What Are You Going to Do Today?

This week on our Twitter and our Facebook pages, Megan Hansen, who manages our online communication, posted a reflection written by MaryAnn McKibben Dana entitled Kick With Your Left Foot. The springboard for her reflection was a podcast she heard about the 1999 Women’s World Cup Soccer final in which the US National Women’s team beat China in a penalty kick shootout. The winning goal was scored by Brandi Chastain. Any of you who follow soccer at all may remember that moment and that kick and Brandi Chastain’s reaction. But what caught MaryAnn Dana’s attention was the fact that just before Brandi Chastain walked onto the field to take that kick, her coach told her to take the kick with her left foot. Something she had done hundreds of times in practice, but never in a game. Especially a game and a moment of that magnitude. Chastain followed her coach’s instruction. Took the kick. With her left foot. Scored the goal. The rest is history.

Ms. Dana ends her blog post with this:
And that’s how life works, isn’t it.
We do what is ours to do, day by day.
We pursue our “craft,” whatever that might be;
we explore what it means to be our authentic selves;
we learn, we engage in rituals and traditions,
we practice so that at moments when we are most needed in our communities and families, we are ready to give our best effort for the sake of tikkun olam, the healing of the world. As Danusa Veronca Goska writes, “When we study the biographies of our heroes, we learn that they spent years in preparation doing tiny, decent things before one historical moment propelled them to center stage.”
Tiny, decent things.
Tiny, decent, surprising things.
Tiny, decent, surprising things…so we’re ready to jump in, with either foot forward.

Which brings me back to today.
And, to the Bible.
And, to you and me.
And, to our claim and calling to follow in the way and the spirit of Jesus, who, if Matthew’s Gospel is to be believed, spent his time and energy healing and teaching and bringing something of God’s Kingdom close.
Tikkun Olam.
Healing the world.
Little by little.
One person.
One step.
One household.
One community.
At a time.

One of the scribbled notes on the file folder in which I keep sermon notes and ideas is:
“Quit thinking you have to be Gandhi.”  
Which, I think, means this.
Quit thinking you can’t do anything about it because the problem is too big.
Quit thinking you are just one person.
Quit thinking that someone else with more time, more energy, more influence, more power, more clout will be the one to jump in to fix it or solve it or do it.
Quit thinking you have to be Gandhi.
Or, Martin Luther King, Jr.
Or Nelson Mandela.
Or, Jesus.
Instead, remember it is…
Tiny, decent things.
Tiny, decent, surprising things.
Tiny, decent, surprising things…that make us ready to jump in, with either foot forward.

In that same file folder as the scribbled note about Gandhi, I found this written by Emilie Townes, the Andrew W. Mellon Professor of African American Studies in Religion and Theology a Yale Divinity School. She writes:
Ultimately, I believe that somewhere deep inside each of us
We know that perhaps the simplest, yet the most difficult, answer to the challenge of “what will we proceed to do with the fullness and the incompleteness of what we have brought to this time and place” is:
Live your faith deeply.
Now I am not talking about perfection.
I’m talking about what we call in Christian ethics, the everydayness of moral acts.
It’s what we do every day that shapes us and says more about us than those grand moments of righteous indignation and action.
The everydayness of listening closely when folks talk or don’t talk to hear what they are saying.
The everydayness of taking some time, however short or long, to refresh ourselves through prayer or meditation.
The everydayness of speaking to folks and actually meaning whatever it is that is coming out of our mouths.
The everydayness of being a presence in people’s lives.
The everydayness of sharing a meal.
The everydayness of facing heartache and disappointment.
The everydayness of joy and laughter.
The everydayness of facing people who expect us to lead them somewhere or at least point them in the right direction.
The everydayness of blending head and heart.
It’s the everydayness of getting up and trying one more time to get our living right.
It is in the everydayness that “we the people” are formed.
And, we the people of faith, live and must witness to a justice wrapped in a love that will not let us go and a peace that is simply too ornery to give up on us.

So…
What are you going to do today to claim your calling and to follow in the way and spirit of Jesus?
What are you going to do today…
To heal?
To help?
To teach?
To bring God’s Kingdom close?
One person at a time.
One moment at a time.
One household…your household…at a time.
To heal the world…
Your world…
Our world…
This world…
Just a little bit?

Remember it is…
Tiny, decent things.
Tiny, decent, surprising things.
Tiny, decent, surprising things
That make us ready to jump in, with either foot forward.