The Easter weekend is a full four days with Friday and Monday as national holidays. What a time of celebration! We went with Lucy and Moses (and Prince, of course, or we can't go anywhere!) to Lucy's and Moses' mass, area-wide church meetings in the "Civic Center" on Friday evening. I was so discouraged because I had thought my Nigerian English comprehension had improved but I only understood about half of what the pastor said. It was encouraging, in a strange sort of way, to learn that Lucy and the others had a difficult time, too. The sound system wasn't too good. This is soooooooooo often the case. During the closing hymn, "It Is Well with My Soul," the power went off and things actually sounded better. Everyone kept singing acapella, with drum beats and trumpets keeping us together. Cell phones came out of pockets everywhere and the little flashlight features came on -- voila! a candlelight service!
In their denomination, women must wear headcoverings, so, I used a scarf that Joey had brought me from a missions trip to Cambodia and our gang called me an A-free-kan woe-man. Jim wants me to wear it more often -- no way, too hot!! Anyway, the service was ok but not something we really want to repeat.
So, Easter morning, we went to a different church, yet again. Nope, we knew very soon that this would not be a repeater for us, either. Our visiting weekends are about done and then we'll settle in, soon, somewhere. But it is exciting to see what God is doing around the area. We see many patterns and rituals that make us question, once again, our own patterns and rituals. No matter the denomination, tongues speaking occurs -- some very publicly, some very privately. No matter the denomination, dancing happens, not the typical "white folk" swaying, I mean all out, serious dancing. So, I'm slowly starting to move around more. At home I feel very free to dance that way, but it just doesn't seem right seeing an old white lady dancing like these limber Nigerian gals. Jim just stands and closes his eyes in worship and never sees that others are dancing. It's definitely not his style and that's a-ok.
Other patterns we see everywhere are: the leader shouts "In Jesus' name" and the folks respond "Amen!" and this continues, back and forth, a lot. When the leader shouts "Praise the Lord" the group responds with "Hallelujah" and that seems to usually occur when there's a pause in the speaker's thoughts or a pause as they wait for a musician or some such thing. During prayer time, everyone prays out loud -- it's very powerful to be a part of. Some of the churches guide us in our topic of prayer -- praying for our repentance, praying for our family, praying for the church, praying for the nation, ...
Offering is more of an act of worship in many of the churches here -- more so than is often the case in the U.S. Each one lifts his/her envelope with the tithe/offering and prays aloud before the ushers pass the bags. Sometimes people file up to the front with it. Sometimes there is more than one offering -- a bit offensive for us foreigners, that some of the places are allllllllllllways asking for money. That is probably our greatest struggle. We are tired of being treated with special honor because of our white skin -- which is spelled m-o-n-e-y. Every church wants us to sit in the front, meet with the pastor, give them our address and phone number, etc. Prince, who is the group's skeptic, thinks it's all about money. Lucy and I think that often it is just a genuine "welcome" and heartfelt appreciation. (with the full awareness that if we settle in, we'll probably be good for some sizable, by Nigerian standards, gifts!!)
We remain a bit concerned because some of the pastors are millionaires and we don't want our money going into their pockets. Many are honest millionaires in that they don't take a large salary from the church but they have many in the congregations who lavish them with gifts. For instance, if a pastor has prayed over a man's wife for healing and the woman is healed, then that man will bring baskets of food, financial gifts, etc., in appreciation. Prince knows of pastors who have received MANY brand new cars as gifts and, always the skeptic, he thinks the giver is doing it out of more than gratitude -- it's gratitude mixed with trying to buy more blessings from God/this pastor. Because the background of most of these people includes signs and wonders from evil spirits, cults, etc., they carry a bit of that mindset of "keep the gods happy" into their Christianity. Yes, it's a bit confusing. And then throw into the mix the poverty and desire to receive material blessings -- well, it's ripe for the "buying off God" philosophies!!
So, we still see this polarization of materialism versus legalism. Of course, the churches that grow the fastest have the materialistic emphasis while the holiness churches struggle with low numbers and are a bit over-the-top in their piety! Here's an example of the phenomen that might help you see what I mean -- one week, a church we were in announced that the next Sunday was "key holder" Sunday. When "key holder" Sunday rolled around, the church was PACKED and the energy was high. The music was frenetic, to say the least. By the time the speaker got up, the people were psyched! Cut to the end of the service -- the ushers passed out a key holder to each person. Some folks came to multiple services to get more key holders, a problem the pastor addressed in his message. Then, for about 20 minutes, everyone was guided through prayers that they shouted and begged of God, kneeling, weeping, etc. -- they were asking God to give them a key for their key holder by the end of this year, specifically, a key to a new house, apartment, or car. They left believing that God would give them a key, indeed.
This lead to quite the discussion, later, with Prince and Lucy. P and L both said that God gives us keys by giving us jobs and the strength to work. Prince said, "I've never seen a house fall down from heaven, have you, Lucy?" So, we talked through the many ways that God does, indeed, work miracles in providing gifts to us through others -- prompting someone to bring something to us, guiding someone to send money in the mail, helping someone return borrowed money, etc. Anyway, all of these experiences cause us to re-think our theology, that's for sure!!
Lastly, I'll tell you about last night. What a deal! A concert at a church that included -- rappers, dancers, children's groups, contemporary soloists that were fantastic, traditional warbling-voiced soloists, instrumentals, and ... even a choir singing excerpts from Handel!! (I fought back the tears!) The strange, but fun, feature was a comedian reminiscent of Mark Lowery. He mocked the traditions of these churches, like "God is telling me that He has a message for someone sitting in a white chair" -- there are 1500 white chairs and nothing else in the whole place. Or " some of you young men have pains in your stomach, put your hand over your stomach, now remove it, is the pain still there? God is telling you ... (giant pause) ... you are hungry -- eat something!" The people were roaring with laughter and hooting and hollering. Interesting!
Prince about has a Chris Tomlin CD memorized, we listen to it in the car so much. He loves "Your Grace is Enough" -- that's way cool!
Thus endeth the post-Easter ramblings!
Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed!
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