Swing Shift

Good Saturday! Are you all washed up or just washed away from last night's storms? The clouds are hanging around this morning, but I don't know if that means more rain or not. The longest day of the year brought some impressive flashin' and boomin' with the storms, but why am I trying to be some kind of weather reporter? Is there nothing better to talk about out here on the plains of Colorado? Weeelll, let's just stop right there. I don't want to confirm any nasty rumors about small town life on the arid high plains.

I heard a DJ on the radio this morning who also worked at least one night this week. This is not unusual. Any operation that runs 24/7 or even long hours on a daily basis, must come up with people to fill in shifts that don't work out evenly. People need days of rest and the seven-day week kind of messes up scheduling. Someone, or more than one, generally becomes a swing shift person. This person may work a morning on one or more days, then evenings or nights on other days. This is not a fun way to work because most of us do better with a more stable work schedule. Of course, there are worse schedules, such as the one where the employee is just on call whenever the company needs him or her. What is the point of this in a Christian devotional?

That person may be a neighbor; one of those we are to love as Jesus commanded. Sometimes we do not fully understand the difficulty a neighbor faces. The difficulties may arise from children, work, spouses, temptations, health issues, or many other things, but do we as loving neighbors understand and sympathize with those problems? How can we find out these problems without coming on as prying? Good question! On the job training as a loving neighbor is not easy for many of us. At times, communicating with a neighbor may seem like talking to an especially quiet and withdrawn boulder. Other times we may get more problems to pray for than we can possibly remember. Only Jesus has the answer for every situation, but we can begin by reading about love in our Bibles. Some mornings, when both cats are extra loud, I have to remind myself that love is not irritable or rude. You may end up with a neighbor like that, but Jesus didn't give us any exceptions to the command to love them.

Have a wonderful weekend; try to dry out from the drenching of last night.

Bucky