Plunge into the Grunge
Over the years it has been my undeserved privilege to totter along to a few dinner parties. These were often colourful and riotous occasions with tasty food and refreshing beverages. Sometimes new acquaintances were initiated. Frequently old relationships were enhanced and strengthened. There was often giggling and sometimes uninhibited, raucous laughter. As far as I’m aware no one ever got arrested and the experience is recalled with fondness and affection.
But those ingredients of friendship, conversation, privilege and service are also to be found in what comes after dinner party. The grungy, inevitable dishes.
Some of my most fruitful conversations were not at the dinner party table but at the kitchen sink doing the washing up. Here in the hot sudsy water, adorned in my finest rubber gloves and Mothers Union apron, I learnt about the important stuff. The argy bargy over that will that was made last century and is still hotly contested at vast expense. Old so and so’s gout/hernia/tonsillectomy. The time when The Reverend X did the unthinkable and unspeakable.
It’s easy when the wine is flowing, the food is fabulous and the company is witty and sparkly, but this is only a small part of the whole life experience. Such bliss is unsustainable. Real, authentic service, the gritty nitty stuff, the muck that really matters, is often not attractive, a bit on the nose and not at all glamorous. There must be times when we roll up our sleeves, maybe even put on a pair of gum boots, take a deep breath and plunge into the grunge.
It is there that we do some of our finest work and some of our most rewarding service. It is there in the bathing of wounds with patient listening and reaching out with a compassionate heart that we will find … we will find Him.