By Amy Butler
“Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away.” The woman’s cigarette-roughened voice, harsh and grating, echoed off the limestone of the National Portrait Gallery building. You could hear the wistful tone in her song, mixed together with some regret and, I think, a good amount of defiance.
I would have heard the singing even if I’d been inside the church office, but I happened to be out on the sidewalk that afternoon along with what seemed like everybody else in downtown Washington. A humidity-free day with a temperature in the low 80s in D.C. in late August, after all, must not be overlooked. I myself was busy walking to an afternoon meeting when the notes wafted my way.
I heard her before I saw her: “Now it looks as though they’re here to stay. Oh, I believe in yesterday.” The almost-on-key melody got louder as I turned the corner and saw her sitting on the National Portrait Gallery steps waving a tattered sign that read, “Homeless Please Help,” while holding out a plastic cup to the streams of pedestrians walking by.
Hearing her song, I started thinking about these next few weeks at church. We’re kicking off a year-long celebration of 150 years as a congregation, a grand history that fills several books and a whole archive room of file cabinets and storage boxes. There’s a lot to tell in the story of this congregation’s yesterdays, and depending on who’s telling them tales of the church’s history can sound almost legendary.
Like most churches, this one has a history filled with grand accomplishments and soap opera-worthy human drama. We also have the added intrigue of historical events in the nation’s capital.
There’s a lot to remember and claim as legacy, for sure, and knowing our story of faith is a critical piece to honing our identity as a congregation. Telling our corporate story of the life of faith can be a powerful, community-building experience.
My musings were interrupted just then, as the sidewalk serenade continued, louder: “Suddenly, everybody’s being mean to me. I wish things were like they used to be.”
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I’m no Beatles expert, but when I heard that stanza I thought: “Hey, wait a minute. Those aren’t the real words to the song, are they?”
I checked; they’re not. Those words were, of course, a personal lament for the way things used to be — her personal version of “Yesterday.”
“Oh, I believe in yesterday!” the woman on the sidewalk concluded with conviction.
The woman’s personal rendition of the song reminded me that a grand history can be a handicap, too. The past can loom so large it obscures future possibilities or, worse, hides present realities.
Looking at life only through the lens of the past has a tendency to skew our vision of the present. It paints a history where reality becomes blurred and excessive energy is spent wishing we could go back to the good old days: Everything was wonderful. The church was filled with tithers. The pastor was a much better preacher.
Ah, yesterday.
It’s understandable that churches sometimes become transfixed by their past. Many times the present is too complicated to see a clear way through. Fear and uncertainty about the future can be overwhelming. It’s safer and much easier to spend energy talking about the good old days.
But when we do, we can end up rewriting history, composing new stanzas to the old song. Committed attention to the past sometimes results in less-than-accurate memories, rose-tinged remembrances of a time when, let’s be honest — even if the preacher was better — we had the same challenges we have now, just with different trappings.
There’s nothing wrong with longing for yesterday, as Paul McCartney sang. Our congregations have great stories of faith and fellowship that undergird our current realities as the church.
But let’s not forget that God’s faithfulness in the past stands there, grand and legendary, for the purpose of leading us to remember God’s faithfulness right here and now and into whatever lies ahead.