In church world we talk a lot about “going out” for one reason: Jesus told us to (Matthew 28:20). The problem is that it’s so easy think that we’re doing this when we’re actually not.
As pastor, I’m in no way exempt. There’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes to run a large church – meetings, homily prep, sacraments. All of these are well and good but too much of it happens in the office or behind a desk.
No, to “go out” we actually have to physically go out. Recently a few of us on staff have been making an effort to reverse this trend. Someone generously donated money to our festival raffle but they didn’t want the tickets. So, we went out to the community to give them away.
At first people think there is a catch: “What do I have to buy? What do you really want?” The answer this time was that we just wanted to bless them and invite them to come to our festival. I decided to stop by the fire station nearby to thank Norfolk’s finest for what they do and to offer them a small gift. It was a lot of fun and they appreciated it.
Small actions aren’t small but too often we’re so busy that we fill our time with other things. Imagine what our festival would be like if people sponsored the ticket purchase themselves and then went out, gave the tickets away, and invited people to come to our festival? Maybe they would receive an invitation to Discovering Christ. Who knows, they may come to know Jesus in a personal way.
I look forward to our Parish Festival tomorrow – Sunday, September 9th. We welcome any guests who plan to join us. Thank you for sharing life with us. God bless you.
Sacred Heart Parish 