Check Out All of the Mug

This is something Rebekkah says whenever it's so muggy out that you can see it. And why doesn't this make sense? I mean when there is a lot of fog we say it's foggy. So if it's really muggy why can't we call it mug. Adjective: Foggy, Muggy...Noun: Fog, Mug. It makes sense to me. Anyway we thought it was hilarious and had to share it with everyone.

In other news, we have visited a really cool church in our town which is not at all "hicky." We were very surprised. As someone else who I work with that had visited commented, it includes all of the Christians in Waverly/Piketon/Chillicothe who are not hicks. They even have a website with a forum! (But seriously, I need to get over my prejudice against about 80% of the residents in this area. I don't know why I have such a disdain for rednecks/hicks.). Their lobby looks like a Starbucks where they serve coffee and such. The auditorium/sanctuary looks sort of like a living room with multiple centerpieces (each consisting of a celtic looking crosses, material, and candles) strewn about the room. The setup is very intriguing and not something I ever expected to find in rural Southern Ohio.

The pastor is lower 40s (I'd guess), the praise music is quite contemporary, and they are currently experimenting with a new arrangement for their service: chairs in a circle. Apparently the new experimentation is an idea "borrowed" from Mars Hill in Michigan. It is different but I think I like it. The praise band plays in the middle of the room and consists of a vocalist, bongoist (or is it congaist or mangoist?), keyboardist, and guitarist. There is a screen set up at the north and south ends of the room to make it so you don't have to turn too much to see the words. The only wierd thing that will take some adjusting to get used to, is that you are looking at eachother the whole time and therefore cannot fall asleep (it's more than just the pastor that sees you fall asleep).

The church is a non-denominational community church called River Valley Community Church. According to the pastor, the history of the church is from the early 90s as part of the Vineyard but because of what was going on at the time with the Toronto Blessing in the denomination, they chose not to affiliate themselves with the Vineyard. Now they are a blend of ex-Catholics, ex-Baptists, ex-Methodists, ex-Lutherans, ex-Presbyterians, etc. We're very excited about continuing to go here and felt that we have found a church home while we are here.

On another note, we went to a fabulous outdoor historical drama called Tecumseh! in Chillicothe. We were very impressed with it though we all agreed that it could have been about 30 minutes shorter. Nicole read a book on Tecumseh on the trip over to Ohio and she said that the drama was mostly accurate though she got a different impression on a few items from the book she read. The short version is that Tecumseh was a Shawnee hero who saw through the sneakiness of the "whites" and would not make any peace treaties with them. He sought to defeat the "Americans" by uniting all of the different Indian tribes. He almost succeeded but all of his efforts were thwarted by the schism created by his deceptive, power-hungry younger brother. He was killed in the War of 1812.