This weekend was spent in Leeds visiting one half of my pension investment. There isn't much of an asset yet but I have high hopes of a good return.
Of course I am speaking about my darling son Ben. Seriously he is a gem and seems to be settling down to life without my jibes, teasing and humour very well. He still hasn't mastered the art of tact and did manage to put his foot in it a time or two! (Usually with his sister)
Part of the reason for the visit was to try to encourage him to find a new church so off we trotted to what we felt would be a good choice. I cannot name the denomination or actual church for legal reasons. It all started rather well. We had a good welcome and found the required number of seats towards the back of the church (as you do on a first visit). Only problem was we had placed ourselves in front of the church critic. Most have at least one and we were in front of him. His comments on the service content varied from, 'that's wrong' to 'I can't hear'. This hightened our senses and we began searching for other evidence of miscontents. These surfaced in different ways. On the left of the church was the worship band who sang and played only choruses and modern songs. On the right of the church was the pipe organ and organist who only played traditional hymns. Most of the elderly congregation only joined in the hymns and refused to sing the modern stuff. After these observations we, to our shame, began to find all manner of things amusing and as families do, made jokes about and found humour in a lot of what went on. The crowing moment came when a woman with religious terets started to make inappropriate contributions to the children's story (well only one really but I was assuming writers license). Needless to say Ben probably won't be returning.
On a serious note it never stops amazing me that even after 2000 years we still try to make sense of what we feel church ought to be instead of just trusting God's Spirit to do His work in empowering us to be Christ's body. Bless us Lord.
A note to Ben, enjoy the adventure and remember we sent you to Leeds you didn't just go. Shine for Him. We are proud of you son.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
hhmmmmm. Terrible owner of Ben speaking like that about him!! You are as bad as Teapot, she put us on a spin cycle!!
I just could imagine Matt and Chris in a service like that! They would have found it so funny having a contest between the organist and the music group aka "band" that they would have been rolling in the aisles stuffing socks in their mouths!!
Eat your heart out Adrian Plass! It seems to be the kind of place where ANYTHING spiritual is mnisunderstood. I still remember Adrian PLass, in the book, writing about bending down to look for a lost sweet on the floor under his pew, and the person in front of him thought he was in desperate need of prayer and proceeded to "lay hands" on him, praying in a very loud voice!!
Keep on searching !!
PS Watch out as Mrs. Teapot has been bleaching everything in sight today!
Post a Comment