"Not So Loud"

I hope the wrong person doesn't ever see this. I suppose that's extremely unlikely.

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So, the kids at my church, early teens, were sitting in the sanctuary, practicing a fun song that, I thought, had a great message in it. (It was for VBS, as I recall.) At the end of one rendition, some of the girls cried out, and one in particular, with her hands above head, "Whoo! We did great!"

One of our deacons, whom, I doubt not, is a good man, was sitting across the isle from the kids. I suppose, at that point, he felt he had to prove he is an old fart. He must’ve because he looked at the girl and said, “Not so loud.” Sheesh!

Among the many things that adults screw up is that we teach our children to march and sing, "I'm in the Lord's Army!" We think that's alright. Then, when they get a little older, we try to turn them into the dried up cheese wedges that our parents turned us into.

We think everybody's supposed to be so quiet, calm and, dare I say, cold in God's house. We fear praise and worship and don't want our little, nice redundant services interrupted by some child being "silly' and making any joyful noise in the House of God.

We wonder, though we shouldn't have to, why our congregations are waning in both number and spirit. When any one among us tries to cry to God in joy or pain, the rest of us "sticks-in-the-mud" do our best to shut them down. It seems to bother us when we see genuine joy in someone else. Joy we wish we had.

I don't want to be too hard on this deacon. As I've said, I believe him to be a good guy. I'm sure he never gave a second thought to the repercussions of his actions. Of course, part of the problem is, we don't think, we just do.

Mark 10:47. And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out, and say, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me.
48. And many charged him that he should hold his peace: but he cried the more a great deal, Thou son of David, have mercy on me.