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Worship is a vital part of the church’s body system

Amy Roon, who is on the ministry team at University Congregational UCC in Seattle, reminded that all body parts are parts of the body—eyes, ears, hands.  If the whole body were an eye, it could not hear.  God has arranged the members.  There are many members in the body.  Some have greater honor and some inferior, but all are part of the body of Christ.

Amy Roon, who serves at University Congregational UCC in Seattle, preached during the revival worship.

Speaking about an inferior part, she said that seven years ago she lost her mother to metastatic colon cancer.  During her mother’s illness, Amy learned about that vital part of the body, vital in “our plumbing,” she said.

“I learned the hard way it was something more than a basic function and that we know less about the gut than the brain,” she said.

Why did her mother eat and nothing happened.  Things came in and couldn’t go out.

Then Amy learned the cancer spread to the perineum, the sac that keeps the intestine from falling down the left leg.

This container is part of the living organism. Nothing is superfluous, she said.

“The container, in a subtle way, gives cues to make all in the body do what it is supposed to do to keep you alive,” she said. She likened the body systems to worship.

“Andrew is passionate about worship.  He thinks it is one thing.  I think it is something else.  As a church community does worship, it may find some elements weaker,” she said. 

“We put a sign out that gives the worship time.  We do the welcome, call to worship, songs and pass the peace.  We argue about chairs or pews, hymnals, lighting and plumbing.

“We can do worship and church in ways so we forget it is a vital part a vital organ to who we are as Christians and whether our mission is alive for the next generation.  We can do that only if what happens is more than plumbing. 

We may argue about the parts, but we know worship is wondrous.  We only begin to understand how it works,” Amy said.  “We come to church for any number of reasons and stay because we made friends.

“It’s about our thoughts, words, theology and music passing from one generation to another. Members have made a friend in Jesus and in one another. We make friends and those friends are the basis of our commitment to what becomes our church family.”

No one talks about it being a miracle to have 45 members in a church, but Jesus had 12 really good friends. 

“This is a lonely time.  We have a lot in common with Jesus’ time.  Jesus walked, talked and made good friends. The friends were transformed by friendship,” she said.

After Jesus was gone, she continued, the group of friends carried on. 

“I am transformed because of those who have been in the church, who did not know me, but welcomed me and saw me as a child of God,” Amy said. “I see in the mirror in the eyes who I am and could be. Friends are our mirrors.  They tell the truth.  They reflect back love.”

Amy called for church members to do that for each other, to be transformed by friends in Christ so that “we are the living church,” said Amy, who earned an MDiv at Pacific School of Religion in 2002.  She has also served as associate pastor at United Churches of Olympia and interim at Lummi Island Congregational.  She earned a bachelor’s degree in vocal music in 1996 at Oberlin College.

 

Pacific NW UCC News - Copyright © Summer 2019

 

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