welcome to Confessions.

What do you think of when you sit down to a evening of performance by a Bible school choir?

I think of cheesy christian songs, an emphasis on being good and gracious, grateful and happy, joyful and overflowing - in general, an evening full of the cleanliness of Christendom. Woo...



Do you think of confession? Would you expect to hear and see, feel and experience moments of embarrassment, shame, joy, hope and amazement? Would you expect to be brought to tears by a confession of anger, shame, or addiction?

No.

Tonight I was surprised out of my pew by a group of kids from Canadian Lutheran Bible Institute, who brought all these things to the stage and so much more. It was incredible to see my hopes an dreams for community being drawn out in front of me.

It's moments like these that the cynicism fades to, I must confess, little more than insecurity, fear and loneliness.



Here's a quotation from the program:

"Everything in spiritual community is reversed from the world's order. It is our weakness, not our competence, that moves others; our sorrows, not our blessings, that break down the barriers of fear and shame that keep us apart; our admitted failures, not our paraded successes, that bind us together in hope.

[But it can be terrifying to be this vulnerable.] It seems weak, so unnecessary, so morbid and self-criticizing. But we are all wounded and we've all been failed. We protect our wounds with all the fierceness of a lioness watching over her cubs. And because it is nearly impossible to see who we are as separate from those wounds, we think we are protecting our selves when in fact we are preserving our wounds.



A spiritual community, a church, is full of broken people who turn their chairs toward each other because they know they cannot make it alone. These broken people journey together with their wounds and worries and washouts visible, but are able to see beyond the brokenness to something alive and good, something whole."

-- Larry Crabb, The Safest Place on Earth