#323. Trying to look cool at church.
Jul 1st by JonMy wife and I attend North Point Community Church in Alpharetta, Georgia. It’s a megachurch full of the most attractive people you’ve ever seen in your life. Seriously, I haven’t verified this with any of my friends that work there but I’m fairly confident they keep ugly people away with some sort of force field. Or they have their own service that they all attend. I’m not sure, the point is that everyone there is cool.
I know that’s not entirely true. North Point is actually more diverse than it gets credit for and there is obviously no beauty requirement for membership. I love that church for being real and honest despite the influx of beatuty. But regardless of that, I really want to impress people at church. I know that when it comes to Sunday morning I consciously think, “how can I look cool this morning?” I know God isn’t concerned with that. He probably laughs that I have “church jeans” and “hang around the house jeans” but there it is. I’m insecure and I was reminded of that a few months ago.
My wife and I were just lightly chatting in our seats before church started. Suddenly she pulled out yarn and needles from her purse and began to knit. I was horrified. I knew that we had maybe seven seconds before the cool people around us saw what she was doing and asked us to attend the 2:35 in the afternoon Ugly Person Church Service.
“What are you doing? Put that away.” I said in a hushed whisper.
“What? I’m just knitting? What’s the big deal?” My wife said, clearly startled at my shallowness.
The big deal was that I mistakenly thought knitting was for almost dead people. At the time I didn’t realize how hip and popular and artistic knitting really was. I thought it was for old people that called the Internet the “World Wide Interweb” and collected plates with Shirley Temple on them and watched “Matlock.” I felt like I might as well be whittling a pipe out of a corn husk next to her or churning fresh butter.
I realized three things from that moment:
1. I am shallow and superficial and still try to impress complete strangers.
2. Knitting is way cooler and hipper than I am.
3. No one has ever written the definitive guide on how to impress people at church.
So I thought I would. Here, are five different ways to impress the people around you at church in the moments before service starts:
1. To look in love
Want to look like you are deeply and madly and wildly in love with your wife as every good, holy, Godly man should be? Use the ten minutes before service starts as “cuddle time.” Call her cute little names like “pookie pie” and “miss kissington huggertons.” Give her big, awkward hugs. Extra points if you give her a neck massage during the service with one hand. (You know who you are lady that sits near me at church.)
2. To look spiritual
Want to look like you’re a theologian, lost deep in the biblical embrace of sweet baby Jesus? Crack open the Bible to some obscure chapter. As you read, underline things, in multiple colors and occasionally mutter stuff like, “Of course, the Hebrew translation. Amazing hermeneutics.”
3. To look in fellowship
Fellowship needs it’s own post, because other than “Fine,” it’s the official Christian F word. We love to be in fellowship. Use the ten minutes before service to network. Talk to as many people as possible and then when they start the service, act surprised as if you didn’t know church was about to begin and do that shoulder shrug apology move that says “I would love to talk further but church is starting.”
4. To look generous
Want to look like you have a giver’s heart? Wait until church to put your tithe together. And don’t just write a check. There’s no sizzle in a check, no pizzazz so to speak. Use cash. Take out your tithe envelope and then one by one, add dollar bills. Have you ever tried to cram $50 in dollar bills into a church envelope? You look like Diddy. Make it rain. Make it rain.
5. To look important
Want to look like you’re an important business woman? Someone that’s on the go, climbing that corporate ladder? A real go getter? Put one of those Bluetooth phone headsets in each ear. Then get a blackberry, for each hand. You’ll have to get really good with your thumbs, but it will be worth it. People around you will be massively impressed with your importance. Promise.
I wish I didn’t care about what people at church thought about my wife’s hobby or people on the highway thought about my car or people at the mall thought about my shoes. But I do, more than I’d like to anyway and I’m not sure when that changes. I was hoping it was when you turn 30 but at 32 I know that’s not true. And it can’t be 50 because my friend is in his 50s and he recently told me, “I didn’t want to buy a unicycle at first because I was concerned that I was just doing it to make people think I was cool.”
The funny thing is that I don’t know if anyone in the recorded history of unicyclery has ever picked up that one wheeled wonder as a way to look cool. For me, it’s kind of the ultimate symbol of confidence, a move that with a large degree of boldness and brashness says, “I am so sure of myself that I’ll ride a unicycle. In public.”
So maybe that’s the trick. We don’t need to look cool at church. We need unicycles. I need to trade in my cool t-shirts and white puma sneakers and hip ideas for something the clowns have been trying to tell us for centuries.
Long live the unicycle.
Comments
more genius… i’ve longed for the husband neck rub… to no avail… he’s too hip.
I stumbled across this blog today. Very funny and sadly, oh I have seen all of this behavior on Sunday mornings. Of course for singletons like me the married couples cuddling is extremely annoying. Oh I never wear any sort of jeans as they are not impressive enough for God. Or that is what my mom taught me. I think if I wore jeans to church I would burst into flame after setting foot inside church.
As the weekly recipient of the neck rub/hair stroke, I say to all the nay sayers: you are just jealous. If it bothers you to see my husband love me this way, don’t watch. I have had many people comment to me about how it blesses them to see him caress me so tenderly. It certainly isn’t intimate on a sexual level, so get over it. We are not there to see what other people are doing (or not). We are there to worship. If this is how my husband and I communicate, don’t complain. Who doesn’t get a blessing to see older couples tenderly holding hands? Well, there is no magic age to start that, you know. They held hands when they were younger. This is just our version of that.
Yeesh!
Hrmmm… I am a unicycle rider, but never thought for an instant that I was cool or beautiful… I took it up cuz it looked fun and was a way to talk to people…
As for the knitting… um… I can say that I have never seen anyone knit before, after, or during any of our services…
We do things like Carpet Jousting…
Did she knit during church? I had to laugh…it sounds like something I would have tried…
I once was able to knit a baby blanket while in a master’s class while the professor rambled for 8 hours since he learned I could do two things at once. It saved me from wasting 8 hours every Saturday.
I KNIT, I KNIT!!! Unfortunately I have been knitting since I was 8. But I will take cool points anyway I can get them, especially since I am so old.
do churches still have altar calls? coming forward, silent, pious, and contrite was once the ultimate of christian cool. if i start attending church again, i think i will start coming forward while simultaneously knitting.
I think this is one of my favourite “SCL” posts. It’s so true that we like to look cool, and that we care so ridiculously much about how we appear in church… when it’s the LAST thing we should be caring about. Thanks for the reminder!
- CG
yep…knitting in church is soooo hip right now. i suppose it’s an indicator of how Contemporary your church is. (as in, “Jeans, Coffee, and Knitting in Our Sanctuary–We’re Like Real Life!”).
Don’t forget you have to bring your “cool journal” with lots of stickers on it to take sermon notes in!! Ultimate coolness!
lol.
So, let me get this straight. At some churches it’s cool to do the neck rub so I shouldn’t do it do in order to just try to look cool but at some churches it is most uncool with people and therefore should do it to show how not cool I’m trying to be?!?!?
I’m confused. I know I shouldn’t do stuff based on what I “should” do (btw. I made the air quotes with my fingers just now, not easy to do while typing, and “air quotes” made it into the dictionary) but I’m trying not to offend. Jon, can you do a part 2 on how I can quickly figure out what is cool when I visit a church?
While it does involve two pointy sticks, knitting?!?!? for a dude?!?! wow.
Okay, I gotta defend the neck rub. My husband will often rub the back of my neck at our Sunday service but alas, it is not a sign of affection or tenderness. He simply is aware of the knot you could crack walnuts on that runs down my neck caused by the pre-church circus. Its nothing short of a miracle how we manage to get a baby, a 3-year old, a diaper bag fully stocked for the angels in the nursery who care for our little guy, two bibles, a coffee cake (did we actually sign up to bake in this heat!!!???), and the shoebox for the “Kid’s Town” bible story diorama out the door and into a car. Our home is a chorus of “Are we out of diapers?. Where’s my other shoe?, I thought YOU were going to make coffee. The cat threw up on what???, just get in the car, the car, move, just Please for the love of all that is HOLY GET In THE CAR!!!” So, its not affection all the time…sometimes its migraine prevention—-Oh and I don’t knit. Handing me long sharp pointy things?—not wise.
Hilarious! LOL…I guess everyone is different but hang in there. I am 46 and the older I get the less I care.
the mere fact that you said “world wide interweb” shows me you love Christopher Guest.
I definitely knit & crochet during church. Like others that have commented, it helps me focus and there's the extra bonus of getting more time to work on projects!
I loved this post–probably one of my all time favorites. It really is a bummer that we try so hard to impress other people. It's such a waste of our time!
Seriously. The unicycle. My Dad – the pastor – recently bought a unicycle. And took it to church. And rode it. On the stage. During the sermon. As an “object lesson”.
I don’t think anyone remembers what the sermon was about – just the unicycle and Dad riding it around like a one-legged elephant.
But, hey, my Dad’s just cool like dat.
He also wears shorts to church. In the winter. In Canada. (And we come from Australia.)
‘Nuf said!
My Dad has since bought a second unicycle and takes them everywhere with him. He is set on converting the entire church community to unicyclists, I’m sure.
wv: badjig – Riding a unicycle in church is a badjig.
so…i have a friend who has a job but spends a whole lot of time surfing.. she sends me random blogs you’ve written.. some old, some more recent. They have all made me laugh and think and ask myself some hard questions.. i just wanted to tell you that a girl in Philly (actually, a few girls) are enjoying your blogs. Looking forward to reading them ALL.
try going to my church which was started by three ex models. Im talking successful models. to this day its a on going joke how we find pictures of the head pastor and his wife in picture frames in stores. The youth pastor also besides being a ex model was a semi- pro beach volleyball player and semi- pro surfer. Thank God I was already married when I started attending this church. funny after 9 years there i dont think their that good looking anymore. I see them as they are big dorks i love.
Ha! I'm totally cracking up right now! That was especially clever and funny for me as a church goer and knitter! You're a very talented and gifted writer! Love the humor!
i am quite alarmed that your logic chain that led to the unicycle made sense to me