"Lift with the knees boys!"

“Hey man can you help me move?” It’s the one sentence that sends shivers down everyone’s spine. No one likes to life heavy boxes, pack delicate dishes, and walk backwards down the steps holding a 1000 pound entertainment center. The reason I am thinking about this is I helped a good buddies parents move yesterday. “Parents, it wasn’t even your friend” you say. Nope I have never met these people before in my life and odds are I won’t ever see them again. What I did know that this friend had some folks that were in a bind and needed some big strong men [obviously why I was personally requested…wait that didn’t happen]. Me and three other men volunteered our Tuesday night to help out a buddy out and as lifting is fairly mindless work I began to think [warning]. The reason we volunteered to help this friend out is he is a brother. He goes to our church and he is the type of man that would be there to help you if you needed anything and we all knew that. When his mother was thanking us for helping her and her husband out we all did the normal “Not a problem I don’t do much” , “Ill do anything for a sloppy Joe”, and “I love a good work out”. Though these statements work in the situation though reality is that we all love this friend and we love Christ and it is that love propels us to help him. It comes back to Christ [most situations always do]. This is a practical was of living out the gospel. Instead of grumbling and griping about helping move, helping with a smile and for the simple fact that you want to love another human in an extremely practice way. To me this is why I follow Christ. Because a friend can put out a request and people actually respond. He did no arm twisting just simply asked. I am a guy who likes to think about big theological issues. I love getting in 3 hour conversations where there is no way to find out the answer we are wrestling over. But on nights like yesterday it reminds me that sometimes following Christ is as simple as picking up a box and doing it with a smile.

Merry Christmas folks remember this is a time that we celebrate the fact that “The Word became flesh and moved into the neighborhood” so to speak.