Listening to the spirit...

Funny things happen when you are open to the Spirit, yes?  I find that when I listen for the Spirit's prompting in my life, I often find a host of connections between the assigned Scriptures for the week, my life and the lives of those in our faith community.  This week, for example, the words of Isaiah speak of harmony, forgiveness and sharing signs of hope.  And last night the community gathered for our annual Harvest Dinner - about 70+ people came - along with this group of incredible youth.

We ate and laughed, shared stories and checked-in with one another in ways that were healing and holy. Together we were young and old and in-between, wise and foolish, healthy and sick, gay and straight, male and female, rich and poor together sharing a common table.  Like the poetic prophet of Israel said:  They shall not labor in vain, or bear children for calamity; for they shall be offspring blessed by the Lord— and their descendants as well. Before they call I will answer, while they are yet speaking I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like the ox; but the serpent—its food shall be dust! They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the Lord.

Today it was announced that we are close to our goal of baking 400 pies for the community Thanksgiving Food distribution - with 92 pies coming in this morning.  When this challenge was first given to us, we laughed in mock horror saying, "That is too huge a goal for our small congregation."  And truth be told, it probably is - but then people's imaginations were kindled and the Spirit took charge - and now we are laughing and rejoicing together in our quest to feed and love our neighbors in need.

After worship, our children practiced for the Thanksgiving Eve show

while I met with our Christian Ed team.  We're putting together family resources of Advent/Christmas.  And when we got hung-up on finding a date for an Advent gathering, the Spirit led us to a much better solution: Let's do an Epiphany party instead.  Life is FAR too busy for our kids in the Nutcracker and Christmas Carol productions and families don't need one thing MORE to do.  So why not do our Christmas pageant during worship on January 5th and hold a part afterwards? So we shall... Today I am truly grateful to be a part of this collection of sinners and saints who are faithful and funny and willing to listen carefully for the prompting of the Holy Spirit.