A month ago most of us were unwrapping gifts and making noises of excitement, surprise, and gratitude. “Ooh,” would come from our mouths, followed by “Aah,” “It’s just what I wanted,” or “What a great gift!” Wrapping paper was strewn all around and bows were haphazardly slapped on the backs of cats and dogs as they walked by. (I was busy doing other things which you can read about here, but I know that’s what most of you were doing.)

A mere thirty-one days later, most of those gifts are sitting in some place where we may see them, use them, but do not gush over them. Special gifts quickly become common. “Constant gratitude for common gifts is uncommon,” Edward Hays writes.

Four years ago I was very sick. I could not walk to the bathroom without help. I kept getting weaker and weaker, and the doctors did not know what was wrong. When they finally found out and did the things I needed- surgery, medicines, rehabilitation- I began to get better and was so grateful for…well…everything. The feel of clean sheets, the taste of cold milk, being able to walk to the mailbox, feeling the sun on my face, the sound of rain hitting the HVAC system outside my study window, getting texts and calls from friends. All of it brought so much gratitude to my heart. And I could not stop saying prayers of thanksgiving for all that had been done for and to me.

In her book Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Annie Dillard tells the story of a blind 22-year-old girl. She had an operation, and suddenly she could see! But she closed her eyes for the next two weeks because of the brightness of the world. When she finally opened them she just kept saying repeatedly, “Oh God! How beautiful!”

I understand why we can’t be in a constant state of overwhelming gratitude. The emotional energy it drains from us would keep us from doing anything else. I love a good party, especially a surprise one. But afterward, I am worn out and need some rest.

Still, we need to find ways of experiencing the joy of the gifts we are constantly surrounded by. The dullness to our senses and our spirits robs us of the fullness of life. We miss so much of what is around us. Last night Henry McMaster, the governor of my fair state, quoted Joni Mitchell’s song “Big Yellow Taxi.” “Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone.” It’s when we lose those gifts that we realize that we could have been more grateful.

So, on this month after Christmas Day, I think I’ll give special attention to all of the normal, common, everyday gifts in my life. And do my best to be thankful.

(Note: I wrote this several years ago. I had not published it on my blog)

While walking one morning I passed a cement truck and workmen laying a new sidewalk at a home. Memories came flooding in.

Inman Elementary School, 1962. The school bell rings at 2:30 and 200 screaming first through sixth graders run out the doors, heading towards home. Suddenly they all stop, silent, eyes wide, mouths agape. There before them are two large cement trucks, 6 workmen, and 40 yards of freshly laid, smooth-topped sidewalk in front of the school. We all stand for a minute in complete awe and silence. Then, suddenly, 400 little hands grab 200 sticks, and begin to write over 200 names in the sidewalk, destroying the hours of work done by those hard working men. You could hear their groans.

We all want to make a mark in something that will last.

Some build financial empires with their names forever emblazoned on them. Others build great buildings. Others form political dynasties. And others work on families. Scratching our names into something that will last.

But none of it does. It never does. Finances fade, buildings fall, empires tumble, and families end.

Jesus said “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.” (Matthew 6) He also said that only what we do for others will be known in heaven (Matthew 25).

I was back in Inman several months ago. Not a trace of that sidewalk remains.

This Christmas was a little different for Cathy and me.

We had planned to visit her sister and brother-in-law on the 23^rd, then my sister and her family on the 26^th. Christmas Day itself would be a stay at home day.

Which is unusual for me.

For many years I have always gone to church on Christmas Day. Even when it did not fall on Sunday. I just feel that celebrating the birth of Jesus ought to have some sort of worship involved. Nothing fancy, but gathering with other followers of Christ, reading the stories from Matthew and Luke, singing a few carols, offering prayers, and sharing with each other. And since I was pastor of the church, I had a key to the sanctuary.

I would tell the staff they did not have to join me, but they were certainly welcome. I would invite the congregation to come, kids in pajamas, adults in sweats, however they wanted to dress, around 10 in the morning. I would break out my guitar and we would sing. (I have a special gift of singing- the louder I sing, the louder everybody else sings.) Kids would share what their favorite gift was, and then we would talk about the gift of Jesus. It usually lasted about 30 minutes, then we all go back to our regular celebrations. This was done regardless of the day of the week Christmas fell on.

At each church I served it always started off small, sometimes with people telling me I should not be doing it. After all, they said, isn’t Christmas about family? I would tell them it was, but it wasn’t about theirs (or mine). It was about a family in a cave with a baby in a manger. The first year a few people would show up. But each year it would have more and more. For many it became part of their family tradition.

But now I am retired, and while I still serve as pastor of two really good small churches, they are a forty minute drive away from my home. So, this year, for the first time in decades, we were going to be home all day. I was really missing being in church.

We did not get to meet with family, either. Cathy’s sister has cancer and is getting chemotherapy. It has lowers her immune system. The week before Christmas we had some kind of respiratory illness, so we decided not to visit her. This was very hard for Cathy. She and her sister are joined at the hip. They are not only sisters, they are best friends, and they start and end each day with phone calls or texts to each other. She was missing her sister something awful.

And, because of the illness and some of the reactions to my cancer treatments, we decided we could not make the two and a half hour drive to see my sister and her family. Paula and I have always gotten along with each other, but there were many years when we didn’t get to see each other often. However, the last few years we have become quite close. I am loving how we are getting along now. And her children are a joy for me as an uncle. Her husband David is a wonderful guy and I am so glad he’s a part of our family and we are a part of his. But I wasn’t going to get to see them, either.

So…no worship, no family, no special meals on Christmas.

Then Cathy hits me with this.

“I’ve got to go to the horse farm and take care of the horses Christmas morning.” Many of you know Cathy volunteers with the Florence Area Humane Society. They have a farm for abused horses and other large animals, and she goes out to feed, clean, and groom them. It is a place of joy for her. “No one else is going to be out there on Christmas day, and someone has to feed the horses.” She’s right, of course. For those who live on farms or who have animals, caring for them does not take a holiday. And though that is not my particular calling, I did not want her to go out there alone on Christmas Day.

So, we get up early on December 25, grab a cup of coffee and head out to the farm.

Turns out we were not alone. Jane, the director of the FAHS, and Tom, another volunteer, were there just beginning to take care of the animals. They had the same idea as Cathy, not knowing that anyone else would show up. Cathy hands me a pitchfork and points to a stable where the horse had just been taken out to pasture, and tells me to muck it out. I start pitchforking horse poop into a wheelbarrow, while Cathy takes care of some of the other animals.

She knows them all by name. There are some horses, including a small Shetland named Sam; a donkey who starts braying when you start the golf cart up (because he knows food is on the way); a bunch of new puppies that had come to the regular shelter and there was not room for them; and Rocco, her favorite, a pit bull that was rescued from being a bait dog. When I approach the animals, they shy away. Most of them had been abused, and mostly by men, so it is understandable. But Cathy has them all- horses, dogs, donkey- coming to see her.

I finish mucking out the stable and go to where she is feeding the dogs. She hands me the hard rubber chew toy. It has dog poop all over it. “Here,” she says. “Clean this.” It’s Christmas morning and I’m on poop patrol at the farm. As I’m washing the chew toy, I wonder if Joseph had to do this kind of thing.

A car pulls up and three more people get out. Ernst, Patricia, and their college student son Patrick. They start helping. We talk as we work with the animals. Patrick is in his last year at Clemson and we talk about hiking trails up in the area. They were worried about the animals, so they showed up “just in case.” And a few minutes later a couple of more volunteers showed up, not knowing that anyone else would be there.

We finished up faster than we had planned. Cathy spoke to each and every animal, all the people spoke to each other, we wished everyone a merry Christmas, and went home.

That evening I was thinking about the day. I didn’t have church, didn’t read aloud the Christmas story, and wouldn’t see my family. But I was in a stable on Christmas morning. And made it a little better for some of God’s creatures. And while I did not see the Holy Family, any shepherds, or magi, I do think I saw a few angels.

Today, January 8, is the anniversary of the death of Galileo Galilei, who died in 1642. Although he was not the first to posit it, he said that the earth was not flat. (It had been pretty much proven by lots of people from the Egyptians to the Greeks and the Romans for a few thousand years.) He also argued for a heliocentric universe, saying that the sun does not rotate around the earth, but that the earth rotates around the sun. Both of these (along with some other scientific theories) got him into trouble with the Church of the day. They argued that the Bible clearly stated the earth was flat and that the sun and stars rotated around the earth.

Eventually the Church threatened to burn Galileo at the stake if he did not recant. So he did. Not out of scientific understanding or religious belief, but out of fear of a painful and horrible death.

He anguished over his decision for the rest of his life.

(Note: In 1992, 350 years later, the Catholic Church admitted it was wrong.)

Every year on this day I take some time to think about the things the church (or at least a large part of the church) argues about in the culture where they believe “the Bible clearly states” whatever they believe. In the past it has been support of slavery, genocide, subjugation of women, child labor, destruction of the environment, and taking of land from native inhabitants.

I know that the church has also done much good (public hospitals, education, promoting democracy, helping the poor, etc.), even having people within the church fight against the sins listed above. But that does not negate the fact that we still do some pretty bad things, and we still persecute those who stand up for something different.

While by no means being a loud voice crying out in the wilderness, calling for justice, peace, caring for the poor, and inclusiveness, I have spoken what I know God wants for our world. And have had some pretty surprising pushback from church members. Not threatened to be burned at the stake (at least, not yet) but some things I never thought followers of Jesus would do.

In Cayce, I had put on the marquee “Join Us In Praying For The President.” This was during the Obama administration. I had phone calls threatening me with violence, and threatening to tear down the sign. This was from people who claimed to believe the Bible. Well, all of it except for 1 Timothy 2:1-2. And Romans 13:1-7. And… Well, you get the point.

In Florence, I received several letters from an anonymous author threatening me and by implication my church with violence. I think the term used was “destruction and death will be brought upon you.” The letters were turned over to the police, and since the US mail was involved, they eventually went to the FBI. It was specific to me and my church. No other United Methodist Churches received similar letters, and none of the churches in Florence, regardless of denomination, did. The FBI said it was probably just a crank, but encouraged us to be careful. The trustees of the church, who are empowered to care for the safety of the church, wisely decided to hire an off-duty police officer to be at the church on Sunday mornings. Nothing ever happened of violence.

But I wonder how much money our church and lots of other churches have had to spend on safety. Money that could be used for other good things.

Most of the threats do not come from the world outside of the church. The world outside pretty much ignores the church these days unless it figures it can be used for political purposes. The threats come from within. And they come from people who believe that “the Bible clearly states…”

Back in the early 1980’s one of my favorite TV shows was Hill Street Blues, a cop show about a police station located on Hill Street in a large city. Almost every show started with the police officers getting their daily assignments from Sergeant Phil Esterhaus (Michael Conrad). He always ended his session with “Let’s be careful out there!” Esterhaus was not referring solely to physical safety. He was also referring to how they interpreted and used the law. It affected real people.

Sometimes I think every church service should end with the words, “Let’s be careful out there.”

Leonardo DaVinci’s famous painting, Mona Lisa, lies protected deep within the Louvre Museum in Paris. Guards surround it and thick glass covers it to keep air and light from destroying this ancient work of art. Crowds of people come to look at it and try to get a photo through the dark glass that encases it. It has not changed It has not changed in over 500 years. The same enigmatic smile, the same background. Those who looked at it in the early 1500s saw the same thing I saw when I was there (without, of course, the dark glass case, the guards, and the people with cameras).

Outside of the museum, in one of its courtyards, is a vine that has been growing for years, perhaps since the museum was founded in 1793. Not many people notice the vine, but it is carefully attended by a gardener. While the vine is the same vine it has always been, it does not look the same as it did in the past. It is living and growing.

For those of us who are followers of Jesus, our relationship with Jesus often becomes like that of the painting. We have not changed, we have not moved, we have not grown. We worship, study, pray to, and serve not a living God, but a portrait of what that God was like back when we first came to Christ. We turn a living relationship into a set of closely guarded and protected rules and dogma.

Yet Christ is alive and our relationship with him should be like that of the gardener and the vine. (As a matter of fact, Jesus said something about him being a vine and we the branches- a living relationship.) We should be growing, expanding in grace, serving in new ways, and welcoming people to the family of Christ who are different from us. 

Here’s a quick way to tell if you’re worshiping an idol, or in a relationship with a living God. As in all things be honest. Answer these questions: 1. How have you changed in the last year? 2. What do you believe now that is different from what you believed when you first came to Christ? 3. Would those who know you best say you are changing in ways that make you attract people to Jesus?

What is true of our relationship with Christ is also true of our relationship with the people around us. As a matter of fact, Jesus said that the way we treat others is the way we treat him.

So, on this first day of a new year, I ask myself, am I growing in my relationships, or are they pretty much the same as they always were?

The answers will tell a lot about whether my relationship is with a painting or a living vine.

(Credit Where Credit’s Due Department: the idea for this came from Selling Water By The River by Shane Hipps. I highly recommend the book.)