March, 2010

From the Rector’s Desk…

One Lenten discipline that I have tried to practice is to get up in the morning and watch the sun rise.  I am not normally an early riser.   People that I know who do get up early have always seemed to me to be more productive.  Of course, I know many very productive people who are not early risers too.  So, it really depends on the person.  Anyway, I have been getting up to have some quiet time on our little beach on the sound, and to watch the sun rise.

We notice things when we change our routine.  When we do things a little differently, and break the normal pattern, we seem to slow down enough to observe things a little more.  It seems to open our hearts to gratitude a little more too.  Author David Stendle-Rast wrote in his book, Gratefulness, “Even the predictable turns into surprise the moment we stop taking it for granted.”  He says that we tend to have a preconceived list of what we should be grateful for.  He suggests instead that each day we throw away the list and foster gratitude for the many gifts we have been missing in life.  To me this means slowing down and noticing things in a different way – letting myself be surprised by life.

Life still gets busy, and there are challenges and tasks that demand our attention.  I can also still get impatient or thoughtless.  I still fall short of God’s call to love and I need forgiveness.  Yet I have noticed again that there are people in my life who love me, and that every morning the sun comes up again.

Faithfully in Christ,

John +