I woke up with a start today. Nothing specific happened; no sound or flash caused it. It was just the weight of the week suddenly landing, I think… and a deluge of tears came with it.

This morning, my family has no church home to head to. We are still working out where we will land after the sudden loss at the end of May. Since that time, we have traveled and visited, we have found community beyond the walls of the traditional church, and gone back to our COVID experience to fill this educational time of the week. It is not perfect or sustainable, but it is this season for us.

For the moment, I’m just laying here in the silence of my nearly (finally) settled and cleaned house, weeping over the loss of a church that never wanted me anyway. I grieve for all who have been unwanted before me… and in a very deep way, I grieve for those who are still looking away.

The abused will never belong unless the church chooses to actively stand against the abusers and make it safe for them to do so. That’s what I want in a church. And that’s what the church of the Nazarene has declared time and again to be of too great a liability. This reality communicates to a hurting crowd of people that the cost of caring for them is too great… that they aren’t worth it.

It is all well and good to say that you “believe that this circumstance can be redeemed,” but that belief falls flat without sacrificial action living into it. Simply stating that you “see this as an opportunity to emphasize the call of the church to be a safe harbor for children and youth” does nothing to hold accountable the abusers of all kinds who are arriving today to the place where they have unfettered access to vulnerable people because of the lack of accountability and structures to prevent it. Those systems (or the lack thereof) that allow people to be harmed have been replicated worldwide, and the victims are increasingly unwilling to remain silent… even if the church largely does.

As long as the church is content to settle into the safety of closing statements that offer themselves comfort without allowing for or requiring healing work to be done, it cannot be the Church God calls.

My family will likely worship online somewhere this morning. We are continuing to clean house, both the house built around us and the emotional house that provides a haven around our hearts. This is all that is safe enough to do today, and I believe God is present in our desire to gather… and with us in our inability to do so.

I pray that if you gather, it is in safety this morning; that you have a Church home that allows your family to worship with the body of Christ in a way that is holy and healing. I pray that if you have suffered at the hands of a church that has been silent for too long, that God shows up for you today… because that is not his Church.

Do not let the shadow of shame darken your heart. There is hope… not the fluffy wish that things will be better, but the weighty expectation that change is coming. Grieve what is necessary, and breathe in the freedom of new life.

You aren’t alone.

If you need to talk, I’m always here.

I love you.