At the Hub

I am filling in for the church secretary for the rest of the week. It is strange here. Normally, there are people in and out, or at the very least, a minister or two around. But not this Thursday and Friday.

Our senior minister just became a grandpa and is soaking up the first of many days of grandbaby love out of town. Our junior minister and youth minister just left on a mission trip. Yesterday there was still plenty of activity as they finished up any loose ends before leaving and a few others preparing for VBS.

But today, it is rainy outside and quiet inside. What's more - there isn't any big project to do or lots of little things to take care of. So I sit here, stamping envelopes or checking email and listen to the air conditioner cycle on and off. It's very peaceful. It's very unusual.

I remember getting frustrated when I was the secretary and not just a sub as I compiled yet again a lot of information onto one sheet. I remember thinking to myself, as I grabbed information from here and more information from there and called someone for a little more detail and emailed someone else for clarification, that there had to be SOMEWHERE that all this stuff was together in one place so it would be easy to find and get to.

That was when it hit me. Right in the face. There was.

It was me. I was the place. That was why I was calling and emailing and pulling and looking up. I was the place. I was the one who compiled it all into one single easy to find and read list of information... or calendar... or database... or whatever. It was then that I came to appreciate exactly what this desk represents. It's our hub.

Our elders make executive decisions to do with the building. Our ministers and deacons help people and take care of everyone on a daily basis. The myriad workers do all their scurrying about taking care of the zillions of other things that go on. But it all goes through here. This is the support system.

It's not that I don't think we would get things done without the person here but I also don't think we realize just how much we rely on our hub people. And it doesn't have to be a secretary either. There are people working behind the scenes in every place -- even a home.

My challenge to you is to see them. Do you magically have clean socks again when you open a drawer? Somebody had to do that. Is the lawn mowed regularly somehow? Someone did that too. Did someone besides you bag your groceries or fix coffee or clean up after you?

Or encourage you when you needed it? Or do something that spoke to you? Or let you cut into traffic? Or work hard to give you the time you need?

Gratitude and appreciation are both things that our fast-paced society is slowly forgetting. It seems to me that very few people take the time anymore to express that they appreciate something. Some suggest that people now feel like it is their right or priviledge to have others do for them. That they take for granted what used to be a gift.

Maybe that's true to an extent. But I also believe we don't encourage that sense of gratitude anymore. We don't foster it in our children and we don't make the effort to grow it in ourselves. I'm going to plant that seed though. I would like appreciation to bloom in me and in my children. It would be a flower worth the work, I think.