February 2018

Michelle, Kaitlyn and I went to the furniture store the other day.  We normally don’t just visit furniture stores, but we had some time to waste before we picked up Madison from an event and we were close by, so we went.  Kaitlyn was so excited to go in, when we told her where we were going she said, with a smile, “I love furniture stores.”  Of course we know why she loves them.  She gets to try out different chairs and sofas, lay on different beds, and it is a lot of fun.  Kaitlyn likes to do more than the normal person though.  She saw a blue fuzzy carpet and went over and felt it.  Then she ran back a little way, got a running start, and just slid, head first, onto the carpet – kind of like a baseball player sliding into second base.  She looked up at Michelle and I and said, you have to feel this.  It is so soft.  Michelle and I just laughed.  I did bend down and feel the carpet and it was soft.  I didn’t go for the slide though.
 
As I thought about our trip to the furniture store, Kaitlyn’s slide onto the fuzzy blue carpet, and how much it made me smile, I started to wonder if I need to slide more in my life.  Really, everybody sits on the couches, tries out the chairs, lays on the mattresses, but how many people slide head first onto the carpet.  I’m not even for sure that the carpet is for sale.  People don’t seem to be there to shop for that.  I have started to wonder if I should start doing the unexpected, the thing that is out of the ordinary, those things that most people aren’t going to do, as a follower of Christ.
 
We see this in the life of Jesus, don’t we?  He stops a funeral procession because He touches the coffin (Luke 7:14), He reaches out and touches the leper (Matt 8:3), He ate with sinners (Matt 9:10), He remained quiet when accusations were flying (Matt 26:63), He slept while storms where raging (Luke 8:23), He didn’t fret when food was short (Matt 14:15-16), and He didn’t run when the enemy came for Him (John 18:4).  That is how we find Christ acting.  How do we act?  Do we act as expected?  Do we talk like people think we should?  Do we limit our sharing, protect our pride, defend our honor, try to be seen in the right way, or be on the right side?
 
The cross is called foolishness (1 Cor 1:18) and if it is our hope, we are called to be fools (1 Cor 3:18).  We are called to surprise the world with an attitude that is unexpected.  To make them wonder with our gestures and acts that are unanticipated.  To bring something different to the table, a new song to the dance, light into the darkness.
 
Most people visit furniture stores and test out the furniture, but maybe we, as Christians, are call to dive on rugs.  Go through the power and call of the Holy Spirit and look like a fool, a fool that hangs every hope on the cross.
 
Because of Him,
​Lynn       
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