Now back to our regularly scheduled programming ...

It does seem like the first full week of the Easter season is like going back to our regularly scheduled programming, doesn't it? For those of us who are highly involved in the church, whether lay or ordained, Holy Week seems to put us in a form of "suspended animation" where the rhythm of our lives is disrupted - even if only for a brief intense few days.

But now we're back. Back to the regular routine of school and work, back to household chores (and boy did that laundry pile get out of control last week!), back to writing papers to finish up that pesky M.Div. so I can get ordained.

St. Paul says, "So then, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; what is old has passed away– look, what is new has come!" (2 Corinthians 5.17). But what happens when Easter feels like a resurrection back to the same life rather than something totally different?

For me, this is the trap of looking for some miraculous mountaintop or lightening bolt kind of experience to affirm my faith in Christ. I don't know of a time when I wasn't a Christian. Sure, I've had conversions (note that's plural!) along my journey, but the vast majority of the time, my call is to find the extraordinary in the ordinary.

I'll admit, finding God's presence in the pile of dirty laundry is a challenge; however, I learned a lot from an obscure monk named Brother Lawrence. In a little book entitled, The Practice of the Presence of God, Brother Lawrence was interviewed by Joseph de Beaufort, a counsel to the Archbishop of Paris. These conversations were recorded and published in this small book in 1691 (you can print a copy from the link above).

Brother Lawrence's aim was to live a life in constant conversation with God and that God's presence is in and through all things - even the most mundane tasks. Lawrence is my kind of guy - he really didn't like being assigned to work in the kitchen (cooking's not my gift either). But by setting his heart on doing everything for God, even the tasks he didn't like became a joy instead of a burden.

So I'm looking for God in the laundry room. I've no doubt God is there.