October 21, 2024
I could see part of her message before I even opened it. In bold letters it began, “I am so sorry…” The text was from a neighbor we love. What in the world would she have to be sorry about?
When I read the full message, I laughed out loud.
My beloved had noticed recently that something kept digging up the landscape at church. “I bet it’s a dog,” he’d mumbled. I forgot all about it. Until I read her message.
Her chickens were to blame. They loved coming to church and roaming around. They were the ones pecking in the mulch. Each time she took them home, they made their way back. They were living out Psalm 122:1: “I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the LORD.’”
I still smile when I think of it. My neighbor was planning to relocate them and hoped they wouldn’t return. She offered to clean the concrete, too. Apparently, they felt so comfortable being there that they’d relieved themselves all over the parking lot.
The sweet lady asked me to apologize to Pastor Tommy.
Isn’t that just good stuff? You know you’re a country church when chickens are a thing.
As a new year begins, I hope you will be just like those chickens. I hope you will be drawn to be at church. And I hope you will keep going and going, like my neighbor’s poultry-and let nothing deter you.
Of course, the people are really the church but it just feels so good being in the church building. When everything was shut down due to COVID, many were in a bad way. Oh, we knew we had God with us and had His Word, but the meeting together with other believers is an important, necessary thing. It’s like a training and a pep rally all in one. We need the human connection of other believers.
When the Apostle Paul was under house arrest in Rome, he did have a few freedoms but some believe he might have been continuously chained to a soldier. Instead of being filled with self-pity, he was filled with compassion and concern for others. Making great use of his time, he wrote the books of Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians during his incarceration. He could have prayed for many things (i.e. chain cutters, an escape plan), yet he prayed good things for believers in other places.
Though he had not met them in person, Paul had gotten word of the faith of the Colossians. In chapter one, he prayed several things for them: to know God’s will, live worthy, be strengthened by the Lord, and to be thankful.
In Hebrews 10:24-25, the author (probably not Paul) encouraged the Hebrew Christians to “spur one another on toward love and good deeds” and not give up meeting together. I want all these things for you, too!
I have a prayer for you as we begin 2022. This year I pray you will love Jesus more than ever. I pray you will seek, know, and do His will-even when you’re scared. I pray He will be your Rock, your Number One. In this new year, I pray you will love God’s Word-that you will not only love it, but you will apply it to your life and then share it. I want you to be that church lady or man who oozes Jesus and throws His love around like confetti. You’ll be the one who has a Bible verse for every day, every occasion. And I want you to be faithful to go to His house. (Did you just picture chickens?)
A year from now when we look back, I hope you say, “Wow! Look what the Lord did in my life in 2022!”
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Dawn Reed is a pastor's wife and newspaper columnist. Reach her at preacherwife7@yahoo.com.
