However, the BEST edible surprise came in the form of my most treasured possession!
That's right! A cake in the shape of Truman! It's was awesome! It tasted just as sweet as I expect the real Truman would!
To my girls in Jax, thanks for such a great night. It means a lot to me that you fully understand and support my extreme obsession with my dog! I love you all!
On to church this morning..... I'll make this brief, but I welcome your thoughts.
I worship at a fairly large, conservative (read: old) Church of Christ. While I don't necessarily agree/or disagree with all of the traditional CofC 'policies', and have visited multiple other churches in the area, I love the message from the pulpit minister and have found a great support group of women and surrogate mothers through this church family.
A few months ago the church's original pulpit minister (who was very fire & brimstone) retired, and the Youth & Family's preacher (who is awesome) filled that position, which leaves an opening for an associate minister.
All that to say, we had a 'guest' praise and worship leader today. (I'm assuming the elders are testing people out to fill the position. This guest, however, was a very energetic young fellow, who I can only describe as over-caffeinated. ) So after one of the elders led the congregation in a few opening songs (Dad, you would have approved they were very traditional) this guest praise leader gets before the congregation and proceeds to lead a few more songs. He steps in front of the church, briefly introduces himself, then literally cranked up his microphone and vocally jammed out to "What a Fellowship". He snapped his fingers at the church a few times to encourage us to speed up in our tempo, and walked up and down the aisle to sing-a-long with fellow parishioners. While most of us younger members were somewhat enjoying this unorthodox style of singing, it was clear on the faces of the older founding members of the church, this was appalling. It was so appalling in fact to the older couple to my right, the gentleman slammed down him hymnal, grabbed his wife's elbow and stormed out of the sanctuary mid verse!
Now, I can't say that I would enjoy having this young man leading me every Sunday, but I knew it was just for today, just for these two songs, and that a great message from the Word was on its way. My initial thought was to go after that man and ask him, who at that moment did he think had just won his heart. Jesus or Satan? (but who am I to ask that!)
To me, it was just a song, led by someone who is young, and drinks too many double shot venti espressos. To me worship time, as a whole, is about fellowship, a message, a time to rest my soul with other believers. I find it difficult to understand, why people get so distracted and overwhelmed by 'church stuff' instead of letting themselves be overwhelmed and distracted by the amazing Grace and Mercy so freely given by Jesus. I don't understand why background noise or human imposed rules outshine the beautiful words of our Savior! I don't understand how such a wide spread intolerance of "it must be this way, cause that's how it's always done" (not a direct quote by the way) can overshadowed the message of unconditional love.
That man who took his wife and left missed such a great message today! (Ironically 1 Corin 12:12-26)
I know there are too many opinions to count on this matter. But, I hope next time I come across something that is unconventional to me in terms of worship, instead of storming out, I hope I'll stop looking for it to be my way and check to see if its God's way.
4 comments:
Interesting worship story. It sounds like the older guy overreacted a bit, but I have a thought about what caused him to storm out.
I used to lead singing sometimes at a church I went to in college, and as time went on I'd throw in little tidbits of information about the songs, crack jokes, and in general become practically an emcee of the service.
But at some point I realized what I was really doing: I was really enjoying making myself the focus of the worship service. In later years there, I switched to leading singing in as low-key a way as possible, sometimes even just starting the song and leading with my voice, then turning to face the same way as everyone else so it wouldn't be as if they were singing to me.
I think this may explain what the grumpy old guy was reacting to. By leading singing in such an overenergetic, in-your-face manner, the overcaffeinated young guy was drawing far too much attention to himself, even though he wasn't supposed to be the focus of the worship service.
Interestingly, this principle explains a lot of why liturgical churches do things as they do. For instance, priests don't choose what they wear; they wear specific liturgical robes based on the season in the church calendar. This means that whatever church you go to, the priest looks very similar (especially from the back); it helps you think of him as "the [generic] priest" instead of a specific person, and you're less distracted. Many liturgical practices are similarly designed to remove our individuality so that we focus on God instead of ourselves.
Well said, Jeanne. A lot of things fall into place when we focus on worshipping God and not all the man-made technicalities of that. Bon Voyage!
Oh girl--Good ol'COC or is it CoC no wait is it coC, cause you know that's an issuse for people these days too. Sadly, I am not shocked at all by the reactions you got. I think YOU would have had every right to have said your comment to that couple, but I am not always in the right in my decisions. How does he know what that song leader was trying to accomplish, yes maybe he was trying to direct attention to himself, or maybe he was trying to encourage the congregation (to step out of their comfort zone) to praise God, in the same, but different, way that a traditional song leader would have you stand up or sit down during different songs.
We are currently going to a Christian Church, and are loving many thing about. We did not seek out a Christian Church when we moved here. I mean come on Jon and I both grew up in "The Church," (I hate it when the Church of Christ is refered to as "The Church.") believe me we tried out ALL of them within a 30 minute drive of us first, you stick with what you know, but they were just not for us. So long story short, too late, we are currently not attending a Church of Christ. I am thankful for the opportunity God has put in front of us opening our eyes to different ways to worship Him. We have a band, and some Sundays I feel we are really rocking out, and on those days I find myself missing accapella singing, but most Sundays I love the singing (and the band but keep that on the DL). To sum up...why can't we all just get along? :-)
Anyways I have taken up too much space on your blog.
Looks like you had an awesome party, what sweet friends. Good luck, take care, and may God bless you and those you meet.
Jeanne, I just wanted to wish you blessings as you set out to leave! God has prepared your way, I pray your heart will be forever changed! I am SO proud of you. Take care of yourself!
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