sunsets...

I had to do it.

Florida in November, for a Michigander, means you must go to the beach. Despite the fact that I’m directionally challenged, I managed to find the beach and catch the tail end of a Gulf sunset.

I made it, barely. But in enough time to role my cords up and walk in the water. It felt great and I called Jen so we could share the sunset together. I took these shots and then tried to enhance them. I have no clue what I did, but I thought they looked cool.

So what’s so great about sunsets? How come we never tire of them? Maybe sunsets mark the end of a day and our hope for the next. They go out with glory and something inside us hopes for the next one. It’s as if internally, we’re saying, “Do it again!” Note to self: “Spend more time marveling sunsets. Seek them out.”

When I wasn’t training, I had some extra time on so I went to Barnes and Noble’s. There’s nothing like picking up a random book and starting to read it. I stumbled upon one by TS Eliot. I learned that, upon his death, a commemorative plaque was placed on a church wall bearing his chosen epitaph (his ashes were sprinkled somewhere else). --lines from Four Quartets:

"In my beginning is my end. In my end is my beginning."

Sunsets and TS Eliot brought to life an observation I made at the church I was at this weekend. The majority of volunteers serving this youth ministry were over 65 years old. Someone might say, “That’s nice, gives them something to do. etc. etc..” But that’s hardly the point… not even close. This older generation was serving a younger generation… with joy, with pride, with hope.

It was a beautiful but sadly, a rare picture for me.

In a sub-culture called the church, I find that much of the environment focuses on turf wars over power, preference, and one’s own fulfillment. I suppose we can point fingers somewhere, but I fear that the fingers point back to our own self-perpetuating dysfunction in the church. It seems we have communicated (in word and action) a message at says that people can outsource their spiritual needs to the local church and the institutional, American church has been willing to be a one-stop hub, inviting people to get what they need, when they need it.

It’s not surprising, that when a local church community changes, many in that community feel that it “isn’t their church anymore.” The problem with this thinking is that it was never “their church” to start with. The church exists ultimately for others, not ourselves. She exists to serve the world through humility and love. And she is fueled by the hope God gives that, by God’s Spirit, we might participate in the healing and restoring of our broken and hurting world.

But generational trenches are dug deep. Some stake their claim in a church and fight to keep things the “right” way. They use theological arguments to promote what seem more like personal preferences and so, in the end, we end up having a church hosting a “community” of strangers that looks more like a mini-mall filled with specialty shops. The faithful are “under the same roof,” but nobody enters anyone else’s space.

And then I see these seniors serving the youth group with great gusto. I really believed that they thought it was THIER youth group. Imagine that.

And I thought of sunsets.

I thought of how each of us will spend the sunsets of our lives… either doing everything we can to prolong our view of how things “ought to be” or to go out in glory cheering on others, excited for the next day and the next generation.

The American church’s dysfunctional cycle will only be broken when an older generation serves the younger and a new, healthy rhythm begins.

I realized that I saw many, many “sunsets” this weekend. And they were beautiful…