When a Good Friend Brings Good Grief!

Laura and I had the thrill of having good friends from PA with us this weekend. Rick and Ginger Glass are some of those rare "true blue friends" that stay by your side through thick and thin. God really has and continues to use Rick and Ginger in our lives (The picture above is of meand Rick right before moving to Michigan).

We were actually in PA last week and had dinner with Rick and Ginger. Half serious and half jokingly we said, "Hey, you guys should come back to PA with us for the weekend!" They did and it was awesome. But if you were in Ryan and Carrie Sharpe's 2nd Hour Class last Sunday morning here at Gaylord E-Free, Rick told a story (at Ryan's devious prompting) on me from my previous church where for Christmas I dressed up like Charlie Brown.

It was my first Christmas at the church and our theme was, "A Charlie Brown Christmas." Everything about that Sunday was centered around the Peanut's Gang. We had a giant inflatable Snoopy sitting on his dog house and we showed a clip from the classic Charlie Brown Christmas cartoon. And "yours truly" dressed up like Charlie Brown. I wore black shorts, knee socks, brown shoes and the infamous yellow shirt with the black zig-zag line around it.

As I was greeting folks at the doors as they arrived for the service I shook the hand of a college student who was home for the first time since I had become the pastor so he had never met me. There were many people coming in the door so we didn't really talk or make any introductions - just shook hands. Afterwards, his mom told me the following story.

She said that not knowing I was the pastor, and because of the way I was dressed, her son thought I was a man with "special needs." As he sat down for the service he thought to himself, "How cool that they let that man with special needs stand at the door and greet people - most churches would not see that as a good first impression." Then he was completely shocked when after the worship part of the service, that same man with "special needs" stood up and preached!

All I can say is, "Good Grief!"