A New Worship Experience

Written by Rick Butler January 04, 2011

Growing up in St. Joseph, MO, a town of 75,000 in my day, there were lots of opportunities for good experiences.  It was a fairly conservative community—1950’s family values, emphasis on education and religion. Lots of parks and safe places for children and youth to play and roam.

One of the greatest gifts to me, one I have cherished year after year, was First Christian Church.  Location: Tenth and Faraon Streets—near downtown and across from the YMCA.

In this conservative community where literal interpretation of scripture was the norm and “accept and believe” was pretty much the way, FCC represented a faith tradition that encouraged questions, thinking, reflection.  I was taught and encouraged as much about living a faith relating to social justice as I was about believing certain things..

Sunday (01.09) at 5 PM BVCC launches a new worship experience.  It will be on the 2nd and 4th Sundays of the month. The words we’re using are Connect—With God, Others, Self.

It’s a new direction in worship.  It’s not a traditional nor a praise nor an emergent nor a contemporary service (though there may be elements of each of these).  It’s a service focused on God within rather than God “up there” or “out there.”  It’s a service working at providing a safe place for people to explore their spiritual journeys.  It’s a service in which some may identify themselves by traditional Christian terms while others identify themselves beyond or by new terms for faith.

I hope this new service with its new direction might be a gift 20, and 30, and 40 years from now.  I hope it might be a gift that keeps on giving.  I hope decades from now there might be former participants who say:  “You know, at a time when I did not know what I believed, when church did not meet my needs, there was this place that offered time to think and share and explore.  It took my faith and me quite seriously, and quite lovingly, too.