My husband and I found an activity that might be nerdier than the live streaming of the national speech tournament awards show and rooting for our team as alumni. Our favorite date night activity is to go to Hamiltunes and karaoke through the entire soundtrack of Hamilton with other people in our city who love it as much as we do. We love Hamiltunes, because we love the musical but our consistent presence at Hamiltunes goes deeper than that. We like the way the event makes us feel.

As I spend this summer preparing for a grand re-opening of a faithful little church, I can’t help dream about what that will be. We are sticking with the hymns because we all know them, and like them, and there are plenty of books around with the words. At Hamiltunes you are not out if you don’t know the show. We are excited to introduce you to the show, to tell you our favorite lyrics, to see the delight in your face when we all throw our hands in the air to snap and yell WORK! We are in a club or sorts, but you are invited and we want you there to experience it. What if the church sang hymns like that? Like we actually believed the words, like what we were singing mattered, like this thing that we sing about is really remarkable and we want to introduce you to it? I want to go to a church like that.

At Hamiltunes everyone is in and everyone is welcome. This is also true at New Hope, I have truly never seen a more welcoming church than the one I serve. I went before I started preaching there, and y’all they were amazing. Every single person who walks in through those doors knows they are loved. At Hamiltunes everyone is also welcome to participate. We WANT you on the stage, as a chorus member or to throw out a random line. We want you to sing along from your seats. We want you in on the action, as in as you want to be.

What if that is how it was at church? What if you could come up and lead because you just love this song so much, or you could sit in the back and just take it all in. What if every way you wanted to participate in worship were a good way?

I like Hamiltunes because I can try out different parts. I like that I can try being King George, or George Washington, or Angelica. I like that you can figure it out and see. Turns out that the range for Hamilton is not the best for me, but Burr works well. I know that King George is way more fun than I thought it would be and George Washington is where my heart lies. I know that because I got to try. I got to try and see if it wasn’t for me then I knew. I want church to be a place where the people get to try and see if their heart sings, if they love something. I want church to be a place where you can discover you love something, and your church roots for you. Your church can’t wait to see you nail it. Your church is longing for you to succeed and wants to cheer you on when you do.

I want to go to that church, one that feels like Hamiltunes. I want people to be as comfortable on Sunday, as they are at the Vista room, singing their hearts out.