Russellings of the Spirit

One of the sappy realities of my recent induction into the blogosphere will be my child-like fascination with the idea of blogging. Apologies to those to whom this stuff is totally passe.

I noticed earlier today as I was cutting my grass that I kept thinking about what I might blog about next. And in order to stay somewhat consistent with the title and theme of the blog, this means looking for the places where God is at work. So there I am, pushing my Toro along on a REALLY hot day with my Gospel Eyes (or gospelize if you prefer) peeled. Mostly there was just sweat dripping down into my Gospel Eyes, but it struck me as a cool sort of posture with which to approach the world.

It reminded me of the time at Aldersgate UMC when I was working with the confirmation class. The Saturday before Easter Sunday rolled around and Iva Lee – the actual confirmation teacher – casually said to me, “Now, you ARE planning to preach at the sunrise service, aren’t you?” Actually this was the first time I had heard anything about it, but I wanted to be cool and casual and so I responded with a hearty, “Sure! you bet!” and then began to panic.

But what happened was all that week I had my antenna up, looking everywhere for evidence of God’s influence on me and on the world. Anything… a chance encounter in the check-out line, a song on the radio, Joan’s report on her day at work… could become fodder for a sermon illustration. The clock was ticking and I needed to harvest some significance whereever I could! “This must be what it is like to preach every week!” I thought to myself. “You have to be alert! You have to be ready to be ‘gospelized’ at a moment’s notice!”

But really… regardless of whether you preach in front of a church every week or not (and I still don’t due to the fact that I am at the UM Church of the Resurrection), aren’t we called to see God at work in the everyday events of our lives? If we only understand our faith to be meant for Sunday morning, we have failed to recognize the life and history-changing power that has been handed to us by our spiritual forebears. We have missed the point BADLY.

Go forth with a new set of Gospel Eyes, prepared to meet God at every turn!