We did lots of crazy stuff and we must have been blessed because it worked more often than not.
Once on Easter morning we covered the stained glass windows with thick brown rolling paper so the Sanctuary was pitch black. Everyone had to reach out in darkness to find a pew to sit on and of course everyone fought to sit on the back row so there were lots of giggles and curses as people plopped down on one another.
A guitar was plucked as a lone voice sang, "Anybody here seen my good friend Martin?"A lone candle was lit in the front of the Chapel and the entire earth was silent for a second.
"HE LIVES!" Cindy Weber screamed at the top of her lungs as the paper was ripped from the windows. Light exploded in the room as though Jesus himself were sashaying down the aisle.
"Hallelujah!"
"Shit!"
"Glory!"
"Stop hitting me!"
Those are the reactions I remember being said all at the same time.
We were a crazy Church doing crazy stuff.
But the most popular service of the year was my son's Jeremy's birthday.
Everyone loved Jeremy. He was the six year old who turned the Baptismal Pool into a bathtub! Homeless guys would lounge in it with him, candles lit, a Boom Box playing Jimmy Buffett as they all achieved a peace that passeth all understanding.
On the Sunday closest to his birthday, instead of preaching a sermon ... cause enough for a major celebration ... I read a letter I'd written to Jeremy.
Homeless men would cry in joy because (a) I wasn't preaching and (b) they all loved Jeremy and his sister Kristen. She blatantly took advantage of this by getting them to panhandle enough change so they would buy her a Happy Meal from McDonalds. Once, I found her with 5 at the same time surrounded by happy men.
Jeremy was never that way. He liked to just hang out with the guys.
Now, decades later, he still likes to simply hang out. We do it pretty naturally together. He's here now, grading papers for his students at the University of Georgia as we listen to Bob Dylan wonder "what's a sweetheart like you doing in a dump like this?"
Sarah wanders in and out. Her girls wanted to skip school today so they could hang out with him too. They're excited he's here and stayed up late to talk with him. He rode with me to take them to school and now we're just hanging out.
He flipped through my new book Sandy Bottoms & Duct Taped Hearts and said, "It's nice to read a book I've already read."
We have no real plans. There's a birthday party to attend tomorrow, some football to watch over the weekend, see his Mom and a few friends and drink some beers. We're just hanging out and I can't think of a better way to spend a weekend.
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NICE ONE AGAIN!
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