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Tuesday, November 20, 2012

A Thanksgiving Reflection On Account of Josh

by Tom Pappas


One of the ways Laurel and exercise our faith and commitment to God’s creation is to organize our church’s Green Team (I sometimes call them “earth angels”).  We are the ones who nag, and complain about the unnecessary dependence on one-use items, especially foam cups.  For a significant number of years we have collected enough volunteers to wash ceramic cups and glasses each Sunday.

Josh joined the church with his guardians last October. He is a special young man whose baptism brought tears to my eyes as he carefully placed his glasses on the edge of the font and carefully lowered his over 6’ frame directly over the basin.  We sprinkle at Westminster, but it’s a good dose! Even though Josh was coached on what would happen, there was a bit of surprise; I found it a sweet moment.

Some of us conspired to invite Josh to help with dishwashing last Sunday. I approached him and he thought it was important to not waste resources, and he’d like to give it a try and he could do it today if it was OK with K___ and J___. It was, and he did.

Our machine doesn’t take coffee or tea stains away and is hopeless against lipstick, so every cup must we scrubbed and inspected. Josh nailed it.

He was visibly happy and so was I.  I will not try to count the times he commented, “I think I can do this every week.” (Coming in second, “I’m doing great, aren’t I?”)

God is good. Life has its ups and downs. There are many things for me to be thankful for in 2012. Spending less than an hour with Josh is one of them and puts a lot in perspective. It remains to be seen if this is the beginning of a call story. Stay tuned to see whose call it might be. Josh?  Me? Other volunteers?

The Josh experience freshens my attitude. May you have an experience that will be the seed of the gift of a fresh and inspired Thanksgiving.

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