I tend to believe my Thursday night Bible study is one of a kind.

Half the time I'm frustrated because no one can stay focused and in the middle of discussing Ezra someone will go off about Joan Jett. Then the other half of the time I feel it went really well and I learned a lot.

Last night was different.

Kraus talked about Ecclesiastes and how everything is meaningless. How the only thing that is worth investing in is other people and stuff. It was good. Then before I knew it we were flipping each other off with all the many different varieties and styles of flip-offs. We flipped each other off for like 30 minutes. We examined the intent of different flips-offs, along with the many faces that go behind the middle finger and what each combination meant. Then it turned into pick up lines. Then it turned into a combination of flipping off and pick up lines. My personal favorite combo was the flip-off-then-wink-while-saying-"Ya like that? Let's do sumpin." (Thanks Dustin for sharing that line with me at lunch. It changed my life.) My second favorite was Drew's pickup line to be used by women: the-look-up-and-down-and-say-"Mm. I just had twins." And Kraus's addition to that (a preceding "Plop, plop.") was good too.

Seriously. What other Bible study ends this way? Most of the time I don't think its very good to end a night of talking about Jesus with flipping off your friends. But on the other hand, we had a great time. We invested time in each other. I felt closer to each person there last night than I have in a while. So maybe that time of meaningless chatter was actually a good investment. That's what the lesson was about anyway. Things become meaningless if they are ill-spent or spent selfishly. But those same things can be highly uplifting if used to build up people. Like money. videogames. middle fingers.