Lenten Challenge, Day 5: Settle

Settle.

To get comfortable; to become established and satisfied in some routine.

It's nice in some ways, isn't it? Eating the same thing you always eat at your favorite restaurant, saying "I love you" every night before bed, going to church every Sunday (okay...almost every Sunday).

But the thing that's so nice about the "routine" is also what's so dangerous about settling into one. I don't ever want my "I love yous" or times of worship to become something I do simply for the sake of doing them. I want them to mean something every time.

This morning, Gavin asked me if we could wear our PJs to church. He just recently had a "Jammie Day" at preschool, and thought it was a great idea for our Sunday service as well. I told him that we don't really have jammie days at church, and he insisted we talk to Shawn, our assistant pastor about it when we saw him this morning. Graciously, Shawn indulged his almost-4-year-old curiosity and said he'd check into it.

What I loved most about the exchange was that Gavin's thinking out of the box made me think out of the box. What if we stopped conforming and let ourselves be a little uncomfortable instead? What if we tried that new restaurant we heard was struggling? What if we emptied the dishwasher instead of just saying "I love you"? What if we wore PJs to church?

What if we refused to settle into a safe and comfortable routine, and instead, tried to strive for something extraordinary? That, I'm sure, is where we'd start to change the world.