Grumpy 2

Let me share about times I have been grumpy with kids at church:

1) After early-morning church service, between services, when the second-service people were arriving,

    a 3-year-old girl was out-moving her mother by several feet, and I could see she wasn't going to stop before she ran into the parking lot.

    I let out a warning yell and she stopped right at the curb. It may have scared her, but that's not what's most important.

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2) I was once a maintenance man at a large church, where the interior architecture included columns made of squarish concrete blocks.

     I loudly, but caringly, yelled at kids for running the foyer, knowing that if one of them collided with a concrete column, the child would be injured.

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3) I once was passing through the youth building during a teen event, where a young man had his hand around the throat of a young woman. 

     I intervened. Some of the teens may have though I was overstepping their culture, but I don't care.

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4) As a church maintenance man, I once caught a boy running around on the main flat roof of the church, 30 feet above ground,.

    The roof was off-limits everyone but maintenance personnel. 

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Here are other reasons why church people may seem grumpy:

5) Some folks have troubles in their lives, and while they believe in God, their troubles nearly consume them. 

     Death, disease, marriage and child-rearing woes plague everyone from time-to time.

     If someone seems distant or is snappy, don't assume you did something wrong. Ask if something is wrong.
     A lot of older people miss their own parents near birthdays and holidays.

     And of course, people can be sad when their children abandon God.

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6) Some people on Sunday morning are focusing on their 'class-starts-in-10-minutes' church obligation.

    They may not notice others. 

7) Frankly, some people are unhappy with their lives and get jealous of other people's happiness and get 'snappy'. 

     It's an unpleasant fact.

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8) Some adults are simply visitors, new to church, trying to get their bearings, and they too are looking for a friendly face to welcome them.

     A young person might not recognize this. These visitors are not church regulars.

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9) Some regular church people are coming to church with the weight of sin on them, from the past week.

     These folks have a weakness or a point of rebellion that makes their time in church uncomfortable.

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10) There are wolves in church, those that won't make the cut because they're simply not saved.

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And I do I need to mention the reputation that church people have 

among the wait-staff in various restaurants as part of their Sunday Lunch traffic?

I wonder how many complaints are valid, and how many of these complaints 

are from atheist internet trolls looking to smear the church?

Perhaps each restaurant should have one waiter dressed up like John the Baptist, to calibrate Sunday-customers' behavior.

But to balance this out, everyone who goes to a restaurant expects a certain amount of attention.

So, management's staffing decisions might be responsible for part of the frustration seen at Sunday Buffets.

(see photo and comment below)

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And yet those church folks, who are truly saved, will someday be flawless.

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As said in 1 John: 3: