Slightly Cloudy

DAILY BYTE

At varsity after a meal, my roommates and I would often say to each other, ever so nonchalantly, as we grinned awkwardly showing our pearly whites, "How's the weather today?" And if the answer was, "Slightly cloudy," we would race to the ladies' room to try and dislodge the spinach stuck between our teeth. Now, this tactic may not have been as suave as we thought, but we jokingly chose a phrase about the weather because people start SO many conversations like that.

But, Scott Ginsberg says on his website, 'Think before you speak: Strategies for Combatting Conversational Crappiness," that "Starting a conversation about the weather means you’ve settled for starting a conversation about the weather! This makes your conversation partner feel like you’ve settled for them too" [http://www.hodu.com/think-before.shtml].

Now, this is not to say that we should never talk about the weather. But, we do often settle for being a bit bland and civil and well, just nice.

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus says in Eugene Peterson's Message version, "When you see clouds coming in from the west, you say, 'Storm's coming'—and you're right. And when the wind comes out of the south, you say, 'This'll be a hot one'—and you're right. Frauds! You know how to tell a change in the weather, so don't tell me you can't tell a change in the season, the God-season we're in right now."

Jesus coming to earth and existing wherever you are means that as we head into spring there is another kind of change in the season. Jesus means that things cannot be as they were before, and we've been given the task this week of discerning what season God is calling us to be in right now.

How’s the weather in your life? What new and different season is God blowing in to the world?

FOCUS READING

Luke 12:54-56 (NRSV)

He also said to the crowds, "When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, 'It is going to rain'; and so it happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, 'There will be scorching heat'; and it happens.
You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?