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| My Swanky Office |
I make fruitcake when things are going well.
It's time consuming and expensive so it's a good sign when I make fruitcake.
This is the thing.
I write a blog for a living now. So it's just not so pressing to do it on my own anymore. In case you missed the news, I'm the new Director for Evangelical Mission for the Northeastern Iowa Synod, ELCA.
It's a strange but wonderful position. As I described in my Staples post, I work for the ELCA but am deployed in the SYnod Office. And I am doing stuff no other DEM is doing.
Most DEMs are all about new starts and mission congregations. Well we don't have many of those so my job description was written to include helping congregations use Social Media for outreach.
It's kind of scary because I keep getting introduced as the "Expert in Social Media" when I'm really not all that expert. I've just tried some stuff that works, read some stuff and know where to find answers,. Usually.
I'm doing stuff I love. I work with a Bishop I admire and other incredibly hardworking, knowledgeable, talented and downright pleasant to be around staff. I wake up in the morning thinking "Yea I get to go into work today" I travel around to different churches to preach and people are happy to see me. People listen to me. It is for me, anyway, the Best Job in the World.
But this is the thing.
There are parts I don't like. Sometimes I have to do things I don't want to do. And even though just a few short months ago I couldn't breath I was so grateful and excited to get this job, there are times now when all I do is think and grouse about those silly things I have to do that I don't like.
What the hell is wrong with me? I guess that is what sin is.
Because this is the thing: Gratitude does not come easy to us.
And when it does, it doesn't stick around. You have to work at Gratitude. You have to make an effort. Get lazy and you will default to bitchin and moaning about those things you don't have you wish you did or the things you do have and wish you didn't.
Don't get lazy. It's Thanksgiving time for crying out loud.
Maybe things are not going as well for you as they are for me. Let me tell you in the darkest of my times, I have found gratitude to be all the more important.
Thinking about what I did have that was good in my life has kept me out of some deep wells of despair I could have easily plunged into.
"Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you" I Thess. 5:17-18
Yea, what he said.
Oh and here's my Fruitcake Recipe
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