Weekly Assignment

I believe I have written before about Father Evan's weekly assignments for our church parish family.  Yesterday I got one of those rare opportunities to attend church alone and I was really able to soak up the message. 

Fr. Evan began by talking about Christmas wish lists and the ability to save wish lists on various websites for family members to search and get exactly what you want.  God, too, has a wish list and the only thing on it is YOU.  It is all he wants.  What a wonderful thought. 

The following is sort of a mix between Fr. Evan's assignment and my own reflection of how it impacts me...and maybe you if you choose to follow along.  The assignment for this week was to reflect on the areas of your life that you have let slide.  What are those areas that you have slipped slightly in living in the way that God wants you to live?  We all have them.  It's human nature and no one is perfect no matter how much Type A people like myself try to control everything.  I find myself trying to control and fine tune so many areas of life but upon reflection by doing this I'm often neglecting other very important relationships, friendships, self-care, etc. 

So this holiday season Fr. Evan recommends that in order to give God his one wish we should spend the first few days of this week reflecting on the relationships in our lives.  Relationships with friends, spouses, children, parents, siblings, co-workers, or even strangers.  Reflect on your relationship with each of these people for a few days.  By about mid-week choose one relationship for which you will give some extra TLC. 

Fr. Evan advised us all to form a practical strategy to improve that chosen relationship.  He reminded us that it is not practical or a reasonable expectation of ourselves to resolve all of the relationships that need attention. 

I extend Fr. Evan's assignment to all of you.  Will I choose you?  Will you choose me?  I know we will all choose the relationship that is right for us at this point in time while reminding ourselves that we can't fix everything at once. 

Will it involve tolerance?  Probably.  Will it require patience and reflection beyond our normal comfort levels?  Yup.  Will it improve the chosen relationship exponentially?  Well, it takes two to tango so that's hard to say. We can only control our own actions and our own responses.  If the relationship continues to struggle or fails to improve at your preferred rate, I encourage you to pray.  Pray about it. Pray for it.  Just pray.  There is power there.  We have all seen it.  Use it and be amazed by it's power.

Good luck to all that choose to participate in this assignment and may the peace of the season be with each one of you!