Yee Haw: The Cowboy Church Experience

I've found myself in some pretty strange places....


A tattoo parlor in Ava, MO where a gray haired hippie offered to tattoo an armadillo on my ass for free.
Taking a shower with six other people who were also covered in chocolate pudding.
A hostel in the Red Light District in Amsterdam where there were no lights or shower curtains and eight leering men.
Hanging out in my living room with the cast of STOMP.
The house of a psychic drag queen who read my fortune.
Sleeping (errr...passed out) in front of a Florence hotel because I couldn't figure out how to open the fancy wooden door.
A bonfire party in the country where a man with a shotgun scared everyone off the premises but allowed me and my friends to stay though we were complete strangers.



But the strangest place I've ever found myself...


Church.



I've always enjoyed an adventure. I think it's our job to get as much from this life as we possibly can. I want to see and touch and taste and smell and explore EVERYTHING - minus a handful of things like meth and dog-fighting and other things I find repulsive and a waste of our precious time. When someone offers me cake I have a hard time justifying a "no" answer. I hear in my mind Carpe Confection! Cake today, gone tomorrow. And suddenly my mouth and fingers are covered in frosting and people are looking at me strange and small children are crying and the cake is mysteriously gone though none of the plates or forks have been used.

Yeah, I've eaten a whole cake by myself before AND I'D DO IT AGAIN. What's it to ya?


Life is like cake - and I want to eat it all.

Even the crumbs. Probably gonna lick the plate.



I'm nearing the end of my church journey, but I'm still hungry for more. I have an endless appetite for adventure (and food). I could spend my life exploring churches and still not see them all. That's amazing to me. If I live to be one hundred years old and attend church every Sunday from now until I die I would still only make it to 3,588 churches. There are an estimated 3.7 million Christian congregations in the world - just Christian.  Even if I attended church every single day I still wouldn't come close to putting a dent in that number.


There is so much to do in this world. It's fantastic.


With so much to see and do in the world I couldn't justify missing out on another church adventure.


Springfield is full of interesting religious opportunities, but there was one I couldn't pass up...

COWBOY CHURCH. Yee haw!  

I wore my cowgirl boots.

I was fairly certain this was the one church I could convince my friend Hannah to attend with me, because the dress code was right up her alley. "I'm wearing jeans" she said with certainty. "And I'm probably going to wear the flannel I've been wearing all weekend" she continued. "Hannah. It's Cowboy Church. That's what EVERYONE is going to be wearing."


And I wasn't wrong.

When we pulled up to the Springfield Livestock Marketing Center there were ladies with rhinestoned jeans and men with ten gallon hats. Mud splattered trucks and SUVs covered the parking lot. Hannah and I stood among the cars taking in the scenery. But we didn't stand there long. Adventure was calling us....kinda....it was mooing at us.




We passed groups of cowboy boot clad friends chatting over coffee and donuts and followed the signs to the auction area - where the service was being held. We turned a corner and were greeted by the sight of risers filled with people and the overwhelming smell of cow. In front of the cow gates - where cows were weighed and auctioned - a group of people were playing guitars and singing bluegrass. Like almost every Sunday, I felt like I'd stepped into an alternate universe.

Thick tall men with cream colored cowboy hats and bright golden belt buckles escorted their petite bible carrying wives to their seats. The room was loud with music and chatter punctuated with the smells of hay and dirt and poop and heifer.


I've never been to a hoedown, but minus the absence of pie and dancing and moonshine, it was exactly what I imagine a hoedown would be like - good music, country company, traditional values and long corny hillbilly stories with zany punch lines.

A man in a plaid shirt and elastic wasted jeans welcomed us to service and then he and the band broke out in song. The music was amazing. There's something Bluegrass music. Something powerful. Something magical. It's fun and uplifting and danceable but still carries deep thought-provoking lyrics that touch the soul. Now I love intense chorale numbers with rows of people in matching armless robes lifting their voices up to the heavens in quiet harmony BUT I think if Jesus were to be in a band it'd be a Bluegrass one.

After we got done singing we greeted our neighbors with handshakes and a "howdy". I got slightly dizzy from turning a 360 to shake and greet all the hands around me. Everyone was friendly, but not overly friendly. I like that.

We listened to some announcements and heard some special music - more Bluegrass, hooray! We sang "Happy Birthday" to all the birthday peeps and "Happy Anniversary" to all the
married peeps. I used the time to throughly read the "Cow Pregnancy Chart" and see when the heifer
holiday specials were coming up. In the quiet between announcements you could hear faint mooing coming from the stocks behind the auction room. There was a little window just at my eye level where I could see cow tails moving.


Then it was time for the sermon...


So, I've heard quite a few sermons by now and they are almost always my least favorite part of the service. Sermons remind me a lot of my days in speech and debate where my coach would throw me into Extemporaneous Speaking for shits and giggles. You and your massive file folder of research, this was before laptops and smartphones, would go into a room and you would draw a topic from a jar. It was usually a social topic - capital punishment, education reform, etc. Then you were given a short period of time to come up with a five minute speech. Sitting through these speeches was a nightmare. Stuffy uptight teens in hideous neckties and ill-fitting navy blue suits would ramble on about nothing but pretend like they knew everything. They would make shit up, say random unrelated things, - anything to fill the time and get a decent score.

Preaching is basically the same. You've got your topic. You've got your research - The Bible, with verses that may or may not be related to the topic. Then you've got a whole lot of BSing to fill in the holes.

Now, this isn't true of ALL pastors, preachers, spiritual leaders, etc. I've heard some truly motivating sermons in my time. But most of the time I sit through thirty minutes of globiddyglook.

I sat through globiddyglook on Sunday. Again.

Hannah and I had a hard time following the sermon. There was something about being grateful that Jesus died for your sins, we are all washed in the blood, it's okay if you didn't marry who you wanted here because you can marry up in heaven, this life isn't the important part - the next life is.


This life is hard. I get that. There's disease and heartbreak and divorce and disappointment and weight gain and animal cruelty. It's rough. Imagining a magical place where there is no pain and no sadness and no calories sounds pretty fantastic...kinda.

But what's the point?

I'm the weird girl who not only thinks heaven isn't a real place but thinks it wouldn't be all that heavenly.

I can't imagine that after one lifetime on Earth I would be okay with spending an eternity in a rocking chair sipping honey tea on God's front porch. I would get too antsy, kinda like how I felt during Scotty's sermon. Ugh, that just sounds so boring. I want to always be learning, always be growing, always be changing
and one day when I've soaked up all the world has to offer I want to be shot into the sky to join the stars and twinkle with unconscious satisfaction.

That was silly. Forgive me, I've had some wine. And I'm sick. This might all be nonsense. I don't care. Like at all.


I have to believe that God in all of God's infinite wisdom didn't create the Earth as a waiting room for
heaven. That seems wasteful. This world is too beautiful for that. We're here for a reason. I believe we should make the most of it. Which doesn't necessarily mean eating a whole cake every day, because in the morning your tummy is going to hurt so bad that you will be begging strangers for a sprite and some saltines. I've been there.


Guess how they conclude services at Sac River Cowboy Church.


Guess.






They sing Happy Trails.

Precious.



Happy trails to you my friends. Until we meet again....