Cynicism

One thing I like about our church is that I honestly and sincerely like every person there. I don’t expect that to last as the church grows. I’m not being negative or anything, I’m just being realistic. There’s always people you end up not completely gelling with, and whatever, it just happens. But yeah, as it is, I like everyone there and I find that fairly amazing. It’s a blessing.

I’m still a bit disturbed about how much cynicism has a hold on our culture and on me. In many circles, I think cynicism is viewed as a mark of wisdom. Maybe some people even view cynicism as *being* wisdom. And I actually think that’s reasonable as far as the world goes. But there’s something disturbing about that for those that live the gospel life I think.

I think that’s the biggest blessing I received from Promise Keepers. Just, it consistently broke through my cynicism and reminded me that although my skepticism in humans is justified, there’s power in the power of Jesus, and that’s where our hope comes from. I think it did a fairly good job in emphasizing that it’s not self help, it’s not that we can change things, but that everything is impossible unless Jesus steps in. And I dunno, there was something refreshing about that.

The worship band was another example of breaking through my cynicism. I’m awful when it comes to praise. Just tend to be really harsh in my head. I was no different coming in. But I was won over. Just, there’s something powerful about worshiping together with tons of people – it repeatedly gave me chills. Plus the band was super tight and the worship leader was very good. He even explicitly brought attention at the end at how music can be manipulative and how we need to be focused. I really appreciated that. I dunno, they were really great.

It is extremely odd though hearing a bunch of baritone voices with no females in the mix. Plus they arranged all the songs lower so there was a strong deep masculine rumble when everyone sang. Also the worship leader kind of looked like Donovan McNabb. I’m not being racist here. He really did.