Pastor’s Corner: How Did We Do This?

August 10, 2022

Sunday School formally resumes meeting this coming Sunday, August 14, after over two years of sporadic gatherings and Zoom. It’s very exciting! It has also meant another round of trying to answer this question:

“How did we do this before?”

The pandemic (which isn’t over, I’m afraid, but which is less risky than it was, thanks to vaccines) has left us all with a lot of similar questions. Once-familiar routines now require great effort to remember. Occasionally, I must do extensive research before the light bulb glows in my memory.

“Oh, right. That’s how we did this before!”

Sometimes, though, the old approach simply doesn’t meet the current situation. That’s true in the Sunday School, which will be meeting in a different space than before, and which will be using a different curriculum than before. It’s true in worship. We stand now each Sunday to say the Lord’s Prayer. Partially that adds a physical dimension to our devotion, but partially it’s to compensate for the limited opportunities to move in the absence of congregational singing.

“So. This is how we’ll do this now.”

There are many places in our lives where we’ll face this question, “How did we do this before?” We may well struggle to remember how we did this before. And we may well find that what worked before no longer serves us well. Perhaps things have changed. Perhaps that old approach never worked as well as we thought.

Don’t be satisfied with remembering how you did things before. Work toward how you’ll do things now – and may it be the best yet.

With aloha,

Pastor Eric