Ordinary Time is another name for the Season after Pentecost. Not surprisingly, Ordinary Time begins the day after Pentecost Day, and it continues until the day before the First Sunday of Advent (in late November or early December). Therefore, depending on the date of Easter, Ordinary Time covers approximately half a calendar year -- that is, twenty-three to twenty-eight Sundays.

It should be noted that half of the calendar year spans the highest, holiest days of the Christian Year -- Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost. On Christmas, the Church celebrates the Incarnation, in which God becomes a man, Jesus born of Mary. At Easter, the Church enters into the Paschal mystery, in which Jesus dies for the sins of the world and is resurrected for the salvation of the world. At Pentecost, the Church recalls and receives anew the Holy Spirit, who is poured out from the Father and the Son. For the Church, these are indeed extraordinary days.

But then comes the long, long season of Ordinary Time. To be sure, there are high Sundays in Ordinary Time -- Trinity Sunday, All Saints Sunday, and Christ the King Sunday; but they do not rival the highest Sundays of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost. Ordinary Time is a long, liturgical haul.

As all of us know, Ordinary Time includes the summer season, and the summer offers all of us a needed change of pace. The relaxed schedules, the down time, and the extended vacations offer the chance to rest, relax, and rejuvenate. Given the hurried lives we lead, that is good for all of us.

However, it is important for us to remember that Ordinary Time is not meant to be a vacation from God’s love, from God’s law, and from our covenantal promises to God.

Ordinary Time is a wonderful time to: enjoy the water and the waves, read a couple of good books, travel to faraway places, visit families and friends, sleep some extra hours, cookout, and debate political issues and candidates. But throughout Ordinary Time, we should also continue to: recognize the cunning of evil; resist any evil we encounter; profess our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ, in daily word and deed; remain faithful to the Church universal; stay loyal to The United Methodist Church; and participate in St. Peter’s United Methodist Church. In our Baptismal Covenant, we have promised to do these things.

Ordinary Time at the beach involves the special challenge of more than a little hot, muggy weather. The local weather wilts not only the daily newspaper but also our will to strive. Even with air conditioners humming, weather can drain us of energy and good intentions in a flash. Add the challenge of summer weather to the distractions of the summer, and we Christians can have a real fight to be faithful to Christ and His Church on our hands. Even so, fight -- or strive -- we must.

Because of the presence and power of the Holy Spirit, Ordinary Time just might turn out to be a time for extraordinary opportunities for faithfulness to the One who graciously rules over all time, over all of us, and over all of the world.

How about: Ordinary Time -- extraordinary faithfulness, anybody?