‘The good Lord has brought us through.’ One pandemic year in the life of a small church.

A year ago this week, we locked down our rural Montgomery County church due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Last March, I could hardly conceive of the shutdown lasting more than a month. Maybe six weeks, tops. But I thought even that might be tricky. Would the congregation hang around until we returned to our sanctuary? Would we be able to pay the church’s bills?

As it turned out, our church campus has remained largely closed this whole year, except for a handful of outdoor services in the churchyard last fall and very small, ongoing, biweekly indoor services led by an elder.

At long last, later this month — now that our highest-risk church members are getting vaccinated in significant numbers — we will fully reopen our building. Hallelujah. We’ll still have to wear masks and practice social distancing, but we’ll be back.

In the unprecedented 12 months since March 2020, I’ve learned new spiritual truths I didn’t foresee, and seen other, more familiar principles reinforced.

Here are some observations from the pandemic:

▪ It takes as much courage to shut down a church as to keep one open. We heard a lot in the news media from Christians claiming they would keep their churches’ doors open despite public health warnings and state mandates, as a demonstration of their faith. They refused to fear the coronavirus, they said; some refused to even wear masks. To each his or her own. I try not to judge others’ beliefs.

But I can tell you this: it’s just as hard to close your church for months on end, knowing that some people will see it as cowardice or apostasy, and not knowing whether the congregation will dry up and fade away in the meantime. We made our decision after much prayer, and because we believed it was the right thing to do, and we stuck it out for a solid year. To me, that demonstrated a measure of trust in the Lord all its own.

▪ God is faithful. We discovered that our congregation—and its finances—actually increased rather than decreased. We established Sunday online services that drew hundreds, and often thousands, of worshipers. Our Wednesday adult Bible study, which we moved to Zoom, also flourished.

With a bit of innovation by deacons and lay people alike, we were able to continue feeding the poor and celebrating communion. Our musicians posted videos online of themselves performing our church songs solo from their dens.

Each time we ran into a fresh problem, the Lord gave us a fresh solution. It turned out our traditional ways of being a church weren’t the only ways.

▪ Most people are faithful. I remain humbled and grateful beyond expression at how the huge majority of our congregation hung in there. I could count on my fingers the number of times anyone complained. People stayed in touch through texts, Zoom meetings, calls, cards and drive-by horn-honking car caravans. I’m the leader, but they inspired me more than I could have inspired them.

▪ It’s beneficial to sit with our discomfort, fears and impatience. Ironically, sometimes church programs and activities—no matter how well-intentioned—distract us from real spiritual growth. This past year we were largely separated from those usual church routines. Instead, we spent lots of time alone, staring off into the cosmos.

I can’t speak for everyone, but I found God resonant in that silence and stillness, in ways I hadn’t previously experienced. I relearned that, to steal a line from the 17th century English poet John Milton, “They also serve who only stand and wait.”

▪ Nearly all setbacks are temporary. Yes, I say this a lot, but it’s never been truer than with this pandemic: the good times never last—but, bless the Lord, the bad times don’t last, either. Who knows what’s around the next corner? Still, for the moment, it appears COVID-19 might be winding down. I can envision a not terribly distant future where life might seem almost, well, normal again. At some point, we might get to ditch our masks and hug each other in the church’s sanctuary.

Whatever happens in the future, two facts seem clear right now. First, this past year has been a heckuva ride. Second, the good Lord has brought us through.

Paul Prather is pastor of Bethesda Church near Mount Sterling. You can email him at pratpd@yahoo.com.

This story was originally published March 11, 2021 at 1:39 PM with the headline "‘The good Lord has brought us through.’ One pandemic year in the life of a small church.."