If you want to make things happen, call Pat Geiger. If you have any need to know where she is, just call information in North Springfield, VT.
“What’s so special about this lady?” you are surely asking by now. I’m glad you asked. In the late eighties and early nineties, she single-handedly led a campaign for a new U.S. postage stamp with a picture of rockabilly Elvis on its cover.
That led to an unprecedented nationwide vote between two portrayals of Elvis – one as a young teen idol who could swivel his hips with the best of them and another as the heavier, middle-aged crooner. The young Elvis won hands down – 851,200 to 277,723.
And Pat didn’t do badly either. She was flown in as a VIP to Graceland for the unveiling of the new stamp. The red carpet was rolled out and every amenity one could want was at her fingertips.
Now stop and think a minute. All that effort for a stamp! How many lives do you think have been changed by that portrait of Elvis? What about the hundreds of hours Pat Geiger dedicated to drumming up support? What was so attractive to the news media about a ¾ inch by 1 inch piece of paper that they hovered continuously like hummingbirds over freshly-found honeysuckle hedge?
Does all this say to you that somehow our priorities are out of order?
I wonder if we are as determined to see a neighbor, work associate, friend, or relative come to know Jesus Christ as Pat Geiger was to create a new stamp with her idol plastered upon it. I question whether we are as committed to inviting people to worship the living God as she was in inviting people to sign a petition. Could it be that we get more excitement about the unveiling of a stamp than we do about the unveiling of Scriptural truth?
Well, since then, the U.S. Postal Service has put out stamps for Otis Redding, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and Bill Haley. If that hasn’t satisfied you, just wait, I’m sure they are planning quite a few more.
This all serves as good reason for a “gut check” of our priorities, doesn’t it? I hope you are giving as much time to the things of God as Pat gave to the things of the U.S. Postal Service. God Almighty would like to plaster Jesus’ picture all over your life and mail you to your classmates, your workmates, and your neighborhood.
Without a stamp a letter cannot reach its intended destination. Unless we are taking Jesus to the world we are not fulfilling God’s desire for our lives. Unless we are offering Jesus to a lost world we have nothing of value to offer them. Will you ask God to help you become as committed to unveiling Jesus as Pat Geiger was to unveil Elvis on a stamp?
Stamped and ready to be mailed,
Pastor Steve