't even post (although on some levels my trip to OTM was pertinent to this exercise...it didn't quite qualify)
• Week 4 (today) I'm being good again

So I'm at week 4 which is really week 3 which is really week 2. Got it? Good.

Today, I went to The Bridge again...last time I was there, several people went out of their way to apologize and tell me it wasn't a "normal" Sunday...today it was what I suppose is considered to be a "normal" Sunday at The Bridge, in which there isn't much normal about it and you never know what is going to happen next. It's kind of like being at a circus. Or in a bar. Or at an AA meeting. It's a place where f-bombs are dropped and smoke breaks are taken, where O'Douls is given as a prize; where Bob and Larry are the butt of jokes. It is a place where those without tattoos, dreadlocks, pink, red, green or blue hair, or unconventional piercings are in the strong minority.

It's called 'being real', folks, and it's some killer crazy fun.

I have to qualify that statement with this paragraph:

There is still powerful "Worship" at The Bridge. There is still "sound teaching" at The Bridge, and there are still highly educated and qualified Pastors at The Bridge. This isn't a free-for-all. The observations I choose to share are anecdotal and serve to make a point, not meant to personify what The Bridge or it's heart is all about. I feel very strongly in the importance of sharing how different, and therefore safe for the misfit like me, this place is. But their heart isn't about being "different" as a purpose or an end, and I absolutely don't want to define it as a place that says "Look how cool and relevant we are". The Bridge, to the best of my understanding, is about loving on anyone who comes through the doors, and ministering to people in any way they can...regardless of who they are, how they look, how they live, or where they do/don't live.

But it is a place that IS different. For one thing, when I was explaining the phenomenon that is The Bridge to my husband, he said, "Well, it sounds good, but I'm not sure I like that the f-bomb is considered to be acceptable church language". I have an important point about that.

When I was involved in my CLB and all the trappings thereof, one thing which was stressed, emphasized, time and time again, was the idea of "being real". The fact is, being real in many church environments is a myth, elusive and invisible...at least in my experience.

We would go to church and pretend we were better than we are. We would plunk our asses in a seat on Sunday morning (or Saturday night), put on our church lady and sing praises to the Lord. The rest of the week we'd cuss, scream at our kids, and gamble, drink, use meth, or partake of pornography. Then on Sunday again, we'd hear a sermon about how important it was to be real, as we sat prim-and-proper in our seats, hearing a proper sermon and singing proper worship songs.

At some point we'd have a small group where we would all still pretend, just a little less deeply, that we were all OK and didn't really struggle with anything serious. We'd share that we overspent the budget, forgot to tithe, or maybe, just maybe, we would share that we fought with our spouse. The problem with this model is when the day would inevitably come where someone would take the call to "be real" to heart, judgement would be so thick you could cut it with a knife. So we were only real to a limited extent. We thrived in the lies and half-truths; the environment where you're only OK until you are not OK.

Why pretend to be something that you're not when you're in Church? Where the hell did that model come from? I would rather be in a church where no one had any illusions about anyone else and we were all comfortable in our broken humanity. Being honest about their imperfections doesn't make The Bridge a perfect church. Instead, they are a place full of perfectly wounded, abused, addicted or formerly addicted, spiritual and/or societal misfits...of which I am one and I fit right in.

I would rather hear one sermon that has the word 'fuck' in it...and not just for effect or to make a point, but simply as natural language...and sing one worship song that says "We don't know how to be sober" (as I did today), than spend the rest of my life in a church where standards are unrealistic and people are false.