We went to socially distanced Advent One on the Beach. Sam is so trendy and yet super traditional at the same time. I love him to bits. I didn't listen to a word he said though, zoning out watching his passion as he jammed a candle into the sand, lit it with his vintage zippo in spite of a burgeoning offshore wind and began to shout above the noise, all brimstone and saltwater and love. We held hands. All nine of us who attended from the point. We made a crowd, apart from other small groups of mostly two. We closed our eyes to block out the sun, tried not to shiver in spite of it burning our corneas (it was still hovering around freezing. That's why only nineteen people showed up out of a twenty-person limit*. Three services a Sunday plus the podcast is back. He is used to a few hundred people but this is a necessity.) and were exceedingly grateful that Sam kept it to twenty minutes, give or take. He spoke about this being a changed advent and yet we still wait for Jesus and we must do it with kindness and grace.
Matt shouted Amen and Sam grinned and wrapped it up with a reminder that collection has moved online effective last weekend, as he mentioned and all the information is on the church website but if anyone has any problems they can swing by the church and drop off their envelope or he can walk them through transferring by phone.
This has effectively ruined the whole point of going to church for half the boys, pure heathens always up for mischief as detailed here over the years with everything from gravy lakes and tiny paper boats to live baby chicks or Lego in those plates.We are awful and hilarious and Sam's absolute favourites, he only wishes we attended more often because he says the church needs to catch and hold the imaginations of the younger congregations who only show up if they have nothing better to do.
We did our part. I shrug. The church needs to stop being so imaginary and rigid. Bring it down a notch. Make it magical. Sam does a good job on that part but his is a microchurch in the grand scheme of things. I watch the politics and trends of it. I was a minister's wife and Jacob was on two different bodies that spanned globally trying to find ways to attract a younger audience for their message so I got a steady diet of ideas and experiments.
(I mean, to be honest right now their best bet is to stock their pulpits with hot younger progressive men. It works like a charm. Sad but true. If you are young and passionate I will hang off your every word. If you are old and boring and just recite doctrine I'm checking out first, thanks. Sam is adorable. We only show up for that reason and I'm fairly certain a lot of the other folks do too. Life is short. Objectify your friends.)
(Oh my God. It's a JOKE.)
We came home and stuffed our faces with waffles, champagne (meeee) and hot coffee until we could feel our toes again, and congratulated Sam on a banger of a morning. Short, sweet and done is our favourite. Just for church, I mean. Not for anything else.
Snort.
*(The twenty person limit is achievable through an online booking system. Log in, claim your free ticket. He has twenty tickets available for each service and allows for last minute cancellations in order to be as fair as he can be. He has ruled out attending altogether if you are sick or compromised in any way and has done a lot of triage tech support to help people listen along to his podcasts so he's fine. I don't know what other churches are doing, they left Sam swinging in the wind a little so this is what he came up with, apparently there's no blanket plan for the greater organization.)
*(We have decided to go every third Sunday to free up room, which kind of sucks during Advent but Sam said he can do a private service here since there's only twenty of us or so.)