Spiritual Orgasms

Photo credit: San Diego Shooter via Foter.com /CC BY-NC-ND 

Picture this: I'm at a new church, my first young adult gathering. Aka, the best place to be judged for coolness, how spiritual (or not) you are, and the best time to leave a good first impression or even catch potential bae's attention. All is going well and no one is starting too much at the new girl. A simple question is asked, "who has ever been to a young adult conference", and as you may know (hello long time blog readers!) I have been to quite a few of those. Remember this and this?

So, I eagerly raise my hand and proceed to share my experiences.

I talk about how different my experience might be from what they have in mind for their upcoming conference (a one day conference). Then I go on to say that all the ones I've been to have taken me out of town, sometimes to rural (internet-less) areas. The part about not having Internet access caught their attention - it's 2016, and we're in Canada, so they're kind of shocked to hear that there are rural internet-less places. Yeah, I have their full attention. And that's when it happened.

I think it's an awesome phrase between. Not just because that guy who doesn't know my name, hasn't met me before now, had to stop me in the middle of my sentence to help the group acknowledge their shock. Yeah, that happened. Time stood still for about two seconds before laughter erupted, as the whole group realized that I really just used "spiritual" and "orgasm" in the same sentence. You know, not even putting a word between them to 'maintain a holy barrier'. I don't know why I didn't just say, "spiritual awakening", which would have driven the same point home. When I recounted the tale to my friend the next day, she said, "they'll get used to it, you have colourful words". I've got to agree.

The phrase really refers to those life-changing moments you have when you go to Christ-centered gatherings. The moments when you're so convinced that Jesus is Lord, that you can move mountains, that God's power is enough to help you beat this addiction, enough to give life to your dead spiritual walk. You know those moments when praise and worship is so turnt, that you can imagine singing in heaven forever? Have you ever had a similar church/conference/retreat moment? It could have been a new church or a three-day jungle retreat with awesome God-loving people. 

I used to live for those moments. It's why I loved the churches I loved and endured the ones I did. I love the "aha moments". But, apparently, the bulk of the Christian walk is done in mundane moments where how you respond to a late order reflects how much like Christ you really are. Boring eh? How great it would be to dance to hip Trip Lee songs and wail to Bethel music all life long!

The phrase (spiritual orgasms) is originally from Abbie Smith's "Celibate Sex: Musings on Being Loved,  Single, Twisted and Holy."  I got the e-book here. It's an awesome book; the title alone should sell you on this. 

Anyway, to end this ramble,  when next you're the new girl (wherever you find yourself), just hush if you're not sure whether or not you're wearing your mouth filter. #TakeMyAdviceI'mNotUsingIt.