The Cold Never Bothered Me Anyway

My day did not get off to an inauspicious start. One of the hazards of sharing a few matresses on the living room with an adorable toddler, her mother, and her possible future stepfather is that occasionally early in the morning there are accidents that leave an awake and somewhat agitated child who does not let anyone else sleep. When that is how a day begins, there is little direction to go but up, but even so that is not the sort of event that sets a day up for success, as my efforts to read and relax in the morning were largely unsuccesful as I had I play keepaway with my cell phone so that the toddler would not take endless selifes and completely drain my cell phone batteries. The game was mildly irritating, but all the same I was generally successful in my efforts, and thought I left later than I wanted to, I ended up having a successful drive in that I arrived on time at services before the Bible Study started, and that is always the aim, after all.

The Bible Study itself was an excellent one on the subject of trust. This is an area I have frequent difficulties with [1]. As I was chatting with a couple of the other people on the front row before services, there are a couple of areas where the speaker commented on that I particularly struggle in, and I would like to think that God is merciful and compassionate to the many of us who struggle mightily when it comes to trust. It is one thing to know that trust is a problem, still another to know why it is a problem and where it is a problem, and yet another still more difficult task to be able to trust effectively. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I have never done the sort of trust fall that the speaker showed from Northwest Camp, because it is extremely likely that I would pike in my excessive anxiety and lack of trust, which would make it particularly difficult for the people to successfully catch me when my nerves got the best of me. The fact that I am left-handed would mean also that others, even if they wanted to catch me successfully in a trust fall, would likely to assume I was right-handed and be out of position, making it likely that they would fail my trust and make me even less likely to trust in the future, if that was possible. Often a lack of trust is a self-fulfilling prophecy, in that it requires great skill and dexterity to overcome extreme suspicion, a level of skill that few of us possess.

After the Bible Study ended, a little bit late, there was a fast turnaround and a sandwich bar in which choir members ate first before scampering off to practice. I was asked to give the opening prayer to practice and then we sang and worked on the piece we were doing. I was one of four people, all of us adults, who sang in the combined choir, and the piece went well, which was good, because it was quite a motley group of people singing, to be sure. Any group that includes me can’t be too terribly exclusive, though. With 200 people present today in Tacoma, the opportunities to chat were plenty, which was good, because not all of the opportunities I wanted for the day were available, including the opportunity for peace and quiet without being followed around. Even during the sermon six teens and young adults, all of whom I knew at least a little, and some of them very well, came up to the stage right in front of me to pick out the topics that the minister spoke about concerning the gifts and rewards of God, which made my spot in the front middle a less desirable seat than would normally be the case. I thought the sermon was well done, and inventive in design. Later on, though, during dinner, I found it odd that it seemed that others were trying to pick various arguments, whether about the question of what we can call Job’s contention with God as well as making complaints about Zionist Jews corrupting society and making attempts to rehabiliate at least some aspects of Hitler’s geopolitics. That sort of testy interaction seemed to be a microcosm of the testiness of the entire day.

Perhaps the most unpleasant time was pondering the waste of time that the dance ended up being tonight. In three hours I danced three times. Only one of those was the sort of dance I most enjoy, a slow dance where there is friendly conversation. One time was the funky chicken polka, and the other time was the obligatory line dance for U2’s “With Or Without You.” Again, at least there was good conversation, though I greatly disliked having one particularly miserable looking person who seemed around me far more often than would have been the case in a random sample, no matter where I happened to be. Such is the life, unfortunately, but I did my best to enjoy conversation with those who wanted to talk. One cannot force others to interact, or induce others to interact in ways that are edifying and worthwhile. All one can do is to think and speak as openly and kindly as possible, and to treat others with as much concern and consideration as possible, with respect and tenderness far beyond what is deserved, and to hope that one can help others in their own walk with our heavenly Father, in the hope that our own dysfunction does not make the lives and situations that others are dealing with even worse, even despite our best efforts and intentions. Even so, about a third of those of us who had attended services were told to take our conversations outside, and then told to take them off the premises altogether. Even on evenings like this, one doesn’t often leave until they throw you out [2].

[1] See, for example:

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2015/06/21/book-review-mother-should-i-trust-the-government/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2013/10/10/trust-is-what-im-offering-if-you-trouble-me/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2013/05/18/trust-in-me/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2013/04/13/your-trust-account-is-overdrawn/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2012/03/22/trust-and-the-limitations-of-success/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2011/06/04/in-the-absence-of-trust/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2011/05/20/book-review-the-speed-of-trust/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2011/05/12/a-matter-of-trust/

[2] See, for example:

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2013/09/02/dont-leave-until-they-throw-you-out/

https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2015/02/16/all-i-do-is-win/