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Also, a teenager with a ukulele sang a country song


July 1

United Methodist Church

            An observation: pastors who say “I’m going to keep this brief”—generally don’t.

            We had out-of-state friends visiting us this Sunday, with two little boys who’d spent long hours in the car for two days. The next few churches on our check-it-out list were all quite a drive away, and we didn’t want the pressure of getting everyone out the door early enough to get to one of those churches. So we picked a church in town.
            I don’t have much to say about this church because I really don’t want this blog to become a church-bashing site. And truthfully, there wasn’t really anything wrong with this place; it’s just not for us. People were friendly. No “pass the peace” during the service, so that was nice. There were some things I didn’t love--for example, I couldn’t even tell you now, not much later, what the sermon was about. However, that could be because our friends’ baby was sitting with his mama right next to me, and he’s the cutest little dude ever. And in the pastor's defense, it was her first Sunday at that congregation, and she was admittedly nervous.
            One thing I appreciated: it was communion Sunday, and there were
printed instructions about how that particular congregation does communion (since it seems as if every church does it just slightly differently). That was helpful to people like me, for whom doing something incorrectly is horrifying.
            All in all, though, I think we won’t be going back, and even if pressed for a reason, I don’t think I could tell you why. In the words of Associate Supreme
Justice Potter Stewart, "I'll know it when I see it." Well, he was talking about what constitutes a dirty movie, and I'm talking about a church, so that might not be the most appropriate quote to use. Nevertheless...it just didn’t feel like home. I’m giving it a 4 out of 10.

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Comments

  1. Joy BachJuly 8, 2018 at 4:15 PM

    Love your posts.

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownJuly 8, 2018 at 5:11 PM

    You will know when it's the right one. I've known on the first visits. Something just clicks, and your soul goes "ah, home".

    ReplyDelete

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