And they say God doesn't have a sense of humour!

So this morning, Glenis (the Corps officer here at Timaru) came to the Corps and asked me to help her clean the emergency caravan in preparation for the Search and Rescue exercise this weekend at Peel Forest. Well, if you had seen it prior to our cleaning, you will know how excited I got at the prospect, but I nonetheless agreed. Nothing like dirt, dust, grime and mouse poo to make you love Monday mornings!

Several hours later, I found myself at the kitchen sink scrubbing and scrubbing the oven racks from inside the caravan. No small feat.

By this stage, the fun had fully gone out of the exercise and I was counting down the minutes until lunch. “Blimey, God,” I said. “There is so many other ways that would be a better use of my time. For example, I could be writing my sermon for Sunday!”

I then remembered what our preaching tutor told us: Think about the sermon all the time, meditate on the Scripture and see what God shows you, etc.

“Fine, then, Lord,” I told Him. “I’m going to spend these minutes scrubbing these awful racks thinking of my sermon. Now let’s see … it’s on Christ … being the servant.”

The irony was not lost on me. I could hear God chuckling. And I kept scrubbing. It was still a horrible job, but my mood was most definitely lightened.