I don’t have any hard data on this, but I think that of all the major world religions, Christianity has the highest dork per capita ratio. Did I say that right? Is there a different metric we’re using to measure number of dorks that I should have referenced instead? Are we still rolling with the per capita ratio? It’s so hard to find good research on this topic.

But think about it, no one ever says, “You know who is cheesy? Muslims.” Rarely will you hear someone proclaim, “The Hindus are all uptight.” And when Buddhists are stereotyped they’re labeled as being “relaxed and peaceful.” Christianity though has a lockdown on dork status and you know what?

I love it.

I used to hate it. From the time I was in the seventh grade right up until I became 33 I railed against it. I did everything I could to prove to the world that I was not some cheesy Christian. I distanced myself from Christian culture as fast as I possibly could because it all felt so overwhelmingly dorky. But then something weird happened, something unexpected … my five year old tried to get into pop culture.

I’ve got nothing against the particular pop star my daughter suddenly became fascinated with but the transition from “I love the Wiggles” to “the Wiggles are for babies” was ridiculously fast. (In her defense, that Captain Feathersword who the Wiggles run with, scares me to death.) Up until that point I really hoped my daughter would grow up to be a cool kid. I wanted her to be part of the popular crowd at school and be considered hip. But when she started sweating pop stars and other little girls in our area started getting into teenage television shows, I had to pause.

Those things weren’t created for a 5 year old. The entertainment she wanted to watch was not written for a girl two years out of diapers. It’s got boyfriends and girlfriends and topics that are way out of her understanding as a little kid. And she might love it. She might sing all the songs and have a blast doing it and fit right in with all her friends. But if I encourage her to do that, if I push her toward that, I fast forward her through childhood. I speed her up from a 5 year to a 10 year old. And although I make about 47 dad mistakes a day, I have learned one secret about childhood:

You can fast forward childhood, but you can’t rewind it.

I wish I could but I can’t. Childhood only goes one direction and I want her to stay a little kid for as long as she can. There will be plenty of time later for her to think boys are cute and interesting. (Right now I’m pushing for “smelly and cootie laden.”)

Until then though, she’s not going to be hip. I’m going to raise a dork. Which is different from naïve, don’t misunderstand, she’s going to be like Matthew 10:16, shrewd as a snake and innocent as a dove. And if you’re making different decisions with your kids, please don’t hear this as an attack. I’m new to being a dad, am by no means a pro, don’t have all the answers and am really only writing about the two kids with my last name. Who will be dorks.

I hope I don’t help create one of these sheltered Christian girls that just goes insane when they get to college, but I promise you that I’m going to do everything I can to keep my kids young, out of the loop as far as the world goes and maybe even dorky. And when my oldest daughter yells at me when she’s 13 because she can’t go to a party with a bunch of boys, who I know are going to try to kiss her, I’ll show her this post. And she’s going to yell some more, but at least I’ll kind of look like I predicted the future, which is fun.

A few weeks ago I spoke to a singles group about honesty in dating relationships. The talk was called “The Biggest Gift” and focused on the idea that in order to have honesty in a dating relationship you need to give the person you’re dating the gift of going second. I spoke for about 30 minutes and then was supposed to take 15 minutes of questions. I expected maybe two or three questions and then we’d call it a morning.

I was wrong.

Before I had even finished saying, “thank you for having me,” a guy in the front row had his arm up. And then a lady in the back row starting waving her hand and then like popcorn, hands started going up in the air and I started getting sweaty.

Without realizing it, I was suddenly thrown into an “Instant Sermon Feedback” situation. Never experienced an ISF? Allow me to explain.

An ISF is a quick Q&A session that immediately follows a message. It could be at a conference, in a Sunday School class, at an all members church meeting, etc. It’s simply your chance to respond with no wait to what you’ve just heard. And they can be tricky.

Usually in those situations, I bite my tongue because my first desire is to ask a fake question whose goal is only to get my across my own point and make me look smart. Basically I make a statement, instead of asking a question and essentially say, “Hey everyone in this room, I want you to think I’m smart and all bibley, so I’m going to pretend I have a question but really I’m just adding my own P.S. to this sermon.”

That’s ridunkulous, (a phrase I would say constantly if I could actually dunk which is why God cursed me with a low vertical leap, it’s my thorn in the flesh) but I do it. And chances are I’m not the only one who could use a little refresher in popular Instant Sermon Feedback.

So here are the three most common ways people respond when given a Q&A moment with a speaker:

1. Yeah, but.
If you’re a speaker and you hear this phrase, “Yeah but,” get ready for a wild ride my friend. No one ever starts a sentence with “Yeah but,” and then ends it with “you’re really awesome and a great communicator.” During my Biggest Gift ISF a woman asked me to “define intimacy.” I replied, “Intimacy is the ability to be emotionally naked and vulnerable without fear of consequence.” She immediately said, “Yeah but, I’m not talking about being all naked under the sheets.” Thrown into a weird tailspin by the “yeah, but” I had no other choice but to respond, “Neither am I, but I am a big fan of naked under the sheets.” I think I even gave naked under the sheets the double thumbs up as I said it. I’m such a smooth operator.

2. The Challenge
This one is fun to experience when it’s not you on the stage. Jumping right over “yeah, but,” someone in the crowd just busts out a question that lets you know they disagree. This happened to me, when a woman asked, “What would have been a gracious way to handle that situation you described?” What she meant was, “The way you handled it wasn’t gracious, can you please give us an example where the main character in the story, in this case you, isn’t a jerk?” Touché. She was referring to a story I told to illustrate what happens when you over share on a date. Once on a first date in college, I went to a girl’s apartment. She went back into her bedroom and emerged with a pillow case full of journals and diaries she had written over the years. She then proceeded to read them to me. In that moment I started to calculate how many of my keys I didn’t need and which ones I could throw into the kitchen to make a shiny, loud distraction so that I could sneak out a window. On a first date, the answer to the question, “Do you like living in Atlanta?” is never “My dad didn’t hug me enough or ever throw the baseball with me.” But the woman in the crowd was right, I could have handled that situation with more grace. So she got me, and you’ll have the chance as a crowd member to get a speaker with your own challenge during an ISF. I highly recommend it.

3. The curveball
Another great approach is to throw out a curveball, some completely unforeseen sentence of awesomeness that reduces both the speaker and the crowd to fits of laughter. That happened to me at the Christian Web Conference a few weeks ago. During the Q&A session I told the crowd, “humor is a gift from God and when we refuse to accept it, it makes him want to take it back, like the unicorns.” Minutes later, a very serious looking, bearded gentleman raised his hand. I called on him and he said, “Sure, but why did God take away the unicorns?” I loved that and responded with something like, “Because we took their beauty for granted and did not respect their ‘stabbing horns.’” He responded, “Well I think you’re disrespecting unicorns. I have a site called stuff unicorns don’t like.com and you just made that list.” I thought that was hilarious and chased that guy down later to ask him to guest post on Stuff Christians Like. Few things are as delightful as a perfectly thrown curveball.

Those are the three options I see most often, but what about you?

Have you ever experienced one of these three Instant Sermon Feedback moments?

What’s the funniest or weirdest or most awkward thing you’ve experienced during a church flavored Q&A?

I’m not going to lie to you, sometimes it is hard to come up with ideas for Stuff Christians Like. Although I learned a fire drill kind of approach to idea generation when I was writing branding for Home Depot, sometimes there is absolutely nothing creative coming out of my pen.

I mow the yard and my head keeps coming up empty. I drive to work and can’t concentrate on my commute with the flood of horribly unfunny ideas in my head. I scribble down nonsense on scraps of paper that my wife’s friends later find and mock me about. (“What did your husband mean by that post it note that just said, ‘I wish I knew more unhappy rich people?’)

Sometimes new ideas just refuse to show up, but other times, they fall right in my lap.

Or hand as it were.

I took this picture at a souvenir store in Destin, Florida. The resolution isn’t great, but hopefully you can clearly see what is written on the side of this shot glass.

That’s right, it’s Footprints in the Sand.

Arguably our favorite piece of literature outside of the Bible, the Footprints poem is a short ditty about a man talking with God. After seeing only one set of footprints in the sand during the difficult times in his life, the man asks, “Where were you God?” To which God replies, “Those were the times I was carrying you.”

I’ve got nothing against the Footprints poster, mug, commemorative belt or sport hair visor. I like sand, I like indentions in sand and I love God. Me and the footprints poem could probably share a small Kia rental car on a long trip through California wine country without getting into any major arguments. But footprints on a shot glass?

That is ridiculous.

The front of the shot glass says, “Footprints in the Sand. Destin, Florida.” The back? Oh the back is where the nonsense really gets the party started Pink style.

Here’s what it says:
“When times are tough, when you’re feeling blue,
if you’re not sure where you’re headed, remember the Lord, he will carry you.”

I wish I was the copywriter assigned to that project. I would have taken a slightly different angle on that poem.

“When times are tough, and your drink was blue,
If you pass out, someone will upload a photo on facebook of you.”

Or

“When times are tough, and you lost your right shoe
Remember your left eyebrow? Cause you lost that too.”

Or
“When times are tough, and you’re feeling blue,
you should go look in the mirror because you’re looking kind of purple too, I don’t know if all those shots was a good idea and then you ordered the #17 at the Magic Sun Chinese restaurant after eating “the fourth meal” at Taco Bell. I don’t feel like any of those things were wise decisions on your part. I’m just saying. You my friend, are the color of rotten pomegranates.”

OK, OK, OK, that last one got away from me a little bit, but I think I’m still reeling from the absurdity of the footprints poem on a shot glass.

How about you? How would you have written that poem if you were given the task for the side of a shot glass?

Let’s have a “Footprints Shot Glass Poetry Contest.” (I’m pretty sure Guideposts magazine already did this exact same thing, but I’m not terribly original.)

What would you put on the side of that glass?

Mike Foster is 50% of the people who came to my “multi-person” meet and greet at Catalyst last year. (Technically speaking, multi means more than one, so even though only two people came, I’m rolling with that.)

He was speaking that night and came by to encourage me because he’s one of the kindest people I’ve ever met. He’s also one of the most insightful so when Zondervan asked if I wanted to give away 5 copies of the book he wrote with Jud Wilhite, Deadly Viper Character Assassins, the answer was a pop n’ lock accentuated yes.

Let’s do a comment contest. Best 5 answers to this question win a free book:

“What’s the funniest thing you’ve ever noticed at church?”

It can be anything. Some song you always sing, a deadly fist fight between the mime team and the hand bell crew. What’s something funny and church related that you think belongs on the Stuff Christians Like list?

Comment until Tuesday, September 29.

What’s the funniest thing you’ve ever noticed at church?

(If you like Tyler Stanton, and you should, you ought to go to the Catalyst Conference. In addition to it just being an awesome conference, Tyler is going to be all over that thing like a spider monkey. Seriously, he’s done some hilarious things that are going to go live at Catalyst and you would find them delightful. In the meantime, he’s checked in with another great guest post. Enjoy.)

Evangelizing about trivial things.
The other day Jon asked me my thoughts about P90X, a workout routine I purchased just moments after being hypnotized by its 30-minute infomercial. Without even the slightest hesitation, I launched into a Romans Road-esque discourse about its pros and cons, its benefits and reliability, and a (powerful) personal testimony of my own. I wouldn’t rest until Jon decided to become a disciple of Tony Horton.

As ridiculous as that sounds, it’s not that far off. I spend an insane amount of time, energy, and passion evangelizing about all kinds of trivial things. Don’t believe me? Here’s a typical day in the life of Tyler Stanton:

6:42am – Run by my local Starbucks and grab a grande black coffee. Sure, the meeting I’m about to go to will provide coffee, but I like to show up with a massive logoed cup so I can promote their superior bean to my co-workers.

8:33am – Once I’m through with coffee, I pridefully whip out my gum brand of choice and, without being asked, begin proclaiming truths about its flavor crystals and teeth-whitening capability. I then start distributing pieces like they’re individually wrapped tracts, mentioning that they should “taste and see” for themselves.

9:50am – As I open my MacBook, I look across the room and scoff at the ugly Dell across from me, as though I’m personally offended by their belief system. When its owner asks if there is a problem, I take a deep breath and dive into an apologetics rant that I learned at the Genius Bar.

11:08am – I overhear people at the table next to me talking bad about Twitter. At this moment, I can’t help but feel like I’m being persecuted for my social networking convictions. I turn around and ask them pointedly, if they died tonight, where…would people find this information out? Email? Please.

12:35pm – Someone has the audacity to suggest La Frontera for lunch. This is my opportunity to evangelize to the masses. I stand on my chair and, using the acronym C.H.A.L.U.P.A., list the reasons why El Torero is the one true Mexican restaurant, and that I’ll pray for the souls of those who suggest otherwise.

1:22pm – When it comes time to pay, I slowly pull my “Restaurants” cash envelope out from my pocket and regurgitate nasty credit card statistics that I learned from The Dave Ramsey Show. I offer the one guy who seemed remotely interested a ride so that I can answer some follow-up questions that he might have.

1:57pm - When the lady in line behind me at the bank asks to borrow my pen, I consider this a divine appointment and waste no time diving into my rehearsed one-minute testimony about how my life has radically changed since Bryan Allain introduced me to the black Bic Atlantis. “I’ve never experienced such a classy ball point!” I keep telling her.

4:40pm – My co-worker asks me if I want to go with him to the Georgia football game on Saturday. All of the sudden, I’m angry and offended. Being a Tech fan, he might as well have asked me if I wanted to accompany him to a puppy sacrifice down at the abandoned warehouse. The man who was once Darryl from accounting is now a nameless pagan cult follower in my book.

7:14pm – To cap off the day, my wife suggests we watch Reba. I gently explain to her that we were created for something more, something better and more satisfying…like 30 Rock.

10:10pm – I lay my head on my pillow, proud of my contribution to society.

(For more hilarity from Tyler, make sure you check out his blog, tylerstanton.com or follow him on Twitter.)

During my Senior Year of high school I decided to sit on the front row at church. I didn’t do this because I wanted to be closer to my parents or the pulpit. This was not a noble attempt to break free of the distraction of sitting with all my friends so that I could perhaps hear the word of God spoken more clearly.

I sat on the front row because I was an idiot in high school.

I realized that with our u-shaped chair arrangement in the Marlboro Middle School Cafeteria, (shout out to churches that meet in places other than churches) I could sit directly across from the youth group section of the congregation. I could see all my friends and make faces at them during the whole service. I could flirt with my girlfriend and essentially “perform” on the front row for all my friends. So although geographically, my seat said “front row focuser,” my body language yelled, “look at this idiot.” Although we’ve never spoken about it, I’m sure that my contribution to the service was less than appreciated by my father, the Senior Pastor.

But maybe he didn’t notice what I was doing? Maybe he was so lost in the moment of speaking that my annoying adolescent antics (alliteration) didn’t even phase him? Maybe he is such a consummate pro that I didn’t even make his sermon radar?

It’s possible, but I want to be honest with you, I would have noticed.

Whenever I speak I tend to laser focus on the person that is paying the least amount of attention. Perhaps I am a masochist but I tend to scan the crowd and lock on to the person that is completely zoned out and thinking about whether it would be weird to buy a rock tumbler as an adult? Seriously, you always wanted one as a kid when they were in those massive Sears catalogs they printed at Christmas and you’ve got an income now. You’re the adult, if you can eat cereal for dinner and ice cream whenever you want, why couldn’t you just up and buy yourself a rock tumbler? That’s the guy I watch when I speak.

And maybe you’re that guy or girl. Maybe you’re tuned out. If so, I want to tell you the three worst types of Sermon Body Language you can throw at a speaker.

1. The Rip Van Winkle
Ever fallen asleep during church? I’m not talking about during a long, lights are down prayer moment. I mean right in the middle of the sermon. Ever done that? If so, I hope you enjoyed it, because the days of casually doing that are over my friend. I was in a big meeting a few months ago and one of the higher ups fell asleep. How did I know? Someone showed me the photo on their camera. They had taken a snapshot of the sleepy person and it spread like wildfire in my circle of friends. I’m not saying that if I ever see you sleeping when I speak, I’ll stop what I’m saying, walk close enough to hear your soft little snores and take a photo that I then post on Stuff Christians Like, twitter about and add to my facebook page, but I’m not saying I won’t either.

2. The Arm Fold Head Shake
By this point, everyone knows that when you fold your arms over your chest your body language is saying, “Whoa, I’m building a wall with my arms and mentally shot blocking whatever it is you’re telling me.” And then on top of that, I’m going to add a head shake instead of a head nod, the shake being a sign that like a Portuguese Water dog, after a brisk summer swim, I am shaking away any words you’re throwing at me instead of nodding along in agreement. Whenever I speak somewhere I do a humor litmus test to gauge the percent of AFHS in the crowd. I basically just tell the Booty God Booty story and if arms start crossing and heads start shaking immediately I scratch my ear which is a signal to my wife to start the car and crack open a window for me to crawl out. Things are not going to go well for me.

3. The “Look at my Arms”
A few weeks ago I spoke at a retreat where they created a fill in the blank outline for my talk. During the fill in the blank portion of the message I noticed a handful of people scribbling down the words I was saying, but out of the corner of my eye, I saw one guy stretch his right arm onto the back of the chair. “Hey, maybe that guy is a southpaw. Maybe he’s writing down all these insightful words I’m saying with his left hand.” I thought to myself. Nope, a few seconds later he put his left arm up on the seats. He sat there, arms outstretched, not even to lovingly cradle someone as he was sitting alone. It was as if he was saying, “Look at my arms, this is when I should be writing notes down but I don’t even need to. I put my handout on the floor, next to my keys, which I’ll probably kick at some point if you start going on to long. Look at my arms, not note taking here. I would if there was something ink worthy being said.”

Those are the three worst forms of Sermon Body Language. Want to send your minister a different signal? Lean forward, with note paper in hand, and a glint in your eye that says, “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry right now or maybe do both but I’m learning, I’m listening and I might even be life changing right here in my seat.” Or at the bare minimum fall asleep in a section of the church where it doesn’t look like people have camera phones.

What’s the worst sermon body language you’ve ever seen?

Here are the three people who won a free copy of one of Jason Boyett’s Pocket Guide books. If you made one of the winning comments about which book you wish had a sequel, please email me at theacuffs@yahoo.com with your mailing address and “Boyett Winner” in the subject line. Thanks so much for sharing your ideas.

Kathy said… Gone With The Wind.
SEPTEMBER 12, 2009 6:35 AM

Chris Hill said… Partly Cloudy Patriot by Sarah Vowell.
SEPTEMBER 12, 2009 1:56 PM

wheresmycow said… I’d probably just go for a Pride and Prejudice sequel
SEPTEMBER 14, 2009 9:05 AM

I’m a little terrified of my friend Nathan.

He’s not physically scary. I mean he’s kind of a brawny, weight lifting type of guy, much like myself if you’ve seen the video from Cross Point. And he has a breakdancing ministry in inner city Atlanta so clearly it’s not a pop n’ lock issue. It’s just that he tends to ask tough questions. He tends to say things that make me uncomfortable. And that’s exactly what he did at Willy’s a few weeks ago.

We went there for a burrito because unlike Chipotle they don’t charge you for chips. (At this point in the history of burrito consumption, I feel like charging extra money for chips is like a restaurant asking you to pay for the use of a fork. Boggles the mind really.) During lunch I was telling him that I felt like I had hit a spiritual wall. I was stuck. There wasn’t any one thing I could point my finger at, some neon issue I had jumped back into with both feet, but for some reason I just seemed off kilter.

After hearing me ramble for what probably felt like 19 years, Nathan asked me simply,
“Where is all this stuff going? Your quiet time, your study, your reading, your Bible work? Where is the outward expression of your faith? Who are you serving right now?”

Ahh come on. I don’t want tough questions. I want easy friendships where I show up and you show up and we tell each other how awesome we are. “You’re a fantastic Christian!” “No, you’re a fantastic Christian!” I don’t like questions like that.

But as I thought about what he asked, I was confronted with the reality that I really only want to follow the first and greatest commandment. Are you familiar with that one? In Matthew 22:37-38 a guy named Jesus says, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment.”

I am down with that verse. When I read it, I think to myself, “Yes, that is what I am talking about! I will focus inward and learn to love the Lord with all my heart and my soul and my mind. This is fantastic. I can twist this into some sort of God-flavored self improvement course. This will be like a Biblically based version of that productivity book I’m reading right now, ‘Getting Things Done.’ I’ll find a quiet spot, cocoon myself in self effort and just go to town growing my faith in a little greenhouse of me.”

That’s what I want to do. But Jesus doesn’t stop thought there. I want him to. I want him to drop a hard period at the end of that sentence and move on to walking on water or multiplying fish with his bare hands. “End scene Jesus, end scene!” I want to shout. But He doesn’t get down that way. He follows verse 38 with this gem about the second commandment:

“And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Nards! Really? There’s a neighbor involved? Can’t I just go on a deep spiritual retreat to a cave in the desert where I grow a beard, and live alone as I work on my faith, perhaps keeping a wolf as my only companion? I’ll name him “Timber” after the one Snake Eyes had in GI Joe. Can’t I turn the Bible into a self help book and God into a self empowerment guru? Can’t this faith thing just be about me?

But it’s not. There’s a second half to that thought. There’s a neighbor and a call to love and an outward expression of faith and Nathan challenged me on it.

The truth is, I sometimes want my faith to be like a bonsai tree, the miniaturized versions of trees made famous in the Karate Kid movie. I want to manicure it and study it and prune it and move piece by piece around with tweezers, never once taking my eyes off the small little tree and refusing to admit there is a forest outside my window. Never once admitting that there are deep woods all around me. Never once realizing that I walk through groves of trees every day that need to be loved and served.

Is there an inward direction to faith? Is there a place for being deliberate about your heart and your mind and your soul? Without a doubt. I don’t think Jesus made a mistake when He called loving the Lord the most important commandment. I think the internal life is a critical part of our faith experience. But Jesus didn’t stop there. He didn’t end the thought with that foundation. He didn’t end the thought with a single tree. He jumped into the forest. He finished by calling us toward our neighbor. He ended by calling us toward outward love.

And whether I’m afraid or lazy or selfish or a million other things, I can’t escape from the fact that He wants me to have more than bonsai faith.

If I had to guess, the inventor of the semi-colon is pretty angry right now. I don’t know who he or she is, I mean I suppose I could look it up on the Internets, but that feels way too close to me googling something grammar related and I swore in the seventh grade that would never happen. (I know, that was before the Internet even existed, but I was always a pretty intuitive lad. I had a gut feeling it was coming, you know?)

And do you know why the inventor of the semi-colon is so bothered right now, why he’s jealous of the inventor of the colon, why he’s somewhere getting drunk with the lady who invented the ampersand and bemoaning his fortunes?

The smiley face emoticon.

Even though I predicted the Internet a decade before it blew up, even I didn’t see that thing coming. When you combine a colon, not a semi but just a regular colon, with a parenthesis, wild things happen. Magically a smile pops up. Look at it, , it’s so powerful and tiny.

Big deal, right? There are a million emoticons, we even made a list of Christian emoticons. We all use them in some way. The chat system they put on our computers at work inexplicably has both a sheep and a soccer ball icon you can automatically insert in your corporate chat sessions should you find yourself in need of a “sheep soccer” reference. Who cares about the smiley face? It’s useless. Or is it? I’ve started to notice something lately, whenever someone tells me something difficult or borderline mean, they punctuate their thought with a smiley face.

That small smiley face absolves you of anything hateful or mean or gossipy in the email or text message or tweet you’ve just written. It’s the ultimate Christian get out of jail free card.

I dare say it’s the digital version of “bless her heart.”

We’ve covered that majestic phrase a million times on this site already (it’s what you say when you want to slam someone but not look like you’re in fact slamming someone). But lately I’ve really seen the making a strong showing.

Just the other day a pastor busted on me on Twitter and then threw out a smiley face at the end of his tweet. For the first part of the message I thought, “Ahh, that stinks, that dude doesn’t like me. I hate to read negative stuff about me. Why do I care so much about this stuff? I wish I wasn’t so insecure. Maybe this guy is right, maybe I am horrible.” And I started to get blue, but then I saw the smile at the end of his tweet. “Ohh wait, wait, wait. There’s a little smile at the end of the tweet. Phew, for a second I thought this guy didn’t like me, but those kidney punches at the beginning of his tweet were just to soften me up so that I could receive this hidden hug at the end.”

It’s uncanny really, and I fear the smile face is going to eventually replace my favorite “pretend I didn’t just say that” phrase. I’m of course talking about “I was only joking!”

That used to be my go to phrase to drop when I wanted to pretend what I really thought wasn’t what I really thought. I’d say something hurtful or maybe even confess something honest about what was going on in my own life and then I’d say, “Ahh just kidding. I was only joking.” I used to hide behind sarcasm like it was a quilt lovingly made during the moments before church starts.

The whole phrase worked pretty well until I saw this in Proverbs 26: 18-19:

“Like a madman shooting firebrands or deadly arrows is a man who deceives his neighbor and says, ‘I was only joking!’”

Oh snap! The phrase “I was only joking” is in the Bible? Are you sure? The real Bible, not just the Message. I mean the message says a lot of things, that’s a Bible sure, but are you telling me, that the NIV puts the phrase “I was only joking” on blast?

I am, that’s what it says. And I don’t want to shoot deadly arrows. I don’t want to deceive my neighbor. I don’t want to be a madman. And I don’t want you be one either.

Let’s retire the . Let’s put it in the same place we put our Ace of Bass CDs. (I agree, those were crazy, heady times, I loved “All that she wants is another baby” just as much as you, but we made the right decision. We did.) Let’s retire the digital “bless her heart.”

Let’s retire the : + ) = we can say whatever we want. Let’s give the inventor of the semi colon a reason to smile again. All he has right now is that stupid wink emoticon thing. Let’s knock down the colon guy a few notches. We can do this. I know we can.

I saw the sign.

(I couldn’t help it. I tried to avoid a second ace of bass reference but I just couldn’t do it. I’ll be a better blogger next year. Promise.)

Has anyone ever smiley emoticoned you?

I recently saw the GI Joe movie. My only complaint, other than that Snakes Eyes’ mask inexplicably covered his lips too which created this weird gummy smile, was that there was no public service message at the end.

That used to be my favorite part of the cartoon. At the end of each episode on TV, there would be a thirty second clip of some dumb kids trying to do something like pet a cougar. Then a member of the Joe squad would come out and say, “Whoa kids, cougars live to maul and maim. Though their fur is soft and downy, you should never pet one.” The kids would look up and say, “Gee thanks Bazooka, you really saved us today.” He’d look at the camera and respond, “Well now you know, and knowing is half the battle.”

Knowing is half the battle, deep words from GI Joe and certainly words that were floating in my head when I decided to write about a subject I’ve largely avoided- Pastor’s Kids.

I guess as a PK, there’s part of me that didn’t really know how to approach the topic. There are about a billion ways you can write about the oddity that is a pastor kid and I wanted to do us justice. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that yes, knowing is half the battle and if I can help you know what kind of pastor kid you have at your church, I’ve done a public service.

I believe there are primarily four types of pastor’s kids:
1. The Replica
2. The Romeo
3. The Rebel
4. The Regular

And the easiest way to tell which kind you’re dealing with is to take this quick quiz:

1. During youth Sunday, your pastor’s kid:
A. Delivers a fire and brimstone sermon, with an altar call and spontaneous baptisms.
B. Winks at his girlfriend from the pulpit and mentions that ladies can follow him on twitter if they’d like or myspace or facebook or just in the parking lot.
C. Promises to come to church that day and not throw anything round or square at the puppet team. Again.
D. None of the above.

2. During camp, your pastor’s kid:
A. Questions the theology of the counselors leading the camp and feels glad that he packed his 37 pound concordance Bible with him.
B. Plays the three chords of guitar he knows, kisses 4 girls from 3 separate youth groups and almost gets kicked out for getting caught outside his cabin at night.
C. You’re kidding right? He didn’t go to camp. He didn’t want to and that camp still has him on the blacklist after last year for that thing with the paint.
D. None of the above.

3. Your pastor’s kid tells a counselor:
A. “The pressures of tending for a flock are really heavy. And I haven’t found a date to the eighth grade dance yet.”
B. “Is that your wife in that photo on your desk? Well done.”
C. “I’m here because my parents made me come. And I wish my dad spent more time loving the people in his own house instead of the people in church. He came home empty some days.”
D. None of the above

4. Your pastor’s kid drives:
A. Demons out of people.
B. A jeep. He’s the guy with the jeep.
C. A Volvo wagon with band stickers that may or may not be Swedish punk rock devil worshippers.
D. None of the above

5. Your pastor’s kid plays:
A. The organ or the harp although he’s not above a little tambourining if the girl he is courting wants to practice the HWMT.
B. The previously mentioned acoustic guitar, but he may also buy a pair of bongos when he realizes girls like mellow things like Jack Johnson.
C. Electric guitar or turntables depending on what is currently considered the most “screw you mom and dad” music at the time.
D. None of the above

6. Your pastor’s kid walks around church as if:
A. He’s praying for the building and the work of the lamb to be done there.
B. You can find him at the club, bottle full of bub.
C. He’s looking for some sort of structural damage he could exploit with an M80.
D. None of the above

7. Your pastor’s kid’s theme song is:
A. Pick a hymn, any hymn.
B. “Son of a preacher man.” Was there any doubt?
C. Is there a particular song you don’t like? Then it’s that one.
D. None of the above.

8. In church, your pastor’s kid sits with:
A. His mom on the front row but he’s got his eyes on the big pastor chair that’s on stage. Someday, someday.
B. With the shortys and or honeys and on some occasions, his boos.
C. Sometimes in the front row in an ironic way but mostly in the very back row.
D. None of the above.

Answer Key:
If you answered mostly A:
Ahh, the Replica, that junior version of the senior pastor. He knows more Bible verses than you, spends his summers practicing preaching in his tree house and knocks it out every year on youth Sunday. This kid came out of the womb knowing what he wanted to do. He is a chip off the old pulpit.

If you answered mostly B
Well, hello, hello Romeo. The ladies man. The “hi, you come here to worship often?” Charming, intuitive, slick and currently giving his parents ulcers. You can only hear so many stories from deacons or elders before the pastor starts hitting the pink stuff.

If you answered mostly C
Unlike, Stryper, this cat is not saying “To Hell with the Devil.” He’s dedicated to going the opposite direction that everyone in church and youth group goes. He’s going to swim in the baptismal, get kicked off each retreat he’s forced to attend and eventually realize he filtered God through the image of his dad all these years and they’re very different people.

If you answered mostly D
You’ve got a pretty regular kind of pastor’s kid on your hands. He’s not going to cause a ruckus but he’s also not going to lead a revival anytime soon. Nothing to see here folks, move it along.

Those are the four stereotypes I experienced most. Where the ladies at? Great question. I wrote this from the guy’s perspective because 100% of my own experiences as a pastor’s kid have been as a guy. (Maybe we should get a lady PK to write a guest post.) Me personally, I was a bit of the Replica and the Romeo. I loved speaking at church, but I spent most of my youth trying to get girls to make out with me. Emphasis on the word “trying.”

That’s my take on the pastor’s kid. What’s yours?

Are you a pastor’s kid?

Did your pastor’s kid fit any of the molds I offered today? If not, what stereotype did I completely miss?