When The Pastor is Away

What does a congregation do on Sunday morning when the preacher doesn’t show up? The church I attend suggested an answer to that question recently.

Our pastor was on a mission trip out of the country, and our young youth leader (who is a senior in college) was scheduled to deliver the sermon in his absence. He called to announce that he had overslept, had just gotten up, and would miss the early service.

So there we were. No preacher. A retired minister and several official lay speakers were in attendance at the early service, but nobody was prepared to give an impromptu sermon.

What did we do? In the language of Christianity, the Holy Spirit visited us and urged several of us to go to the microphone and say things. We drew closer together as a church family. We learned about each other. By the time the organist got to the postlude, we all felt the thing had been worthwhile and were glad we had been there.

Yet, it was nothing you would call exciting. It was just regular ordinary people talking about daily living. A farmer told a story that led him to some observations about how we do, or don’t, give. A grandmother told us of her daughter in another state, surrounded by megachurches that did not appeal to her, and how a small congregation began to grow in her own town, and how it is prospering. One of the ushers gave a brief testimony of how his life had been changed when he accepted Jesus as his Lord and Savior. And there were two stories about the answering of prayer. A young mother told a story of a friend praying for tomato soup and getting it under interesting circumstances (when she thought it was going to be a soup she didn’t like, instead); the story has added the expression “tomato soup prayer” to my vocabulary. And an aging data entry specialist (me) told her story of the time she had to drive home from work, a trip of over 50 miles, feeling ill, asking for help in getting home safely—and receiving it.

And there you have it. We had an excuse to just cut the service short and leave (unless we wanted to stay for Sunday school or the later service). That energy or force we call the Holy Spirit had other ways of handling the situation. (I personally think that when the Creator, the Source of All Things, makes his presence felt…that is what we call the Holy Spirit. I am not a Trinitarian—to me, the doctrine of the Trinity does not describe God but the various ways we experience God [or perhaps think we do].)

Be that as it may, the Creator is always ready to take an opportunity to help us grow, and that Sunday morning was a good example of how that works. It was good to have no sermon. I like good sermons, but there are other ways to learn also. We were blessed in other ways, instead. I was glad I was there.

Let it Snow!

When I was growing up, I kept hearing a song called, I believe, “Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.” At least those words made a line in the song, whether or not that’s the title of it. I thought a lot about that song the other day during the Blizzard of 2011.

When I looked out my window at 10:30 that morning and saw some snowflakes in the air I thought, Well, it’s beginning.

When I looked out my window at 12:00 noon I thought, Okay, we’re settling in for the long haul.

But when I looked out my window at 1:30 I thought, Boy, am I glad I didn’t go to work today!

The storm developed much more rapidly than I could have expected, by 2:00 it was well established, and it only grew stronger and nastier throughout the afternoon. Some of my neighbors gathered in the community room downstairs and watched through the picture window. I, hermit that I am, stayed in my apartment and watched it from there. By dark, you couldn’t see much out of the window wherever you were watching the storm.

You really could call it a howling blizzard. The wind was blowing so hard that the snow fell horizontally, not vertically. And it was so thick that I could just make out the flag dancing and snapping around in the winds. The houses across the street were pretty visible, but beyond them the view was blurred.

I watched it and marveled. Truly, I was filled with gratitude that I wasn’t out in that storm. I wasn’t homeless. I wasn’t holding a job that forced me to be out in it. I could stay safe and snug in my tiny apartment. And I remained safe and snug because we didn’t lose our electricity.
One thing we can do in response to such a storm is take a moment to remember our blessings, and we all had ample opportunity to do that. I took full advantage of that opportunity as I watched the snow piling up on the ground below my fourth-floor windows.

And once again I was reminded how puny we humans really are. We have built all these marvels—highways, railroads, airports, machines to roll on the roads and rumble on the rails and soar through the air, power grids, telephone systems…All Mother Nature has to do is twitch, and we are paralyzed. We would really be in for it if Mother Nature fully unleashed her energy against us.

So I concluded that another response we can make in such a blizzard is to allow the fury of Mother Nature to humble us, to show us the true perspective of our achievements. I am not putting down our achievements; we have come a long way in the last couple of centuries. However, when all Mother Nature has to do is twitch in order to paralyze us, we need to realize that our achievements are nowhere near permanent.

Perhaps if we could think in terms of working with the natural world, rather than trying to oppose and dominate it, we might be in a stronger position when Mother Nature twitches. It would surely be worth a try.

What Is Wrong With Christmas?

All my life, I have loved Christmas. The colors. The activities and the swirling crowds. The stories. The parties. The generous spirit which, alas, disappears by December 28 every year. The music. Ah, the music. What can I say? I’m in heaven at Christmas time with all the wonderful music that comes out. I enjoy most of the traditional songs, and I positively drool over the seasonal classical music you can find on NPR or PBS, or at local concerts.

Although my beliefs have been transformed so that they no longer embrace many standard Christian teachings, I have continued to love Christmas. Probably for the more “pagan” aspects of the season, for the Bible stories become stranger to me each year. (None of that affects my love of the music.)

Musicians are usually very busy at Christmas and Easter, including me this year, for with a week’s notice I was resurrecting a piano piece and my half of a duet to help my sister out She had been asked, at the last minute, to provide ten minutes of preludes before her church’s Christmas Eve service.

So on top of everything else I do at Christmas, I was seriously practicing.

It really crowded everything else I generally do: cards by snail mail, cards over the internet, shopping, wrapping, baking (not a lot, usually, but some), putting up and decorating my small tree. In fact, there was no baking. I barely got the punch made that I consume during the season, especially when putting up and taking down the tree.

And this year, doggone it, I didn’t really enjoy any of it. I enjoyed Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. That was it.

What really gets me is that everyone else feels the same way I do. When was the last time I heard someone say they were sorry that Christmas was over? Why? What makes us rush around cramming all that activity into a few weeks when we don’t enjoy it? Is there a way I can streamline this, so that Christmas can be enjoyable again?

One thing I might do is start earlier. Which means, before Thanksgiving. I refuse to do that. Thanksgiving is too meaningful for me, and I will not let it get buried in yuletide busy-ness. There has to be another way.

One thing I might do to ease Christmas stress is send cards only to people that I don’t keep in touch with throughout the year. And send as many e-cards, and as few snail-cards, as possible. Local telephone calls would also help to cut the “card load”.

The thing that would really reduce the time and pressure for me is…cutting out that shopping. I can bake presents for local friends, as needed. As for the family, my young great-nephew and I may try to push for a change in the way the family does gifts. That might give us all something new to think about during the season, while easing some of the pressures for all of us. Of course, that all depends on the willingness of the family to go along. Except for my great-nephew who is college now, we have enough stuff anyway.

I will have to think about it this coming year. I love Christmas too much to tolerate being unable to enjoy it. For me, the stories will make a little less sense next year than they did this year. There’s nothing I can do about that. I can’t go backwards, which would undo the marvelous moment that turned me into this Creator-besotted person. But I can work to ease the stresses and re-open myself to the joys of the season.

Christmas is supposed to be a celebration, after all. So let’s enjoy it!