Yesterday I had the privilege of helping out at our church’s contribution to the Oakville Waterfront Festival. For the past three years we have rented a climbing wall and allowed kids (and the occasional adult) to climb the wall. It is generally very popular since it is just about the only free thing at the festival. People are constantly asking how much it costs to climb and it’s fun to see their expressions change when you tell them it’s absolutely free. Some people ask if we take donations or if they can do something to pay for it and we always say “no.” In previous years we have not had a lot of success with drawing people from the Festival to church so this year we took a bit more time to try to connect with the parents of the kids who climbed the wall. I think it went very well and a lot of us had great conversations with unbelievers from our community.
I lied. There is another thing at the Festival that is free. There is a Healthy Oakville tent where those “health food” people showcase their latest tofu-based wonders and sing the praises of distilled water. Yesterday Some of the middle-aged women were showing off the latest and greatest trend in exercise. They put on their spandex outfits and danced around a field barefoot to the beating of a small drum. They waved their arms, shimmied and shook and danced as only someone who has recently irrigated her colon can dance. Perhaps they were trying to burn off the calories of the wheat-free, salt-free, fat-free, taste-free cookies they were selling.
Our church’s youth pastor preached today and he mentioned how proud practicing Jews are of their religious heritage. It made me think about how little most Christians know about their religious heritage. Does anybody care to learn about Christian history anymore? Does anyone know where we came from so we can learn from God’s blessings and human sin in times past? Maybe it’s no wonder that the church seems destined to repeat so many errors that we really should have learned from the first time.
Six days until the first BlogSwap. I am going to send out the information tomorrow. I am expecting about six or eight swaps this week and imagine it will grow as time goes on.
