Tuesday, July 01, 2008
Might as well write
(Actually, I wrote this yesterday, but am posting it today so I don't have a June '08 archive with one puny post.)
Okay, I'm back. I doubt if I'll be much more prolific than I was a few months ago, but I think it might be good to keep up the writing skills, such as they are.
Yesterday I became a full fledged deacon of my church. For those unfamiliar with the term, a deacon is simply... well, actually that term is used for quite a variety of roles. In the Bible, the original deacons were seven fellows who the apostles appointed to "wait tables" when the management of the church's food bank began cutting into the twelve's preaching and teaching time. We then immediately get to hear the tale about how one of those seven, Stephen, ended up getting into a theological argument and getting stoned to death. Of course, modern day "deacons" don't quite match that example. In some congregations, the deacons are really just the pastor's henchmen, keeping the congregation in line and taking care of all the messy jobs that need doing. In other congregations, the deacons are the true power of the church, the mighty personages to whom the pastor must either submit or struggle against. What sort of deacon I'll be, I don't know. Generally at Dry Bones we haven't got into those big power struggles. We tend to be like a bunch of cats, doing our own thing. We all gather together when there's food, of course, but then it's off to our own little areas of service. On the other hand, if you take that last sentence as a metaphor, we could be headed towards trouble. There's a potential worship war on the horizon--disagreement about one area that affects the entire membership. So I may end up being a pastoral flunky after all. I wonder if I can get a shirt with a cool nickname on it, just like the henchmen on Batman.
Okay, I'm back. I doubt if I'll be much more prolific than I was a few months ago, but I think it might be good to keep up the writing skills, such as they are.
Yesterday I became a full fledged deacon of my church. For those unfamiliar with the term, a deacon is simply... well, actually that term is used for quite a variety of roles. In the Bible, the original deacons were seven fellows who the apostles appointed to "wait tables" when the management of the church's food bank began cutting into the twelve's preaching and teaching time. We then immediately get to hear the tale about how one of those seven, Stephen, ended up getting into a theological argument and getting stoned to death. Of course, modern day "deacons" don't quite match that example. In some congregations, the deacons are really just the pastor's henchmen, keeping the congregation in line and taking care of all the messy jobs that need doing. In other congregations, the deacons are the true power of the church, the mighty personages to whom the pastor must either submit or struggle against. What sort of deacon I'll be, I don't know. Generally at Dry Bones we haven't got into those big power struggles. We tend to be like a bunch of cats, doing our own thing. We all gather together when there's food, of course, but then it's off to our own little areas of service. On the other hand, if you take that last sentence as a metaphor, we could be headed towards trouble. There's a potential worship war on the horizon--disagreement about one area that affects the entire membership. So I may end up being a pastoral flunky after all. I wonder if I can get a shirt with a cool nickname on it, just like the henchmen on Batman.
