{"id":87,"date":"2012-03-30T13:53:56","date_gmt":"2012-03-30T18:53:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/?page_id=87"},"modified":"2022-09-09T21:44:32","modified_gmt":"2022-09-10T02:44:32","slug":"service","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/service\/","title":{"rendered":"Service"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Once, when I was nine or ten, my Sunday school class was studying the Sermon on the Mount. I became fascinated with the idea of “not letting the right hand know what the left is doing.” How does that work in practice? I snuck out the side door of our auditorium with a trash bag I had quietly taken from the church pantry, and I began to pick up trash in the narrow walkway that separated our church from a used car lot. I wondered how my right hand could not<\/em> know what my left was doing\u2014they have to coordinate! Deciding that I wasn’t going to crack that one, I resolved to just keep my trash collection a secret from everyone else. And then, to my horror, a church member slipped out the side door, noticed me standing there blushing with my trash bag, and asked me what I was up to. I explained my project, and he promised that my secret was safe with him. “Maybe,” I thought, “but my cover is still blown.”<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

My value to the church where I grew up wasn’t based solely on my acts of service, secret or otherwise. They devoted themselves to my spiritual formation because I was Randy and Kay’s kid and because they loved me as I was when I couldn’t contribute much\u2014even if I had a bit of a “holy fool” streak at a young age.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, evidence of service is rightly part of a tenure and promotion portfolio, though I still feel a little uncomfortable ensuring that “the right hand knows what the left is doing.” Not that I have wanted my service to the university, department, guild, church, and community to be unnoticed or unknown\u2014quite the opposite! It’s just a little awkward to make sure no one overlooks it. I believe I’ve offered valuable service in all of these areas, and in this section of my portfolio, I offer concrete evidence and reflection on my service. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Next page: <\/span>Service to the Department<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Once, when I was nine or ten, my Sunday school class was studying the Sermon on the Mount. I became fascinated with the idea of “not letting the right hand know what the left is doing.” How does that work … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1505,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-87","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/87","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1505"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/87\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":925,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/87\/revisions\/925"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/kelligibson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}