(I think the funniest jokes are the ones based in truth. They take a fraction of a real situation and exaggerate it comically until it’s the size of a skyscraper. Of mirth. That’s what Scott Jamison did today with his guest post. He took something that we all know happens and blew it up. This is a great guest post. I hope you like it as much as I did.)
Expecting all emails to end with a God shout out.
Dear Pastor Holmes,
Thank you for your thoughtful response to my last email.
Upon reflection, yes, perhaps it was a bit ‘overzealous’ of me to suggest that service latecomers be forced to crawl past the good and decent on-timers to the center of the row. And perhaps putting a ‘Punctuality Primer’ message card on all of the middle seats would be a little extreme – although I disagree that Bible verses that deal with the issue of timeliness would necessarily cause visitors to ‘flee our church’. They might say “I respect a church that cares this much about the convenience of it long-time members.”
But that’s not actually why I’m writing.
No, I’m more concerned about the closing of your last (thoughtful) email.
As I finished reading it, I noticed, with some dismay, that you closed it simply, “Dan”
Not “Worshipping with you in Christ, Dan”. Not “Yours in the Truth of the Scripture, Dan”. Not “In Christ Alone, who took on flesh, Fullness of God in helpless Babe, Dan”.
Not even “Totally Depraved, Dan.”
Just “Dan”
Now, my first thought (I tend to think the best about people) was to think – “he just made a simple mistake. He merely forgot. Or maybe he had a long passage at the end of his email saying good things about how my Godly passion showed when I wrote a 2000 word email which highlighted the seventeen most important issues where worship at our church showed serious room for improvement, but then he was afraid that me reading these responding good words might put me in danger of the Sin of Pride, so he deleted it and, in doing so, inadvertently deleted his closing – ‘Thinking you to be of extreme importance to our church, Dan’.”
But then I thought, “What if it wasn’t a mistake? Surely he would appreciate being alerted of his error.” So, as a Christian service to you, that’s what I’m doing. Please have a nice weekend and we’ll see you on Sunday.
Yours seeking unity in all things no matter how trivial,
Scott
P.S. Also acceptable would have been a postscript that mentioned ANY spiritual aspect of your life today. Bible verse references would have been a bonus. But you came up empty here also.
(For more great stuff from Scott, check out his blog.)
