the howie

Today I was visiting a Church camp to be part of a panel discussion on service.

Before the panel discussion there was a service. To start with it began 45 minutes late, I think just because that’s the norm on a christian camp.

The service began with a bit of worship. The worship leader began by pointing at people in the congregation and saying “come on Tony get up here and sing with us”. She kept going until he had 6 or 7 people up the front with the band. I made sure i was well slouched in my chair.

The band fired up and we began to sing. Then part way through a song the worship leader put down her mic and began walking up and down the centre isle. Just before the next line of the song she would shout “MEN” or “WOMEN” depending on who she wanted to sing the next line. I remember when i was a younger chap that this was common practice in church but never with such military delivery. “MEN!!!!!”

My favorite moment was towards the end of a song when it was fading out she shouted “AGAIN!!”

It was an interesting experience.

After the service it was time for the panel discussion with me and a few others from different organisations.

I had to go first in introducing myself, who i am, what I do etc.

I began with a joke about how normally i just speak to young people and that a lot of the people in the room where far from being young. I didn’t mean to begin with such a gag it just came out. As it was falling out my mouth my brain started slapping me on the inside of my head, this could go down the wrong way big time, especially as I hadn’t warmed up with less offensive jokes to test the water. No one knew if I was going to be witty or not they had never seen me before.

Well It looked like i was right to be internally slapping myself as there was dead silence for what felt like 3 and a half hours.  But thankfully the dead silence was followed by a loud wave of laughter. I managed to put in a few gags whilst answering the questions of the facilitator. At one point a man in the congregation laughed so much it looked like his head was going to snap off his neck. His head fell backwards with some serious force.

The guy next to me in the panel did some funnies too, in fact his where much better than mine.