Snow Day Christian

Filed Under Pastor's Blog by St. Paul's Church Office

I keep getting distracted as I type by the snowflakes falling outside of my office window. It’s the first “big snow” that Washington, DC has seen this winter and I cannot help but be a little excited. It’s a snow day! I may not have gotten the day off. I may still be sitting here in my office working. But it is a snow day!

As a child, snow days meant the day off of school, the chance to sleep in and watch daytime television. It meant calling the other kids in the neighborhood, dressing up in layers and layers of warm clothes and then heading outside to build snowmen, make snow angels, create snow forts and run around. Growing up, snow days meant sipping hot chocolate and having a free day, one where everything that had been crammed into the schedule was suddenly canceled.

In the church, we sometimes talk about Christmas and Easter Christians. They are the folks who faithfully show up at Christmas and Easter, but our rarely seen the rest of the year. As I look out my office window today, I am wondering what it might be like to be a snow day Christian. Maybe, just maybe all of us need to be an occasional snow day Christian.

Being a snow day Christian would mean taking the opportunity of a day off from the chaos of daily life to have a day on in our relationship with Christ. Curling up with some hot chocolate, we could pray and read scripture. We could call the neighbors, making sure that they have enough bread and milk to make it through the storm or offering to shovel the elderly neighbor’s driveway. In the quiet of the snowfall, we could remember the beauty of the creation that surrounds us.

I invite you to join me today in being a snow day Christian, slowing down for an unexpected opportunity to spend time with God.