Sometimes faith sounds like a baby shrieking with delight as the Sunday lessons are read. Sometimes it sounds like folding chairs atop creaky floorboards in the gymnasium—the temporary sanctuary of the Lutheran congregation my family and I were visiting. The Lutherans had had a fire, so the Baptists welcomed them while their building is being repaired.
Sometimes faith sounds like a crazy idea. My husband had suggested we do something different and visit this congregation. I’d agreed. But no sooner had the strains of the first hymn faded than I’d begun to wonder what my own pastor was preaching about. Her messages so often spoke the language of my heart, firing me up for the week ahead, calling me back to life, back to God. I was missing it, I thought glumly, sitting in this space that was unfamiliar to me…except…this wasn’t the familiar, regular worship space of the people here, either. They had been displaced. This space was a gift. Suddenly I felt silly and a bit ashamed. OK, God, I thought. I hear you. I began to listen.
The sounds of faith
Faith can sound like a metal folding chair being dragged across a wooden floor. It propped up the sore ankle of an older woman near us, who smiled and checked to make sure she wasn’t in our way. We offered to help and smiled, too.
Faith can also sound like a sigh of relief from a nearby mom. She’d been whispering, working to get her school-aged kids out of their chairs to help during their part of the service. She gave us a knowing look, which we returned.
Faith can sound like a pastor’s wonderful sermon. Faith can sound like a diverse group of people, passing the peace like they mean it.
Faith can sound like your kids, singing along without bothering to look at the Evangelical Lutheran Worship pages. Note by note, my children have absorbed songs and scriptures, to be recalled someday, when they will most need it—some of the same songs and scriptures that once comforted my grandma, when she was very young and lost one parent after another—and after she was very old, when Alzheimer’s had erased nearly everything else.
Faith can sound like a pastor’s wonderful sermon. Faith can sound like a diverse group of people, passing the peace like they mean it.
What is sound?
But what is sound, really? Sound is energy—energy that comes from movement, energy that causes the air itself to vibrate and propel this energy in all directions, firing up our ears, and often, our hearts.
Sound travels in a wave—a movement in the air that carries vibrations to your ear. A movement in the air. Like a rushing of the wind. Filling up empty space the way the Holy Spirit filled that Pentecost room in Acts 2. Sending energy in all directions, giving Jesus’ disciples the ability to speak other languages, firing up ears and hearts.
The distance between congregations, between waves of sound, was not as far as I’d thought. The next time you’re at worship, listen. What sounds do you hear? What do the sounds say about the worship space?
Elizabeth Hunter is editor of Gather magazine. We welcome her back from sabbatical this month, hoping she sounds serene.