Unchanging
Have you ever been to Niagara Falls, Ontario? The avenues that lead you toward the majestic, awe-inspiring, and beautiful falls boast extreme visual invitations on the buildings to come explore and enjoy what they have to offer within their doors. For example, the Burger King boasts a giant Frankenstein preparing to eat a monstrous Whopper on its roof. Just across the street, the Ripley’s Believe It or Not museum can’t help but catch your eye as it looks startlingly like a sideways building with King Kong clutching its spire at the top. From what I’ve seen and heard about Las Vegas, that city also chooses to overwhelm visitors with its splendor in architecture and displays.
When we went to Niagara Falls for a family vacation, our oldest son was almost five years old, and he was the type of little guy who approached the world with timidity. Loud noises terrified him, so things like balloons popping, firetrucks at parades, and the dumping of a giant bucket of water at an indoor waterpark were nightmares. As you can probably imagine, he dreaded this particular walk down the main street as it was another form of sensory overload to him. He would duck his little head down and try not to stare at the monstrosities looming large above him as they are larger than life and a bit frightening to some small children.
Sometimes people enjoy and perhaps even expect this kind of in-your-face, notice-me kind of advertising. Visiting a place results in lots of sensory memories, and some people approach their vacations looking for those rushes of grand overlooks or visual cacophonies of stunning displays such as these. Tish Harrison Warren suggests that sometimes religion has been “captured by a tourist mindset” (66). People go into their vacations wanting to experience the new and the novel, and they can have the same expectations when it comes to going into a church.
The roads of religious belief have been well trod for centuries, and sometimes the most meaningful and precious experiences come in following those quiet and purposeful paths of tradition and ritual. When we come into the church doors wanting or perhaps even expecting to be wowed, we are bound to be disappointed most of the time if that is our primary purpose. Being a Christian is not about getting the next high of adventure or novelty. In fact, God reminds us of that reassurance of our unchanging foundation upon which we stand in Scripture :
Hebrews 13:8 “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”
Isaiah 40:8 “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.”
We live in a world where all around us, things are constantly fluctuating. Just try talking to someone of a different generation from you about their slang terms (You may find you have rizz… who knows?) or their musical tastes (Even the Taylor Swift that I heard perform back in 2007 opening for Brad Paisley is an entirely different Taylor Swift from the woman that struts the stage now…) Styles change: check out people’s hairstyles or colors… clothing trends are constantly cycling through of what’s cool and what’s not. Just see if you can keep up with the latest AI trends and capabilities; it’s enough to take one’s breath away!
But the Gospel of Christ is not like that. A compelling speaker may find a different way to explain the same eternal truth to us, but the basis of what it means to be a follower of Jesus is no different from what it meant in the days of the book of Acts. We are called to embody those qualities of Christ that He exemplified in His walk here on earth, and among them were His meekness and the way He turned to the quiet of a garden to kneel and speak to God. Cherish the traditions of the Christian faith, and don’t get caught in a mindset that tempts you to come to church with your hands out for what you can get instead of hands open to what God wants to tenderly and gently place in them.
