#508. Emotionally Confused Church Services.
Mar 16th by JonThe second time I ever spoke “professionally” was at a college retreat put on by a church I’m friends with. It was at a hotel near the beach, and I was nervous. At 32, I felt a lot older than the 18-year-olds in the crowd, and I didn’t know if I could make them laugh. I was there for humor, despite aggressively resisting any application of the label “Christian comedian” to my name.
I was assured by my friend, the founder of this church, that despite the Saturday night time slot they had given me, it would not be a typical sloppy agape cry fest. That’s some sort of church law. On Saturday night you have to make people weep and that I was given permission to avoid that was huge.
The night started off with the Senior Pastor doing some funny Q&A with the college students. “Boxers or briefs? Who’s the first girl you kissed?” Lots of silly stuff that had the students laughing and energized. “Yay,” I thought inside. “This is a perfect setup for me.” But before I could get up and tell jokes about prayer shot blocking and why we’re afraid to witness to people, a husband and wife acoustic guitar team was scheduled to play for about an hour.
I confess, I instantly got a little nervous because I wasn’t sure if they got the “Don’t be all serious on Saturday night” memo, and sometimes acoustic guitar players lean toward the melodramatic side of things automatically. I don’t blame them–it’s next to impossible to write a cool, happy song. Think about it. Can you name three really happy, positive, sunshiny songs you respect musically right now? No, you can’t. But you can probably name a million mopey songs. And sometimes husband/wife teams multiply each other’s melancholy as they stare longingly across the mic at each other.
And my fears were confirmed. For an hour they played some of the saddest, most beautiful music I’ve ever heard. I actually wrote down some of their lyrics, they were so great. If I was at a concert, I would have loved the music. Unfortunately, I wasn’t. I was, as the lead singer said at one point, “the funny guy coming up next.” Someone leaned over to me during one particularly painful song about a father dying and said, “They are killing this room.” I could only nod and think to myself, “Do I have any jokes about death? Is there a good death joke transition that I’m unaware of?”
There’s not. (Believe me, I looked.) Fortunately the Senior Pastor, tapped me on the shoulder before I went on and said, “I’m going to do some sort of transition.” I wanted to side hug him, I was so excited. After the singers were done, he made the crowd stretch and did a mini meet-and-greet thing. Lots of pastors don’t have such good crowd sense, but I think he instinctively knew the sushi rule of church services.
As I’ve written about before, in between bites at a sushi restaurant, they give you ginger so that you can clear your palate. They don’t want the squid to run into the snapper and the snapper to run into the sea urchin as you have piece after piece. The ginger gives you pause between bites, so that you can appreciate what’s unique about each individual piece. They help you transition from what may be wildly different taste experiences.
Church is the same way. Sometimes you need a bit of ginger between experiences to clear the palate. If you’re planning on starting with a really funny skit and then following that with a devastatingly sad video, and then a sermon about tithing and then a really happy worship song, help us out a little. Give us some transitions on that emotional rollercoaster. Create some ginger moments so we can appreciate the unique experiences you’re weaving together.
Or figure out a really good joke about death that I can use when my next gig follows a sad acoustic singer songwriter. Because that would be really helpful to me.
Have you ever experienced an emotionally confused church service?
Comments
Yesterday we went from a “Why are we here” Raymond clip, followed by the sad death of a church Elder this week, to tithing for Zimbabwe…. and ended with a happy song. It didn’t seem confusing then but after I read your post I am searching for the ginger! (I have some frozen, so I will bring it next Sunday)
wv: fissl…. fo shizzle
A lot of times. I’m glad they transitioned for you. Sometimes during a service I wonder what I’m supposed to be feeling at a certain time. Should I be praying, singing, crying? Church can be stressful. Transitions are very important (Well apparently important enough for every english teacher I ever had to write TRANSITION on every essay I ever wrote).
i’ve experienced that at church a few times but nothing too overwhelming. i do have a funny story from high school though. i was a part of the drama club, and in the spring we do a one-act
play.
well it was my senior year, and i was chosen along with another senior to direct the one-act play that year. so after you perform the play for your town, there’s a regional and state competition for high school one-act plays.
at the regionals, we were scheduled to be last, which was great because we could leave everyone remembering how great and funny our play was. it was about a woman who was trying to hang herself in her apartment but kept being interuppted somehow. and then when she decided she didn’t want to hang herself, she couldn’t get down and had to beg her neighbor to help her. it’s a pretty hilarious play.
well, it would have been great, except that the play right before us was a super serious act about suicide, and how terrible it is. yeah. that was awkward. nevertheless, we ended up winning and going to states, where we placed 2nd
so i guess it wasn’t all bad.
Frankie was digging in his yard the other day when his elderly neighbor popped her head over the fence.
“What are you doing, Frankie”
“My fish died, so I’m burying it.”
“Oh, dear! I’m so sorry! But, Frankie, isn’t that a rather large hole for a fish?”
“I have to make it this big because my fish is inside your big dumb cat.”
Hope that helps!
The only joke I know about death goes something like this.
Two guys are sitting in a bar. The first guy is trying to convince the second guy that being drunk is great because you don’t get hurt.
“I’m telling you, your body gets all relaxed and bounces back from anything.”
“Listen, I’ve been hurt plenty of times when I was drunk.”
“Yeah, but you probably weren’t really drunk, or would have been hurt a lot worse.”
“Ok fine, prove it.”
“Well, I think we’re drunk enough. I bet you $100 that I could jump out the window and just bounce right back up I’m so drunk.”
“That’s impossible, we’re on the 2nd floor, you’re gonna break something, probably your neck.”
The first guy wasn’t listening at that point because he was too busy opening the window and climbing out. Sure enough, he jumped out the window fell to the ground then bounced back up and into the window.
“Well, I just don’t believe it.” The first guy said as he handed over a $100 bill. “I must be pretty drunk myself.” So he climbed out the window to try this amazing trick.
As the first man looked out at the broken man below the bartender walks up and says to him, “You are a mean drunk Superman.”
If you assume the guy died then it is about death.
Now on a less morbid note.
I often think abut transitions. For me the hardest part is moving from silly and fun to serious. I work with you and so most of the service is light and fun, even much o the sermon. I plan about 10-15 minutes for the sermon and work at building to a serious conclusion. I usually start with some funny videos and other such that is relevant to the sermon and work in some humor into the first point, but start transitioning into stories about my life that are quasi funny but mostly serious before drawing to the conclusion. I have a phrase I will use to let them know that I want their complete attention for the next couple minutes. Most have learned that when I say that phrase they need to focus for 2 or 3 minutes and then it is over.
This mostly works for the current setting but I’d like to find a better way to transition from “Walking on Goldfish” to “Jesus died for your sins.” That can be jarring which is why I spend about two thirds of the sermon on the transition.
Word Verification: gumse
A game in Youth involving gum. That is all you need to know, really you don’t want to know more so don’t ask because I run the game and don’t want to know more. The nightmares ….
A man away on a remote mission trip gets a telegram from his wife. It simply said: “The dog has died.”
When he returns home, he says to his wife, “It was very stressful to be far from home and to be told such bad news. Perhaps you could have broken the news to me more gently.” “What do you mean?”, asked his wife. “Well, you could have sent more than one telegram. The first saying, ‘Rover is acting strangely, he is up on the roof barking’; followed by one that said, ‘Rover has fallen from the roof, but the vet is doing everything he can.’ The last telegram might say, ‘Despite every effort, Rover has passed away.’ That would have better prepared me for the bad news.”
A few months later, the missionary is again out in the field when he gets a telegram from his wife that says, “Your mother is up on the roof barking.”
In most of the church services I have been it.. people seem to know what is coming and therefore adjust their emotions accordingly…
I struggle, however, when we go from a great worship session to “meet N greet” i usually take a while to ‘come to’
Yesterday at church, during the offering, a band played and sang Third Day’s “The Thief” as scenes from the Passion played on the screen behind them while the room was completely dark. There was a guest preacher because the pastor had emergency gallbladder surgery, and after the song was over, the lights come up, he hops up on stage and says, “Are you ready to talk about taming the tongue?” while a cartoon looking image of a tongue sticking out of a mouth has now filled the screen as we’re still recuperating from those Passion scenes.
My biggest transition problem comes at the end of the service…the pastor gives a life changing message, we all worship and pray at the alter…God seems to be doing amazing things…and then it’s over. There’s a short prayer or something to dismiss…and we’re all kind of left stranded. We mingle and talk awkwardly about Little Tina’s soccer game or something and then go to Taco Bell. Something seems wrong to me about that.
I’ve noticed these so-called roller coaster services a time or two and I tell you, no amount of ginger would have ever prepared me for most of them. You know when on the coaster the first hill is very steep and your stomach is going to end up in your throat; so you try to brace yourself, but it never works. Same with these coaster ride services.
I think you just have to get off the ride altogether, and then come back for something else.
Katdish, I actually laughed out loud at that joke.
Blessings.
A man places some flowers on the grave of his dear departed mother, says a prayer, and walks back to his car. From the corner of his eye he sees another man loudly weeping at another grave. His grief is profound. He can hear the other man repeatedly yelling, “Why?! Why did you have to die?”
Filled with compassion the first man rushes to his side and asks, “Who are you grieving? Whose death has caused you such grief and anguish?”
The second man replies, through tears, “My wife’s first husband!”
Found another…
A man has a gravely ill father. Because the son knows he will become very wealthy when his father dies he dicides to find a woman to help him enjoy his wealth.
He visits a local bar and sees a breath-taking woman. He approaches her and says, “I know I don’t look like much but when my father dies 2 weeks from now I will inherit 20 million dollars.”
The woman and man leave the bar together that evening.
Three days later she becomes his stepmother.
A man spoke with the Lord about heaven and hell. The Lord said to the man, “Come, I will show you hell.” They entered a room where a group of people sat around a huge pot of stew. Everyone was famished, desperate and starving. Each held a spoon that reached the pot, but each spoon had a handle so much longer than their arms that it could not be used to get the stew into their own mouths. The suffering was terrible.
“Come, now I will show you heaven,” the Lord said after a while. They entered another room, identical to the first – the pot of stew, the group of people, the same long-handled spoons. But there everyone was happy and well-nourished.
“I don’t understand,” said the man. “Why are they happy here when they were miserable in the other room and everything was the same?”
The Lord smiled, “Ah, it is simple,” he said. “Here they have learned to feed each other.”
Not the funniest death joke I know, but perhaps a good transition for emotional confusion.
Helen – I likey.
A few weeks ago at church, the pastor ended the sermon by showing the video of the father/son triathlon group, where the dad pushes and carries his son around because his son has cerebral palsy … yeah, if you can watch that and not cry, you may not be human.
So anyways, he ENDS the sermon with this, which means that we’re all still sobbing like babies, not even to the dry-heave sobs, when another pastor gets up to do announcements. How do you tell a room full of emotional shipwrecks about youth ice cream night and the new morning service? Awkward.
After sitting on the sidelines for months, enjoying SCL posts and the ensuing discussion by many individuals who have become recognizable by their tags, it’s time for me to join the party!
Transition… I am very happily a part of a church that recognizes the importance of transition in a service really well. Although this sometimes results in a service that is somewhat formulaic, you’re not subjected to an environment where your emotions are abused. I come from a church tradition where emotions are embraced rather than suppressed, and I guess it should come with the territory that the emotions of an individual should be respected and at very least not abused!
A church service is not a random collection of segments like a variety show – every element is done with purpose, and is ordered intentionally. It amazes me how little some people take this into consideration when planning a church service. Or those who dismiss emotion as having no place in the church… Maybe I’ll finish here – I see that can opener working around the one with worms in it…
Word verification: noflesso
The opposite of espresso? (I’m not very good at this game yet!)
beth,
yeah I struggle with this whole “service is over now get on with your life” transition. I try to make a real world application they can implement immediately. If I talk about witnessing I encourage everyone to go tell someone right away before they forget about it.
I do this after the closing prayer so I’m sneaky like that. I don’t know if it helps with the transition but it makes people feel more award about standing around chatting when they have a commission to fulfill. It does help when I target this challenge to reach out to someone they don’t know by talking to them or something like that. Then you feel like the weird after service banter is part of the service.
that was great reading!
I’ve never been to a sushi place so had never heard about the ginger “transition”. Three cheers for the pastor who gingered things up for you
When I was around 13, we had a worship leader who was emotionally tone deaf. I he had planned to close the service with HyperBouncyGoofyHappySong, then he’d just start playing HyperBouncyGoofyHappySong at the time the service was supposed to end, even if it was in the middle of a protracted, gut-wrenching altar call. At least once, my father (the pastor) long-jumped across the podium and all but jerked the guitar out of his hands. The guy never got it.
Death jokes…you people are sick! …but also funny.
Great post! My hubby has been leading worship at our church for the past year and transitions are something he works really hard at. Paul Baloche has some great stuff out there for worship leaders to help with that sort of thing.
But there’s nothing you can do when Mr. “I’ve been at this church for 154 years” decides to stand up between the worship and sermon and tell everyone in the church something. Oh, what a Sunday that was!
I think the opposite is just as frustrating especially for a worship leader. The people are at a high point during the worship time and it’s time to hand the baton to the speaker and he/she drops it by saying something like, “So there’s a Priest, a Rabbi and a Minister….” Smooth man…..real smooth.
Isaiah-”There’s a priest, a rabbi, and a minister”….then what? I want the rest of the joke!
Recently we had the video Thousand Questions (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YiNBmNl88Pk) shown at the end of our pastor’s message, and he said that we should take time and reflect on it afterwards. Well, that video always seems to yank my heart up into my mouth – I always cry at it.
When the video was over – bang! The lights came up and the worship team started jamming on stage as people dazedly looked around and then got up to leave. Hmm, great reflection time…
Ok now everyone take a big piece of ginger and chew on it slowly.
Done? Good.
I am asking people to please pray for a wonderful woman named JoAnn. She has cancer and the Dr. has said to prepare for death. She is getting very bad very quickly. I visited her just a bit ago and her kidneys are failing so she is retaining all kinds of fluids and is very yellow.
I am not interesting in prayer for God o heal her or take her. Nature has already set the course for her to pass soon. I am interested in the Supernatural. That is what God does. He supercedes nature and makes things happen beyond that natural path.
Please pray for her complete healing.
Now have another piece of ginger before reading on.
We used to have a worship pastor who really liked themes. He would pick a key word from the pastor’s main Bible passage – faith, grace, redemmed. Apparantly, he had access to some type of church song concordence and would find 4-5 random songs with the key word in the title.
He would open each service with the following statement “The theme of the day iiiiiisssss….” in his best Price Is Right announcer voice.
What followed was a worship roller-coaster: fast song, melancholy song, stand-up-and-clap song, hymn, finally finished off with a let’s-mix-it-up-and-sing-this-one-Jamaican-style song.
i would love to hear the rest of that joke…probably have heard before (it being used in a service)
haha.
I loved this entry. Good Advice.
I always love the transition in our church between worship and communion- you’ll end on a certain impression muscially and then all of a sudden out of no-where this person will come up and talk about the complete opposite thing to conjure up the opposite feeling that the music created….ah!
We have one guy in our church that most definetly needs to have a lesson in proper sushi etiquette.
I was a guest speaker one time at a youth camp. I was told to deliver the Gospel in an applicable way. I had it all planned out and was ready to go. Similar to this situation, I was upstaged. The two things before me was:
1. Foam Soap Dancing
2. STD video
3.. me and the gospel.. I didn’t have anyone to rescue me. I trudged along.. through the foam.. luckily the increase was not up to me and the Holy Spirit showed up and some folks gave their lives to Christ..
I.H.S. -
Thanks. I’ll be here all week. Try the veal!
wv: proop – fake excrement used in the new, smash off-broadway hit, “DOGS!”
When I read your post I was thinking that will send a minister off get his Masters degree, including a big helping of public speaking training but we won’t take the time to plan an orderly worship service, because that’s up to God!
If it’s up to God in isolation then the minister just spent years in training for what he shouldn’t have done.
It’s true, sometimes my church’s event’s have wicked mood swings.
Sort of. I go to a 9:35 Sunday school class geared towards college students. There’s about three of the same type but ours is labeled as the “fun loving, crazy, dorky, loud nerds”. After about an hour and a half of “fun” worship, we all head over to the 11:00 service. It’s not more serious per se, but it’s more toned down.
Greg -
That is hilarious. I had to repost part of your comment and humbly admit that my situation was nowhere near yours. Wow. I can’t believe this happened:
I was a guest speaker one time at a youth camp. I was told to deliver the Gospel in an applicable way. I had it all planned out and was ready to go. Similar to this situation, I was upstaged. The two things before me was:
1. Foam Soap Dancing
2. STD video
What an incredibly smart pastor!
The only joke about death I know came from the great theologian Michael Scott. It’s about Lincoln and as he said it has just recently became funny:
“I need to see this play like I need a hole in the head.”
Maybe you can use that one next time.
I was a guest speaker at a church filling in for the pastor – and not long before my turn, a very stern member of the finance committee gave a report about the church’s bleak financial situation and laid into everyone about their slacker giving habits.
what would you call that mood, “black cloud of impending financial doom”? aaaand, Faith you’re up!
however, after reading Greg’s post, I know that it can and does get more awkward than that. so thanks for that, Greg.
Worship whiplash. This happens all the time in our church.
That is a great story. And I agree… I love the thought of “ginger moments” LOVE it! Looking forward to connecting at the Orange Conference.–Anna
Greg,
It seems wrong that they put the Foam Soap Dance before the STD video.
Coming from churches that expressed no emotion I guess I don’t get why the sloppy agape cry fest is something to be avoided.
Having a range of emotions is not a bad thing to me. Would rather start with laughter then end with repentance, tears etc.
Maybe I just don’t get it.
WV: updog
type of flavored dog drink
Dr. Awesome, you took the only joke I knew. And that’s probably why they call you “Dr. Awesome” and not me. Oh well… =)
“Can you name three really happy, positive, sunshiny songs you respect musically right now?”
Yes, and they’re all by the band Five Iron Frenzy.
And the Lord said unto John, “Come forth and receive eternal life.” But John came fifth and won a toaster.
“Anonymous said…
And the Lord said unto John, “Come forth and receive eternal life.” But John came fifth and won a toaster.”
I don’t care who you are, that’s funny!