Christianity or Bust

Some of you may remember my post It’s *NOT* better to burn out than to fade away?. Sadly, I can’t believe I may end up in neither category - I have the cold.

Seriously, I do have a big week ahead. Tomorrow night, I have to prepare a meal for 40 people for InterNet (that’s the name for the New International Ministry). This afternoon, I went to Glenmore Meat and got a huge batch of chicken thighs for it and will chop and marinate tonight!

Oh yeah, Chris, if you’re reading this… If God didn’t want mankind to eat meat, he wouldn’t have made animals so tasty.

On Friday night, I’m going to a movie night organised by Ruth and seeing and discussing American Beauty. After that I should have a couple of hours to make some chocolate mousse for Saturday night’s Network’s Kairo talk about ministering to women in prison before I go to bed for the bushwalk organised by Lawry. Things will be tight but doable.

I’m sure I’ll have to go to bed early on Thursday night to wake up for the Australia Vs Croatia World Cup match.

At the moment, my fragile health is maintained by a diet of Fisherman’s Friend.

Last night after service, groups held a Ministry Expo in the hall during supper. This was a small event to let the congregation know the various areas where they can help out in the church and subsequently recruit people.

The groups there included:

• Network - the group for workers or people of worker age
• MSG - Mission Support Group - the group involved with Missionaries
• 7:15 Admin - stuff involving admistration or the 7:15 service
• New International Ministry - the ministry aimed at Chinese students
• Carols in Vic Park - involved in organisation for the annual Christmas Carols service in nearby Victoria Park
• Music - performing at services and special events

I signed up for Network, 7:15 Admin (only because they have some nerdy things to do) and Music.

I think I came across as strange to Stef at the Music stand because I was wearing my Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defence t-shirt and she kept looking at the logo.

During our conversation I mentioned that I’m throwing myself into everything and she said she would be concerned about overloading. I kind of smiled and laughed and said “The most rock and roll answer to that is: ‘It’s better to burn out than fade away.’” She disagreed with that.

(For those who didn’t click on the link above, that line was from a Neil Young song. Subsequently, it appeared in Kurt Cobain’s suicide note. Also, for the record, it appears as a line in Def Leppard’s song “Rock of Ages”.)

I still think it’s better than to fade away. I’m so bored with things nowadays.

So I hope to get into the church band. I used to be in one but never had to audition for that. I’m getting Marty McFly thoughts of “What if they don’t like it, I don’t think I can handle that kind of rejection.”

I know I’m writing too much at the moment. I’m also a tad bored with work because I’m making huge changes to the data structures of my program and it’s breaking everything.

I got back from my lunchtime letterbox drop half an hour ago. It was a nice half hour walk in the sun, distributing a postcard advertising Easter at Barneys and postcard targeting Chinese students in each letter box (except those marked with “No Junk Mail” even though this isn’t junk) within a small set of streets in Ultimo.

Really though, nothing much happened until I reached Queen Street. Almost every house on the street has a wooden sculpture in its’ front. The one I found the most memorable was a strange sort of person in a swing. I wish I brought a camera. It’s nice to know there are unique places in the Inner West.

This morning, I got the courage to call up Helen and ask her if she’s interested in coming to Barney’s special night where a Supreme Justice (or some authoratitive judege type) discusses the case for the resurrection over dinner.

She sounded interested but I feel I sounded pushy because I said I needed a firm answer by Sunday on whether she’d be back in Sydney because I’d have to buy the tickets. On the other hand, I did offer to pay for her ticket.

Anyway, Helen is looking for a job in Melbourne. I’m a bit curious why she said “we’re looking around” when I called. I really ought to catch up with Chris and make sure he hasn’t run off to Melbourne with her. Just kidding.

I probably should write about the weekend away that my church’s evening congregation had. It was held at Springwood which is part of the Blue Mountains.

About 80 people came. Most of us were aged between 20 and 30, which makes sense since our congregation is the youngest. There was a couple of exceptions such as the pastor.

The program had a balance of study and learning with recreation. The mornings of Saturday and Sunday were filled with services and discussion of the sermons and speeches. Mike Paget spoke on the theme of faithfulness: a) faithfulness from God b) faithfulness to God c) faithfulness to each other.

Saturday afternoon and evening were the main recreation and free times. On Saturdday afternoon, I went abseiling, which was both scary and exhilarating.

I still think Christians suffer from Cinderella syndrome - that is, the need to rush to bed before midnight. However, on early Sunday morning, I ended up playing Jenga that was made from super-large blocks.

This weekend, I also found someone else who loved playing guitar and horror movies. That was so cool. When I told that to Ian, he said he was glad that once he found someone in church who loved The Rolling Stones.

Ummm… I got to know some really attractive Christian women better during the weekend. I guess there’s two that I want to talk to more, in particular. After Mike’s sermon about faithfulness to each other, during which he mentioned that we have all of eternity to get to know each other, Phil reminded me of this point but

During the ride back, I came to another major generalisation: you can pick Christians with bad taste in music. If they like Powderfinger, they are probably a generic boring Triple J listener who is too lazy to explore music on their own. If they like Jack Johnson (not the blues musician), it’s even worse.

After that, I got home for a 2 hour nap then had to do powerpoint and mugs duties for that night’s service. Whoa! What a full weekend!

PS: I kind of feel down now. After so much social interaction, my life is back to my normal socially-starved situation.