"Relationship......................."

Our final day of school is always no more than a gathering of all staff members in the cafeteria for a sharing of accomplishments, events encountered along the way. Those who are leaving, for one reason or another, retirement or economy-forced reductions, are recognized for their part in the big picture. It’s three hours of being “family”, some humorous stories, some encouragement, some reminders of what “being a teacher” is all about. Then everyone returns to their individual rooms to ensure that the space has been prepared for the custodians’ annual cleansing. That’s it. Summer is officially here… I’m reading Fulghum’s “From Beginning to End”, a book about how “The Rituals of Our Lives” are really the fabric of whom and what we are as individuals. In one place he likens it unto silently sitting around an open campfire remembering, our need to revive and relive times past as vital to us as breathing. It is not just the telling of tales, but a renewing of what has shaped us. It helps us to connect and make sense out of things, giving significance and explanation as to why we think as we do. I see it more of a “thread” running through all of us, a common river of existence given us by the Creator, its origin extending from Him and, indeed, restored to its intended potential when we invite Him to once more be one with us in its course as it comes to us. My friend Tony spoke with apology in Wednesday’s Bible class on how, for him, “church” just didn’t “work”. What he discovered by simply “hanging in there”, however, was a matter of Christ being not a formula or a format, but a “flow”. If one will be willing to open up and allow the Spirit to go out, somehow the stream of His presence not only brings meaning to our mess, it also rejuvenates us in the path that we travel, tying us one to the other and allowing us to put what we don’t understand into His hands. It also, in such manner, renews us with fresh oil. Our faith is not so much a matter of “I believe”, but “I am”, even as “He is” within me. Each segment of our walk is, likewise, not so self-centered. We learn, as the writer once put it, “No man is an island”……