The Rev. Donald A. Davidson – Anglican Priest
Anglican Church of Canada
So perhaps this evening, before immediately launching into the next project or worrying about the unfinished things waiting for Monday…
Pause.
Sit outside for a while. Watch the light soften toward evening. Have supper slowly. Call a friend. Pray.
And let the unfinished list remain unfinished for one blessed evening.
But the Kingdom of God seems remarkably comfortable working through small acts of generosity.
God meets us in the middle of real life.
In the half-finished prayer list. In the distracted morning prayer. In the exhausted evening sigh that barely forms words but still somehow reaches heaven.
Every step along the road. Every conversation with a stranger who somehow became a friend before the day was done. Every cool breeze arriving at precisely the right moment on a hot afternoon. Every beautiful place to stop and rest. Even every glorious café con leche along the way.
All of it became almost sacramental.
And perhaps part of our calling in Ordinary Time is to relearn how to join it.
Not by doing more.
But by paying attention.
The breeze moving through the trees. The absurd confidence of a robin defending territory vastly larger than itself. The smell of cut grass that somehow convinces us we have accomplished something important merely by smelling it.
So if today finds you looking at the spaces around you — the relationships, the interactions, the small, daily encounters that make up your life—and thinking, “This is not entirely tidy…”
Take heart.< You are in the right place. Because this is where growth happens.
And that presence is found not only in extended periods of devotion, but in the quiet, consistent practice of showing up.
Because when we serve in these small, ordinary ways, we begin to reflect something true about the life of Christ.
And it is here, in the grocery bags and the small decisions and the slightly overambitious plans, that faith takes on its most practical form.
Which means that when we speak of a “Spirit-filled community,” we are not inventing something new.
We are reflecting something ancient.
We are drawn into the very life of God.