So it's been a good weekend, you might say.

This weekend has been kind of an interesting experience for me. You see, on Friday night I drove up to Oklahoma to visit my youth group at Falls Creek. I took my guitar, as I am wont to do when I go on a trip of any real length. I got to Falls Creek in just in time for the evening tabernacle service, and after going to Hinton's cabin just to say "Hi" to Joann (a cook for our cabin, also a great friend and mom to one of my best friends), I went with Lynnae up to the tabernacle so I would know where Hinton was sitting. The tabernacle holds about 6000 people when you really pack them in there, so sometimes it can be hard to find your group.

So when we got near the Hinton group, people I haven't seen in almost a year immediately recognized me and smiled ever-so-wide as they waved hello to me. Among a group of about 60 folks all seated together, at least half of them must have said "hi" to me in a span of about five seconds. It was dizzying and a bit confusing, but it made me feel like I was among people who were truly happy to see me; I had really missed these people, but I never knew it.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I don't feel loved and accepted here at Baylor, this was just a different kind of acceptance than I had been experiencing at Baylor for the past year. Whereas at Baylor I have different groups of people I hang out with depending on whether it's a band activity , a K-Psi event, a church activity, or some other type of thing. In Hinton, it doesn't matter what you're doing, you're always with the same people. So these people not only know about everything you've ever done, but they probably had a rather large hand in many of those events. It's the whole "small town mentality" that I complain about so bitterly and yet love so much.

(Off-topic, but I wonder if this is just something I do or if it's more common than that: the things I love most are the things I find myself complaining about the most. Is this because I'm just naturally inclined to complain about things [hope not!], or is it that these things are so dear to me that if I perceive anything to be the slightest bit wrong I immediately start whining about it? I must ponder this.)

So after the amazing service (go Bill Green!), I joined the group back at the cabin and was talking to Dave a little bit about what's going on when all of a sudden he just up and said, "Man, I'm glad you're here, you can play guitar tonight." Now, I really wanted him to ask me to do this, but I was still surprised that he would just come out of nowhere like that and offer me that opportunity. I hadn't played in front of people for almost a year before Friday night, so I guess I'd forgotten that when you show up in Hinton (or rather, when you're among Hintonites) they immediately put your skills to work. *laughs*

Long story short, Kim, Corey, and I ended up leading the worship that night. I didn't sing (wasn't my place; I've graduated and moved on, so I was glad to just be a part of the rhythm section), just played my guitar and nodded along with the beat. We did "Romans 16:19" (they cracked my resolve), "Waves of Mercy," "Here I am to Worship," and "Breathe." After all of that was done, Dave let me sleep in the cabin out of the kindness of his heart (thanks again, Dave). The next morning I helped a bit with the cabin-cleaning and left for Fort Worth.

After a fairly short drive to the Big City, I had an excellent lunch with Jen at Applebee's. I'd like to think that both of us really enjoyed it, but I can only speak for myself in this instance, and I did indeed have fun. We made plans to see each other later that night when she got done singing for some folks' wedding. (can't remember their names now... eep)

So I had some time to kill in Fort Worth at this point. I would attend the Saturday night service at my Uncle Sam's church, Bear Valley Community Church in Hurst. I hadn't even been to this church in almost three years (maybe more, I can't remember), so I figured I'd probably be able to sneak in mostly unrecognized and just enjoy the service, assuming none of my family was actually there that night. I spent about an hour studying Political Science at a nearby Starbucks, and then I headed to the church.

When I got to the church, the first person I saw(!) right at the front door immediately held out his hand, grinned and said, "You must be John." So my intentions of anonymity were dashed fairly quickly, you might say. You see, my brother (Rob) works as the youth minister at the church, and so people there know of my existence because he likes to tell stories of how annoying or frustrating I am (I know of at least two lessons he's taught where I acted as some sort of "obstacle" he needed to get past; thanks, Rob). Some people say we share a very strong resemblance, so this guy saw my Oklahoma license plates, noticed the family resemblance, and immediately I was marked. *laughs* I must have shaken hands with twenty people who all said "It's so good to see you!" and all that. I did happen to run into some of my family: my Aunt Nancy was there to do some of the music and my cousin Will was doing sound. It was cool to see them, I must say.

The thing that interested me about all of that was the way I was greeted. Most of the people I met last night had never seen me or even talked to me, and yet they knew exactly who I was, where I came from, and could ask me questions about my family without even having to struggle for names. These people knew me, certainly, but in a completely different sense than the people in Hinton knew me. Two churches, two groups who knew me, but two completely different approaches to "knowing" me.

This morning I went to UBC (my church here in Waco), and received yet another type of welcome. These people know me only from the experiences I've dealt with since coming to Baylor. These people know practically none of my history, but they know a fair amount about what group I spend the most time with, how I'll react to certain things, etc. They've seen me develop and grow over the past year, and that's how they see me. So that's now three ways that the people I've encountered this weekend "know" me.

All this to say, perhaps this relates to how we can know God. We can know him like the people at Bear Valley know me, through assocation and stories they've heard. Or we can know him like the people in Hinton know me, through shared past experiences and lots of memories but without any growth or new communication coming or going. And finally we can know Him like the people at UBC know me, by experiencing things together and constantly communicating about what's happened and what's happening. I should hope that I'm striving for the third, but sometimes I know I'm not doing any better than the second. Eep.

My prayer for today:
"God, help me to continue to grow and know You better like I know I should. Don't let me fall into a pattern of simply remembering what You've done, but let me to continue to realize what You can do if only I'll allow it to happen."

Listening to: Alive - P.O.D.