It's been a mad mad month around here, and things aren't getting any saner. I haven't had the time I usually have to blog, which means I haven't really had much time to process lately, which for me is not good. So, I have a long day in the office with a long To-Do list in front of me and I'm going to put it all off a half an hour and do some blogging. Actually I'm going to put blogging on my To Do list. So here they are: three things I want to blog about, take your pick.
1) Worlds of Fun: Christian Edition
This past saturday we went to the "Heartfest" day at Worlds of Fun, our local amusement park. Every ride had at least 30 minute lines and the parking lot was packed with church vans and buses from around the midwest. Surely this would be a great day at Worlds of Fun. We were disappointed. Lots of stories about that, including David Crowder Band's incredibly predictable and uninspired concert, but I just wanted to share this little scene which I feel captures the attitude of a lot of Christians right now: A couple walking through the grassy-hill concert seating area, the one wearing a classic pop-theology, penal-substitutionary-atonement-theory (I think) tee-shirt that said "Jesus died for myspace in heaven" with the word "myspace" using the logo from the popular social networking website. Typical, I thought, but then I had to laugh when I read the t-shirt of the guy she was with; his said "I'm open to suggestions, as long as they're mine." Classic. Nothing like the double barreled shotgun of closed mindedness and narrow mindedness to really express your love of Jesus Christ.
2) Speaking of being disappointed, Tony Jones is Disappointing me. I read on a blog that he was starting up a new website called "rethink Christianity" intended to be "interactive with posts and videos" I thought that sounded cool, so headed over to the site, and I was intrigued by their tag line, an apparent play on the radio shack commercials, it read "We have questions, you have answers." Now that sounds like a nice idea to me, but then I found that the only way I can post my answer is by video. I contemplated the possiblity of using my morning to shoot,edit, and post a video in response to their question, but besides my not having time I felt it was a bit of cheap gimmick. AND the more I post, the more chances I have to win a free iPod! Woooo! I must have this sort of mental filter that kicks in whenever the words "free" and "iPod" are combined in an effort to get me to do something. But this site, it seems, represents the co-opting and corporatization of at least some of the "emergent" church.
3) A few days ago I had an affirming comment about my "job performance" over the past three years at St Luke. The person who made the comment actually didn't realize it pertained to me in any way, but it did. She found out that I worked at "the church next to penguin park" and started telling me about how she used to go to the youth group there, but that she "just felt like another number" and that every time she was there she ended up being asked to talk or do something else that embarrassed her. The group was just too big. And when I arrived at St Luke, I felt the same way: there were almost 40 kids coming on Wednesday nights. Some people may see the fact that we're down under 10 on a regular basis now as a failure of some kind on my part, remarking how sad it is that we have such a small youth group now, but really I think it's much better this way. It's a tricky balancing act in youth ministry, trying to be responsible in doing outreach but at the same time wanting to have a small enough group that a can get to know them all and build relationships. In the end it looks like I chose a small group of close relationships over a large group with high-energy/high-emotion meetings, and I'm glad I did things the way I did. I think the kids in that group are too. Last night was my last official meeting with them, and we had some really nice conversations. I felt good about where we've come from and where the church is headed based on last night's conversation.
