HELLO!

This morning I finished the September 27^th bulletin and sermon, sent the bulletin to Bethe, June, Gus and the AV team (I do this six weeks ahead to give the worship leadership team a chance to add, subtract, plan, be aware). I like to do this on Friday mornings, typically my day off, though this August also part of my vacation). It gives me the rest of the day to do other things. As I was working on the bulletin and sermon I could hear and see Kim mowing the lawn. I understand there are some practical reasons for keeping one’s lawn regularly mowed, tics come to mind. But if we are being honest, the number one reason is convention. A neighbour told me he mows his lawn, so it looks like his living room carpet. I remember displaying a photo of our front lawn in the church. I didn’t tell anyone the photo was our lawn, but I kept it on the screen throughout the service. The lawn featured what we call “weeds” but are plants like any other. The lawn, like all front lawns in our subdivision, was originally “fill” dumped to make room for the space where our homes would be built. All the others in our area sodded their lawns, adding decorative bushes and majestic trees. We left ours “as is”. Thus the lawn looks like the surface of the moon, covered in weeds. But grass (weeds) need to be mowed unless you want your neighbours calling the “suburban covenant” police.

I once did the mowing, but because I am frugal, I used an old-fashion push mower, purchased at Lee Valley. Kim was highly critical of the effect of these mowers, she said all they accomplished was to push the weeds down for a day. She got frustrated and bought a used gas-powered mower and has been cutting our grass (irregularly) for the last fifteen years. She wears the “Groundskeeper Willie” t-shirt I bought her, as she mows.

I raise this mundane matter because I often wonder how much of what we do, say, worry about, spend money on, is a matter of convention and not connected to a creative, caring or fun desire on our part? Obviously, there are many things we do, things we don’t enjoy, because they are necessary for a larger good, to help others, to improve our skills, to keep our spaces clean, safe and inviting, not to mention attractive. But again, if we are being honest, how much effort we do expend in doing things only because they are expected, what others do, to abide by conventions no one really understands beyond, “it’s how we do things”. Way back when, when I began my work as an ordained minister, when I arrived at a new (to me) church I would ask “why do we do this” and quickly learned those being asked assumed my agenda in asking was to “change things”. It wasn’t (they were confusing me with my colleagues). I don’t need things to be “my way”, I have no agenda when I come to a church, other than to make room for as many people as possible. I ask, “why do we do this”, not to change it, but to find out if we are exhausting ourselves to make things a certain way because it is a desired goal or because someone, years ago, did it that way. If there is no longer joy or a sense of growth from that activity, it begs the question, why are we doing it, especially if it is causing stress. I never want to get others to do what I do, except to inject a question I hope they will ask themselves, “Why am I doing this?”

Peace, Kevin