The Weekend is Slipping Away...

I suppose before I get caught up in another whirlwind of a week, I may as well record a few thoughts from the weekend....this will be random, but that's just a product of the way my weekend has been.

First of all, after the post on Saturday, I spent the rest of the day studying (sort of). I realized in the late afternoon and evening that my focus problem was probaby resulting from (1) being overwhelmed with mass amounts of information from class, and (2) finally starting to absorb the reality of what I have done over the last few months - as in quit my job, move, and start an entirely new career. Don't get me wrong, I am still happy about the decision, but that doesn't make it any less strange, and it doesn't make me any less lonely when I am buried in books on Saturday night. I spent some time last night trying to decide which church to visit today. As with restaurants and other various venues in Atlanta, there are more churches than I could possibly visit in the next two years. I finally decided to narrow my search to fairly close proximity (staying inside the perimeter). I am not determined to only visit PCA churches, but most of the other church websites I have visited (including some PCA) do not look like what will be a good fit for me.

I narrowed today's choices to about 4 locations and finally decided on the closest one, which was Christ Church Presbyterian. It was a good visit. I unfortunately have in my head a rudimentary grading system, which is not intended to judge the church but nonetheless helps me determine if I want to return. This church had a few people who scored highly on friendliness and a few who scored almost zero. I try to base this on mainly whether people take the initiative to greet me when given the right situation. For example, I sat down in the Sunday school class this morning at a round table across from 3 people. They all simply stared at me for about 20 seconds. Trust me, 20 seconds is a long time to sit across from people like that when you are the visitor. Anyway, finally one of them spoke up. I would have introduced myself first, but I was literally dumbfounded by how inconsiderate these people were. They were not talking amongst themselves, but literally sat there and made eye contact with me without saying a word. Anyway, there were several other people who were much more friendly and inviting. On to other scores... the preaching scored very highly. The senior pastor is British, so he gets points for the pleasant accent, not to mention he was well-spoken and preached straight from the scripture passage, which happened to be in Titus 1. The worship was also good, though I find it hard to immerse myself in worship in a new environment amongst a group of strangers. We had communion, and a slight lack of direction showed through because I had no idea what to do with my little cup when we were done. I didn't even see what anyone else did with theirs, because we were sitting, standing, and singing all during the communion. The atmosphere scored fairly low, though this will not make or break any church for me. The sanctuary almost had a warehouse feel and was decorated (in my opinion) kind of out of date. The best visual part about this room was the art displayed on the back wall, but I didn't notice that until I was on my way out. I guess that's more than enough about the church. I didn't really report on the one I went to last week, Intown Community Church. It scored high on friendliness, worship, and facilities. The preaching was good the morning I was there, but I listened to some older sermons that were kind of lacking direction. This is probably because they are in between senior pastors and have different people preaching every week.

In other news, I have already managed to let my checking account slip to require overdraft protection. Stupid! I haven't yet figured out the optimal plan for trasferring funds each month from my savings to checking (as I have no income), so obviously this month I was a bit late in making that transfer.

I noticed today that there is a Fresh Market on Peachtree Road, not too far from my place. I also noticed that this Fresh Market has a parking garage. A parking garage. For a grocery store. I love it. Thankfully, there is an elevator to prevent having to haul groceries down the stairs.

And last but not least, one more random thought. I have been reading some in Gray's Anatomy to accompany the other 3 books I have for class. I noticed in the author's bio that Henry Gray died at the age of 34. If you have ever read Gray's Anatomy, you will realize that this man accomplished a remarkable amount of work in his 34 years. The book literally describes every tiny portion of every part of every tissue or structure in the human body. It's amazing. To make it even more remarkable, he wrote it in the mid-1800s. I hope that in 6 years, when I am 34, I will have produced even a tenth of the amount of valuable information that Gray has left for us. Unfortunately, this blog will probably not count as part of that valuable information.