Wandering Towards Joy
11 September 2016 Proper 19C Have you ever been walking or driving somewhere, but not really paying attention and ended up somewhere else? When I was a kid, my family went to the church multiple times a week and more than a few times, when my mom's mind was busy and she wasn't paying attention, she would accidentally drive to the church instead of wherever she was trying to go. Sometimes she would realize it before she got to the church and change course, but sometimes we would pull into the church parking lot and us, the kids, the back seat drivers would ask, “why are we here?” and my mom would look around and say, “I wasn't paying attention.” We all wander off course sometimes. Some of us have the wandering off tendency more than others. Sometimes we have good reasons for wandering off. Sometimes we are looking for other things. Sometimes there is no good reason, but we feel the need to do so and off we go. Metaphorically, when we ...