A day in the life of our suitcase church

That Sunday morning began like all others. I removed the seats from our van and loaded the “black monster” – a large, heavy box of sound equipment. I drove to Msgr. Smith School where we meet each week. I arrived at 8:45 a.m. to find the driveway chained and the doors locked. The caretaker had not shown up. Calls to reach a person with keys were unsuccessful. If we were to meet at all, we would have to do so outside, on the blacktop portion of the playground behind the school.

Our first miracle that day was the weather. It was October 26 and warm in Calgary! The forecast predicted a high of plus 18. (Three days later, we awoke to six inches of snow and temperatures in the teens below zero.)

The miracles continued. Our setup team sprang into action, phoning prospective attendees and asking them to bring chairs from home. Jon, a new Christian baptized this summer, went to the local Wal-Mart on his own initiative and bought out their entire supply of fold-up canvas lawn chairs. We found one exterior electrical outlet to power a keyboard. We used two acoustic guitars, unplugged, and someone ran home to get a small drum that hangs from a strap around the neck and is played by hand. Our worship leader, who craves order and planning, discarded her entire set list and chose some familiar songs that would not require our usual PowerPoint projection system.

I abandoned my message for the day. Instead I invited the roughly 100 people in our “cathedral of the sky” to a 1 Corinthians 14 format. Anyone prompted by the Spirit could offer a word of encouragement, a Scripture, a song, and so on. The response was amazing.

A pre-Christian man who attends my Alpha group was the first to speak. He celebrated his opportunity to lift the spirits of a dejected man at his workplace that week. Nicole followed with an amazing story of her four-month-old niece with Down’s Syndrome who has survived eight surgeries in her short life. Little Olivia has been used to bring her father to Jesus and God’s joy to many others.

Quiet Waldo stunned us by standing to speak of God’s healing in his life, not just through painful back surgery but in his wounded heart and marriage as well. He urged our men to follow him in a renewed commitment to their spouses and children. Jessica, another new believer baptized this summer, cried openly over the painful lives of her abused friends and relatives. We prayed for them and for all of our neighbours who struggle without God’s hope in Jesus.

Our Creator brought us outside to sing and shout His praises toward His majestic mountains on the western horizon. The music seemed to echo off the snow-capped peaks. Neighbourhood parents who brought their children to the playground on the unusually balmy October Sunday morning got to hear the joyful praises of God’s people wafting into the open air. Pamela, a searching young woman attending for the first time, sat in the front row with the most incredible smile on her face.

Many people told me later that this had been their favourite day yet in The River. Several told me they sensed God’s Spirit blowing among us, awakening us to His presence. Some said it was the first time they had ever experienced church with all of their senses.

Some were sure that our Enemy had planned to throw us off stride, hoping we would cancel church and head off in isolation to the nearest Tim Horton’s. But God transformed obstacles into an opportunity to meet the living God in spirit and truth.

Curt Snell is pastor and church planter with The River, a church begun in southeast Calgary in 1999 as part of Mission Calgary.