Church Grounds Clean-Up Day

Church Grounds Clean-Up Day

Saturday, August 2nd

9 AM to 11:30 AM

WEEDING & SPRUCING-UP

Bring your gloves and join in to help out !!

KITCHEN COUNTER MUSING

From Pastor Mark for Friday, July 18, 2025

                I’m a weeder.  As in, I love to take the weeds out of…anything.  To be clear, I am not a gardener.  My wife, Lucretia, is a Master Gardner and she won’t let me near her gardens.  She says I can’t tell the difference between a weed and a plant.  OK, there was that one horrible “accident” years ago.  Something about bulbs, blah, blah, blah.  Since then I have been banished from the mulch!  Sheesh!

However, I may be out of the dirt, but I’m not out of the gravel.  I can’t put my hands in the dirt, but I do put them, almost everyday, in the rocks!

If you came to our house last year you would know we have a large gravel driveway. (P.S. I want you all back during a better season than winter.  October, I’m thinking.)  It’s become my job to keep all the weeds out of the gravel.  And I probably spend at least a half hour a day doing so.

Why do I weed the gravel?  I do so for a few reasons.  First, it’s easy to identify the weed.  If it’s not a rock, it goes.  Second, there are very few areas of my life where I can say, “I’m done.”  I set myself a task, and I complete it.  I need that simple satisfaction.  I do the shopping and the laundry for the same reason.  Finally, for reasons I can’t fully articulate.  I find weeding very relaxing.  Weeding is one of the few activities where I lose track of time.

But, most importantly, I remove weeds for spiritual reasons.  They are a reminder of the need to tend to the life of faith because if you don’t—wait for it–weeds grow.

Weeds don’t wait for permission to grow.  They just grow, even in the most beautiful garden/spirit.  There is no person alive who does not have to tend to their spiritual life by attending to the weeds among the flowers of our heart.  When I weed the gravel I review my day, or week, and try to pay attention to where I haven’t been paying attention. Where have I been envious, or indifferent, thoughtless?  Weeds one and all!   I don’t get all the metaphorical weeds within my heart, but I get most of them.  Just like in my driveway.

                And now I want to turn my attention for a morning to the Road Church need for weeders.  I want to invite you to join me from 9:00 to 11:30 on Saturday, August 2^nd at The Road Church to weed the landscape surrounding the church.  We have a lawn cutting service that cuts the grass, but we pluck out the grasses that grow in the wrong place.

I’ll provide coffee, water and pastries.  You bring some gloves.

But remember, I get the grass in the parking area!

Pastor Mark: 860-705-1262