We go to church to bless (and are blessed)

The Legacy Christian Church, Clovis, California
We were sitting at the end of a row toward the back of the church (as we often do. On rare occasions we want to make unobtrusive escapes). A minute or two before the start of the service, a bearded man walking down the aisle turned to us and said, “Welcome, beloved! God bless you!” before continuing to the front of the church. We received many friendly greetings from people (Mindy said four different women greeted her after the service), but his welcome stood out , so I immediately jotted down what he said.

Mindy had seen the church’s Facebook event about commissioning their new building, and we noticed a sign for the church on our way home from shopping in Clovis. Google maps led us to a shopping center I’d never been to before (with a discount movie theater I’d never seen before. Wish I’d known about it earlier rather than days before moving out of the area.)

Immediately to our right as we entered the building, a notice board contained tags listing items the building still needed. They were clothespinned to the board so that people could take the tag if they wanted to give the item (among the items were acoustic panels and indoor plants). Directly across the lobby from the door, we couldn’t miss the “Vision 2020” mural with the church’s goals. The last one read, “NO LONGER MOBILE BUT MOBILIZED.” We would soon learn that when they launched Vision 2020 in January, they had no idea that just six months later that last goal would already be fulfilled.

Before the church even thought about moving, they had already made huge changes in the first couple months of the year. They launched the vision on January 7th. On January 14th they confirmed nine new board members when there had previously been three, and on February 4th they installed fourteen elders (again up from three). Expanding the leadership team allowed for shared labor and was intended to prevent burnout. The leadership hoped more people would also provide more ideas.

At the time, The Legacy was meeting in a school with offices in another location and worship service supplies in a storage unit. Every Sunday, staff loaded a trailer and hauled everything to the school where they had to set up and tear down everything every week. I’ve been part of churches that have this weekly ritual, and it can be wearing.

The church also adopted new bylaws on February 15th. In many churches the process of writing and passing those bad boys can take years in itself. Just three days after that, they heard about a building that might be available. By April 7th, they were in that new building.

That first Sunday, we heard, there was dust everywhere, but that was okay. They didn’t have to load up that trailer anymore. The trailer is parked in front of the church now, and it’s used for storage. As he recounted the events of the past six months, Pastor Andy White noted that churches usually move slowly, and a church making so many changes in six months is...Well, he used the word, “insane.”

Something else happened during the last six months. Pastor Andy and Pastor Ben Bertolero became part of the Clovis Pastors Cluster. The program for the commissioning service thanked a number of pastors from other churches, and some of those pastors attended the celebration.

Pat Biggs. the owner of the building being commissioned, attended the celebration as well. He’d previously rented the building to Encounter Church, which he attended, but when that congregation decided to merge with Valley Friends Church in Clovis, Pat needed another renter, and he hoped it would still be a church. He prayed for the congregation, blessing the building and the people who gathered there. He also noted that in spite of the transition from one church to another, he’d never missed a payment.

Pastor Andy admitted that we were there that night under false pretenses -- people were supposedly attending a building commissioning, but the church isn’t about the building at all. Andy said, “We’re pregnant.” (Certainly an attention-getting phrase.) “God is at work inside our body with a vision.”

He continued by saying that praying for a building was a little strange -- kind of like asking people over to announce you were getting a new van would be strange. But, he went on, if you’re getting a new van because you’re going to have a new baby, people would be excited and the invitation would make sense. The Legacy Church is excited about a new building because they were excited about God’s vision to reach people. The building will house the people.

As the service closed, everyone was invited to look around the building and to pray for the ministry the church will have there...and to have some cake in the fellowship room. So I walked around the church, in the meeting spaces and supply rooms and even the restrooms, and then I did go to the fellowship room for cake (I even helped take the cake out of the boxes).

Mindy had found a seat at a table, so I joined her there. Amy was also there with two of her children, and I asked when she first started attending the church. She said she came as a teenager when her neighbor invited her. After a few minutes, we realized that she has another connection to the church now: she’s married to Pastor Ben and they serve as the church’s care pastors. While we were talking, he came over, and I saw that he was the bearded man who’d greeted us before the service began.

We told him about our project of visiting churches and our year long trip, and about our book about the trip. Ben invited us to come to a Sunday morning service, but we told him we were moving out of the area within a week, so instead, he asked if he could pray for us. Ben and Amy put their hands on our shoulders and asked God to bless us as we traveled and looked for work, and Pastor Ben asked if he could pray for our van, since we’d be driving that as we moved. (After we left, I noticed the humor of this, following Pastor Andy’s remarks about the oddness of praying for a van.)

We walked out to the parking lot and showed Pastor Ben the bumper stickers on the minivan, and he laid hands on the hood and prayed. Our Dodge Caravan has over 223,000 miles on it, so his prayers were especially appreciated. We’ll be praying for The Legacy too, because as Pastor Andy said, “To say God has done a work in Legacy Church in the last six months is a gross understatement.” We’d have to agree.

We unexectedly go to two churches

Yosemite Valley Community Church and Our Lady of the Snows, Yosemite National Park, California

A guy was using the eagle on the top of the flag pole to move the “Love” banner from the front of the sanctuary to a wall off to the side. The banner covers the cross when the chapel isn’t being used as by Yosemite Valley Community Church -- when the chapel is used instead as a public building that’s part of Yosemite National Park. Since I John 4:8 says “God is love,” it seems to me that the banner can be used as a Christian religious symbol, too, but rules are rules…

We’d been looking forward to attending a service at Yosemite Valley Chapel for some time, but driving there takes a little over two hours. We were glad to find a time to visit. During the winter months, the church has only one Sunday morning service, but during the busy summer months, the chapel hosts two (at 9:15 & 11:00 am), the opposite of many churches, where attendance is low in the summer due to vacations (leading to those churches having one service in summer and two the rest of the year). The building is also a popular location for weddings. (We have friends who were married there, which is how Mindy first learned about the chapel. Hi Ken! Hi Michelle!)

We also looked forward to attending a service officiated by Pastor Brent Moore, but that wasn’t to be. His wife recently had surgery, so he had asked some of the ACMNP team (A Christian Ministry in the National Parks) serving in Yosemite Valley to lead worship. From Memorial Day through Labor Day, ACMNP sends college and seminary students to national parks where they work for the various concessionaires in the park during the week and lead worship services on Sundays. The ministry works in cooperation with the National Park system, but receives no government funding. Caroline from Tulsa, Garrett from Dallas, and Anthony from Dallas teamed to lead the music (a cappella), readings, and prayer.

Caroline's sermon was based on parts of 2 Chronicles 33. It was a Father’s Day message on the importance of setting a good example (using King Manasseh as a negative example and her own father as a positive example). Her father, a teacher, participated in the recent teacher’s walkout in Oklahoma, a two-week strike for an increase in educational funding. She assured us this was a necessary measure no teacher wanted, but set a positive example for students.

She noted that at times, all of us fail to act when we should. We don't stand up to bullies, we let racist or sexist remarks go by, we avoid homeless peoples' eyes. When we fail in these things, we fail to set a good example for those around us.

I was able to talk to Caroline after the service. She’s working toward a masters degree focusing on theological perspectives on environmental issues -- Yosemite would be a good place to contemplate such issues.

The service was brief, and as we left, we realized we had time to get to the 10:00 am Mass in the theater of the park’s Visitors' Center. It took some quick walking, but we made it.

There wasn’t a cross on the wall at Our Lady of the Snows (the room is primarily a theater, so there was a movie screen instead). A crucifix stood in the center of the front, with a table functioning as an altar and another table functioning as a lectern. Near the entrance, a larger table held paperback missals (a book with readings, songs, and other worship elements to guide worshipers through the Mass).

Father Matthew O’Donnell, a pastor from All Saints University Parish in Turlock, California, led the service. He was the official Yosemite chaplain for the week -- Our Lady of the Snows is the Catholic congregation of the Yosemite Valley but, as a mission congregation, it doesn’t have a full time priest. Priests are recruited to spend a week in one of the most beautiful places on earth while staying in the church’s rectory in the park. Father O’Donnell described it as a great gig that allows him to go on hikes and swim in the Merced River every day.

What he appreciated about being in Yosemite, he encouraged others to appreciate: the opportunity to allow God to touch their hearts through beauty. He encouraged people to leave their worries and trouble at home -- “they’ll still be there when you get back” -- and enjoy time with family and appreciate the wonders of God’s creation. He said the beauty around us is a way God says, “I’ve got this.”

Two of the Scripture readings for the day (not chosen by Father O’Donnell -- read in most Catholic churches that day), Ezekiel 17 and Psalm 92, spoke of the cedars. We thought about those cedars later as we hiked past trees in the park. Even Mark 4, the Gospel reading for the day (the parable of the seed growing) reminded us of the work of the Great Planter.

People often say, “I don’t go to church, I go out in nature to worship God.” Speaking for myself, I’d say appreciate God’s creation even more after time in church with His people, learning about Him in His Word. Have you ever appreciated a book more after you’ve learned about the author? It’s like that.

As a lover of books, I have to say Yosemite National Park is better than any book I’ve ever read. Well, better than any book except one.

We finally go to church on purpose

Pilgrim Armenian Congregational Church, Fresno, California
“Sorry to interrupt you,” Paula said. “You can take pictures of whatever you like.” I had been taking photos in the lobby at Pilgrim Armenian Church, and Paula wanted to introduce herself because she saw I was a visitor. I was happy to have photographic reassurance because plenty of people seem to think taking pictures in a sanctuary is the equivalent of making graven images to be worshiped. Or maybe stealing souls, I don’t know.

Instead of scolding us, Paula was one of many who made us welcome on our visit. It’s nice when we’re actually invited to a church; usually we find churches through internet sleuthing. We had intended to visit this church earlier, when we’d planned on doing a month of Armenian churches (Fresno has a large Armenian population). We’d been especially excited about visiting the church because we had visited the San Francisco church pastored by Nerses Balabanian in 2015. But Mindy got confused on her direction the one Sunday we’d tried to go, and we found ourselves at another Armenian church by mistake.

We’d still intended to visit Pilgrim, but our work schedules kept getting in the way. Mindy often had to be at work at Macy’s at 10:45 am, before Pilgrim’s worship service began. I was usually working hotel night audit starting from 11:00 pm Saturday to 7:00 am Sunday, and I had a hard time staying awake longer than the 8:00 am, at most a 9:00 am service. But as we were finishing up our jobs in anticipation of moving out of the Fresno area, we received an email for Pastor Balabanian’s wife, Sevan.

Sevan wrote that she had come across our blog. After twelve years at Calvary Armenian Congregational Church, they had come to Fresno just eight months ago. She invited us to visit their new church, and suddenly a visit to PACC shot up even higher on our priority list.

So on Sunday, we entered the sanctuary and sat as far back as we could (some of the back rows were roped off). We noticed teenagers wearing blue t-shirts, first almost a whole row of girls, then some boys sitting behind them. The organist played “What a Friend We Have in Jesus” using the chimes. Posted on the screen was the morning’s sermon title, “The Power of the Quiet Testimony.” We soon learned that Pastor Balabanian took quiet quite seriously.

As the organist finished playing, Pastor Balabanian stood before the congregation and gave a kindly reprimand. “I ask you to sit quietly and listen to the music. The organ prelude is not the time to fellowship, it is time to put things out of mind. Music is not for entertainment, but for worship.”

This subject has been an ongoing conversation for Mindy and me (but not in sanctuaries just before the worship services). Is it better for a church if people are silent and meditative prior to worship or is it better if there is lively conversation and laughter? We go back and forth on this, but Pastor Balabanian argued that fellowship, conversation, laughter, and hugs were all good things, but for another time and place on the property.

He then greeted the congregation with a joyous, “Good morning, I love you all!” People responded with return proclamations of love. “I always love to start with the Word of God,” he added, leading into a responsive reading from Psalm 39. (The Scripture was projected on the screen in English and Armenian, though only the English was read aloud. The same was true of the song lyrics.)

One of the worship songs was Amazing Grace sung to the tune of House of the Rising Sun. It brought back my days as a student and a leader in Young Life. After the service I thanked Kevin Kasper, the associate pastor and worship leader, for using it. He told me he’d appreciated a version of the song performed by the Blind Boys of Alabama, and one of the founding members of the group, Clarence Fountain, had died just days before. (Don’t quote me on this, but I’m pretty sure none of the Blind Boys are Armenian.)

We were happy to be there for a rather special day in the life of the church (though Pastor Balabanian said all Sundays are special). They were commissiong two missions teams. The teens we noticed in the blue t-shirts were leaving the next morning for Houston, Texas, where they’d be doing construction work. Later in the month, a team of adults would leave for Armenia.

The morning’s visitors included a group of women from Light-House Recovery Program, which aids women battling problems with addiction. During the sermon, Pastor Balabanian asked questions expecting a response from the congregation, and the women were frequent responders. People also introduced friends they’d invited to church, but we retained our anonymity.

The sermon was part of a series on I Thessalonians 4: 9 - 12 where Paul wrote, “aspire to live quietly.” Pastor Balabanian pointed out that this seems like an oxymoron to us, because we associate aspiration with grand things, not quiet. After all, “This is the United States of America, we are not silent!” Paul also wrote in this passage to “mind your own affairs,” which Pastor Balabanian said was not a natural thing for Armenians. Paul also wrote to “work with your own hands,” to use your gifts. Pastor Balabanian pointed out, “Whatever is given to you is not for you, but for you to give to others.”

At the conclusion of the service, Pastor Balabanian asked members to stay for the congregational meeting rather than go to the fellowship hall for refreshments. We decided to try to find Sevan, and when we did, she greeted us warmly and introduced us to her husband (who gave us both warm hugs). He needed to go to the meeting, so we went to the fellowship hall with Sevan.

We’ve learned to expect food at Armenian churches, and we were not disappointed. Though there wasn’t any traditional Armenian food (unless you count the sandwich rollups), we enjoyed apricots, watermelon, kettle corn, and two cakes -- one honoring the Texas missions team and the other honoring the Armenian missions team. We sat down at a table with a couple who had attended the church for years (even when services were conducted in Armenian, though they don’t speak the language.)

Armenians have a rich and vibrant tradition in the Fresno area, and Pilgrim Armenian Congregational Church is certainly a part of that tradition, but we were happy that this place celebrates Jesus more than their heritage.