Life

Well, it’s been quite some time since last we talked via the blog.

Truly, much is going on in world. Much of it during these last few weeks of Christmas and Roberts family expansion time has caught my attention for a few fleeting seconds – at least long enough to make me think, “I could write about that on the blog…”

There is the very serious and overwhelming. More troops are going to Iraq. A Lutheran church trial is happening in Atlanta, and a child abduction filled the news and thankfully resolved, but with many details yet to emerge.

There is the silly. I mean, we’ve had a couple of nights of the greatest tv in the world --- the first round of bad, bad auditions on American Idol.

Certainly, there is much to write about, but those topics will have to wait for another day.

This week, my thoughts have been colored by a symbolic trip through time and space.

My parents have been at our house (and they’re faithful readers of the SOTHBLOG, of course), and there is nothing like standing in the middle of three generations to give a person a sense of perspective and place.

For instance, even with all that’s happened in the world, and the ways that things change every single day --- some things really do stay the same.

These are the things you learn when a new baby makes its way into your family. When you’re blessed to be surrounded by family and friends and an incredible church.

For the last couple of weeks, the world of the Roberts house has shrunk down to a wonderful couple thousand square feet.

Whatever goes on in the world at large, the world right around us demands our attention, and is the place that life is really lived. Please don’t get me wrong --- I want Christians to engage with the world and to be God’s agents of transformation and kingdom-building.

But these few days have brought me to a new realization. When I think about all my memories, my childhood and family and all of the things that weave generations together, it’s the simple things that really matter.

I’m pretty sure that life comes down to all that happens in the processes of keeping everyone fed, clean and healthy. Life happens one home at a time, one day at a time.

I love the new series of – yes – sausage commercials that have been on tv lately, playing on this very theme. Click here to see them, and make sure to go all the way down and watch the one called, "Why."

It’s a push and stretch for most of us to keep it all in balance. We may not have to “light and heat the earth,” but we all certainly have a variety of responsibilities that keep us more than occupied.

A quick glance at the magazine rack of most any major retailer will find a common question posed most often: How can we do it all?

How can we cook gourmet meals in thirty minutes or less? How can we shed fat and build muscle in only minutes each week? How can we beat stress, succeed professionally and still find time to be the best moms and dads?

And, then your pastor says, “don’t forget to give of yourself, plug in, build relationships and grow closer to God.”

Church guilt, the sweetest kind.

How we gonna get it all done? Jimmy Dean pre-chopped breakfasts?

There’s bound to be another way, right?

This Christmas, a wonderful cousin of mine gave the family a tremendous gift. She spent time sitting down with my grandmother, preserving her time-tested recipes and compiling a cookbook of all our favorite, home-cooked meals.

Sixty years’ worth of biscuits-and-gravy wisdom are contained in those pages. But the recipes, incredible as they are, aren’t even the best part.

On about every other page, my cousin included quotes of folklore, wives’ tales and common sense from my grandmother.

Early in the book, she poses the question all of us have wanted to ask:

“I asked Grandmother how she did it, how she raised six kids and cooked three meals a day and took care of everything else. I wanted to know her secret.”

My Grandmama’s response is a wonderful thing: “It wasn’t real easy, but it was a different way of life back then, you were expected to learn and do certain things and not fight about it. It was just something you did.”

I love her response, because I don’t think the question even really makes sense for her. It’s certainly not one she’d ever thought of asking. We might as well ask her how she breathed for those years.

It’s just what you did.

The key, I think, is that she wasn’t trying to do it all. Just the important things, and to do them “without fighting about it.”

What if life really could be more about getting breakfast on the table for the kids than an existential quest for fulfillment?

Jesus had a job. A trade and craft. He had a mother and siblings. Meals were put on the table…everyone was kept clean and fed and healthy. Life happened, day by day.

In the midst of it all…fulfillment.

May you know the presence of the Holy Spirit today, and as Garrison Keillor always claims for “powdered milk biscuits,” may it give you “the strength to do what needs to be done.”

And don’t fight about it.

Grace & Peace,
Adam

LIFE AT SOTH:

Once again, what needs to be said is a huge thank you to all of you who have done countless acts of kindness and giving for our family since Jack’s been born. SOTH UMC, you are the greatest! Adam

Don’t forget, SOTH’s new worship schedule is 9:00 and 11:00 a.m. with Sunday School for all ages between services.

Second installment of our sermon series this week from Rick Warren’s book, “God’s Answers to Life’s Difficult Questions: How Can I Live Life Above Average?”

Our Bible Study of the Gospel of John continues with chapter 2 in the worship space at 10:20.