12/04/2005

Jesus Joy!

Over in the comments thread for this post, and commenter rayceeya wrote:

I went to that way of th master site and found I'm directly guilty of breaking nine out of ten commandments. I guess I'm going to hell anyway.

which reminded me of a conversation Monkey and I had today. We had a candidate for Senior Minister preaching today, and he said that if you tell one lie, you're a liar. If you ever take something that doesn't belong to you, you're a thief; if you have ever taken the Lord's name in vain (and he told us he knew we did since we are in Red Sox territory), then you are a blasphemer.

At lunch, Monkey and I were joking around, and I told her she was a liar, a thief and a blasphemer. She replied "Hey, I'm not a thief!" Oh, she makes me laugh.

Monkey is a firm believer in Jesus Christ as her Savior, and in God in general, which makes her the only non-heretic(k) in the house. She hasn't been going to church, though, because of two unpleasant things happening at the same time: 1. They stopped funding the Children's Music program; and 2. She witnessed a minister from a different church that rents space from South Church slap a girl in the face. She reported the guy, and the group is no longer at the church, but I don't think he ever faced any criminal charges (he's a real smooth talker, this fellow. Slick as a willy).

Anyway, the Director of Children's Education kept calling and asking Monkey to come back, and they finally swayed her by reminding her that the Christmas pageant is coming up. The girl loves a pageant. So she came back to church this week, and she was welcomed like the prodigal son, and she even got a solo in the pageant (she is really a terrific singer).

At South Church, they do an Intergenerational message, where they call the kids forward and do a sermon just for them. Rev. Heretic used to open with a series of knock-knock jokes, one of the many reasons I miss him every Sunday. Today, the person who was supposed to do the sermon didn't make it to church, so this really annoying member who sticks her nose into absolutely everything wrote up a sermon for one of the choir members to read.

This was during our rehearsal, in the morning before the service starts. The choir member who was drafted to deliver the Intergenerational Message came up to the choir loft, and she relayed that annoying member wanted her to say the following:

You know that excited feeling you get when someone opens a special present you made for them? I like to call that "Jesus Joy!"


Oh. my. fucking. god. I had tears pouring out of my eyes I was laughing so hard. I could never be a Christian, because I could never believe myself if those words came out of my mouth. My inner cynic would be rolling her eyes, telling me I was full of shit.

Anyway, the phrase Jesus Joy has already, in less than 24 hours, become a catch phrase in our house. I made a nice dinner today, and John told me that eating it filled him with Jesus Joy. We rented Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Sio declared that Johnny Depp must have been filled with Jesus Joy to pull off that performance.

I hope it goes away soon, because it's starting to lose the ability to make me laugh.

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