Take the Parade Route, it will all work Out

In the beginning it is messy. Like a lot of things in life, you sometimes just have to be patient and have the confidence to know it will all work out in the end. Parades are a living moving example of this.

 Walking through the downtown area this past week with coffee in hand, the streets are empty, the sidewalks are lined with empty lawn chairs and the birds are just beginning to chirp. As I get to the Grocery store parking lot, trucks pulling horse trailers begin to arrive. Folks get out with their steaming cups filled with coffee and begin whispering to each other as if not to wake anyone up! Before long, the floats arrive; some know how to drive them, and some don’t. One driver begins to jack-knife, as a woman begins to yell at him, just before he backs into the local mailbox! Tempers begin to flare. Its not long before the children arrive; oblivious to the stress experienced by the adults, they prance, dance and practice twirling. Clarinets, trumpets, and flutes add to the noise creating a crescendo that can be heard across the valley.

Parades seem to mimic life, a great idea that quickly turns to chaos, then straightens itself out along the Parade route of life. A good plan and a lot of patience are the secret in any endeavor. The pay off can be multi-faceted, a sense of accomplishment, the joy of knowing you made others happy, and of course the deep sigh of relief when it’s all over.  Parades are a thing that are not forced on the people, they do it voluntarily, unless it’s a parent threatening their child, but besides that, it happens because of the goodwill of the people.  It is not enshrined in Legislation, not done through oppression, acts of deception or force, a parade happens because people with all sorts of different talents want to share them.

From Romans: 12:3-13 4 For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5 so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. 6 We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us.

While the whole thing might seem pointless after the streets are left with trash, tired children and grandparents are carried home. It’s good for a community to have parades, because it is here that you will see random acts of kindness, someone helping to catch a runaway horse or to help a child find its runaway parent! It is here, where you will see a whole community doing what you are doing, working to get through the parade route of life.