Percolator

Guiding Prayer For Our Season of Fasting: 

Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy Name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those that trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For Thine is the kingdom,the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen.

Myself in Truth

Holy God give me boldness to share what I love and who I love with others. Amen

Nurtured and Nurturing 

Jesus, Son of God, help us to know and love our neighbors. Amen 

                         The Gathered

Gathering God, may our love bubble over beyond our church walls to a community in need of true hospitality.  Amen  

Challenge 

This entire week, challenge yourself to meet someone new, talk to someone you haven’t ever talked to, share the love of Christ with someone you would not normally spend time with.

Percolator

One of my favorite books is “Blue Like Jazz” by Donald Miller. I think I love it because Miller speaks about himself and his faith with absolute honesty.  Honesty that is touching and hilarious and achingly sad at times.  The book opens with Miller talking about how he first began to love Jazz music.

“I never liked jazz music because jazz music doesn't resolve. But I was outside the Bagdad Theater in Portland one night when I saw a man playing the saxophone. I stood there for fifteen minutes, and he never opened his eyes.

After that I liked jazz music.

Sometimes you have to watch somebody love something before you can love it yourself. It is as if they are showing you the way.”

As I thought about this excerpt from the book today, I thought about how true that was about so many things in life, like sharing.  You only really learn to share from people who love to share.  If sharing were unpleasant every time you witnessed it, then no one would ever do it.  You have to experience the joy that someone gets from sharing with you, to truly want to share yourself.

I remember the mornings after I would spend the night with my Grandma Patterson.  She would wake me up and make buttered toast in the toaster oven and I would watch the percolator on top of the coffee pot bubble as we waited for the timer on the oven.  After the ding, we would sit at the table together and have our toast with sausage and eggs and grandma would have her coffee. 

I remember how good that coffee smelled and how much she seemed to enjoy it. She would look at me watching her drink her coffee with such pleasure and she would get up and get me a little pink melamine coffee cup and put about ¼ cup of coffee and sugar to about ¾ cups of milk. I remember how she would smile as I would hold that cup just like her, like I was big, and enjoy the coffee with her.

That’s why l love coffee so much I think, because Gran loved to share it.

I wonder if the same could be true of hospitality.  What if others will never experience and show hospitality unless they experience someone else’s love of it first?  I think hospitality is contagious. When we open our homes and lives up to others, they feel freer to open theirs up as well. 

But hospitality isn’t just about our homes; it’s a way of living. When we get to know the guy or girl behind the counter at the gas station, they feel freer to share of themselves and get to know me as well.  Hospitality can give us something to look forward to everyday.

When we share what we love or simply just share our love, then we show others, and sometimes remind others how to share and love in their lives. It has a percolating effect on the people around us, and the love of Christ bubbles up everywhere.