Trinity Lutheran Church

This experience of church-hunting in the Inland Empire has turned out to be more personal and introspective an undertaking than it was in Hollywood. The first church I selected was one frequented by friends. The second church I selected was frequented by my mother and father. So it seemed fitting the third church would be the one I best remember from my own childhood: Trinity Lutheran Church in Montclair, CA.

My first church-related memories are of Trinity. We attended until I left the 8th grade and my family left Pomona (adjacent to Montclair) and relocated to another town in California. This was in the late 1980s. Between then and now, the only other time I was there was for my brother's wedding in the mid 1990s. Since I'd been a member, Trinity added a new church building, the old sanctuary remains and is presently being used by another congregation. Much of the original exterior of the facility is exactly as I remember it. The playground area has the same swingset. There is still a giant iron mailbox in front of the old building. But this was my first time inside the newer part of Trinity.

A nice thing about the new building is the one interesting architectural element -- the stonework at the front of the church -- prevents any PowerPoint presentations, not that such a thing would be considered. The building might be new, but little else is. People in the congregation remembered my family, if not me. My former pastor wasn't there, he retired, but the current pastor was old-school. In the pockets of the pews were the exact same hymnals and songbooks that I used more than 25 years earlier, as well as -- praise God -- copies of the King James Bible. When I was a child, the organists were family friends whose organ playing abilities could best be described as "well-meaning." The current organist also means well.

The order of worship had been trimmed considerably. Not a lot of standing compared to the old days. The demographics of the place skewed much older, so I'm not sure if that connects to the lack of movement during worship. There was a handful of children in attendance, but none of them the right ages to be an acolyte, so an elder lit the candles on the alter. As the opening hymn played, the pastor did a one-man processional to the front of the church, we confessed our sins, there was a brief children's message, then the scripture readings, a creed, another hymn, and the sermon.

The sermon made me smile, which was odd considering the topic was more than a little somber. The thrust of the pastor's message was that life sucks. To use his words, "Life is hell, but then you die." Prejudice, poverty, and pain all exist on Earth. It is, frankly, a Buddhist approach to life, which is odd to hear inside a Lutheran church. Using the book of Revelations as his basis, the pastor posited that life in Heaven would surely be better. I sincerely hope so.

Like many Christians, I am not an avid Bible reader; it is not a book I could curl up with beside a fire. It is not a fun read and, at times, is is a very hard read. One book I have attempted over the years is the Revelation of John. It is just so dark and mysterious and off-the-charts strange that I find it compelling. I've read it, read the writings of others who have studied it, and watched documentaries about it. I've reached one inescapable conclusion: We have no idea what it means.

To my non-believing friends, assume for a moment that the future was revealed to a man. He saw the world end. He saw things and people and creatures from far into his future. And then he was tasked with writing it down. Let us assume that is exactly what happened. Put yourself in John's shoes. You're living in the first century A.D. and the sky opens up and projected before you is... something. And then, later, you have to put it into words.

The words aren't there. How could the words possibly be there? For instance, let us say John saw an F-14 Tomcat screaming through the sky, its pilot clad from head to toe in a flight suit. Or he saw people milling gathered inside the Burj Khalifa. Or he saw people riding inside a Toyota Prius. Using the available language of John's time, describe those things. While not impossible, it seems more likely that more representative descriptions would be used. Do I think four horsemen will bring about the destruction of the Earth? I think that is one possibility, but another equally valid possibility is John witnessed someone or something riding atop something, and since in his universe such a person is typically called a horseman, that's the word he ascribed to what he saw.

If you ever read the ultimate book of the Bible, and if you see a word like dragon, think about the vocabulary of the time. If John saw a modern-day tank spewing fire missiles and fire from its canon, would he have called it a dragon? And think about how someone 500, 1000, or 1500 years later might have translated such a word. Assuming John saw what he saw doesn't mean we have a clear idea of how the world will really end or what heaven is really like. It is a mystery, and as a favorite author of mine once wrote, "And I am both terrified and reassured to know that there are still wonders in the universe, that we have not yet explained everything."

Trinity was the church of my childhood, but it is not to be the church of my adulthood. I could try to describe the way I remember the church as I was growing up, the smell of the coffee in the hallway after worship, the sound of metal chairs scraping on the linoleum in the fellowship hall, the pictures of former pastors that used to hang everywhere (some friendly and welcoming, others stoic and even unsettling). I'm not sure I could put into words all that I saw when I was there, and that is just looking into the past. Were I to look into the future, the result would probably be even more confusing and unclear.

Despite having a communications degree, I don't always express myself as well as I could. I don't think any individual can accurately express who he or she is, a lifetime of memories and experiences and emotions. John remembered something he felt and witnessed, and he tried to communicate what he saw, the end result being we really have no way of knowing what he saw. I think we can all relate to that. But when it comes to learning what happens after we die, I don't think it brings us any closer to knowing. Still, it does make me wonder, which is both terrifying and reassuring.

Amen.
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Sunday Scorecard:

What is the contact info for the church?

Trinity Lutheran Church
5080 Kingsley Street
Montclair, CA 91763
http://www.trinitymontclair.org/

What was the denomination?

LCMS Lutheran

What Bible verses were referenced?

Revelation 7:9-17, 1 John 3:1-3

What are the demographics of the congregation?

A small congregation of mostly seniors, a few families

Was the atmosphere formal or casual?

Formal church environment

What was the music like?

Organist who gets an A for effort, but didn't really inspire a joyful noise from those in attendance

How was the use of PowerPoint?

None at all

Immanuel Lutheran Church

One of my favorite websites is 27bslash6.com. It is a hysterical and well-written website about the banality of little things -- little things that bug us, little things that nip at our heels, little things that make up the bulk of our lives. In one fictional exchange between two coworkers, one of them is punished for questioning a corporate policy. He replied with the following parable:

"I once read about five monkeys that were placed in a room with a banana at the top of a set of stairs. As one monkey attempted to climb the stairs, all of the monkeys were sprayed with jets of cold water. A second monkey made an attempt and again the monkeys were sprayed. No more monkeys attempted to climb the stairs. One of the monkeys was then removed from the room and replaced with a new monkey. New monkey saw the banana and started to climb the stairs but to its surprise, it was attacked by the other monkeys. Another of the original monkeys was replaced and the newcomer was also attacked when he attempted to climb the stairs. The previous newcomer took part in the punishment with enthusiasm. Replacing a third original monkey with a new one, it headed for the stairs and was attacked as well. Half of the monkeys that attacked him had no idea why. After replacing the fourth and fifth original monkeys, none had ever been sprayed with cold water but all stayed the f*ck away from the stairs. Being here longer than me doesn't automatically make your adherence to a rule, or the rule itself, right. It makes you the fifth replacement monkey. The one with the weird red arse and the first to point and screech when anyone approaches the stairs. I would be the sixth monkey, at home in bed trying to come up with a viable excuse not to spend another fruitless day locked in a room with five neurotic monkeys."

Today is a big day in the protestant calendar: Reformation Sunday. This is the Sunday when people commemorate Martin Luther nailing 95 theses to the doors of a Catholic Church, or -- in modern terms -- this is the Sunday when people remember Martin Luther tweeting 95 DMs to @Pope2YouVatican. This is the Sunday when one lone nut dared to question the largest religion in the course of human history. Luther questioned authority, and for that alone I can relate to the guy. Luther's actions not only led to the foundation of new forms of Christianity, but it ultimately led to certain reforms within the reluctant-to-change Catholic Church itself.

In my previous review, I stated rather emphatically that I was not a fan of modern forms of worship, but I'd like it known I am not against change. What I am against is change for the sake of change. I see a modern service and in my mind I picture the organizers thinking to themselves, "We can do this differently," but I don't envision them questioning why things were done the way they were, or why different equates to better. But the other end of the spectrum are those churches that are so set in their ways that Martin Luther could walk into them today and feel at home. Tradition matters. But a tradition devoid of meaning or intent is just as distasteful as a change made without purpose or forethought. In my travels, I have encountered churches with congregations merely going through the motions -- congregations so locked into doing things a certain way that they are done without thought. In short, churches do things, and they never know why, and they never question it.

Immanuel Lutheran Church in Riverside has existed for over 100 years. My family is actually a part of that history. Both of my parents worked there at various points in their respective lives. Two close family friends whom I referred to as my aunt and uncle were longtime members. As a child, I worshiped there on a few occasions, mostly during Christmases spent with my aforementioned aunt and uncle. This is a church I once knew. I called myself Lutheran for most of my life; now I call myself Christian. Over the centuries, there have been divisions and splits within the Lutheran church itself. Presently there are two main branches of the Lutheran Church: LCMS and ELCA. Immanuel is an LCMS church. Immanuel is one of those churches that Luther would recognize.

Much has changed at Immanuel, but much hasn't. This Sunday was set aside to appreciate and thank those who have served as ministers and deacons, and that was when I learned the senior ranking member of the ministerial team had only been there 10 years. The head pastor was in his fourth year of service to the church. As the opening processional took place, 10 people in robes and sashes made their way down the aisle, some holding candles, one holding a cross, but -- oddly enough -- nobody holding a Bible. Odder still, instead of a Bible, the book being raised up for all to see was the Lutheran Service Book, a.k.a. the hymnal. This was peculiar to me for many reasons, and by peculiar I mean I stood there thinking, "What the f*ck!" Considering we didn't even follow the order of worship found within the hymnal, it seemed beyond odd that we ought to revere it in a way I normally reserve for the actual Bible (and a few books by the late Douglas Adams). But nobody seemed to question it; everyone droned through their 1,500th singing of "A Mighty Fortress."

As the droning of "A Mighty Fortress" drew to a close, the droning of three pages of calls-and-responses began murmuring through the sanctuary. Sigh... talk about phoning it in. Last Sunday I was in a church where over 1,000 people phoned it in, many holding their actual phones as they did so. Now, in an entirely different style of church, apx. 100 people stood or sat, going through the motions, none of them asking why. On this of all days, what the Lutheran Church needs is another Martin Luther to awaken their spirits and embolden their voices. The Bible tells us to "make a joyful noise," but I couldn't hear any joy at Immanuel. Mostly, what I heard was a tired congregation, and while I can in many ways relate to that, the function of the ministers being honored is to breathe life (and faith) into the pews.

I liked that the pastor preached from the pulpit; I liked that there was a pulpit. I was excited to see no trace of projectors for PowerPoint slides upon my entry to the church, only to be saddened to see a giant screen swing out and drop down from out of nowhere so a PowerPoint could go on during the sermon. The candles and vestments were nice to see, but I didn't -- for lack of a better phrase -- feel it.

In his sermon, the pastor drew a parallel between a story in Matthew 13 and Confederate currency at the time of the Civil War. Looking at the average age of congregants, I guess the pastor assumed a Civil War analogy would be something they could relate to? But I did appreciate that the (by comparison) young pastor emphasized the need for continued reformation within the church. "Reformation is meant to go on," he said, adding that we should all continuously "rediscover, reevaluate, and recommit" to God and faith and all that implies. In an LCMS church, such talk is practically blasphemous -- I half expected to see a gang of monkeys try to drag him down the stairs.

Amen.
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Sunday Scorecard:

What is the contact info for the church?

Immanuel Lutheran Church
5545 Allesandro Blvd.
Riverside, CA 92506
951/682-7613
http://www.immanuelriverside.com/

What was the denomination?

LCMS Lutheran

What Bible verses were referenced?

Matthew 13:44-46, 51-52

What are the demographics of the congregation?

Mostly seniors, a few families

Was the atmosphere formal or casual?

Formal church environment

What was the music like?

Organ, choir, lacking in oomf

How was the use of PowerPoint?

Sneaky... screen slides out and unfolds as the sermon begins