People become a part of a faith community, I believe, for a variety of reasons. For some it is to express their specific beliefs and to join in with others who do the same. Others join a church because it has been a long standing family tradition. Still others join because they want to engage in ways that make a difference in the world, to tell the gospel story through their actions. There are some who join because they think they ‘should’ and still others who do so because they think others think they should….their mother, their wife, their boss, the college they might apply to someday. I make no criticism or judgment about any of these reasons because I also truly believe that, if a person becomes actively engaged in a faith community, they will be transformed in significant ways. That is the work of the Spirit.

One of the things a church can offer people is ‘being known’. We exist in a culture where it is quite easy to be invisible if you want to, to live through whole days where no one calls you by name. I have often said that what the majority of people want when they come into a church community is the same thing Norm received when he walked into the bar at Cheers. People want someone to call out their name:"Norm!", to be known, to be visible in an important way.

I thought of this yesterday as our third graders received the gift of their Bible from the church. Being a third-grader is to be in the middle of the pack, so to speak. You do not have the cute factor of being a kindergartner or the cool factor of being a sixth grader, i.e. an ‘almost teenager’. So to be called out from this valley of ages to be recognized, to be known, is a great gift from a community of mostly adults. Many dressed up for the occasion, families joined them, even grandmas and grandpas if they lived near. Pictures were snapped and cake was served in their honor. As each student was handed this small black book(with print fit for their young eyes), I saw them look at the gold letters of their name printed on the cover. To have your name imprinted on the cover of a book is impressive at any age.

My sense is that they will forget the cake they ate. They may even forget what they wore. Over the next few years they may even misplace that Bible, though I hope not. I hope they can read those stories and connect it with their own experience of God, or find an answer to a question they have been pondering, or comfort for a very trying time. I hope they study its contents and are able to know the story of their faith ancestors.Whatever the case, perhaps in a few years, as they clean out their room preparing to head off to college, they may come across that little black book. They may hold it in their now much larger hands and run their finger across the gold letters of their name. Hopefully they will think:"That was a day I was known".

It is one of the things a faith community can offer. And isn’t it what we all want?

"O God, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from far away. You search out my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways."  Psalm 139