From the Oct 18 newsletter:

Were you there the time when...

...we forgot to put wine and juice in the chalices?
...a 6-year-old almost upstaged Rebecca preaching about sex?
...Ekeng slayed us with a version of Katy Perry's Firework?
...we packed 120 people in a room meant for 50?
...we had karaoke church?
...the Today Show came and recorded worship? (After we brewed our own beer, that is!)
...no one knew how Unwritten actually goes but we made it through anyway?

Especially now that Chelsea's on board, we talk a lot as a staff about why we do church the way we do church. (Like, why anyone would do church the way we do...) It's not that we plan to forget stuff, or to sing a song we don't really know, and yet — it does keep happening. Some of it seems to be our collective personality, and kind of beyond our control. And some of it is in our DNA.

In an early visioning document about Gilead, we made a list of words about who we hoped we'd be: "open-hearted, hospitable, intimate, life-changing, communal, DIY, homemade, homegrown, authentic, roughhewn, handmade." Not that there aren't things we want to get better at, but we never set out to have a polished "product." We set out to make church with you, the people who show up. We think church isn't something you come and simply receive. Church, is something that happens, that you make. (Not that we're blaming you for the thing with the wine and juice...) You make church by and with your presence, singing, laughter, ideas, giving, your stories. And that much, at least, is exactly what we were going for.

Come be part of it all again this week. Otherwise, you never know what you might miss.

We meet every Sunday at Red Line Tap (7006 N Glenwood) at 5 pm. Kids are always welcome; soft drinks are on us; booze is on you. This Sunday is your first chance to meet our new music director. (Come at 3:45 if you wanna sing We Belong to the Light with the pick-up choir; reply to this email if you want us to send the music.) Sunday's storytellers are Gilead's own Ellen Wessel and Jeff Olson, along with Greta Johnsen (whose name and voice you might recognize from WBEZ or her podcast Nerdette). Which one of them was in a knife fight? You'll have to come to church to find out.

Read more newsy-news from the 18th here.