Before Coffee Was Cool

Whenever the topic of coffee drinking comes up, I joke about being discriminated against as a tea drinker. Meetings at work usually offer coffee, not tea, and the loser alternative of tepid, plain water. How did I end up a tea drinker when both of my parents consumed gallons of it every week? Genetically, as a daughter of a Swede who started drinking coffee at 12, I should be addicted to the stuff. As I've always explained, my parents drank coffee before coffee was cool. There's a hipness integrated into coffee that never existed when I was growing up; it was that strangely bittersweet smell that wafted out of a Thermos in the front seat of our Clubwagon van, drifting backward and permanently imprinting on our brains as the smell of early morning departures on long family road trips. But there were no coffeehouses with trendy wall colors and racks of branded cafe merch. You drank coffee for what it was, not how it made you fit in to the coffee culture. 

When I say my parents drank coffee before coffee was cool, it's with a mixture of affection and pride. It's somehow symbolic of their independence of empty trendiness and paints a reassuring picture of their steadiness over time, the way parents should be. 

Having been involved in leading music at church since I was a kid, I've seen a similar evolution from something that was simply practiced and developed in local churches into a mega industry of worship recording artists, concerts, worship leader magazines and conferences, etc.etc.etc. with huge followings. It's amusing to me that I was doing something before it was cool and now it has practically surpassed all the other Christian music out there in popularity.

It's good, though- all this creative energy being put into the experience and expression of a new generation of God-followers. Clearly, there is a longing that has been tapped into, and it's very exciting to be a part of it as we are called to be. What do you think? Do you remember a time, not so long ago, before worship music was cool? How does this surge in "big names in worship" affect us as individuals and as local churches? How can we experience unity in the larger church while being committed to our own local communities as expressed through our music?...