Family Chapel: The Word Collector

welcome to family chapel at all souls unitarian church in tulsa oklahoma all souls everywhere i'm shannon boston your religious educator and i am very happy to be with you today let's light our chalice if you have one go ahead and light you if you have one go ahead and light yours and we will say our covenant and our invocation because this is indeed a day to celebrate let us rejoice in it and be glad and let us count our many blessings let us be grateful for the capacity to feel and understand let us be grateful for the gift of life and let us be especially grateful for the ties of love that bind us together giving dignity meaning worth and joy to all of our days join me in our covenant our promise to each other and to ourselves that love is the spirit of this church and service is its law this is our great covenant to dwell together in peace to seek the truth in love and to help one another today i want to talk to you about your spark about what makes you come alive what makes you interested in interesting what what feeds your soul is it animals is it math equations is it keeping things in order or messing things up it can be anything it can be it can be anything it's your spark and finding it can take a lifetime can take just a moment some people know it from the time they're itty bitty some people have several some people have one some people go through many of them there's no right way to find your spark but we all have them and it's kind of what makes world the world interesting so i i hope you find sparks i hope you keep your eyes out for them and when you find them hold on to them seek them out and and kind of nurture them have you ever seen a little bitty fire like this a little bitty campfire you know how you have to blow on it to make it get bigger to make it grow to really get a fire fire fire going when you just have a bunch of little twigs maybe that's why they call it a spark because it has to be fed it has to be nurtured you have to take care of it for it to grow into something real i've got a story for you today it's right here it's called the word collector it's by peter h reynolds and it's really good settle in collectors collect things some people collect stamps some people collect coins some collect bugs others collect baseball cards others collect rocks some collect art some people collect comic books and jerome what did he collect jerome collected words he collected words he heard certain words caught his attention he collected words he read certain words popped off the page he collected words he saw certain words jumped out at him short and sweet words like spark and bloom drift and dream two-syllable treats like treasure motif whisper and glimmer and multi-syllable words that sounded like little songs guacamole kaleidoscope and symphony there were words he did not know the meaning of at first but they were marvelous to say aromatic vociferous effervescent there were words whose sounds were perfectly suited to their meaning molasses torrential smudge and bellow jerome filled his scrapbooks with more and more of his favorite words jerome's collection grew he began organizing them dreamy science sad action poetic one day while transporting them jerome slipped and his words went flying and as he began to pick them up he noticed his collection had become jumbled big words next to little words sad words next to dreamy words jerome began stringing words together words he had not imagined being side by side he used words to write poems he used his poems to make songs they moved they delighted some of the simplest words were his most powerful i understand i'm sorry thank you you matter jerome eagerly collected more and more of his favorite words the more words he knew the more clearly he could share with the world what he was thinking feeling and dreaming one breezy afternoon jerome climbed the highest hill pulling a wagon packed with his word collection he smiled as he emptied his collection of words into the wind he saw children in the valley below scurrying about collecting words from the breeze jerome had no words to describe how happy that made him reach for your own words tell the world who you are and how you will make it better tell the world who you are and how you will make it better that's what you do with your spark make the world a little bit better a little bit brighter a little bit kinder that's my prayer for you today take some breaths with me some big deep breaths five of them five breaths big big big ah and say here i am here i am our song this season is there's a river flowing through my soul i'm sure you've heard it before sing it with me there's a river flowing in my soul [Music] there's a river flowing in my soul and it's telling me that i'm somebody there's a river flowing in my soul in my mind there's a river flowing in my mind there's a river flowing in my mind and it's telling me that i'm somebody there's a river flowing in my mind art there's a river flowing in my heart there's a river flowing in my heart and it's telling me that i'm somebody there's a river flowing in my heart go and be blessed and be a blessing and always answer here i am help me blow out our chalice help me blow out our chalice see you next week go now in [Music] peace around everywhere everywhere you [Music] is [Music] thank you for being here today for the last 100 years all souls has been a beacon of free faith for the last 10 months we have stretched ourselves to continue to offer incredible programs and services meaningful ways to connect with each other serve the needs of our community all of our programs are offered freely making every opportunity for growth and connection accessible we cannot continue to do this work without your support please consider making a gift or your 2021 pledge today if you can no gift is too small thank you and know that we love you

Channel: All Souls Unitarian

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Id: 34bYnYSXVb0

Length: 13min 48sec (828 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 11 2021