A Long August

August 6, 2017

It started off innocently enough. “Can you help out?” is a simple enough question, to which my knee-jerk answer was, “No, I’m not interested.” No sooner had I hung up the phone than I reconsidered and so found myself preaching again, something I had said I wasn’t interested in doing after retirement. The District Superintendent only asked me to fill in on Sundays, but popping in once a week doesn’t work for me. Preaching to people I haven’t bothered to get to know doesn’t make any sense. Preaching is the process of bringing the eternal Word of God to the temporal need of the people. It can’t be done in a vacuum. But it’s only till the end of August.

I miss being at Park church. I can only participate in the first part of the early service, having to leave before the preaching, and unable to attend the late service at all. I feel disconnected with the people who have been a big part of my life for most of my life. At the same time, this small gathering of mostly elderly folks are managing to wriggle their way into my heart. I’m beginning to wonder if August will somehow stretch all the way to December. Whichever way things turn out, I am grateful for the opportunity I’ve had to meet these people and offer whatever I can to them. So far, whatever I’ve been able to give them has been pretty minuscule compared to what they are giving me. Even though I miss my Park church family, I am finding myself being adopted into the Dunkirk family. It’s a pretty good deal all the way around.