Monday, October 15, 2012

Church of the Buckshot

 

   Every person on the planet has this in-born tendency to repeat the same behaviors over and over again, be they good, bad or boring.  Sometimes we call such behavior a routine, which can be a good thing.  There’s virtue in establishing routines like structuring our mornings so that we get to work on time every day, or going to the gym the same two days each week. Sometimes, however, we stick with our behaviors just because we don’t want to be bothered with making a change.
 

   We humans are indeed creatures of habit. Nowhere is this characteristic trait more obvious than where people sit in a church sanctuary from Sunday to Sunday.  About two years ago, my church added a second service, and I was asked to lead worship for it. Since it meets earlier than the main service, our numbers are smaller. You would think that our First Service people would adjust to our reduced size and sit as an identifiable group, but no.  They all sit in exactly the same seats on exactly the same pews where they used to sit when we all met together in one service. The problem, for me at least, is that hardly anyone sits near the front, or even near each other. I mean, they look like a spray of buckshot out there!

    As a worship leader, this distresses me. It’s hard to connect with 40-50 people in a room designed to hold 300 when they’re spread out as much as they are. I’ve tried my darndest to get at least some of the Church of the Buckshot to sit a couple of pews closer to the front. I swore publicly that it was safe for everybody, as no one on the worship team had cooties. Our bass player even piped up that he’d had all his shots. They all laughed at the joke, but nobody budged an inch. The following Sunday, they all sat to the rear of middle, as usual. I kept trying though. One Sunday I sang a special song to them, a parody of Carol King’s “So Far Away:”

    So far away, doesn’t anybody want to sit close anymore?
    I don’t understand why you sit back by the door
    It just doesn’t help to know that you sit far away
    Yayeeayeeeee, so far away...


They thought the song was pretty funny, but they still didn’t move in any closer. Sitting in a different location would require change on their part, don’t you know. My Lord, whoever heard of Christians making any changes in their lives as mammoth as sitting in a different seat on Sunday? What a preposterous idea!

    I suppose I should just give up trying to make them behave like a congregation instead of strangers in an airport terminal. People are going to do what people are going to do, etc., etc., etc..  - but I can’t. This buckshot seating pattern just BUGS me!  I especially hate to see single people sitting off by themselves - it just doesn’t look like God’s family has gathered.  So next week I may try another appeal for a migration out from the fringes and closer to the front. Maybe this parody of “La Bamba” will work:

    Please sit a little bit closer
    Please sit a little bit closer
    Be friendlier saints
    Sit a little bit closer

    Sit a little bit closer, show me your face
    Please sit up near the front,
    Sit closer together, not all over the place
    Just for a change, just for a change   

    Pleeease sit closer, Pleeease sit closer
    Pleeease sit closer, Pleeease sit closer



That should do the trick, don’t your think? Yeah, right.


That’s all she wrote,
Lynn

7 comments:

  1. Too funny. We had a pastor who wanted to mess with our comfort zones and moved everything around between Sundays. Everything was turned around. The back was the front and vice versa. And the chairs had an entirely different arrangement. You can imagine the grumblings. One person even called the fire department and complained because the stage had been moved to the back in front of the double doors they were used to exiting from. It didn't matter that there were plenty of other exit doors - but because the "fire plan" posted on the wall was an illustration of the old floor plan, the fire chief made the church put everything back where it was before the second service. Well....of course, you can't do that with pews, but you could block the back pews off with yellow police tape, or something.

    Confession: We always sit in the back. =)

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  2. Pastors like to stir up the flock every on and again. It's good for us, really. Ah...back row sitters! Any particular reason for that?

    Thanks for the comment, Patricia!

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  3. Ah, so this happens elsewhere. Maybe it's a denomination and not just a church! Curious, Lynn, has this situation provided any teaching moments from your pastor(s)?.... O Lord, awaken Your bride with a fresh passion for You! (in which case, all will stop singing "Take My Life But Let Me Be")

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  4. You mean they sit in the back in NH, too? Well, well!
    I like your hymn idea!

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  5. I think the sitting-in-the-back tendency is "a protestant thing." Catholic services conclude with communion, so there's more motivation to sit near the front so you can get out of there faster. :) We get scattershot seating at both services in two churches I play at. But, it's not church alone where this happens. I taught high school for 25 years. During the first week of school, until or unless I set a seating chart, the kids tended to take the same seat every day. BTW, I finally got my son the worship leader to add "For the Lord Is Good" to our repertoire; we've done it three weeks running and it has been well-received. On lay faith journey Sunday, one of our parishioners said "That song reflects what I want my life to be."

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  6. Interesting perspective on Communion - sit up front, get out first. Not a factor with us!

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    1. Nor us in either band. We reprise the sending song, so we're always the last to leave. :)

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