I asked our friends how things were going at their church. “We got tired of being in the fog,” they said.

“I know how you feel,” I said. “My church seems to have trouble finding its way through all the fog these days too.”

Our friends said, “No. That’s not what we mean. We got tired of the fog. Real fog.” They said their church had installed a theatrical fog machine. Every Sunday towering clouds of dense fog billow across the stage and spill into the audience.

“It’s sometimes hard to see. And it’s also hard to hear,” they said. I wondered if the sound system was too weak. “No. Just the opposite. A lot of us complained the band is painfully loud. The pastor said we should wear ear plugs.” So, now, as a ministry amenity, the ushers offer disposable ear plugs to arriving worshippers.

Every Sunday the crowds file into the darkened hall and sit in the fog with their ears plugged. The pastor stands in the lingering fog and delivers an entertaining monolog.

“On a Sunday morning, it’s the best show in town,” our friends said. They would know. They both have a bit of a theater background. “After all the years we invested in that church, we hated to leave. But it got to the point we couldn’t see or hear God.”