Ryan Porche: 05/2005

What Can You Do?

Here's a quote from an attendance card Sunday:

"I found the brown jacket/black slack combination of the worship leader abomidable, and frankly, I shudder to think of a congregation in which such ergregious offenses to common fashion sense are tolerated."

Wow.

A Young Minister's Processing

Sunday was a great morning. We had a meaningful time of communion where we asked the entire church to come forward and be served. It was the first time Highland Street in Memphis has done anything like this, and there has been lots of great feedback. Personally, I love these experiences because they help us to become more of a community during communion. It’s the family meal for which we gather on Sundays. I love seeing so many smiles—seeing so much love being exchanged as people are greeted, served, and blessed. And I have special memories of the opportunity I had to serve communion along side Jackie Beth Shilcutt at Highland in Abilene just before I moved. Serving communion to your family is simply a powerful experience.

And, I had a new experience Sunday. A family chose to get up and leave as we began our time of communion. I didn’t recognize them, they may have been visitors. I don’t believe they had anything against me personally, but it is the first time this has happened in a worship setting under my leadership. Now, success and failure in a worship setting is not about my leadership—but I hope you can understand how something like this can hurt. My job is to create an atmosphere each week where God can move, and where His people can best receive and respond to His movement. That’s my job when you boil it down. So, to think that someone was not only uncomfortable—but repulsed to the point of leaving...hurts. On some level, it’s like I didn’t do my job.

And so, I follow the example of a mentor, and I pray for the family who left. I pray for the parents as they seek to be good examples to their children. And I pray for the teens as they learn and grow in their faith. And if we have an opportunity to have a conversation about it, I pray we may all treat each other as baptized people ought to.

Help Me Interpret This Dream

I had a very odd dream last night. And I’m issuing an edict to all blog-readers to help me interpret it.

The Dream: I was preparing to lead worship at Highland in Abilene. As I was running through a couple songs with the praise team (whose members I’ll recall in a moment), I thought it was funny that the left HALF of Highland’s Auditorium was completely full. In fact, they were kinda singing along with us as we warmed up. And as I would interrupt the song to make comments to the team, the people who were there would seem very offended! Finally, someone yelled from the back, “Ryan! Is this just a rehearsal?” They had thought it was an actual worship service! So I kindly replied, “Yes, the next worship assembly begins at 11 o’clock.”

At which point they all left to wander the foyers until eleven. Odd how 900 people can all get the wrong time. Hmm. I continued to rehearse the group until 10:58, at which point I let everyone take a restroom break. When I was in the restroom, I realized that I had not changed out of my “traveling” clothes yet. I was wearing a collared shirt and jean shorts (tucked in, of course). So I ran out to my find my Mother (6th row, 2nd seat, middle left section from the stage) and get the keys to the family van where my clothes were. It was now 11am, and I ran out to the parking lot and found—it was full of cars and I had no idea where our van was parked!

Then the dream ended. I’m guessing the beginning of the assembly would have been at least ten minutes late, and that I would have been out-of-breath and sweaty having just run through the parking lot. Not exactly the posture-of-prayer we would all hope for our worship leader prior to the assembly beginning. I remember that Brett Walker and Jeremiah Gibson were singing tenor with me. Jennifer Walker and Bonnie Jackson were singing alto, and Jeffrey Rasco was one of the basses. And, I also distinctly remember that Jeffrey was dressed in exactly what I had brought to change into (now I know there’s some hidden meaning there—even though it actually happened on several occasions!).

Hmm. So, what do you think? What does all this mean?

Kadesh and Other News

I'm grateful to those of you who continue to check my blog even though I have nothing of interest these days. But after the last several weekends, I'm in need of "nothing of interest!" I'll be in Abilene June 5-12 to lead worship at Kadesh I. The theme this year is "hope," and it's Reg Cox's last time to lead Kadesh. I'm really pumped about serving alongside Reg, Bob, and Jan again. I'm also looking forward to family, Los Arcos, Joe Allen's, and worship in the Amphitheatre in the cool summer night!

Last Sunday was really wonderful. We were focusing on God's love for the entire world as we collected for our World and Urban Missions. At Communion, we had a number of gentlemen read Scripture in their native languages. I LOVE multi-cultural worship--such a taste of heaven. Our goal for this particular special contribution was $141,664, and we had over $151,000 given Sunday morning alone! The Lord provides! And I'm excited about this coming Sunday because it's a special Communion Sunday.

Today I visited a young married couple who just had their first child. I visited for a few minutes and then led a prayer of blessing over the little guy. He was a bit disturbed during my visit. His Dad said he was being visited by "Mr. Pooty." I wasn't sure how to take that.

Layne Rouse is Coming to Town

In other news, my best friend Layne Rouse is coming to Memphis this weekend. Layne and I were roommates for 2.5 years just before I moved here. He just finished at ACU, and he will begin law school at Baylor this fall. We’re going to have a blast!

Although I called him last night to warn him one final time. Those of you who read this blog can understand that I tend to have…uh…”adventures” on weekends. I told him something has happened every weekend for the last seven weeks or so: come at your own risk! At least I won’t be alone this time!

This Sunday is “Senior Blessing Sunday” at Highland Street. I’m excited about it. Have a good weekend everyone!

Layne Rouse and I at the Paramount Theatre in Abilene.

BEEware!

Below, you can see a picture of how one of the children’s ministers here decorated my office door on Tuesday. She was pretty sneaky about it. But the story gets better. She called me late last night and asked me for the number of the bee keeper. Why? Because when she got home from church there were six bees in her dining room! Ha!

“…let justice roll on like a river…”

I found this on my office door Tuesday! Isn't that great?!

Two Bee or Not Two Bee. More Like 2,000 Bee!

I had another adventure this weekend. On Friday afternoon, I killed four bees in the dining area of my apartment. I thought it was odd, but I was leaving for an evening of activities and I didn’t think too much about it. Saturday morning, when I emerged from my bedroom, there were more bees in my apartment than I could count! As I glanced out on my balcony, there were swarms of bees—we’re talking a plague here, folks! I noticed they were going up into the ceiling on my balcony. And the ones in the apartment were coming in through the air conditioner vents!

So, I did what anyone else would do. I grabbed my phone, my wallet, my keys, baby picture albums, and my social security card and ran out the front door! (Okay, that was a bit of an exaggeration). I went the apartment complex office and we called the pest control. The dude came out and helped me begin killing them. The problem is, the hive is up in the ceiling—where we can’t get to it. Which means there’s a queen up there continuing to lay eggs. So, we’re probably going to have to get a bee keeper to come and smoke the rest out! Crazy!

At any rate, I spent Sunday afternoon cleaning up over 300 dead bees in my apartment. Some pictures are below. I’ll let you know if honey starts coming out of my water faucets.