Pastoral Appreciation

Day 7: Send a card to my Pastor

My Youth Pastor (what up Hoppis!) had this activity he liked to have us try called Flowers for the Living.  He had a theory, and I would tend to agree with him, that we as a society have a bad habit of waiting until someone is dead to tell them how much they mean to us.  As we place flowers on the grave we share wonderful memories and generous compliments about a person's life.  But it does the person no good at that point.  So, in Flowers for the Living the rules were simple, everyone would take turns saying what they like or appreciate about a certain person, and the person receiving the compliments could do nothing except sit there and listen.  It was definitely a compelling experience for all involved.  What I took from this exercise is that we shouldn't wait until it's too late to let people know how important they are to us.  Therefore, for today's new thing I decided to send a card to my pastor. (My current pastor not my old youth pastor, although as I write this I realize it would not be a bad idea to send one to him as well!)

Sending a note or a card of appreciation to my pastor is one of those things that I always had good intentions of doing, but simply never did anything about, until now.  In today's digital world I could have just sent him an email, or a facebook message, or even a text message, but those are not my style.  I am a card person.  I like looking through the racks of hallmark greetings and selecting just the right one for the person and the occasion.  Plus, we get emails and messages every day, but how often do we get an unexpected card in the mail.  Who doesn't love that? 

I filled out the card, addressed it, stuck a stamp on it and popped it in the mail.  And that was the end of that.  For a new experience there wasn't much to it.  But for this particular task I think the significance isn't in the doing but the knowing, knowing that in a couple of days someone is going to get an unexpected surprise that will hopefully lift his spirits and brighten his day and just generally make him feel good.  That knowledge is enough to lift my spirits and brighten my day and just generally make me feel good, and make me want to do it again and again and again.