Sometimes, when I go to restaurants, the waiter will say this to me, “Have you ever eaten here before? Is this your first time here?”
That’s a weird question. I’m sure they have to ask it, like wearing a certain number of pieces of flair, but it still doesn’t make sense. Every time I hear that, I want to respond, “No, I’ve never been here, but I have ordered food, off a menu, eaten said food and then paid for it with cash or credit.”
The restaurant scenario reminds me of what we sometimes do to first time visitors at church. The person reading the announcements will say something like:
“If you’re a first time visitor, we’re glad you’re here. We’re going to have a good time today. We’re going to sing songs, of music, and then a man in khakis that will probably be pleated, will preach what we call a ‘sermon.'”
I exaggerated a little there but there are some elements of truth peppered in there. It only gets weirder when we start kind of apologizing to the first time visitors:
“Our Senior Pastor, Randy Smith, is on vacation today, so our Youth Minister will be speaking. And he’s going to be talking about tithing, which we never usually focus on. Just so you know.”
I don’t know what we should say to first time visitors. That’s a little foggy to me. At the church I start called GracePointeLifeTruthHouseNorth I’ll probably say something like,
“If this is your first time, thanks for coming. Church is kind of weird, isn’t? I mean today we’re going to sing songs to the person we feel breathed into existence the universe and the sea horse. We’re going to learn about the person who we feel is most important but we’ve never actually seen. We’re going to tell you how a book that is thousands of years old can help you have a better day tomorrow in your cubicle at work. And then we’re going to cut you off in the parking lot after church cause we’re still pretty messed up. It’s going to be a little weird today but we hope you’ll come back next week. Because even though it’s weird, it’s also wild and wonderful.”
And then we’re going to fire WWJD bracelets into the crowd using those t-shirt guns they have at sporting events. It will be a good time. Promise.
