The Real Deal

Went to a church service like none I've ever been to this morning. The service was held in the foyer section, much to mine and K's surprise – we were hoping to slink in to a back pew somewhere, unnoticed. Instead, we walked straight into a room full of people. Hung around near the entrance for a while, before we realised that was a dumb spot to stand for a couple of new people trying to blend in – we accidentally became the welcoming team for a few minutes there. Quickly went to find a seat at one of the tables in case someone tried to pin a 'Hi, I'm Rebecca!' badge on my front, and sign me up to chair the welcoming team's committee meetings on the penultimate Tuesday of every month.

While we were waiting for the service to start, I flicked through a church bulletin I'd found on the table in front of me. Most of it was the usual yada yada – what's on this week, tithe targets, praise and prayer points, and the ubiquitous hall of fame on the back cover. But there was one article that particularly caught my eye. I hope the author doesn't mind if I copy the article here. This is what it said:

"Is This A Sign Of A Dying Church???

I write this editorial with a heavy heart, burdened with a sense that all is not well in [this church]. Take a look around and count how many of you are here in church today? Where have all the others gone? Why are they not here?

I cannot try to offer reasons for their absences except that I can only hope that they have not chosen to miss church for some trivial excuses. This does not detract from the fact that our pews are getting emptier each week, and if this is not a worrying sight, then be prepared to see a sign on the door of church one Sunday saying: "No Church Today Due to Insufficient Numbers, Please Go & Do Church Somewhere Else!" Are we prepared for this to happen? There are already signs of this happening on long weekend Sundays, when everyone supposedly goes away?

I will confess that I have been rather disillusioned by what has been talked about in church over the past few weeks. I was not impressed by a visiting speaker telling me that church is no longer sacred, and we should be thinking "Outreach, Outreach, Outreach!" While I acknowledge that as Christians, we should not be an exclusive group and shun the non-believers, I take offence to the suggestion that it is better to outreach than to attend church on Sunday. If that is the case, I shall be looking for a nice shady tree in a park next Sunday, bringing a large picnic rug and lunch, and inviting some stranger in the park to come share my rug, my lunch & do "outreach". "Nothing wrong with that", I hear some of you remark, but the bottom-line here is not all of us are cut out to do outreach, or want to do outreach. Some of us prefer to come to church to worship the Lord, be inspired, motivated, and encouraged by a Biblical message and cherish our time of being able to be in the Lord's temple. After all, is not the church the "Body of Christ"?

What are you getting out of church these days? Have you made your thoughts or expectations known to the Elders, your Home Group, your spouse, your fellow brother or sister in church? Or will you just slip quietly away to another church to find more meaningful worship & hope things will improve at [this church]? Are you losing your church before your very eyes? Can you afford not to say or do anything and let [this church] meet her inevitable demise? I sensed that these are troubled times at [this church]…

(Disclaimer: Views expressed in this editorial are not necessarily a representation of the views of other members in [this church]. This editorial is meant to generate discussion, reflection, and quiet meditation before the Lord.) – EDITOR"

Felt a bit like a rabbit that had accidentally hopped onto a shooting range. Didn't have much time to contemplate the article before a guy with a microphone started ahem-ing and shuffling papers up the front. Didn't hear much of what he said for the first few minutes, because all I could think about was his ENORMOUS BEARD. I've never seen a beard that big. Soon snapped out of my beard fixation when I realised that he was introducing what was to be a very serious time of discussion.

Pastor Beard went on to outline some feedback he'd been getting from people in the church lately, and told us he was about to set a few things straight. He drew a diagram on the white board that looked like this:

He explained that he believed that most Christians had a tendency to separate the different components of their lives into sections – work, church, God, family, marriage, social life, etc. It wasn't often that the components intersected. Church and God in particular are not often seen as having anything in common with the world, but rather as a refuge from it. Then he drew a different diagram, one that looked like this:

The dark grey area, he explained, was the goal – that was the ideal place to be. He urged the congregation to view their lives holistically, and not in separate, irreconcilable sections. He wasn't saying to embrace the world, but rather accept that we are all a part of it, and to see all aspects of our lives as a part of our walk with God, and not just the churchy stuff. He said that in Australia, one thousand churches a year close down. If the church didn't change their mindset sooner rather than later, then there wouldn't be a church left at all. Pastor Beard then opened the subject up for discussion. All sorts of opinions were aired. A lot of people wholeheartedly agreed with him. Others leaned more towards the aforementioned newsletter article, seemingly more worried about what they were or weren't "getting out of church". People got fired up. Discussions were had. After about an hour, everyone prayed in groups and then had some lunch together.

This was all very interesting as an outsider. The thing that struck me the most about the whole thing was that this church (or the pastor at least) wasn't afraid to admit, even in the presence of visitors, that things weren't as great as they could be. Nobody was pretending that things were perfect. Nobody seemed afraid to be themselves, or to say what they thought. Some might have seen it as division in the ranks – I saw it as a place where it was okay to be where you were at. It made me want to be a part of it. Mainly because the thing that puts me off church the most are the people/congregations that pretend they have it all together. I don't want to be a part of a church that has it all together! I'd only come along and wreck it. The sort of service that I attended today was, in my opinion, the real thing. People being vulnerable. Leadership being vulnerable. Not pretending to know all the answers, but willing to be open to whatever those answers might be. Sign me up, I say. Am I climbing aboard a sinking ship? I'm not sure. I guess time will tell.

Eurobeat

I just did something a little bit gay. I auditioned for a musical called Eurobeat, based on the Eurovision song contest. I saw it in the paper on Saturday and thought, "what the hell?" Might be fun. Something to amuse myself, and maybe meet some people around this one horse town. So I hopped on Gus in the freezing cold and headed to Newstead College where the auditions were being held.

It was the kind of audition where you just bowl up, fill in a form about great works you've done in the past, and wait until your group of people is called. I filled in the form, and sat on the floor, trying to blend in with the wall. There were probably about thirty people in the waiting area, the vast majority of which were teenage girls. So there was nothing to look at besides acres of ass cleavage and bad mullets. Oh, and the occasional archetypical gay guy minced past, laughing gaily over his shoulder at some dry witticism spouted by the archetypical gay guy's best friend – the Outgoing Overweight Female. Everyone seemed to know someone else, except me. Waiting was pretty boring. But it amused me to find that even though it's been years since I've been involved in musical theatre, the kinds of people they draw obviously haven't changed a bit.

I went in with the third group of people, and the first thing we did was learned a simple dance routine. I felt like an elephant. But I had fun all the same. Then they made us sing one by one. I sang my favourite song to sing at the moment, At Last – the Eva version. I sounded like an elephant. But I had fun all the same. I don't think I was outrageous enough, though. Everyone else I auditioned with was trying to outdo each other in outrageousness. One lady even slunk on the floor like a snake as she sang her prepared song. I think she was trying to look sultry. I guess if there was a male snake in the room, it might have felt turned on.

There's something both demoralising and empowering about doing all these things by myself. I really want to meet people, so I'm trying to not be scared and just get out there and do stuff, even when nobody I know wants to come with me. But nobody ever wants to talk to the person who's sitting alone. It's heaps easier to meet people when you're already with people that you know. So you can't win – it's like having to ring up to get the phone connected. But at the same time, I wasn't as nervous tonight as I thought I'd be – I guess I just figured that nobody knew me, so I had nothing to lose.

I probably won't get a part. But maybe I will! The director mentioned that there might be some nudity involved for some of the parts. If I land a part, I hope I get to flash my boobs.

Happy Clappers

Wasn't going to go to church on Sunday, but ended up there anyway. Not that I got dragged kicking and screaming mind you, but I sort of tagged along with someone else before I really realised what I was doing. It was one of those churches that everyone knows because of the guy who runs it, but it's still got some token ambiguous Christian-sounding name (usually with the word 'life' in it somewhere). You say to someone, "I went to Launceston Life Church on the weekend". Blank stare. "Um, you know, Joey Jo Jo Shabadoo's church". Instantly, their eyes brighten with recognition. And of course, they'll have a highly thought out opinion already prepared about Joey Jo Jo Shabadoo's church, even if they've never been there themselves.

• Walked in slightly late, to a packed auditorium. Was greeted at the door by a middle aged woman, who crinkled her eyes right on cue, and put on her best 'full 'o joy' expression. Then, quick as a flash, my tonsils nearly got a paper cut courtesy of a church bulletin being rammed down my throat. Welcome to church! Had I been before? No? Well, I'd better have a contact card then! More paper ammunition headed straight for my face. I ducked just in time and went to find a seat. Like, contact cards are like, so 2006.
• All the seats were taken, dammit. Suggested joining the throng of people on stage. We probably would have blended into the crowd up there quite nicely. A bit too much jumping/boob bouncing for my liking though. Chose some seats in the back row instead. Ended up sitting behind a young kid who looked like a frog, who stared at me through the whole service.
  
• My highlight was the power going off during a Powerpoint presentation. Felt like standing up and prophesying that it was God's way of showing people not to have boring slide shows in their church services. But then I remembered I wasn't wearing a hat, so I thought I'd better not.
• Went to find the toilet (snuck out while every head was bowed and every eye closed, with everyone locked in the shampoo position). Accidentally walked into the kid's church room instead. They were playing some lame follow the leader game. Exited the room just in time to hear one kid whine, "what's the point of this stupid game?" Felt like taking the kid aside and telling her to get used to it – that she'd probably be lamenting those very words for the rest of her churchgoing life.
• I'm struggling to think of an object, person or concept that didn't receive a round of applause at some time during the service. Give the Lord a round of applause. Give the band a round of applause. Give the kids going to kid's church a round of applause. Give that last round of applause a round of applause. Sat on my hands obstinately, in case they developed a life of their own.
• At one point, someone spiritual instructed us to lift our hands towards the front to pray for something or other. Grabbed K's arms and lifted them right up for him, making them do a muppet dance. Ha ha.
• Learned that growing is about numbers. And not even numbers of new converts – just numbers of people attending. Well, that doesn't sound so hard! Why not just go and flog a whole heap of existing Christians from other churches? That would be the easy way to do it. Besides, those Christians probably weren't being used or fulfilled in their church anyway. Surely it's the best thing for everyone.
• There was cake at the end! Triple brownie points for food. It was nice cake too. Got talking to some people we know, and ended up being some of the last to leave – not sure how that happened, but I don't want it to happen again. Don't wanna look too keen… keep em guessing, I say.

Not big on the concert style service, myself. It was kind of like, "sorry God, can we chat later? I don't want to miss anything". But the pastor is a genuine guy, so I really hope it all goes well for him. It's just not my thing/cup of tea/scene. 2 Joy Gems. **

Like Minded People

Today at work we decided it was Casual Clothes for No Cause Day. We'd all had a pretty tiring week, so we thought an informal day was in order. What a difference it made! I was happy all day. I was comfortable, and I felt like myself. Lunch time rolled around, and I suggested we grab some pizzas to share, instead of our usual trek down to Mike's Country Kitchen (who, incidentally, make roast lamb rolls that are almost as good as the ones at the Fairway Coffee Lounge in Devonport). We got three Pizza Hut pizzas, and they were really nice. Everyone told me what a great idea it was to get pizza. I felt useful. Yay for today!

I got a text message in the afternoon from the girl I met at The Church That My Boss Goes To, asking if I wanted to come and hang out at the pub with a bunch of "like minded people". The same girl had invited me to a prayer meeting a couple of weeks ago. I really wanted to go to the prayer meeting, not to pray, but to hang out with "like minded people" (even though the term "like minded people" is totally wanky). But I didn't end up going. I don't think I'm ready for prayer meetings yet. There are too many things that happen in them that annoy me. Like people who go "mmm. Mmm" in agreement every five seconds. I want to smash 'em. And people who rock back and forth. What's the deal with that? And the other people, apart from me, who pray with their eyes open. You constantly find yourself catching their eye, and then it's all awkward, coz you were supposed to be talking to God, and instead you're looking at some random dude across the room. It's very off-putting. And people who say "Lord" a million times, as though God doesn't realise they're praying to him… or perhaps to remind themselves that that's who they're praying to. And people who tell you the facts of a situation WHILE THEY'RE PRAYING… as though God doesn't know what's going on! "Lord, we come before you Lord, just to ask, Lord, that you will look after Bob, Lord. Lord, Bob is going through a rough time at the moment, Lord, what with his wife going into hospital last night after breaking her leg, Lord. ("mmm. Mmm.") Lord, we ask that you would be with the children, Lord, as they are being looked after by the next door neighbours, Lord, who are going through issues of their own, Lord…" blah blah blah. And someone's always got to clap the end of the meeting. It's not over until someone claps. Eyes open – everyone looks at each other blearily, stretching – "Amen!" CLAP. Aaargh!

No, I'm definitely not ready for prayer meetings.

Anyway, we went to the pub. It was really cool – we met some great people. Like minded people even. I chatted to the girl I'd met, and another girl that I recognised from Ulverstone. And I gave a guy my phone number (ooh err) and he's going to call me to see if I want to be a part of a Bible-talking-about group thingie. Better blow the dust off it if I'm gonna be a part of something like that!

Gotta go now. There's a show on SBS called "Turn Me On: The History of the Vibrator". Time for watching a bit of SBS soft porn with K.

99 Things About Me

I don't like those forward things that you see in your inbox at least once a week. So I made up my own. If you don't like it, I don't care.

1. My name is Rebecca Claire.
2. Apparently, I came very close to being called Jessica. Ugh.
3. I play the alto saxophone.
4. I play the drums too, but I'm not very good.
5. My first job was at McDonalds when I was 15.
6. I worked in a service station for 8 years.
7. I have also worked as a cook in an Italian restaurant, as a singing tutor, and making handmade paper products.
8. I am scared of wasps.
9. I never loved anyone until I met K.
10. When I was a kid, I wanted to be an author.
11. I suffer from anxiety.
12. I have been married for nearly seven years.
13. K and I never dated. We went from friends to engaged.
14. I have a black cat called Ezzie.
15. I have never been drunk.
16. I hate being cold. I feel the cold easily.
17. I think jewellery is a waste of money.
18. I believe the world is less than ten thousand years old.
19. I love to sing. I wish I did it more often.
20. I have a birthmark shaped like Australia on my neck. It has Tasmania and everything!
21. I am an exhibitionist. Wanna see my boobs?
22. I never, EVER want to have children.
23. I cry a lot.
24. I went to Uni but didn't complete a degree. I want to go back to Uni one day.
25. I have a sister and a brother. I am the eldest child.
26. I prefer slippers to shoes.
27. I lost my virginity when I was 15.
28. I hate Mother's Day. I'm not a fan of Christmas either.
29. I love my job. It stresses me out, but I still love it.
30. I like to draw, but I haven't done it in ages. People kept asking me to draw things, and it eventually killed my desire to do it.
31. I loved school. I got great marks.
32. I'm supposed to wear contact lenses, but I don't.
33. I love anything peppermint.
34. Birds make me happy. Especially galahs and cockatoos. I hate to see birds in cages.
35. I'm not very polite. I rub people up the wrong way. I alternate between being devastated by this, and not giving a shit.
36. I think films are boring.
37. I ride a scooter called Gus.
38. Music I like includes Lauryn Hill, Billy Joel, Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, Eva Cassidy, Pete Murray, Darren Hanlon, Dave Brubeck, Jack Johnson and Roxette.
39. I think it's boring when people tell me what music they like.
40. It's even more boring when they tell me about dreams they've had.
41. I'm a glass half empty kind of person. So sue me.
42. Colourful things make me happy.
43. I talk in my sleep.
44. K has never bought me flowers. Flowers are a waste of money, and belong in the garden. Whose dumb idea was it to pick them and bring them inside anyway?
45. I'm not interested in travelling whatsoever.
46. My parents divorced when I was 12.
47. I left home when I was 15.
48. I have compassion for animals, but very little compassion for humans.
49. I seem to get on better with males than I do with females.
50. I'm highly strung and don't cope with stress very well at all. I don't think I'm a very strong person.
    
51. I'd like to get a tattoo one day, but I probably won't.
52. I had braces in my mid twenties, and have more teeth with fillings than without.
53. I like sunbaking naked.
54. I've never felt like I fitted in anywhere. That's such an emo thing to say.
55. I have a Game Boy.
56. I think global warming is a load of crap.
57. Before I met God, I was considering a career as a prostitute. Not that I was a slut or anything – I was emotionally dead anyway, and I thought it would pay a lot for little effort.
58. When I'm old I want to live in an old people's home.
59. I like to swear. Fuck shit bugger.
60. Plants don't tend to live very long under my care.
61. I can do this thing where if I have two objects that are identical but are different colours (like lollies, or pen lids, etc), I can mix them up, put one in each hand, and I can tell what colour is in which hand without looking. I don't know how.
62. I hate marshmallows.
63. I'm damn lazy and I hate exercising.
64. I love Indian food – the hotter the better.
65. I had my ears pierced when I was six, but haven't worn earrings since high school.
66. I'm a spelling Nazi.
67. When I get home after work, the first thing I do is put on my slippers, my favourite fleecy trousers and a stripy thermal top. I usually take my bra off too.
68. I feel like I do most of the housework, and it annoys me.
69. I can't sleep with my mouth closed.
70. Rattles in cars drive me nuts.
71. I'm a night person.
72. I hate cooking. I'd eat out every night if I could.
73. I'm not afraid of people.
74. I won $100 in a poster competition when I was in Grade 6.
75. I love to drink tea. Black, no sugar. My current favourite is Chai. I carry teabags in my handbag so that when I go to cafés, That way, I only have to get a cup of boiling water and it doesn't cost me anything.
76. I don't like sleeping away from home.
77. Sometimes I know things have happened without anyone telling me.
78. I'm scared that life is passing me by, and I'm missing out on some big opportunity or something, and that I won't fulfil my purpose on earth. I have no idea what that purpose might be, or if there even is one.
79. I have big tired looking bags under my eyes that are there and have always been there no matter how much sleep I get.
80. I have never broken a bone.
81. I can raise one eyebrow.
82. Sometimes I wish I was dead.
83. I never cry in movies.
84. I've been singing in the Burnie Christmas Carols for five years.
85. I don't like people shortening my name.
    
86. I love K, but I still find other guys attractive.
87. I once played a lead role in a musical.
88. I wear Sunflowers perfume every day.
89. I used to be a singer in a band. It was fun while it lasted.
90. One day I want to write a book.
91. I am very critical of myself and others.
92. I smoke sometimes. Rarely.
93. Every time I have a cup of tea, I get a new cup out of the cupboard.
94. After I got married, I put on six kilos. I now weigh 54 kilos.
95. I have a terrible long term memory.
96. I can keep a secret.
    
97. I like to break into dilapidated buildings and explore them.
98. I really want people to like me and enjoy being in my company. But only people that I like. The rest can bite me.
99. I have no strong dreams, visions, desires or passions in life.

I would have had 100 things, but the number 100 was too big and so the text didn't line up with all the rest, and that bugged me. I can't remember what it was that I deleted. Probably just more bullshit.

Time Warp

Man I had a crap week last week. I cried at work three days out of five. Go me. On Tuesday I cried three times. Two of those times were about the same thing. I don't even remember what it was now! It was obviously pretty life threatening. My poor male co-workers. Ha ha ha.

K and I went to church last night. It's slowly starting to dawn on me that I am probably never going to find a church whose service I enjoy. The main reason for this is because they are all so BORING ("it's not me, it's you"). You take a group of perfectly nice people, all shapes and sizes, all sorts of different personalities, chuck em in a church service, and WHAM – instant homogenisation. What are people afraid of? Enjoying their lives? Being themselves? Heaven forbid! I'm not entirely sure why I'm even going. Why am I? Something is compelling me to. Not sure why, but heck, I'll run with it. At least it gives me something to write about.

We ended up going to City Life Christian Community Life Family Life Church (name homogenised to protect true identity). This church was randomly selected by means of having the most boring ad in the paper. And is brought to you by the number six. Man's number. Bwahahahaha.

• Opening the front door quietly, K and I were hoping to be able to sneak into a back row relatively unnoticed. Upon entering the auditorium, we snuck into a back row all right, but unnoticed we were not – being two of only nine people in the entire room kinda makes you stand out, visitor or not.
• As we perched on our turquoise plastic school chairs, I felt like I'd entered some sort of time warp. So much so that I half expected archaeologists, complete with film crew, to come tiptoeing onto the stage, whispering, "folks, here we have a perfectly preserved room AND congregation, untouched for some thirty years. Note the orange and brown paint on the walls, middle aged members resplendent in period attire of acid wash jeans, sneakers and fleecy jumpers with collars. And here's a delightful specimen – a mural of what appears to be the Lord, looking serene whilst leaning on a shepherd's crook, gazing out over the city". The mural was a talking point between K and I – he insisted the white blobs in the distance were houses. I was sure they were sheep. They had to be sheep; otherwise the whole shepherd theme would have been a little redundant, surely.
• A guy up the front was singing when we arrived. As soon as the song stopped, he practically broke into a run, skidding to a halt in front of us. A bit out of breath, but trying to look nonchalant, he thrust his hand towards ours, introducing himself. "So, you're visiting this evening?" he asked. I replied, "No, we've been coming here every Sunday for years." A bit mean perhaps, but surely it was obvious to Freddy's blind goldfish that we were visitors. Luckily, he got the joke. He then explained how the service was going to be run. Twice. A few songs, cup of coffee, a bit of a yak, then another coffee. Got it.
• The songs practically creaked with old age. All of them were about spiritual warfare, and all of them were from no later than 1987. Rise up, call on the fire of the Spirit, because he's the lion of the tribe of Judah, break down the strongholds, that kind of thing. I'm standing there, mumbling "Fear not [clap-clap-clap] for I am with you, says the Lo-orrd" in a half-arsed sort of fashion. K leans over to me and whispers, "At least, he was in 1984!"
• At coffee time, a friendly looking chap ambled over to us and introduced himself as the pastor. Thus followed a fifteen minute conversation full of more awkward silences and bored fidgeting than I'd ever experienced. I guess he hadn't exercised the gift of welcoming visitors for a while. After a riveting five minutes discussing the weather we've been having lately, isn't it crazy, yada yada, I asked him what the white blobs were in the mural. "Houses" he replied, looking more than a little ashamed of being a pastor of a church that had a mural on the wall such as this one. "But they're all white! I thought they were sheep" said I. "No, that's a sheep" he said, pointing to another blob a bit lower down. One sheep? What's the point of shepherding one sheep? Besides, it looked more like a cow to me.
• The sermon was next. I slept through it, albeit sitting bolt upright with my eyes open. The topic was "Six realities you should know". The six realities were; 1. God's word. 2. Righteousness. 3. Our freedom. 4. Indwelling of the Holy Spirit. 5. New creation, and 6. Name of Jesus. I would never have remembered these in a million years if K hadn't observed that the acronym for these six points was GROINN. Snaps for City Life Christian Community Life Family Life Church for reclaiming a normally taboo area of the body for the purposes of a sermon, even if it was unintentional. Don't let the devil have all the fun body parts, folks – use them to illustrate your point! Now when life gets me down, I'll just think of GROINN and it's bound to brighten my day.
• Rather than go in for Round Two of Coffee and Small Talk, K and I opted to sidle out the door. Eyes to the ground, look like you have to be somewhere, that type of thing.

This service reminded me of a CD that you've played over and over and over and over. Perhaps you once quite liked the album, but it's probably had one too many plays, so all the fun has gone out of it and it just annoys you now. Time for a new CD, guys! 2 Joy Gems. **