Anonymity

I'd stink at being a famous person.  There's something inside me that doesn't want to be well-known.  Every week, one of our worship services is broadcast on a local cable channel in town.  Not everybody has that kind of cable, so our audience isn't all that broad.  I'd guess if we had an Our Savior's Broadcast Fan Club, we'd be nearing the teens.  But every now and then, I'll meet a stranger who has seen me on TV.  I can't tell you how weird it feels to hear, "I watch you on TV!"  I didn't major in broadcasting, I didn't sign up for game show, nor did I agree to appear on some reality show.  I just went to seminary.  They don't teach about local access cable fame in seminary.  No lessons on choosing the right lipstick so you don't look like death warmed over on TV.  No classes teaching you to tolerate the sound of your own goofy voice coming through TV speakers.  No advice on how to gracefully and subtly tell your acolytes to stop using their cinctures like lassoes because the greater Beloit cable audience can see them. 

One of the happiest days of my life was the day we got a different kind of cable, so we could no longer see ourselves on TV.

Sometimes I'm able to forget that people who I don't know, might know me.  That is, until I'm evaluating my mayo options in the grocery store and a strange woman walks up to me and says, "Hi Jennifer!  How are the girls?  I'm so glad your husband is better.  I watch you on TV every week!" 

Sometimes I really enjoy being anonymous.  I love going to a shopping mall and being fairly confident that nobody there will know me.  There's a strange kind of freedom being somewhere where not a soul knows you.  The girl at the pretzel stand has no idea if I'm a pastor or poker dealer or a barrel rider.  The man in the shoe department has no clue that I can't fit all my shoes in my 3 shoe racks.  The woman at the card store hasn't seen my successes or my failures, on camera or off.  I can truly be nobody, and I like that.  It's like hiding, in plain sight.

Don't get me wrong.  I cherish the gifts of community, of being "where everybody knows your name."  I think it's what many of us love about being part of a church.  There are people there who know us and care about us in ways that nobody else does.  I love that church people ask me how Sierra's liking 3rd grade and rat out Scarlett when she's hiding in the library with a bottle of grape juice from the communion fridge (this only happened once, by the way).  I like being known within my faith community, because I know people care about me there, and I care about them.  Our knowledge of one another is relatively mutual, which is different than the one-sided relationships with our cable fans.  I'd love to know the people who watch me on TV as well as they seem to know me.  I respect celebrities, who deal with this on a grand scale every day.

I love what I do.  I love my congregation.  I love that we're able to reach people who can't or don't come to church.  But I'll probably always think it's a little weird that strangers know me.  So I guess when I want to be anonymous or not be noticed, I'd better find an actual hiding place.