As I was driving to work the other day. I took a turn down Grove Street. After passing my old high school (now an elementary school) and upon coming to the outlet of Grove Street onto School St. I noticed that renovations had begun on the old Ready house. Mr. Ready was the postmaster in town when I was a kid. His wife’s name was Ruth. They were some of our first customers on a paper route my sister and I shared when Brenda was just nine and I was eleven.

The reminiscence brought me to a realization. The ministers of the Vicarage are in a situation that is almost unique. We are ministering this year together in the town we were born in. I have made my career as a minister in the town I was born in. My daughter, Amanda is the fifth generation of our family who has lived in this tiny little town in North Central Massachusetts just on the New Hampshire border. One of our great-great uncles was on the team that built Clyde the Rocking Horse, the symbol of Winchendon (AKA Toy Town). My grandfather was on the board of selectmen. My Dad helped write the modern town charter. These are our people. We are ministering and fighting the spiritual battle for our ancestral home.

As I thought about these things an overwhelming sense of destiny came over me. The Vicarage is not unique just because three ministers live there in a very complicated intergenerational situation further confused by three dogs and a flerkin. The most amazing thing about our situation is that this year feels like it is being breathed upon by the breath of God. The scent of destiny if in the air. The world suddenly feels pregnant with purpose beyond our mortal intentions and as I write that I don’t fully understand what that means.

I am flabbergasted as I question why God has chosen us. I am honored beyond measure and I pray that at the Day of Reckoning we will be found worthy of the calling with which we were called, whatever that turns out to be.

Have you ever felt chosen by God for something? Have you ever felt you were in the midst of some divine plan?