Accordions

Accordion to a recent survey, replacing words with the names of musical instruments often goes undetected.

(Ignore the spelling mistake - the perpetrator has been punished!)

Did you see the error in the sign? (Not the spelling mistake.) Did you notice the musical instrument? Read it again - did you see it this time?

If you missed it how many other things do you miss every day? Things that are familiar or unwanted become almost invisible to us.

Years ago, when I was a minister in Wales I dressed as a homeless guy and sat in front of the church on a Sunday morning. I made exactly £1.27 in the hour before worship, most of it from people who didn't go into church. NO ONE who went into the service spared one moment for the homeless guy outside the gates of their church. I was totally invisible - the accordion in our sign.

The accordion is a great metaphor for the lost of society. There are very few people who like the accordion as an instrument and even played well it is not a glamorous one. You are not going to impress the girl next door by saying, "I pay the accordion, you know." The accordion is best left alone...see what I mean?

Do we see the big issue seller on the streets of the city? The homeless person sitting outside the library? The person with a disability on the train? Do we remember the hidden asylum seekers in the camps? Our world is full of accordions - and it was these people that Jesus showed are the most important. He spoke to lepers (unheard of in his time), he dined with tax collectors and 'sinners' (simply just not done), he spent his time with prostitutes (and not in the way everybody else did) and walked with outcasts, the lowest of the low. The individuals most people miss are the ones Jesus made a beeline for - the accordions.

As Christian people, well, just as people we should take more notice of those around us and think of the accordions in the world.