Volunteering for Others

Our minister has quite a sense of humor. I love it that he can make me laugh and still move me in a sermon. My mother once made the mistake of telling him that she does not enjoy the "meet and greet" during the service. She's done her meetin' and greetin' before entering the sanctuary or she will catch them afterwards. Yesterday he announced, "Just for Sandy, let's get up and greet our neighbors." He found this funny and so did I. Of course, she was the first person he walked toward.

She has a running joke with our pastor that she will do a lot for the church but she does not like to be front and center; she prefers to be behind the scenes. He's constantly threatening to call her during the week and assign her to be liturgist for the next Sunday.

We're in the season of Advent and like many churches, we light the appropriate candles each Sunday. It may be a single person, a couple, a family -- whomever. As we were leaving church yesterday morning, he said to the three of us, "We still need someone for the Advent candle next Sunday." Before she could kill me (and she would never do that in church) I said, "Sure, we'll do it."

Now I have been assigned the family duty of deciding who lights the candles and who recites which lines.

Later we went to an open house and I think our minister had a little smirk on his face. As usual, I'm in trouble.