As I write this month’s front page, I am looking at the first week of the spring season where long sleeves and sweaters will not be the outfit for the day. It is a grand and glorious milestone!
For those of us who have an interest in cultivating green and growing stuff, this marks a time of planting, watering, tending and weeding. This work of cultivating new life will be ongoing over the summer months—and into the fall—until that time comes when the killing frosts arrive and growth is stopped. We are in a season where the world around us is full of activity.
And while nature is in a season full of life and growth, we, in the church are in that phase of the church year called “Ordinary Time.” On the surface of it, that doesn’t sound like a good phase to be going through. “Ordinary Time” sounds kind of dull and unexciting. Who wants a steady diet of “ordinary” in their lives?
Perhaps “Ordinary Time” isn’t as bad as it sounds. “Ordinary” does not describe the character and quality of time but instead describes the fact that the Sundays in this group are not a part of a special season (like Advent, Christmas, Lent, and Easter) and are numbered as they are. The longest stretch of “Ordinary Time” happens between Trinity Sunday and the Reign of Christ Sunday and it accounts for a lot of Sundays in the church year.
Now, even though these Sundays aren’t a special season like Advent, Lent, or Easter, it doesn’t mean that they don’t have purpose behind them. Often times we emphasize the growth of the church—as the Body of Christ—or the growth of the individual Christian. Not surprisingly, the color of these Sundays is green, which symbolizes growth.
It seems that the church has just entered its own growing season, just like the natural world around us. Are we ready for growth in the life of the church and in our own personal spiritual lives? The things necessary for spiritual growth are not really a mystery: it requires prayer, the study of scripture, the willingness to be a servant of Christ to others, and a desire to remain connected to the church, the Body of Christ. Just as there are no shortcuts to cultivating plant life, there are no shortcuts to cultivating spiritual life, either.
The green time is upon us—in nature and in the church. Are we ready to get our hands dirty?
Your servant in Christ,
Rev. Jim Hoppert
