From the WP article:
"Too often "ideal" Christians are social and gregarious, with an overt passion and enthusiasm. They find it easy to share the gospel with strangers, eagerly invite people into their homes, participate in a wide variety of activities, and quickly assume leadership responsibilities. Those are wonderful qualities, and our churches suffer when we don't have those sorts of people, but if these qualities epitomize the Christian life, many of us introverts are left feeling excluded and spiritually inadequate. Or we wear ourselves out from constantly masquerading as extroverts."
There's a lot to think about here. Can we start this conversation? What are your thoughts? Experiences? Great articles? Books?
To be honest, I don't like greeting people. The student leadership team at my high school youth group had to take turns each week greeting people and making sure that the people who stood off in a corner had someone to chat with and felt welcomed. Well, I happened to be one of those people who would prefer to stand off in a corner and would feel just fine there. So I felt foolish walking up to strangers and asking them about their week. What if they wanted to be left alone? Sometimes, I want to be left alone.
ReplyDeleteI recognize that some people need a little bit of prodding in order to open up. But most introverts, like me, take the concept of a "sanctuary" very seriously and aren't that comfortable with hairpin turns on the church atmosphere (i.e. a beautiful worship set ends, and then all of a sudden we have to shake hands with five other people and smile and sit down and try to focus again).
Introverts can be church leaders. But Adam is so right- to try to lead with a facade of bubbly extroversion is incredibly wearying. I've already felt that so far this semester. But because I believe that intentionally building community is very important, I'm not going to stop inviting people to my room to hang out (come visit me!) or not stop to chat if I pass you in the hallway. It's a challenge that I'm willing to tackle for the sake of this community.