If you don’t stop and think first, how do you react? Is your “second nature” reacting the way you want? Do you naturally react well? Or poorly? And what about your habitual reactions to what happens in Church?
The term “second nature” is a little misleading, since there isn’t any first nature. “Second nature” comes from the Latin term “secundum naturam”, meaning according to nature or following nature. In recent centuries it has gained the meaning of habitual. So if something is second nature to you, it is habitual or part of who you naturally are.
Is that good or bad? Both, I think, like with any habit. If you have built good habits, I think that is generally good. For example, I knew my father had developed good habits after he had reached an advanced stage of Alzheimer’s—he continued to exhibit many of the same kind behaviors he had developed over years, despite the frustrations and difficulties of his disease and his inability to communicate. BUT, because of the disease, I am not at all sure that he was choosing to do that. Habits don’t require much, if any, thought. The results of his habitual behavior were good, but they reflect choices he made years before.
What does this have to do with how we act and react in church? I think most of our ways of thinking are habitual. We expect things to happen in a certain way, or talks or lessons to be presented in a particular pattern, with novel elements and engaging examples. And when we don’t get that, we habitually label the talks or classes as “bad.”
Maybe you don’t think that way. I am not saying that happens for everyone. Instead, I’m simply suggesting that all of us should examine how we react and what we think when something happens at church. Do we have habitual reactions? Do we label things as “bad” just because they made us uncomfortable at first blush? Are we actually thinking when we react? Or are we just reacting out of habit?
Fortunately, we can change how we habitually think and react. We can choose how we think, and make that a habitual reaction instead.
So, what are your habitual reactions to Church? How do you participate? Are you thinking about things the way that you want to?
In these posts I am trying to suggest that each of us can have better experiences at Church if we take responsibility for our experiences, and if we are open to learning from what happens by pondering it — by thinking about it in many different ways. We can choose to learn and benefit from what happens regardless of whether it fits our perception of what is “good.” Thinking about our reactions and what we understand allows for revelation and for better understanding.
In this vein, I like the statement that President Hugh B. Brown made in a 1969 BYU devotional, President Hugh B. Brown declared that the Church is “not so much concerned with whether your thoughts are orthodox or heterodox as we are that you shall have thoughts.” We should be carefully considering what we hear at Church, regardless of whether what we heard is right or wrong, orthodox or heterodox.
A lot of our thought depends on how we look at it. It is not different from what many artists figure out—they understand that how you see the world before you is more important than what you see. You might call it ‘active listening’ or shifting perspective. It just means that you see differently. And seeing differently reveals a different world.
In my case, I tend to focus narrowly, thinking about groups of words or sentences, sometimes taking them out of context and thinking about what they say, even if the speaker didn’t intend what I heard. It’s not at all like what we’re taught in school, where the focus is on understanding accurately and completely what the speaker or text says. Its about pulling out useful or inspiring thoughts in spite of what was said.
So, if you aren’t thinking this way, maybe try it next Sunday, or the next time you are in a class or meeting. If you have already thoughts inspired by what happened at church, what are they? How did you react to what happened in Church yesterday? What did you notice? Did you end up thinking differently? Do you think your reactions were what they should be? Were they looking for what God had to tell you? Did your reactions make things better?
This is the latest invitation for reactions to local meetings, continuing a series of weekly posts that started with my post on September 25th about how we receive what happens in Church meetings—sermons, lessons and anything else—and enter a conversation with them, magnifying what was said or adding what we think. In these posts I’m asking us all to think about how we listen and receive what happens at Church. If we only listen for mistakes, or things that bother us, what does that say about us? Is it most important to criticize others? Or to try to change ourselves?
The point here is that no matter how poorly prepared the speaker or teacher is, or no matter how what happens triggers us, or is objectively or doctrinally wrong, we can still find elements in what is said and what happens that inspires and edifies us. Even if church meetings aren’t conducted in a way that reaches us, we can take responsibility and find a way to feel the spirit.
So please, write down reactions and thoughts to what happened in Church. You might keep your own ‘spiritual journal’, or, if you like, you can post your reactions below. I’m adding my own reactions and thoughts as a comment to this post — instead of as a part of this post, because my reactions aren’t any better than anyone else’s.
Let me emphasize that this is NOT a place to criticize what is wrong with church or your fellow congregants. The point is to post what you learned because of what happened at Church or how that led you to think. It’s about the good things we can get out of Church, not the negative things that disturbed or upset us. It doesn’t have to be orthodox, traditional or even on topic.
If you like, make your response in the format, “They said or did this, and I said or thought that.” Even the things you dislike the most can be turned into lessons for what the gospel teaches we should do.
My hope is that these reactions serve as an example of a better way to treat what happens at Church instead of the perennial complaints about speaker or teacher preparation or ability, or complaints that the Church should do things differently.
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