Don’t Ever Expect Exciting Behavior From a Boring Neighbor

Ed, my neighbor next door, asked me, “What have you been so unpredictable the last two weeks? You haven’t been going walking at the track at eleven a.m. each day. You have missed shoveling your snow three times. You are driving your van instead of your little red Pontiac. Something must be causing your erratic behavior.”

“Nothing too serious,” I told Ed. “I’m tired of winter and growing less and less eager to shovel snow. A reoccurring noise while driving my Pontiac has me distracted. It sounds unhealthy and expensive. My car expense bank account is disconnected to any real cash, so I’m driving my van and resting my Pontiac. Recently, a research project and has cut into my daily routines. Next month I’ll get back to normal.”

“Sorry I asked,” was Ed’s reply. “I should have known even your erratic behavior would be boring.”

“Who did you think you were living beside? My name’s not Justin Bieber. Don’t expect excitement from an old goat like me,” I told Ed. “Be thankful for boring blessings, you could have a more exciting neighbor who routinely holds pot parties, and shows you exciting but menacing behavior next door.” Ed, of course, said that my reference to pot parties made him want a cigarette. He went home to light up.

Is it hard to appreciate a boring and predictable neighbor? How exciting is shoveling snow, feeding birds in the winter? Summer is even more humdrum with cutting lawn, gardening, relaxing in a gazebo, watering gardens, and trimming hedges. It is hard to impress Ed because I’m boring. Being exciting wouldn’t really help. Ed would not be impressed with me then either.

Jesus commented that in his generation people were like children in the marketplace. When they heard the flute and were invited to dance and celebrate in a wedding procession, they refused. John the Baptist came inviting people to celebrate and repent for the Messiah and the kingdom of God were at hand, but many refused.

John was seen as boring in that he was a prophet dressed in homemade camel hair clothes. He was a man who lived in the wilderness and ate locusts and wild honey. He drank no alcoholic beverages, and many were not impressed because he was typical of a prophet. Prophets were considered to be strange, and some said John had a demon. People were impressed with John briefly but people do not stay impressed with other people or life very long.

Children in a market would hear mourners singing a funeral dirge, but they were unwilling to sing as the funeral procession went through the market place. Jesus came as a rabbi in ordinary clothes and people were impressed with his healings, miracles and teachings for a brief time. Then they decided he was not holy enough for he ate and drank with tax collectors and sinners. They labeled him a glutton and a drunkard. Folks always feel they are too wise to misjudge other people and their actions.

Ed told me that churches are boring, full of hypocrites and they all want money.

“What if your criticisms about churches are untrue?” I asked Ed.

“It wouldn’t matter, I could find something else wrong with them,” he said.

 

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