‘Reason for hope:’ Virtual services recall church’s earliest days

Sunday morning, Haley Vay Beaman, pastor of University Lutheran Church in East Lansing, sat on the floor of her living room, picked up a well-worn Bible and addressed her congregation via computer and phone screens for the first time.

The church’s first ever “virtual worship gathering,” on Facebook Sunday, had a cozy feeling and a surprisingly hopeful message. Flanked by the ramparts of her own sectional couch, Beaman flashed a reassuring smile. The wall hanging behind her read “I am with you wherever you go.”

“I know this is all scary,” she said as she settled in. “But to me it’s reason for hope.”

Beaman’s church was not the only house of worship disrupted by the coronavirus. The Catholic Diocese of Lansing told members they don’t have to attend Sunday Mass. The Islamic Center of Lansing canceled its Friday prayer services for two weeks and suspended all group events and classes.

All events at Congregation Shaarey Zedek have been canceled until mid-April. The closings are in accordance with the Jewish doctrine of pichuach nefesh, that preservation of life is more important than anything else. (To make the self-quarantine days pass more pleasantly, the synagogue’s website has a helpful list of “The Most Binge-worthy Jewish and Jew-ish Shows on Netflix.”)

Sunday morning, Beaman told her congregation that virtual services like these, along with hundreds of other large and small measures taken throughout the community in the past week, are testimony that people care enough about each other “to help each other avoid a deadly virus.”

Beaman, 34, the congregation’s pastor for more than two years, and her colleagues created the event on the fly, after the church hierarchy urged congregations to find creative ways to hold services without sharing the coronavirus.

Home worship is new to University Lutheran, but not to the church.

“There’s a lot of history there,” Beaman said. “The church began in houses, before people could actively say in public they were Christians because they were persecuted for it.”

And it’s not just a historical parallel.

“In China today, people have to worship in their homes if they identify as Christians,” Beaman said. “That’s the power of house church. It’s been around for centuries, and it’s become a necessity for us in such a time.”

Beaman thought FaceBook would work best for most of her congregation, although she is considering using Zoom next week.

She welcomed comments via Facebook during the “questions” period of the service and acknowledged them all.

“I’m found myself writing my sermon differently, once I knew I was going to interact with people in a different way,” she said. “When I wrote it, I felt like I was having a discussion versus preaching at people.”

Beaman and her staff had already been talking about enhancing worship with technology.

“God only knew we were going to have to be really creative,” she said.

Beaman’s congregation is accustomed to hands-on activity, including work with the Kids’ Hope program in East Lansing, helping underprivileged children at Forest View Elementary.

Members of the congregation’s campus ministry recently got back from an alternative spring break to Tennessee with Habitat for Humanity to help communities that were ravaged by tornadoes.

She has recently moved the church further in the direction of working on social and racial justice issues. The message was evident in Sunday’s virtual service. Beaman followed members’ comments on FaceBook, responding to her questions on what it means to be treated as “other,” and responded to them in real time.

“We’re trying to speak differently in a community that may have been known as traditional in its worship style,” Beaman said.

Most of all, the virtual services preserved the comfort of community in a time of physical isolation.