A Steady Push and Pull Routine

When I was twenty, I stopped believing in miracles. I can actually pinpoint it to the day. I was watching Life of Brian with my then-boyfriend Brian (coincidence?). And for the first time in my entire life, I thought, hey. What if this Jesus guy was just some random dude a bunch of folks thought was the messiah because, let's face it, they were two thousand years' less intelligent than we are? What if taking the Eucharist really is tantamount to taking off your shoe and waving it around? Because if you think about it, if you roll the styrofoam wafer around in your mouth and pause right as you place your hands on the bottom of the communal chalice, it is every bit as silly as taking off your shoe and waving it around. Maybe even more so.

And although I'm typing this from the 29th floor of a building in downtown Dallas, I'm going to pause at this juncture and look around me for any errant lightning bolts.

Okay, I'm good. I think.

The sad truth is that Monty Python's Flying Circus singlehandedly ruined my faith. And it has never been the same. Likely never will be. And most days I'm thankful for this.

But I don't really know what I was thinking when I agreed to tell the Bible story in children's church last Sunday. Actually, I do know what I was thinking. I was thinking that they're desperate for storytellers, and I like kids. I think they're pretty funny, and they always teach me more than I teach them. And sometimes I like to do something more with my life than, you know, save the world one apostrophe at a time. Apostrophes are great and all, but they're not everything, yes?

I found out last Thursday that I was to tell the story of Jesus healing a boy. The first thing I thought was: Oh, great. A miracle. One that I can't bring myself to believe in because it can easily be explained away with science. What those wackos two thousand years ago thought was demon possession? We identify accurately today as epilepsy.

To make matters worse, I found that, in telling the story, I'm supposed to take a small wooden boy-shaped figurine and throw it around on the ground to demonstrate the "spirit" taking hold of the boy. And then walk a wooden Jesus figurine up to the thrashing boy and say, "You, the spirit that keeps this boy from speaking or hearing. I command you: come out of him right now, and never enter him again." And, in the emotional climax, I make the boy stop thrashing.

The second thing I thought: no freaking way.

But I had agreed to tell a story, and even if a story ended up being this story, I had already committed to telling it. So I pushed my cynicism far, far down, memorized the story, showed up at church at 8 a.m. to practice for an hour, and then told the story to the two different cycles of children's church, thrashing boy and all.

The thing is, the kids loved it. Absolutely loved it. Were slightly mesmerized, even. Both cycles were pretty full, with about 20 children in the first and at least 30 in the second. The children are ages three through first grade. Not an age group known for being particularly quiet. But I had total and complete silence both times. And as soon as I was finished and began asking questions about the story, the children politely raised their hands and offered their sweet little answers.

I felt immense relief when I was done. I knew I was nervous about this experience, but I didn't realize until after I left children's church that what I had been nervous about was the kids asking what was wrong with the boy, why Jesus needed to heal him. I knew I wouldn't be able to look into their trusting faces and give them an answer I myself don't believe. But the children didn't ask why, which turned out to be the best thing they could've taught me.

My favorite moment of the whole ordeal occurred when I asked, "I wonder how the boy felt when he was freed from the spirit?" (which is one of the suggested questions, I didn't come up with it, I promise). One girl raised her hand and said, "Weird." Then all the children decided to raise their hands and say the exact same thing. The truly weird thing? I was tickled every single time.