I have nothing against people who are in agreement with prayers at church. You know, those people who repeat "Yes Lord, yes" out loud while a pastor is praying. But there is a line that must be drawn, a line that must never be crossed. Vain repetition. It's in the Bible, just read it. Jesus spoke against it in Matthew 6:7. Not to mention, it completely gets on the nerves of the people sitting around you.

Last night at church, I was a victim of this very thing. In the middle of prayer, I heard something that sounded like hissing. Ssss ssss. Over and over. Ssss ssss. At first, I couldn't even tell what it was. I didn't hear anything else, just the emphasized S sound. Ssss ssss. I slowly felt like I was losing my mind. Ssss ssss. I couldn't even pay attention to the prayer. Ssss ssss. I found myself praying that God would take away the distraction, whatever it may be. I finally just opened my eyes and turned in the direction the hissing was coming from, noticing that it was coming from a woman a couple rows behind me. The girl sitting next to me apparently was getting annoyed too, because she turned at the exact same time I did. Glad to know it wasn't just I who heard it. What was strange about this situation is that the woman even did it when the pastor was telling the people to come forward during the altar call. I mean, agreement during prayer is one thing, but why do you need to agree when the pastor is telling people how to get out of their row to come forward if they are stuck in between a bunch of people?!

When the altar call was over, a girl on the other side of me expressed her frustration out loud. "What is that annoying hissing sound? It's getting on my nerves, but I only heard it during the prayer," she said. Clearly, my entire row had been distracted by it.

Moral of the story: don't be a noisy churchgoer—it does nothing more than distract those around you.