Beyond Sundays - Part 3: Choosing Intentional Community
Reclaiming Sacred Rhythms & Reimagining Church Together
Life is Loud. Our Calendars are full. Our souls are tired.
What if church isn’t just a place we attend, but a way of being and belonging every day of the week?
CHURCH BEYOND ATTENDANCE
In this series, we’ve been exploring some of the reasons church attendance has declined, even among those who still consider themselves people of faith.
In Parts 1 and 2, we considered the ways church attendance has become more difficult and how our culture of hurry and overcommitment has made it harder to stay connected.
Missed a previous part? You can read Part 1 and Part 2 here.
This week, we turn to our own responsibility when it comes to being part of the church community and the larger family of God. How do we resist the culture of hurry and reclaim a life rooted in God’s presence?
KNOWING OUR LIMITS
“Is it time for bed yet?” I ask my wife, right after finishing my morning shower. Some days it feels like that’s all the strength I can muster.
Like last week, I’m reminded again of Jesus words:
Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? (Matthew 11:28, The Message)
My guess is that if Jesus asked us that today, most of us would say yes.
Why?
Simply put - because we have limitations.
Most of the time, we live as if we don’t. But the truth is, we are limited in countless ways:
Our bodies – physical limitations
Our minds – we don’t know what we don’t know
Our gifts – the trap of comparison
Our personalities & emotional wiring – we only have so much capacity
Our families of origins
Our socioeconomic status and opportunities
Our education
Our season of life
We are taught that acknowledging our limitations is weakness, so we keep pushing through.
SABBATH AS RESISTANCE
Maybe that's why God eventually commands the Sabbath.
Does that strike you as odd? It's like commanding ice cream or live music or beach days. You would think we'd all be chomping at the bit to practice the Sabbath. But apparently there's something about the human condition that makes us want to hurry our way through life as fast as we possibly can, to rebel against the limitations of time itself.
Comer, Ruthless Elimination of Hurry
Even when we do pause long enough to notice our limitations, there are always a thousand external pressures driving us to ignore our most basic needs.
Sabbath isn’t just rest. It’s resistance.
Sabbath is a gift that helps us honor our humanity and live within our limits.
In The Holy Way, Paula Huston acknowledges that the world is a complicated and confusing place. But, she writes, “even if it were as serene as a Japanese garden, I’d manage to stir things up for myself.”
Most of the hurry, busyness, and clutter in our lives is internal rather than external. The restlessness of society reflects the restlessness of our own hearts. As St. Augustine famously said, “Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in God.”
No external decluttering of our physical space or of our calendars will eliminate the clutter in our own minds and hearts. That’s why the spirit of Sabbath, like worship, must go beyond one day a week. It must become a way of life.
Worship services and Sabbath rest matter, but they won’t magically transform our inner landscape.
We are still restless, even as we sit in the pew thinking about what’s for lunch or how much we need to do before Monday morning.
Without intention, even sacred spaces become just another item on the to-do list.
CLEARING THE SOIL OF OUR SOULS
Here are just a few of many practices that can help clear the ground so God’s good seed can take root in us:
WORSHIP TOGETHER
We are strengthened by corporate prayers and mutual encouragement.
We are humbled by our shared confession.
We are uplifted by voices joined in singing gratitude and praise.
And we are challenged by the proclamation of the Word to “go and do likewise”.
On the days we least feel like showing up, the community holds us a spirit of belonging.
And on the days when our faith feels weakest, the community sings and prays over us until we have the strength to raise our heads, and our voices, once again.
SEEK WISDOM & UNDERSTANDING
We need the collective wisdom of others, not just to interpret the scriptures, but to encourage one another in living them out.
Discipleship is not a solo journey. Regular study and reflection help us grow.
MAKE SPACE FOR GOD
Spiritual practices are about making space, creating a trellis for you soul to grow. They are means of grace through which you open yourself to receive what God longs to give.
You don’t need to do everything. Start small.
Here are a few suggestions:
Silence – Begin or end your day with a few minutes of silence. Sit, breathe, and listen.
Scripture – Use a devotional like the Upper Room, or try the Lectio 365 app for a guided daily reflection.
Gratitude – Practice a Daily Examen. Journal the highs and lows of your day, noticing where you felt God’s presence — and where you struggled.
Sabbath – Take a full day — or even just an afternoon — to put down your phone, rest from work, and delight in beauty.
Prayer – Pray through your church’s prayer list or expand your prayers globally using a resource like World News in Prayer.
STAY CONNECTED
Friendship is part of spiritual formation. Support and encourage each other. Pull out your church directory and call someone to check in. Join a small group. Grab lunch together.
Loneliness is one of the greatest epidemics in our culture. Be intentional about building relationships with others.
LIVE GENEROUSLY
Give – not just financially, but with your time and talents.
Support your local congregation’s ministries and look for ways to serve your neighborhood beyond the walls.
Generosity opens our hearts to one another and to God.
DO WHAT YOU CAN, NOT WHAT YOU CAN’T
You may be thinking, “I don’t even have time to go to church on Sunday. How do you expect me to do all of this?”
That’s a fair question.
Spiritual practices are not about adding to an already overcrowded life. They’re about building a trellis so your soul can grow in Christ. As branches on Christ’s vine, we need practices to strengthen us so that we will not be trampled in the mud of restlessness, hurry and distraction.
Branches don’t produce fruit by striving and working harder. They bear good fruit by staying connected to the vine.
This is our first and most important responsibility.
When we stay connected to Christ and to one another in community, we open space for rest, margin, deeper relationships, delight, gratitude, contentment, joy, peace and love.
LIFE BEYOND SUNDAYS
Over these past few weeks, we’ve looked at the changing landscape of church life:
Breaking the shame around absence
Resisting the culture of hurry
Cultivating practices that root us in Christ and in community.
It’s not about the guilt of obligation. It’s an invitation.
The Spirit is always drawing us into deeper connection with God, with one another, and even with ourselves.
“Beyond Sundays” isn’t just a series title, it’s a way of life.
It’s about staying connected, every day of the week.
Helpful Resources:
LECTIO 365 - daily Scripture readings with Lectio Divina - https://www.24-7prayer.com/resource/lectio-365/
PRAY AS YOU GO - daily audio meditations - https://pray-as-you-go.org/
REIMAGINING THE EXAMEN (Loyola Press) - https://reimaginingexamen.ignatianspirituality.com/
WORLD IN PRAYER - https://worldinprayer.org/
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NEXT UP: Still Here: Faith, Family, and the Messy Church
Join me on August 7th as I reflect on the question: Why do I stay in the church?
Why remain part of a community that doesn’t always reflect Christ well? What happens when the Church wounds us, yet God still whispers, “This is your home”?
In the next post, I’ll share why I haven’t walked away from the Church, even after seasons of pain, doubt, and deconstruction, and what it means to stay rooted in a messy, imperfect family of faith.
This is a personal reflection on faith, disappointment, belonging, and the surprising ways grace shows up in the mess.
Thank you for this encouragement, Craig. My daily practice was sporadic, and I still haven't figured out a way for Sabbath to actually feel like rest. Thank goodness we can always start again! Peace to you.
When I practice having Sabbath moments and full Sabbath days, I find myself stronger for that. I become despondent when I don't. Thanks for the reminder. I fast from my phone on my Sabbath day which is usually Tuesdays. Fasting from the phone is harder than fasting from food. And it's worth it.