As the church today gets more and more hip--more and more need-oriented, responding to the buttons that people push in their pews--I find myself longing for more of a historical faith. I find myself not wanting to have everything explained to me in simple terms.

I'm not even sure I want all my needs met as much as I want to meet God, and sometimes I wonder if he's really interested in the noise of our contemporary clamoring. Like my dog who can't seem to get anywhere because he keeps having to stop and scratch his fleas, I wonder if we are so busy scratching where everybody itches that we aren't taking anybody anywhere significant.