Wednesday, December 15, 2010

December

I just had my last concert yesterday at school which means that I am teaching free for the next three weeks. It's a good feeling, though I suppose it would feel a lot more liberating if the week before Christmas wasn't always my busiest week at my church job. But today I've got a day off and I'm grateful. I'm trying to take some time this morning to chill, but in a more purposeful way than doing whatever comes easiest to me. I suppose blogging is a perfect example. I get to sit on the couch with my laptop keeping my legs warm (cause it's 54 in here) but I do have to think a bit.

I'd like to make a confession. Lately I feel like I've been buying things all the time. I suppose that Christmas is a big part of that. However, we've had to buy a fair number of gifts for Christmas, spending a considerable amount of money (we need to plan better next year) and that should mean that I tighten up everywhere else. But it doesn't seem like I am. I was thinking this morning, "Krystle, can you go a whole day without buying something?" And by something I mean like a coffee, not a $100.00 pair of jeans. I don't spend money that way. I do it in slow increments, at the craft store, the thrift store, in small increments of $5.00. But when you do that everyday it starts to add up. And I think more than anything what I'm worried about is my desire to do that, not so much the money. Why do I feel the need to accumulate? Do I really have nothing better to do? Ugh. Yikes.

The husband and I have been feeling a little bit...oh...disenchanted about some things lately. Namely about how we live our lives as Christians and what we do in the church. It feels like we aren't going anywhere. I know I've been feeling much too comfortable lately. I know that Sunday morning church has its purpose and is important, but that shouldn't be it, and I feel like for most people it is. I'm included in that much of the time, which is even worse for me because much of Sunday morning just feels like "work." Shouldn't we be doing something a little more radical? Shouldn't we be just a tad more concerned about the people outside our walls? Do we really think that having a special service is what's going to bring people to Christ? Okay, once a blue moon that might actually happen. But from everything I know and have experienced, it's time and relationship that brings people in...people from the outside, not people who are already Christians and just looking for a new church. Do we really think doing one or two programs on one or two days a year is going to make a name for us in the community? Who really do we get to know from that? No one. And no one ever comes. We say it will bring people in. It doesn't.

But at the same time, God has told us to be part of a community, not to abandon it. Where would the church be if Abraham had shrunk back? Moses? David? Isaiah? Jonah (hmm guess we know what happened there)? John the baptist? Mary? Paul? John the beloved? What is right is never easiest. Leaving is almost always easier. Isolation is almost always easier. That is, until you're miserable. So we're just trying to figure things out.

It's Christmastime, which means I'm supposed to be reflecting on light coming to darkness, strength making itself completely vulnerable, a door being opened to us, peace coming to earth. I guess this is the start of that.

1 comment:

J'aime By: Jamie said...

k just saw this today. this and other posts made me get a little teary. you are such a beautiful person. keep it up.