Love in the church?

My dear friend and mentor shared the following quote with me many months ago.

Theology of chaordic organisation
"Heaven is purpose, principle and people.Purgatory is paper and procedure.Hell is rules and regulations."
Dee Hock describing his theology of chaordic organisation in Birth of the Chaordic Age. (p.146)

Sunday, Caroline was to be an acolyte at the 10 am service. She has been waiting months for this day; Saturday she attended training, and Sunday morning starting around 8 am she was ready to go. She was supposed to be there by 9:45 to robe. We went out to the car where we found the battery was dead. After scrambling around a minute or so, we jumped into another car and arrived at church at 9:50. I was asked to go upstairs and check on some Sunday school classrooms and Caroline went running to robe. Seven minutes later, I was met in the hall with a hysterical (and I'm not exaggerating) child who was told she was too late. She kept saying over and over, "Just take me home." Instead, we went to the doors of the church to go in; alas, the procession still had not begun. In the time we stood waiting, she could have switched the robe from the "stand in" (who was more than willing to give it up), but it did not happen. Caroline and I went into church where she continued to sob which started my tears going; we left to compose ourselves. My heart was breaking and I realized that we both felt unloved and insignificant.

I contrast this to a year ago when I was giving a sermon at our church in England. At the last moment, Chris couldn't be there, so the children would be sitting alone. William became very upset--the same type of sobbing. In a true act of love and compassion, our Vicar took him by the hand and had him join us in the procession. William then spent the service sitting on the altar with me.

What makes one different--it's looking beyond the rules and for that matter past time (would it have mattered if the procession was 2 minutes later this past Sunday). But it's beyond looking past rules it's looking deep into the heart and souls of people. I think the people who do it, don't even realize it's impact. It's Christ's love showing through and for them it's just the right thing to do. I know that rules are important in large organizations, but where do you draw the line? And within a church, aren't we supposed to be the model for other organizations?

Caroline has rebounded from the experience and William has never forgotten he was "allowed" to sit with me. We are one family--how many more families are affected in this way and how many leave a church because they feel unloved? It was unintentional, but that doesn't change the hurt.

This morning my devotional ended with this quote "Church is the school of genuine love--it should be the place where our ability to love is stretched to the limit." Guidelines-Jan-April 2008 (p.125)