This past Saturday my family and I traveled to North Carolina to have a meal celebrating my dad’s birthday. Instead of driving all the way to southern Wayne County, we met my parents in Wilson at our favorite barbecue restaurant, Parkers.
Parkers is a NC institution. It opened in the mid-40’s on Hwy. 301 in Wilson. At the time that section of highway was dotted with Bright Leaf Tobacco warehouses, where local farmers would take their tobacco crop to market. Parkers is very basic. Wooden floors. Wooden chairs. Wooden tables. It is nothing fancy, but in my opinion, it is the best. The food is great, the service is always quick and friendly. You eat “family style” at Parkers, so the food never ends. The wait staff is all teenage boys wearing white shirts, khaki pants and 1950’s style paper hats, another reason why my children love Parkers.
I am drawn to that restaurant for another reason: it has not changed since my childhood. In my mind it looks exactly the same. The food is exactly the same. It is the same experience I remember even from my pre-school days. As we had dinner with my parents this past Saturday, I remembered sitting in that same dining room with my paternal grandparents, my uncles (two of whom are now deceased) all my cousins, and of course my parents and sister. As we sat there with my children this past weekend, it was the same experience. It was familiar, and comforting, I think in a way it felt like home.
I like things that don’t change. I have seen so many things change in the world in only 45 years, there are very few things that have stayed the same. I don’t think it is a stretch to estimate that the octogenarians in our church have probably seen more change in their lifetime than occurred in the previous 250 years. And Parkers has stayed the same.
This is how we frequently look at the practice of our faith. In a world that seems to be changing too quickly to keep up with, the one place we want to stay the same is church. To be able to go back to a place week after week that is familiar and safe, where I know the routine and the rules and the roles, it brings great comfort. The only problem is that we serve a savior who regularly pushes his followers to, well, change. To move on. Move forward. To drop old notions and ideas; to forsake systematic injustices and cruel practices; and to embrace what God is doing in the world. But leaving the familiar for the new unknown is not easy. God is in the business of bringing new life and new hope and new beginnings, but often for that to happen some things must be allowed to die or to be left behind. In order to follow Jesus, sometimes we must leave behind the boat and the nets.
I love all the parts of church that should and do stay the same. The ordinary. But I can never convince myself that everything must stay the same. Because that would assume that everything we do or believe is already perfect. And perfect we are not. So God continues to call and mold and change and challenge.
I guess as a native North Carolinian I am saying that it is okay, even desirable, to change my practice of faith as needed, just don’t change my barbecue.