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Yesterday was drop in day – at our local Peavey Mart store.

Things have changed.  The aisles are clear and non-claustrophobic.   Items are easily seen.  The atmosphere is exciting.

A new manager is in place.  Things are changing.

I have two types of store adventures I enjoy.  Peavey Mart has been able to provide both.

The CMS store style.  In my younger days, with preschool kids, I liked to visit CMS in Regina, Saskatchewan.  At that time, the store was crowded.  Things were just thrown in bins with “approximate” costs attached – or you suggested a price at the till. 

I call this the scrounger store – you come to see what you can find.

Then there is the upscale store.  The store is “designed”.  Colors are soothing, the merchandise is accessible and the staff are helpful.  The floors are waxed and the shelves are dusted.

I call this the open concept store – you come to see what they have.

Which store do you find attracts you?

I grew up in the late 60’s and 70’s.  Even the 80’ got a bit of the splash over!  We were about free love and thumbing authority.   We might add tolerance and peace on earth. (OK, some of us . . . not all!)

I remember the songs of that age.  “Let there be peace on earth” was a great favourite.  Our community choir just sang a song called “Hand in Hand”.  From the early 80’s, this song could have as easily been written a decade earlier.

The idea of peace, of loving one another, of full acceptance are all there in the song.  As well as joining hands so that we won’t fall (or be overtaken by sinister forces).

And my mind went off on one of it’s weird tangents.  I remember singing the song, “Onward Christian Soldiers” as a kid.  We were all about being a group together, joining the “happy song”, and blending our voices.  Then the song went out of fashion because it was too “militaristic and violent.”  After all, we were all about peace and love!

“Hand in Hand” was the more politically correct way to approach life.  Be a group together, join in happy signing, blend our voices.

Although . . . somehow this seems like a militaristic theme as well.  Join the army of the peaceniks.  What was revealed in the next decades was a new type of non-violent violence and intolerance that mingled with the lofty words.

Perhaps we were just singing the words backwards? 

The other day I was in the grocery store.  The sales were as usual, the prices as usual, all was as usual.

Until a lady I know approached me.  The gist of the following conversation was along the lines of her great sense of oppression and of a world gone wrong.

I’m not great at being a counselor, but I assured her that God was with her.  She did not need to be chained by a swirling, whirling, out of control world.

As she left, I turned to her and gave her a blessing – a thing we learn as pastors (which is not a bad thing for anyone to do).  There was no preparation, nor liturgical formula, or even a written out sentence.

This just popped out.

“May you have a free spirit, that is only a slave to Jesus Christ.”

Not sure where that came from, but I think the idea is sound.

Today was the seniors complex – off for a devotional at 9:30 in the morning.

Not everyone was wide awake until I used a little reverse word definition on them.  You know, the type where you say one thing, and we all go into a tizzy!  And then we redirect our understanding and we all agree!

I started off talking about working on a committee regarding addictions.  Why does the addict stay addicted?  How do they get unaddicted?  Some answer were fairly quickly forthcoming.

Then I told them that in 1755 (according to a few internet sources), “devotion” was related to addiction.  I asked why they come to meet together on a Wednesday morning for devotions?  What were they addicted to?

The Sunday School answer was right! 

“Jesus.”

And then I asked what would get them unaddicted to Jesus.  On a scale of one to ten, where did they stand in their addiction to Jesus. 

We don’t need a safe injection site to get us off of Jesus.  We don’t need an AA program. 

If anything, we need a full bore ahead opportunity to mine all that Jesus is and has for us.