Episcopal Church Foundation Vestry Papers - for leading congregations

What’s hiding under your basket?

When I was a child, I messed up the words to the ever-enduring song, “This Little Light of Mine.” (A confession: I’m a serial offender as a lyric slaughterer. I thought for years that The Bangles were singing "just another man named Monday" -- instead of "Manic Monday." But I digress). My flub for this children’s song came with the hiding. I was certain that the song’s words encouraged us to stop hiding our light under a bush (oh, no!). It made a lot more sense when I learned that it was a bush-el (basket). 

Of course, knowing the words and living them are two different things. Despite the admonition in the Gospel of Matthew, I hide my light all the time. I suspect our churches do too. 

This morning, I had a wonderful experience of what can happen when we remove the basket. I wrote a meditation for Forward Day by Day that appeared in yesterday’s edition. In it, I explained the staff of Forward Movement gathers each day and reads the daily reflections. But more importantly we pray together. I mentioned that many of these prayer requests come from an online prayer chapel that we host.

As we gathered today, one of my colleagues pulled out three pages of prayers from the online chapel – more than I’ve seen on any given day since I began my work there more than a year ago. Following a weekend, we might have a full page or maybe front and back, but by mid-week, we sometimes receive only four or five requests. We wondered collectively why there was such a big jump, until it dawned us: we had let our light shine. We told people that we were praying for them. And they took us up on the offer. 

Sometimes punching holes in the bushel basket doesn’t even require a change in your current practice. It only takes a willingness to step up, to speak out, and to invite people into the light.