'Twas the week before Christmas break

Well… it is safe to say I feel like the past three months or so have literally flown by. Here I am writing my reflection looking ahead to just one full week remaining before heading home for Christmas. Just like the last week of a semester, I feel like my final week in Booneville is tightly packed with all kinds of things that didn’t get done in previous weeks. This mostly due simply to the timing, but it leaves me with a solidly packed week nonetheless.

Among the things that will be keeping me busy:
-My usual weekly activities of square dancing, Boys and Girls Club, BHDC, etc.
-A monthly lunch meeting with the priest from my church and another member of the community
-Good Fellows (ministerial fellowship Christmastime outreach)
-A trip to Heavener, Oklahoma, with Rachel to experience a midnight service and Morning Prayer for the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe
-A Christmas-themed open house at our house
-A trip to Ft. Smith for a play and bonding time with fellow interns and FUMC (First United Methodist Church) staff
-Christmas potluck at Church

This is just a sampling as I am sure there are many many more things (included, but not limited to packing and saying see you soon’s). While I am not looking forward to the cramped schedule, I must say I much prefer it to projects, exams, presentations and papers. I just hope that, like with school, I do not get too wrapped up in the excitement to go home that I mentally check out of Booneville before our van is headed northbound.

The First Sunday of Advent; or in other words, a new beginning

Today was the first Sunday of Advent; the start of a new liturgical year; a season in which we prepare for the birth of Christ. I find this hard to believe since the high today was in the 70s. I also find it hard to believe that today marks somewhat of a fresh start (liturgical calendar speaking) as there are just over two weeks left until we as interns will take a break, pack our things, and head up to Minneapolis to fly home to our families for the Christmas holiday.

Despite all the doubt and confusion in my mind, I take this new beginning (beginning is actually a synonym of advent) as a reminder that there is always a chance to start over, always an opportunity to try harder. Maybe I haven’t been spending as much time on daily devotions as I would like to … that doesn’t mean I can’t spend that time from this point forward. Maybe I haven’t done so great with meeting our neighbors … but the year is not over, and I can still continue to grow deeper in the relationships I have begun. Maybe I don’t know every Republican, Democrat and some independent candidates stances on all the issues … but I am still learning. (These are the three main goals I have been working toward over the months.)

“… you know the time; it is the hour now for you to awake from sleep. For our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed.” —Romans 13: 11

Time is constantly passing and we are always moving forward, but that doesn’t mean I am stuck in my actions and choices of the past.

I pray that the Lord awakens me from the places I have been sleeping these past eleven weeks whether they be in my spiritual life or in how I can be serving the community of Booneville to the best of my abilities.

Today is my new beginning.

Giving thanks

Lately I have been somewhat in disbelief at how quickly time is passing. Leading up to Thanksgiving I could not wrap my mind around the reality that it was already late in November and just a handful of days until December. I attribute this mostly to the lack of cold weather and snow in Arkansas, as most of my life the entire month of November included cold weather and snow. And while it is getting much cooler, I am yet to see even a single snowflake.

This week we began reading and discussing our new book, Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Quite appropriately, giving thanks daily for small things is major idea in the first chapter.

Bonhoeffer writes, “Only he who gives thanks for little things receives big things. We prevent God from giving us great spiritual gifts He has in store for us, because we do not give thanks for daily gifts. We think we dare not be satisfied with the small measure of spiritual knowledge, experience, and love that has been given to us, and that we must constantly be looking forward eagerly for the highest good.”

I, too, am guilty of looking for something bigger or better to be grateful for. So, as a reminder to myself to remember the small blessings in my life: I am thankful for having a family willing to let me move to Arkansas for a year. I am thankful for having a family, period. I am thankful for the friends that I have. I am thankful that I have been blessed with safe travel for all I have done in the past six months or so. I am thankful for heat, and for waking up morning after morning, for the generosity I have experienced in Booneville, for being a self-sufficient human being and for all the other little things that God has blessed me with that are so mundane and taken for granted that it would bore you to read them all. I hope and pray that from this point forward I can spend my time rejoicing in the small blessings in life rather than get wrapped up in asking for something bigger and better. Everything is a blessing.

I thank you, LORD, with all my heart;
before the gods to you I sing.
I bow low toward your holy temple;
I praise your name for your fidelity and love.
For you have exalted over all
your name and your promise.
--Psalm 138: 1-2