We don’t just find “Holy” in church, but in all those little everyday moments that fill our years. Sitting at a curbside café with people bustling all around we feel something midstream in the action, a thought or feeling in our heart that causes us to pause and thank God that we are part of it all.

Did you ever wonder why we remember slices of days forever? And no one ever tells us that “this is a day, a moment, you will always remember” because they have no way of knowing that you will and neither do you, but for some reason you do. Of course, we remember the Big days. Weddings, funerals…..certain vacations, graduations, the birth of a child.

But remembering the ordinary, that’s something else again. I like to think of these ordinary days as pearls. We get them out of the box from time to time and finger them like rosary beads, feeling the smoothness of the worn stones, going back over the memory. Holy slices in the midst of eternity.

I remember one particular day in Jamestown, California, stopping in at a coffee-house and buying a mug bearing the name of the town. I carried that mug and the memory with me when I moved to Payson, Arizona. One day at work I was sipping my coffee from it when it started to snow. I carried it with me to the window as I marveled at the spectacular beauty of the scene. I’ll never forget the bosses daughter running around the complex shrieking, “It’s snowing…..it’s snowing!”

One memory married to another, like stepping across stones in a garden pond.

Another day, long before I moved, my Mom and I went to visit the home of one of my friends. I don’t think she was home but her Mom was. We sat in her spotless and scrubbed kitchen visiting with the rain pouring down outside and the hum of the dryer coming from her laundry room. For some reason, the warmth of that kitchen remains with me all these years later. It was an “all is well” for right now moment.

Maybe what we should try to do is cultivate more of these “all is well” moments. It comes down to a choice of either being wrapped in worry or peace at any given time. Jesus spent a lot of time telling people not to worry and not to be afraid. Somehow that comforts me. His disciples must have been worry-worts and fearful sorts just like me.

Maybe the best way to practice our faith in a way that is most pleasing to God is by cultivating an “All is Well” mentality in an “All is Not Well” world. Because if we really believed the words of the Book, we would know that everything is really going to be alright in the end.

Moment by Holy moment.

What can I give Him, poor as I am?

If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;

If I were a Wise Man, I would do my part;

Yet what can I give Him? I can give Him my heart.

Christina Rossetti