By Charlie Fuller
Summer’s here! For many of us, maybe most of us, that means travel. The beach, the mountains, amusement parks, big cities, quiet country, traveling to see family, etc. Each of these requires a journey.
Have you ever thought of worship as a journey? Prelude, call to worship, Scripture reading, hymns, sermon. We speak, we pray, we sing, we listen. We journey through the order we’re given. We journey together as many who have become one.
God joins us on this journey. We begin with a call to worship in order to acknowledge that our journeys are never alone. The God we worship joins us as we engage each element of worship. God joins us and binds us together as one body as we sing, pray, speak and listen. Never on our own. Never alone.
We are here this morning not as scattered individuals, but as a congregation. Drawn to this place by a community that cares, loves, supports and worships — together.
When I was growing up, we were often told the stories of farmers back in the day who needed to build a barn. Their enterprise was growing, and they needed either a first barn or an additional one. But the individual farmer could never build a barn by themselves. It was simply too big a job. So all the neighbors would gather when needed and build barns, even though they were competitors when it came time to sell their harvest. They called it a “barn raising.” Barn raisings were ubiquitous in those days because these farm families realized they needed each other. And the barn raising was only one manifestation of how they functioned as community. It might also mean caring for someone else’s fields or their harvest when illness struck. They understood there was a common good, that they needed each other, that they were better together.
Scientists tell us we’re actually biologically wired to need each other. It’s a human trait.
And it’s what draws us to this place each Sunday to gather and do what we can’t quite do by ourselves. We worship. We come together as many and become one as we sing, pray, speak and listen. Let’s build a barn of worship this morning as we sing, as we pray, as we speak, and as we listen — together with each other and together with the Creator of the universe who joins us in this place.