Letter from Inside Out to the Church in Fort Worth

To the onsite Galileo Church in Fort Worth, at the Big Red Barn,

We are the Inside Out community, the online part of your congregation. Grace and Peace be with you, from God whose Wide-Welcome extends further than any boundary the powers and principalities could set, and whose Love draws close to God’s hear more than our finite human minds could imagine.

Some of us used to be onsite and have moved away. We miss you, your physical presence, so much, and we carry you in our hearts every day. Some of us used to be online only, and are now proximate enough to be onsite sometimes—but we have been unwilling to let go of the online community. So we are intentionally both, onsite and online. Still others of us have always been distant—we found this church as an online church, and that is the only way we have ever known it. Some of us have been able to visit; some have not; others have tried, but found it so difficult, it felt as thought the Evil One blocked our travels.

We have heard of the Love and Care you live out daily for our trans and gender diverse siblings in Christ, and your courage and consistency fortifies us to seek justice in our own localities, living God’s love out loud and in public.

We look back on how Galileo started—just a few followers of Jesus in a living room talking and praying and dreaming. We remember how it has grown so steadily since then, and Inside Out feels like a natural expansion of its growth. Neither distance nor pandemic have slowed the growth of this community, which has stayed true to the missional priorities to which Galileo has been called.

We think of you constantly, in our worshipping and in our daily living. We hope you, also, will think of us. We implore you to remember that Galileo Church is not just sitting in the barn, we live in Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, California, Arizona, Colorado, all over Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Alabama, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, North and South Carolina, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Canada. Even though most of us may never experience the Big Red Barn, it—along with all of you—is a part of our lives. We are a part of your lives, too, whether you realize it or not.

We are the liminal spaces. We are the margins and the borderlands. On the outside looking in, and yet also on the inside looking out. Hold us close, we pray, that the spark stirred up in us by the holy fire that burns so bright and hot at Galileo does not flicker out as we live our lives so far from that flame.

We are here. We are part of you and separate from you. We are distant—but only in body—our hearts are there. Our hearts are with you. And with each other. Because we are not just distant from you, we are distant form one another as well.

We are together, too. We laugh and cry, together. We share joy and fear, we celebrate success, and we weep with disappointment. We text one another to figure out what we missed when our rural wifi goes down during worship.

But we can’t hug. We can’t kiss cheeks or give high fives or dance together or bring casseroles or share a meal. We can’t go for coffee or go to the movies or laugh over drinks… but we do it anyway.

We want to see and know Galileo people near and far.

We want to know the God who loves us and is getting the world that She wants.

We want to love Galileo people near and far.

We want to support and love all the spiritual refugees near and far.

We are so thankful for the connections we have with you. When we log on for worship or Zoom calls, there is no difference—the distance dissolves. We can’t imagine what our lives would be like without a connection to Galileo and the people of Galileo, both onsite and online. You pay attention to the big picture and the tiny details and make it work. Inside Out did not happen by accident. And it matters. Real peoples’ lives are made better because you, we, exist. The relationships we have with people in our Galileo groups are so very meaningful. They are different from what we’ve ever experienced in a church community. We co-conspirators of Inside Out have one part of our collective heart anchored to the Barn with you, with Katie, and the other in the world outside of the onsite sphere.

At our retreat this summer, we came up with a few ideas for our life together. We hope you will hear us out and support the direction we feel called to go. We are super over-the-top excited about being a part of this community and helping it to grow and change and become whatever it needs to become. Some of us who were there were reminded of the retreat in winter of 2019, when we realized this is what we needed to do—to go outside the gates of the city. We are ready to keep working.

We are happy to be part of Inside Out. We are proud of our community. We are together, separately. So when you are sitting in the BRB singing, just remember we are singing along too, in some other place. We are part of the body of Christ miles and miles away.

And when you are worshipping onsite, go up to the front, look up, find the camera, and wave. Because we are here. And we are you.

We eagerly await your response in our ongoing relationship. May we all continue to be the hands and feet of Jesus in a world that needs what we’ve got, to the glory of God.