I knew that the incident of the “flying crutches” would make a great story, but there’s an appropriate time for everything, and this occasion was not one of them. It was our annual congregational meeting at church and our pastor asked us to share stories of growth—growth within our church and growth within ourselves. It’s pretty easy to share about things outside of ourselves, like how many more people are involved, what activities have meant a lot, but that personal growth stuff is a little more difficult to put your finger on. It’s harder to track because every moment of personal growth seems to be followed by painful failure.
I had been to a meeting at church where we’ve been working on spiritual growth for about two years. The meetings are intense, we’re vulnerable, we share with each other and challenge each other, and we pray. The end result is supposed to be growth within our church because our level of personal growth will be contagious. So, how’s that working for me? Apparently not too well.
I arrived at home that night after the meeting with all of my post-foot surgery handicap gear. Left foot driving, crutching my way to the trunk, removing my knee walker and hauling it all in the house one-footed at the end of the day had exhausted me. The fact that my husband didn’t run out to help me annoyed me, but I was feeling “spiritual” enough to give him the benefit of the doubt . . . until I stood at the top of the family room steps and observed him fast asleep. The slamming of the trunk, the garage door going down, the passive-aggressive clunking of my equipment—none of those sounds had aroused him from his stupor. I don’t know what got into me at that moment, but the next thing I knew the crutches had left my hand with some speed and were crashing and bouncing all the way down the steps. Words cannot describe the look of panic on my husband’s face as he jumped to his feet. There was no way I could pass it off as a mistake. I looked at the clock—my spiritual growth had lasted eight minutes.
Last Sunday afternoon we presented out community Christmas cantata. Every year many churches in our area come together, beginning our rehearsals in October, and presenting an awesome program to a packed house. We had postponed this presentation because of inclement weather the previous week. Everyone was on stage ready for our pre-performance rehearsal and warm-up. Our custodian came into the sanctuary and asked me to ask a few people to move their cars because our county intermediate school district was doing some road tests for new drivers in our parking lot. Because of the weather, they too had rescheduled. The reaction from choir members was astounding—arguing, complaining and nasty looks. I apologized but it didn’t seem to help.
Fast forward to the performance; all of the lovely carols are being sung with amazing fervor. “Peace, peace, peace on earth and goodwill to all. This is a time for love, this is a time for joy . . . “ I think you get my drift. I’m really not criticizing my fellow choir members—if I hadn’t ridden with a friend that day, I would have jumped right on the complaining wagon with them saying things like, “this is our church” or “why are they doing this on Sunday?” Our collective spiritual growth was kind of at a standstill that day.
Just before the performance began, I was talking with a fellow band member. She too had been acting negatively about a few things and was hoping that her behavior would not affect her playing. I told her that I don’t believe God works that way—He works through our flaws and our crap and turns them into beautiful things. If I believe that I have to be perfect, and totally have my spiritual act together every moment, in order for beautiful music to come from my hands on the keyboard, or from my life in general, then I am putting too much importance on myself. I think that true spiritual growth recognizes that.
The cantata was beautiful. I’m sure there were a few mistakes, but I’m also sure they were not the direct result or punishment for our personal failures. I believe God hears our music as perfect, despite our ignorance and whining. He also makes beautiful music out of our sometimes-pathetic lives.
So, if I had answered the question posed by our pastor about growth within our church and within us as individuals I would say that as a church we’re taking two steps forward, followed by an occasional self-centered step backward. As for me--I’m also taking personal steps toward growth—two steps forward, one crutch-throwing incident backward.
