In Ordinary Times

Dec 31, 2023 | by Pastor Andrew Blackstone | series: (All)


Download (right click and choose save as)

Last January I was with a team from State Road in Palenque, Mexico joining a team from Tijuana to run Brigadas in some remote villages with missionaries Craig and Kristi Libby from Mexican Medical. We had an unexpected stay at a hotel the first night we were in country and that first morning we all funneled our way into a dining area for breakfast. It was a buffet and most items were tagged with name cards that were thankfully in Spanish AND English. One of them items in particular, that is common to most hotel breakfasts, was labeled, “Huevos Revueltos” and beneath it was in English, “Revolved Eggs” Have you ever had revolved eggs? What they meant of course was scrambled eggs.

That’s the trouble with language. Had it not been for the fact that I could physically see what was in front of me, I might have been a bit more perplexed by the words it was representing. My familiarity with the phrase “scrambled eggs” for what I saw in front of me left me confused and disoriented for a minute making me a bit hesitant to scoop any up and onto my plate. In the Catholic liturgical calendar they call the times between Christmas and Easter and Easter and Christmas, “Ordinary Time”. The first Sunday of the New Year is the first Sunday after Ephipany on January 6th, the day celebrated for the visit of the wise men. It marks the return to ordinary time. And at first hearing one might be too familiar with the word ordinary to do much with it, we treat it with the average, unexceptional, run-of-the mill feelings that go with such a word. The decorations come down quickly, faster often than they were put up, the Christmas music stops on the radio, and the Merry Christmas greeting tucked away in our repertoire of phrases til December of next year. In the in-between-times, the “ordinary times” what do you do with your faith? In the months after Jesus birth, through prophecy, Jesus began drawing the nations to himself. Matthew 2:2 says, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” Jesus calls us to himself as well, not just on Christmas or at Easter. The relationship with God that He calls us to is far from ordinary and deserves significant attention in the in-between times. Are you ready to keep looking for Him?

I hope you can join us this Sunday as we look at the prophecies of Isaiah 60 and the account of Matthew 2 to see how we too can respond with our best gifts in the in-between-times.