D-R-A-M-A-T-I-C
(the anatomy of "the serious voice")


in my head, i've teased and thought about this "children's place post" so much that i think i've burned myself out on it. so, when it comes, it'll come. you'll see it. you won't hear about it anymore. on to my monday morning quarterbacking of yesterday's service...

as i've said before, i've been cleansing my palate for months now, ever since rick announced his impending departure, so that i could start recommitting and reinvesting myself into my church. on father's day, with the official arrival of a new minister, i would step down from the balcony and start stirring the pot. in a literal and figurative way, step down from the balcony sarah and i (and joseph) did yesterday. it was a weird feeling to be quite honest. i don't think we bumped anybody out of their normal seats, but moving from the almost empty balcony to the half-filled lower section was not without anxiety. would people read anything into the move? would anyone even notice? would i feel out of place? to be honest, i don't really know how noticed sarah and i are anymore. there, of course, was a part of me that hoped people would see us and wonder where we've been, but i doubt that was the case. i have kept myself on the periphery of things for so long now that my guess is i've fallen curse to "out of sight, out of mind." no difference, though. that won't be the case for long. i did not feel out of place, which helped my mood. it was nice to be able to hear other folks singing along with us during the hymns and doxology. it was nice that we weren't the only stop the offering plate would have to make on our pew. it was nice to have more than one person to shake hands with during the christian greetings portion of the service. and so, the literal move went fairly smoothly. the figurative one? well, that'll take more time to figure out.

on to the service. the one that would introduce our new "leader". the one that would carry us into the next era of our church. first impressions are everything. for everything that rick lacked, he made a good first impression with his first service. sarah and i talked about how one could literally feel the congregation breathe a huge sigh of relief during rick's first service and know that there would be a chance to heal after charles lee dug a hole for us and threw us in. i'll cover the first impression that was chris denson's first service by looking at the pros and cons. let's start with the cons. like everything post-yesterday, i am going to make an intentional effort to end positive even if there are crappy things to mention.

the cons:

* why is it that we can't get through a whole service anymore without a technical glitch? joe crump, noted techno-wizard and old guy, struggled through the ENTIRE introduction of the denson family with either a faulty microphone, a faulty soundguy, or a little bit of both. granted, chris denson had nothing to do with this, whatsoever, but it makes the church look stupid. not a good start.

* joe crump, also known in some circles as "the only guy that could suck the joy out of the fact that we have a god that loves us so much he sent his son to die for us", tells the congregation and the new pastor that he hopes that rev. denson can be successful in "sustaining the vitality" of the church. WTF? did i miss something? obviously, no one has given joe crump a copy of my last post. being optimistic is one thing. being unaware or not true to your church's situation is another. of course, he might have been talking about sustaining vitality kind of like an emergency room doctor might want to sustain the vitality of a person that had spent the last half-hour underwater but miraculously started breathing again when they got him to the hospital. "ok!!! we've got a pulse, people!!! let's sustain that vitality!" i mean, i guess our church does still have a pulse, right?

* during his sermon, dude cried. those that know me know that i am not a big fan of tears. so, he starts the story with how we are raised by imperfect people and i anticipate him spinning it towards a perfect god, yada, yada, yada. nope. he starts talking about his dad painting a picture for him and feeding the homeless (or the "untouchables"), both of which are awesome, but a little hokey for a first sermon. at least for me. and then he choked up and told his dad thanks. not a huge point against him, but the crying stuck out to me.

* the last con. and this one's kind of a biggie. dude sang. yes, he sang. and he has a beautiful voice. but he sang several, if not all (i kind of tuned out), the verses of he touched me. i got the point. "listen to the words. listen to god." but in the same way rick did not realize that "song of my heart" may have resonated in a negative way due to the poor memories of heartsong, i am not sure rev. denson understood that charles lee left us all feeling like we could use a little less singing and show, and a little more memorizing his sermon. the only thing i kept waiting for during the solo was for the guy to go into the choir loft, sit down at the piano and begin swaying side to side like stevie wonder. thankfully, that didn't happen, but the moment was lacking, again, in awareness, and you could feel how uncomfortable the congregation was at the time. maybe that was the point. if so, though, it was an ill-advised point.

now that i am through drinking my hater-ade, the pros:

* there was only ONE joke. just one. and it was kind of crappy. but that's awesome. you are not funny. and that is just fine. the era of stand-up routine followed by the "serious voice" is over. just a message. a very...

* scripturally-driven and centered message. one of the things that rick suffered from was starting with scripture and then losing himself in all sorts of tangential stories and bad jokes. this meant he had to use "the serious voice" to remind us that we were actually talking about god and kind of lost his audience along the way. at least for one sunday, rev. chris denson's delivery was different. he gave us some context help with the passage and preached on the passage. it was kind of foreign-feeling, but it worked ok.

* speaking of his delivery, it was, in a word, dramatic. where rick usually closed with "the serious voice" yesterday was all "serious voice". beginning to end. dramatic pauses. squinted eyes. eye contact with as many folks as possible. all of it. the new pastor has a very big voice and a good presence (and great hair!!!...a plus in any walk of life) in the pulpit and used both of those to his advantage. what i felt in D-R-A-M-A, though, i was able to forgive for the most part, because i felt like he meant what he was saying. even when he was crying about his dad, i still got the feeling he meant it. maybe he's just a crier. maybe he likes fried green tomatoes and doesn't care who knows, but i did get the impression he was genuine in almost every word and phrase he used yesterday. that, also, could be a huge and positive change from my (and others) perception of the previous two administrations.

if i were grading, i'd give yesterday's first impression a "B-". there was room for improvement but it definitely could have been worse.

there were rumors circulating yesterday that he's never been in a church with a daycare and humc will be his biggest church. both of those things bode poorly for the situation he's inheriting. but it will be several weeks before we know if he's in over his head or not.

i did leave yesterday feeling pretty good about, at the very least, yesterday. the guy seems interested in the challenge. that will help.

and so, i am back on board. for any of you that may read my thoughts here and consider huffman home, i encourage you to leap with me, one last time, into the idea that we can still have a home in huffman ten to fifteen years from now. no one is more cynical than i am. i'll admit that. but i am trying to remember what made me love huffman in the first place. i am going to try and be a part of a movement that will allow hannah to create those same memories here. not clearbranch. or trussville. or somewhere that doesn't seem to suck as bad as we do and have. this isn't a call to arms. it's just a request.

to those of you that i've been lucky enough to be in your lives and share humc with in some capacity, i am going to start annoying you soon.

and asking for your help.

i hope you consider it.