Letters to My Congregation

Keep West Franklin Weird

Each week (usually Wednesday afternoon), I send out a letter to the congregation at West Franklin. It’s a tiny way I hope to shepherd them during the week. Perhaps it might encourage, help, or challenge you as well.

Photo by Dan Parlante on Unsplash

West Franklin Family,

Sunday morning, I talked about how weird we are. Like it or not, it’s true. We are a weird bunch. And I love it. Takes one to know one, I guess. The fact that this is a good thing was confirmed again when I came across this article. Yet another reminder that the church is (and should be) weird. Like, super weird.

Here’s a section:

Tom Holland’s prescription for the Church of England is that it should emphasize the “weird” nature of the faith. . . The Church has been “too successful”, Holland said. . .

“The future for the churches is to remind people where these ideas come from,” Holland contended. “They come from believing in mad things, that there is a God who created all human beings equally, gave them an inherent dignity because they’re created in God’s image. You know, it comes from the belief that these were taught by a guy who got nailed to a cross and then rose from the dead and offers the promise of eternal glory in life. These are obviously, objectively to a rationalist perspective, mad things. But the madness is precisely what makes them so powerful and has made them so powerful… People want the supernatural, they want the strange. . .”

I don’t know much about Tom Holland (note: not the Spider Man Tom Holland). But I do know he’s a brilliant thinker. And, on this issue anyway, I cannot agree more. The future of the church is to remind people that we do what we do because we were “taught by a guy who got nailed to a cross and then rose from the dead and offers the promise of eternal glory in life.” Yeah. That’s weird. And glorious. And according to Holland (and, again, I agree), “People want the supernatural, they want the strange.” Yes and amen.

West Franklin, we are a weird people because we - sinful, mundane, weak, inconsistent, stressed, anxious, and blessed - have been chosen by God to be a community that displays His power, glory, grace, mercy, and love. And we do so because we believe a weird - very weird - reality: a guy from Nazareth is our Messiah. He died, was buried, and rose from the dead. He’s reigning over the universe at this moment and is coming back to make it visible and clear to all. Weird.

Let’s keep West Franklin weird. Though it makes me nervous to suggest this (because some of you have already reached the ceiling of weirdness), let’s become even more weird. When necessary, let’s turn the other cheek. When threatened, let’s love our enemy. Let’s go visit those in prison. Let’s go rescue those without an advocate. Let’s show grace to those who deserve pain. Let’s point our neighbors to the work of the guy from Nazareth who was crucified on a cross for them. Let’s take a week of vacation and go on a mission journey or volunteer for Vacation Bible School. Let’s have middle school boys study the Bible in our homes. When someone requests our coat, let’s give them two or three. Let’s hob nob with the weak, the poor, the sick, and the downcast more than we do the rich, successful, famous, and those who can move us up the ladder.

Tom Holland is right. People want the supernatural. They want the strange. This is precisely what Christianity is. Let’s keep West Franklin weird, always stretching to become ‘more weirder’ than before.

Seeking Kingdom Strangeness,

Pastor Matt