Another Beer, Please.

My fabulous new friend and I went to a beer tasting at a community theatre in town tonight. My fabulous new friend is someone that I met through church -- in a strange and confusing way. In fact, you can read about her here. She shares the wisdom of being professional and separating work from social life.

And yet, there we were. Two young and fun women out on the prowl. We can both work a room. We can charm the pants off of our donors and congregants (though she is not the church leading type). We know how to do this -- except when it comes to our personal lives. We are shy. We want the cute boys to come to us (I loved that she admitted this).

I started talking to a young woman who is employed at the brewery whose beer we were sampling. I was apparently dressed up as she commented on this. I explained that I had come from work. Of course, she asked where I work. I thought I might get away with this by giving the location of the place. No such luck. Soon, it unfolded that I am a minister. She was tickled. She is thinking about a call to ministry. She has been looking for a church home. And then, it happened. I found myself evangelizing to this young woman when I was trying to make friends. The social and professional boundaries were blurred. I directed her to the church website and told her to call me with promises of a cup of coffee. Thoughts of emergent ministry flashed through my head. Is this what being visible in the community is all about? Really?

And then, I turned to my new fabulous friend and said: I need beer. I just evangelized. I need another beer.