A Close Shave
Blog is written by Dave Smith
Shaving is something I have done for longer than 40, and closer to 50, years. The practice, ritual, the art of shaving has been part of my life far longer than it hasn’t. Many of you can equal, even surpass my experience timeline. But we could all agree that once you start it you cannot stop, then put a period at the end of the line, say goodbye, and go along our merry ways.
Dave Smith, Writer, Reader, Researcher
Shaving is something I have done for longer than 40, and closer to 50, years. The practice, ritual, the art of shaving has been part of my life far longer than it hasn’t. Many of you can equal, even surpass my experience timeline. But we could all agree that once you start it you cannot stop, then put a period at the end of the line, say goodbye, and go along our merry ways.
However, I feel like there is something to learn from a recent mundane experience I had shaving. It’s something so many of us have in common that you are also bound to find benefit in what I discovered, staring into a partially fogged-over mirror in a steamy bathroom one day. Let me take you through it.
It started the same as always. The most radical change in my long tradition of shaving was with the type of shaving cream I use. I use aerosol shaving foams, but a couple of decades back I added a brush and cake of shaving soap, which I love because it makes me feel like I should be in a mansion for some reason. Anyway, on this day I chose to pretend I was in a mansion, and just that quickly all decisions related to my shaving were complete. I lathered up, grabbed my razor, and started. I begin in the same place—left cheek—and end in the same place—right neck under my ear—always. When I don’t I end up having to backtrack to make sure I am truly clean-shaven and didn’t miss any patches. I almost always miss something when I don’t follow this strategic approach to my regimen. It allows me not to think about it and get it done without cutting myself.
So there I was moving the thinnest, sharpest piece of British steel over my skin when I looked into the mirror. Some among you are thinking it is time for something from 1 Cor. 13:12 and looking through a glass darkly, but don’t rush to conclusions just yet. Other of you are sitting back, folding your arms confidently over your chest and saying, “He cut himself.” But I assure you that is not the case, either. I saw myself shaving differently due to health issues. Out of order. And I wasn't thinking about it, I was simply getting it done!
I was reminded of a passage, not from the New Testament, but the Old:
18 But forget all that—it is nothing compared to what I’m going to do! 19 For I’m going to do a brand-new thing. See, I have already begun! Don’t you see it? I will make a road through the wilderness of the world for my people to go home, and create rivers for them in the desert! (Isaiah 43:18-19 TLB)
I did see it! I saw I was doing it differently, but I was still getting it done. I don’t need to worry that if I execute ministry differently I will fail. And neither do you. It was all right there in the mirror. Through a change in shaving my amazing savior showed me that a change in the way I minister in the SAGE years doesn’t mean He won’t make a way for me to do what He called and gifted me to do. It was a new thing, and it was working!
Don’t think about how you served God in the past. He is doing a new thing, and He will use you to fulfill it.