Chris S (lead pastor)

Chris S is the lead pastor of Seaside Church and he does use an IBM compatible computer. Yay. I could say a bunch of little things like this, but I guess that I said that I would be typing about the conversations that I have had with the men at Seaside Church.

Chris S got around to talking to me for the first time directly before he began to preach about money from Galatians chapter 6. He asked me if I had met anybody yet. I pointed out a number of men whom I had met in the previous few minutes and then added, "who knows, maybe I'll be allowed to meet a woman in a week or two." He responded by saying something like, "just so long as you have a goal." I guess that that conversation was kind of about something.

Then there was the time that I finally showed up on two Sundays in a row (or a column or a diagonal or a rank or a file) and pointed that out. I finally had to become aggressive at a certain point because I didn't want to have the same sort of role at Seaside Church as I had at the Evangelical Free Church of Pullman in Pullman Washington during my college years (i.e. being a do nothing for a couple years and then being assigned to doing something that I wasn't any good at after that) so I sent him and the other elder my customized resume with a customized cover letter (is there any other kind of cover letter for a resume?) in an electronic message. The subject line of the electronic message read, "put me to work." The execution of this idea worked even better than a really really well engineered and manufactured product delivered in a properly padded parcel. I recommend this course of action to everyone, although I guess that it may not actually work at a great big large church like Mars Hill Church in Seattle, but if you're just sitting around waiting for someone to ask you to do just what you've always wanted to do in a church, stop waiting and point yourself out to the leadership.

The problem with conversations that are actually about something is that I cant' always repeat them, so I'll just tell you what these conversations were about. I have actually conversed with Chris S about designated giving, the practice of respect for elders, women, sin, expiation, and I am in the middle of an electronic discussion with him about whether or not husbands are supposed to "help" (that word is important) their wives (clearly husbands are to love their wives, and this can look like help, but is it really?)