Eulogy for the Gate

Last night, the Gate closed its doors.

It was just over four years ago that a handful of people gathered in my living room for burgers and to talk about a new church we were starting.  Some of those folks were still with us when we first walked into Hurricane Harry's for the first night of worship as the "church in a bar."  It was different and somewhat odd at first.  I'd frequently get migraines from the smell of old cigarette smoke that had dug itself into the walls.  It was hot in the summers, and cold in the winters.  Week in, week out we'd set up and tear down.  Sometimes it was one or two of us, sometimes four for set up, but it was always the whole church for tear down.  It was there that we first really began to bond.

Over the years, we added a few more people to the church.  By last night, we'd had almost a dozen different people lead worship from time to time, we'd had a half dozen nights where the students spoke, we'd observed the Lord's Supper through a night of music we called Restoration at least twelve times.  We'd served at Big Event- the service project A&M students do in March- three times.  The first time we found a home where the wife signed up without the husbands' knowledge.  So we moved a massive dog house across a mud filled yard that had just been trenched for new water lines.  We'd served at food pantries, and helped with a city-wide youth service that got rained out so it moved to a nearby church, despite the speakers and some of the bands leaving early.

We never figured out how to consistently get out sound system to work.

Those were the things we did, but they are not who we are.

Who we are is more complicated.  We are Baptist, Catholic, Anglican, Church of Christ, Methodist, Non-Denominational, Charismatic, and other things I can't recall.  We love sports, knitting, comic books, video games, working on computers, art, music, building things, playing games, serving people, and eating.  We were the cool kids in high school, we were the outcasts.  We were pastor's kids, we never went to church much.  We only listen to Christian music, we never listen to Christian music.  We are shy and reserved, cautious in beginning relationships, and averse to physical touch- we are boisterous and friendly and love to hug.  We like to talk and debate theology, we just like to rest on faith.

We are all sorts of people.

We are the in-between people.

And because the people we are is what the Gate is, the Gate is not dead.

Well, not permanently.

When the Gate began, we wanted it to be a church led by college students, but they would be acting pretty much just in the vision of we the leaders.  We wanted to reach students, we wanted to share Christ with them like Paul said- " I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means  I might save some. (paraphrased)" - 1 Corinthians 9:23.  But we had trouble getting into the mindset of college students.

So, why not let the students cast the vision?

To do this meant that there had to be major changes.  No slight and subtle shifts, it had to be fresh start to ingrain this mentality at birth.  The church needed to re-start, to re-boot.

To resurrect.

Like Christ died and lay in the grave for three days, the Gate died and will lay in the 'grave' for three months.  And then, on August 26, 2012, the church will rise.  We do not yet know what she will look like, how she will act.  We know her theology, her place of meeting and her name, but the rest is still in the hearts of the students and young adults who are starting this church with us.

The Gate is the people who are inhabited by the Holy Spirit and connected to each other by this community called the Gate.

And that is why we yet live!