the running reverend

Some of you have heard my theory of church design: I think the reason why we pad our pews, bolt the furniture down to the floor, print up the service in a bulletin, then carefully, deliberately plod through the prescribed acts of worship is out of an inner fear. We tie everything down, we make church so predictable, so settled and fixed because, in our collective memories, we remember stories like this one. We know Bible stories of ordinary people who have heard their named called. We know that the temple, or this church can be a risky, dangerous place, what with the living God roaming about.

~William Willimon in an unpublished sermon entitled “The Dangers of Going to Church”