[SB] Sabbath Blessing

[Molly Wolf]

Paint Job

Over the last three days, my new neighbour and I have been painting my 
living room. When I got the house keys on Thursday, the living room -- 
which is long and large, with a fireplace at one end -- was dismal indeed. 
It had been painted a sort of yellowy tan. Smoking had tinted it deeper 
with nicotine, and one former occupant's simmering resentment had added a 
sort of spiritual staining as well. It was such a sad room. But I we 
scrubbed it down with trisodium phosphate and rinsed that off, and then we 
primed it and painted it. It took us three days, because there was such a 
lot of brushwork, and the ceiling still needs a second coat.

Now it's brilliant. As my neighbour observed, new paint has made it a foot 
higher, eighteen inches longer, and at least two feet wider, and it's 
*elegant*. It doesn't sing yet, but the potential's there.

We talked as we painted, about the town I'm moving into, about our lives 
(interesting stuff there!), about what it is to be a man in this day and 
age, about our kids. About the church we both attend, two blocks from our 
next-door houses; about its challenges and patterns, the things he finds 
frustrating but that I understand -- ach, eastern Ontario small-town 
Anglicanism. His wife drifted freely into and out of the house, and we took 
breaks and sat out on my verandah and drank iced tea while they smoked.

We share certain visions. The big one is that faith is meant to be lived 
out, practically, in day-to-day matters. He wasn't helping out with the 
painting simply to be neighbourly, although that was certainly part of it. 
He was doing so out of a profound belief that (_pace_ Luther) "faith 
without works is dead". If we truly do believe that God took the action of 
coming to live among us, even to sharing our death -- and as Christians, we 
do believe that -- then the least we can do is lend a hand with a 
paintbrush when a single woman takes over a Victorian house sorely in need 
of repainting.

It's got to be reciprocal, of course. My help for my neighbours goes 
without saying -- whatever I can manage practically, but also more than 
that. I haven't their talent for house renovations and repairs; I never 
learned, and I have very little self-confidence (they intend to get to work 
on that). What I can offer is what I do best, which is hands-on Godtalk 
stuff, which they need the way I need help with the painting.

So when we'd finished the painting, we sat out on the verandah and started 
planning how we can build a community that nourishes Christian spirituality 
on a very practical and day-to-day basis, working in a small Eastern 
Ontario Anglican church. We've got some ideas going. We're starting to talk 
theology.

Then my neighbours and I went into the kitchen, where we demolished a 
redundant, ugly cupboard, starting the next stage. Tomorrow, after I finish 
my work project, I'd get myself over to the new house and start washing 
down kitchen cupboards, readying them for paint. It will take all next 
week, but I'll get it done.

(for Stefen and Val, with unending gratitude)