Tag: Revolution UMC

For everyone who has been a part of the Revolution community, whether it was for a few months or for decades, I am so very grateful for you.

I have been thinking a lot this week about all the people who had already planted and shaped Revolution before my family ever arrived, some of whose names I know but I’ve never met.

And I’ve been thinking a lot about Westport United Methodist Church, out of and into whom Revolution was born. The many contributions by its generations of members remind me that the story of this faith community lives on.

All of us, across nearly two centuries, in our own imperfect, flawed ways, did our best to show up for our community, to seek God in all the places that God can be found, and to love our neighbor as ourselves. Nobody could have asked more than that.

I hope that wherever your path leads you next, you find people and places and rhythms that bring you healing, help you love your neighbor, spark your creative imagination, and provide you with deep, soul-restoring rest.

I hope you know that I am cheering you on and rooting for you to be able to bring the best of Revolution—the people and inclusivity and curiosity—forward with you. I hope that the hard parts of Revolution’s journey help you to grow in empathy and strengthen your ability to advocate for yourself and others.

I hope that we see each other soon and often. But even if we don’t, I hope you know I’ll always be happy to reconnect with you, even if it’s been months or years. I’ll never think it’s weird or that it’s been too long. I want to hear about your new church, your new job, and the new book you are reading. I would be equally honored to be trusted with your prayer requests and to be trusted with your questions and doubts.

I hope that you know that you are made in the Image of God, and that you are enough, just as you are. More than anything I hope that you know that you are so very, very loved.

The fact that something ends (a church, a relationship, a business, a life) is never an indication that what once existed wasn’t beautiful and valuable.

Like my husband acknowledged in his prayer yesterday, we know that due to our collective humanity it’s not possible for a church community to always be at its best. As in every community, there were mistakes and harm, misunderstandings and disappointments, and plenty of pride and short-sightedness to go around. But in those moments when Revolution *was* at its best we cultivated a lot that was life-giving, authentic, and good.

We fed hungry people and invited them into community with us. We gave families in need clean diapers and clothing for their children. We danced and bowled and ate and drank to raise money to meet needs in our city and around the world. We served communion at Pride booths and hosted wedding showers for  friends.

We delivered meals, visited hospital rooms, attended funerals, and mourned losses of all kinds. We celebrated milestone birthdays, weddings, births, adoptions, transitions, and all varieties of new adventures. We gathered for book discussions, game nights, play dates, chili suppers, fish fries, pancake dinners, Easter egg hunts, and fall festivals. We invited children to wonder about God and the Bible with their full imaginations and all of their questions.

We met together to study the Bible, explore what it means to love God and love our neighbors. We learned from, and learned alongside, others who had life experiences and viewpoints that were vastly different from our own as we talked about our hopes, passions, questions, and doubts.

We valued the holy words that are “I don’t think I believe this” and “I don’t know.”

It was beautiful and life-giving and always, always hard.

There was never an abundance of money or staff. Having a small congregation meant the same people were tapped to do the work again and again and again. Our values and priorities sometimes conflicted with our denomination and the results were usually messy and painful.

It wasn’t hard because we were doing it wrong. It was hard because it was hard

Revolution is far from the only congregation that has closed its doors in recent years. Church attendance in the U.S. continues to decline and, rightly, that has spurred on a lot of soul searching about what it all means.

I’ve heard a lot of thoughtful, nuanced, discussions on this topic. Conversations that take seriously the very real harm that religious institutions have caused for centuries. Conversations that honor the journeys of people who are connecting with God in alternative and beautiful ways outside of religious services. I’ve also heard a lot of pretty bad takes.

The point of view that probably upsets me the most, however, is when I hear religious leaders talk about how people just don’t care about spiritual things anymore, about how churches are closing or shrinking because people have become too self-centered, too busy, and too apathetic. That’s never been my experience at any church I’ve been a part of. It was certainly never my experience at Revolution.

I’ve never seen a group of people work harder to build and sustain a faith community than I did at Revolution. I’ve never seen a group of people fight harder to keep alive a vision of what a church could be , even when the odds were stacked against it, than I did at Revolution.

The Revolution community made the difficult decision to close its doors permanently for a lot of complicated reasons, and a few very simple ones, but it was never for a lack of effort, commitment, sincerity, or faith.

Sustaining a small community of millennials and gen x-ers in a historical church in need of big, expensive repairs, in a denomination that was often as inscrutable to our congregation as we were to it, was always going to be an uphill battle. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth the climb

I was annoyed when Scott answered the ad on Craigslist for a part-time worship leader position at a church in midtown Kansas City. I swear it had only been 5 minutes since his last ministry job had ended (somewhat poorly) and didn’t he just want to take a break from working at a church for a little while?

Also, I was already on staff at another church in midtown that I truly loved, and couldn’t we maybe just go to ONE church at a time for a while?

Apparently, we could not.

Scott started working at Revolution United Methodist Church on Palm Sunday of 2010. A few years later I joined him on staff because, despite myself, I’d fallen in love with this quirky, maybe-too-laid-back, inclusive, justice-oriented faith community.

I was won over by this beautiful little church filled with people who didn’t quite know how to church, didn’t really trust churches (for lots of good reasons), but still thought maybe a church where you could practice loving God and loving your neighbor as your full, complicated, beautiful self, was worth the risk.

Today, 11 years and 2 weeks after Scott’s first Sunday at Revolution, the church held its final service and closed its doors.

I don’t know if you’ve ever been a part of a church that has closed, but it’s pretty awful. Watching a church community that you love suffer repeated traumas, and then finally close, is filled with very real grief and pain. Grief for a beloved community that will never meet in this place, in this way, again. Grief for dreams that were unrealized or cut short.

Yes, the Church is universal. Yes, the God of Love is never contained in one building or community or time.And yet the loss is real, and the grief endures.

Because we can’t actually experience the Church universally. We can’t actually experience Love throughout time and space. As humans we can only experience these things in particular places at particular times. I am forever thankful that one of those places that I experienced love, and grace, and community was at a church called Revolution.