Week 2: The Sewer

That's right, week 2 of my new appointment has been somewhat centered around the sewer, and I'm not being metaphorical here.

On Friday I was excited to have most of the day to work on preparation for Sunday and laundry. At the end of my four loads of laundry, which resides in the basement of my new parsonage digs, I opened the adjoining door to put a few boxes away. (I have been keeping all of my moving boxes since I have an entire basement and nothing to put in it.) When I opened the door, there was a lake stretched out before me. Pool party in the parsonage basement!

Naturally, I thought this was the product of the intense rain that we had on Thursday night, since it hasn't rained in weeks. I waded through the water to save my big wardrobe boxes, which I actually paid money for, and then called the Trustee chair. Poor guy; he probably sees my number on his phone and wants to run way.

I will say this, the trustees of my new church are ROCKIN'! He was at my house in 20 minutes with a wet vac, which might be my new favorite appliance. He would vacuum up the water and I, water-conservation-conscience that I am, would transfer it to a bucket and haul it upstairs to dump it on the plants.

I felt great about this until another trustee showed up, and they determined that the problem was not the rain, but the sewer. Ah, the sewer had backed up.

I take great comfort in knowing that the washing machine was the reason for the backup, and in remembering how I had pondered why the water that I was carrying up the stairs looked soapy.

So today, the head trustee has been here all day as the plumber is working to replace the pipes, which is made much more complicated in that they are underneath a chunk of the concrete carport and concrete driveway. Let's just say that first there was a jackhammer, and then a bobcat to dig down the 8 feet.

I have to give a shout out to the plumber, who is the first female plumber I have ever met, and who has been slinging concrete and working the jackhammer with the best of them. Yep, women can be pastors and they can also be plumbers! When God calls, all we can say is: here I am, send me!

New Church: Week 1

I have been here at my new church appointment for exactly one week. And what a week it has been! In some ways, I feel as if I have been here forever…it has been one heck of a week. And yet when I look around my house that is still littered with boxes and random piles of stuff that I have yet to find the right place for, I realize how short a time it has been.

Salem is my new home, and it is an area that I do not know at all, which is both fun and challenging at the same time. I was invited over for lunch on Monday at the home of a church family. As the person gave me directions over the phone, they said, “Well, from 419 you take a left on…” and I had to say, “Wait, where is 419?” (419, by the way, is a pretty major thoroughfare in the Salem/Roanoke area.) I know the 1.5 mile stretch from my house to the church, I know the grocery store, the gym, and Target…beyond these, I need the GPS, which may or may not know where he is going.

One thing that I love about being new is the chance to ask church people why and how they do the things that they do. Most of us humans are creatures of habit, and we quickly tend to assume that the way we do things is the right way and the obvious way. But even a lifelong Methodist can be confused upon going to a church that is not his/her own and trying to figure out the way things are done. Imagine leading a worship service for the first time when you have never attended the church before. It’s such a fascinating feat.

For example, most churches have a usual way of collecting the tithes and offerings. In the bulletin, it usually just says something like “Celebration of Tithes and Offerings.” But here was my question as I walked through the service in the sanctuary on Saturday afternoon: Where are the offering plates??? They definitely were not on the altar or up in the front area. Don’t worry, I didn’t lose them! (Sigh of relief). It turns out that the ushers bring them up at the beginning of the “Celebration of Tithes and Offerings.”

The next question is, to pray before the offering is collected or after? My last church prayed after, the church before that prayed before. Anyone want to guess the way that this church goes??? Before AND after. I was glad to have asked this question earlier in the week to the lay leader and then have discussed it with the head usher before the service.

My point is that every church seems to think that their traditions and unwritten rules, the routine of their worship service, is completely self-explanatory and understood by all who walk in the door, and the reality is that it is NOT. I think that a new pastor helps the church to realize this, providing a speedbump so that we ask why and how we do the things that we do, especially in worship.

And now, imagine that you are not well-versed in the church. Imagine that you did not grow up going to church or that you have been away for a long time. Imagine that you can count on one hand the number of times you have been inside a church, and most of those were for a wedding or funeral. Imagine how strange it all must be, how bizarre.

It is good for us to remember this as well, and clergy are as guilty of forgetting as lay people: there will be people who walk into our churches who do not know the traditions, the unwritten rules, the seating charts, the taboos, the expectations. We HOPE that persons who have no idea what is going on will, by the grace of God and the invitation of a friend or family member, show up at the church and attempt to join the community worshipping God.

It’s a good question for each of us to examine and reflect on: do you know why you do the things you do when you go to worship at your church? Why do you do them in that certain order, or that specific way? If not, how can you find out?

Practicing hospitality

"There are families where the faith is not developed, because what is given is traditions poisoned by economic and political interests and wrapped up with things of faith. They want a religion that will merely support those interests. And when the church protests against such selfishness, sins, and abuses, then it is thought to be departing from the truth, and these Christians, with their children and all, go away and continue to live traditions that are not true Christian traditions." ~Archbishop Oscar Romero 12.31.78

"Let no family isolate itself from society as a whole because it is itself well off...It will be so easy once boys and girls are trained in the heart of each family to aspire not to have more but to be more, not to grab everything but to give abundantly to others. They must be educated for love. Loving is what the family is all about, and loving means giving oneself, surrendering oneself to the well-being of all and working for the common happiness." ~Archbishop Oscar Romero 10.7.79

I have learned much about family from my Latino brothers and sisters, as I have learned much about generosity, hospitality, and giving. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why I feel so comfortable and grounded in Latin America; I have always been so well taken care of.

This visit in El Salvador is a case in point. Another female pastor from Virginia and I stayed in the home of Maria, her daughter Brenda, and Brenda's son Diego. They have a small two-bedroom house, and we were given one of the bedrooms. We were treated like family from the moment we arrived, except that we weren't allowed to do any chores or work around the house (as is usually expected of family!) We ate delicious food, watched tv with the family in the evenings, and played with Diego. The day that I asked where I could buy some cough drops, Brenda went out and bought some within the hour (after she had been at work all day, an hour-long bus ride away).

I know that hospitality to strangers was of utmost importance in the culture of the Bible. This is why Abraham and Sarah fall all over themselves to provide for the three strangers who are passing through their camp in Genesis 18. This culture of hospitality is alive and well in Latin America, where strangers and visitors are treated like honored guests.

I wonder if that level of hospitality is encountered here, in the United States, among the dominant culture. I often feel that strangers are seen as intruders or dangerous unknowns instead of potential bearers of God's blessing (did you ever hear the phrase about entertaining angels unaware?) We have large homes and spare bedrooms and even sometimes extra cars, and yet, are we generous and giving of our resources and our homes?

Generosity and giving are characteristics that Archbishop Romero says are learned at home, within the context of family. I know that Diego is growing up in a home where hospitality for strangers, generosity and sacrificial giving are practiced and modeled. Can we say the same? Are we giving such that it hurts, to the stranger, the visitor, the outcast? Or are we demonstrating the selfishness and obsession for accumulation that characterizes much of our society?

The Task of Preaching

"A church that doesn't provoke any crises,

a gospel that doesn't unsettle,

a word of God that doesn't get under anyone's skin,

a word of God that doesn't touch the real sin of the society in which it is being proclaimed -

what gospel is that?

Very nice, pious considerations

that don't bother anyone,

that's the way many would like preaching to be.

Those preachers who avoid every thorny matter

so as not to be harassed,

so as not to have conflicts and difficulties,

do not light up the world they live in." ~Archbishop Oscar Romero 4.16.78

"That is why we preach this way. We wish to shake our baptized people out of habits that threaten to make them practically baptized pagans, idolaters of their money and power. What sort of baptized persons are these? Those who want to hear the mark of the Spirit and the fire that Christ baptizes with must take the risk of renouncing everything and seeking only God's reign and his justice." ~Archbishop Oscar Romero 1.13.80

Immediately after I returned from El Salvador, I had my morning of interviews with the Board of Ordained Ministry. I have been in the ordination process in the United Methodist Church for nine years now, since 2001, and this was, I prayed, my final round of interviews to become an ordained United Methodist minister.

Many people thought I was crazy for going to El Salvador the week before this major event that I have been working on for almost a third of my lifetime. What if you get sick? What if you get hurt? What if something happens with the weather? Won't that make you tired? But I knew that the opposite was actually true; going to El Salvador was the best thing I could have done before being grilled on theology, leadership, and the practice of ministry.

There are many times when I feel like most of us in the dominant culture in the U.S. are living in something akin to a giant version of Disney World, a fantasy land that is not real and is in fact, far removed from the reality of the world.

Methodist pastors in El Salvador are living in the real world, a world in which persons depend on God to provide daily bread and give joyous praise when God does indeed provide. This is a world in which the gospel is GOOD NEWS because it declares that God is with us, presently, and especially with those who live daily on the edge of survival. Most of the pastors are as economically poor as their parishioners; one pastor commented to me that it must be easy to be a pastor in the U.S. because I have access to so many things, like a car for instance!

I got the phone call on Wednesday night that I have indeed been recommended for ordination at Annual Conference this year, so by the grace of God, I will be ordained on June 14, 2010. All week I have been reflecting on this. The bishop will place a stole around my neck and charge me with the task of preaching the gospel. I pray fervently that I will heed the words of Archbishop Romero to truly preach the good news of Jesus Christ that is provocative and bothersome to many, particularly to the majority of those who sit in the pews of the United Methodist Church. I pray to light up the world in which I live, knowing that many will want to put that light out, as they did to many priests in El Salvador, Archbishop Romero, and even Jesus himself. I pray to shake up the baptized pagans and proclaim God's reign and justice, both with my words and with my life.

The Monsenor

"And so the church values human beings and contends for their rights, for their freedom, for their dignity. That is an authentic church endeavor. While human rights are violated, while there are arbitrary arrests, while there are tortures, the church considers itself persecuted, it feels troubled, because the church values human beings and cannot tolerate that an image of God be trampled by persons that become brutalized by trampling on others. The church wants to make that image beautiful." --Archbishop Oscar Romero

It doesn't take long in El Salvador before someone brings up the Monsenor, and when they say this, they are referring to Archbishop Oscar Romero. Romero was a Catholic priest who became archbishop here in El Salvador and gave his life preaching and living the gospel. He was a "voice for the voiceless," for the poor and the people, the pueblo. After several years of speaking out strongly against the violence in El Salvador, at the hands of both the military and the guerillas, after his weekly radio addresses, after his refusal to support the violence and give it the blessing of the church, Monsenor Romero was shot and killed during a church service, while he was consecrating the communion elements.

As Christians, this is a powerful witness, but as pastors, it is even more striking. I will be sharing much more about this experience in the days to come...

Holy Conferencing

Monday was our first day of dialogue with the Methodist pastors of El Salvador. There are 10 Methodist Church in El Salvador, and the majority of the pastors did travel from their homes to be here with us for the time of holy conferencing. (Yes, I think that this is an example of holy conferencing, distinct from what we do an annual conference...)

We are working at the Methodist Church ¨La Providencia¨(Providence) on long tables that span the entire length of the sanctuary. In the large group, I am primarily translating from Spanish to English, and Norma is from English to Spanish. Pastor Juan, who is the president of the Methodist pastors group, gave us a presentation on the history and issues of the Methodist Church in El Salvador, which put us in context for our dialogue. It is such a young church, with such opportunity and challenges all at the same time. Four of the 10 churches are pastored by women, which is a good percentage, even though it is VERY difficult for female pastors here. They struggle in a culture where it is unacceptable from both the Catholic church and the other Evangelical churches to be a woman and a pastor at the same time.

We spent most of the afternoon talking about baptism, first in small groups and then in the large group all together. It is such an amazing opportunity to be a part of this conversation.

None of the pastors here are ordained. They are in the work of developing an ordination process that is suitable for their context, and they are very clear that this is such an important task that it must be carried out with care, great wisdom, and fervent prayer. Most of the pastors do not have formal theological training. Currently, they have a Course of Study school twice a year, and professors from Clairmont Seminary come to teach, which is both a blessing and a challenge, because their courses are not contextual, but are from the North American, U.S. context.

So, it is rather amazing to sit around and discuss things like baptism...what is baptism, why do we baptize infants, what happens in the act of baptism. Wow. I can see why John Wesley said that conferencing, gathering with other Christians like this, is a means of grace, a way in which God shows us grace. It truly is a grace filled experience to gather and share with our brothers and sisters on such a deep level.

The Methodist Family

I am here with a group of pastors, so you know that we are going to spend a lot of time in the church.

Yesterday on Sunday, we attended two worship services in San Salvador, the capital city of El Salvador. It is a two hour drive from where we are staying, plus the flat tire that we had on the way there. We went first to the Methodist Church Vida Nueva (New Life). One of the greatest things about this church was the worship team, which consisted of about 10 young people, all under the age of 17, led by the music minister, who is 30. The drum player was a 15 year old girl, the keyboard player a 15 year old girl, and they were all phenomenal. They lead the worship at this church, and there is indeed a spirit of new life in this place. After worship I spent some time with a couple of 13 year olds, who were telling me about their church, their faith, and how they love to lead worship at the church.

The second church we attended was celebrating their 11th anniversary. The Methodist Church is 16 years old in El Salvador, founded in 1994. There was also lively music and worship at this church, and I enjoyed the opportunity to sing songs of praise to God that I don´t often get to sing anymore in my US context. Again I say, there is something about Latin American that makes me feel at home, that feels right. The most profound part of this service for me, however, was the prayer of the pastor at the end of the service. He asked for everyone to put their arms around the person standing beside them, and then he prayed a powerful word about our connection, how we are blessed to gather as Methodists from the US, Colombia, and El Salvador, how we are one body, one people and we together bless the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and serve him. I felt so connected to this Methodist family from many different contexts and places but gathered to sing glory and honor to God. The pastor prayed for us, for our churches, and for the world that belongs to God and is beloved by God. It was powerful.

We were all pretty worn out by the time we got in the car at 6:30 for our two hours drive home. But as I sat in the car and we drove home in the dark, I sat with my eyes closed and enjoyed the time to pray and meditate on how good God is and how thankful I am. It was really nice to have that time of stillness, of rest, of prayer and reflection, and I wonder that I don´t spend this amount of time at home like this. But then again, who has time to spend two hours in prayer and reflection...maybe I should. Maybe we all should. Maybe we are all way to busy to enjoy God´s goodness the way that we were created to, and too busy to enjoy God the way that we were created to?

Home in Latin America

Many of you know that I am currently in El Salvador with a group of United Methodist pastors from Virginia. I was hoping to be able to blog fairly often, but well, as with many plans, it is not quite possible. For this moment, I do have a computer with internet, and so I hope to share a bit of the journey so far.

On friday I flew from Baltimore to Guatemala City, Guatemala. For the past two weeks, several pastors have been in Guatemala studying Spanish and staying with host families. I am part of a crew of bilingual pastors who are joining the team for the El Salvador leg of the journey. Arriving in Guatemala gave me a strange sensation of arriving home. I lived in Guatemala for four months in 2001, and even though a lot has changed in the last nine years, the feeling has not. As we drove away from the airport, I could feel myself relax. It is such a different rhythm than the US, and I can´t explain it, but I feel more grounded in real life when I am here, and in Latin America.

Saturday we drove to Ahuacapan, El Salvador where we are staying for the week with host families and participating in dialogues with the Methodist pastors and a few lay people of El Salvador. We are also joined by a Methodist pastor from Colombia, so we are quite the multicultural group. This is fun, particularly since I only knew one of the VA pastors before I came, so there is always someone to talkwith and learn about.

I am staying with another pastor in the home of Maria, her daughter Brenda, and Brenda´s son Diego, who is six. We have been welcomed with open arms and experienced tremendous hospitality. Diego in particular is excited to have us around, and he likes to show us his dinosaurs, his cars, or the birds singing outside. He doesn´t like to leave the house when we are there.

It´s amazing to know that you have family wherever you go, and that is what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ and a member of the Church (big C). We are received here as brothers and sisters, and it is a testimony to our connection that we can be a family so quickly. We have received grace upon grace from our hosts and the family of God in El Salvador. What a blessing it is to receive such grace!

Is prayer an action?

I have been wondering this as I observe the United Methodist Church's response to the earthquake in Haiti. The big response is first: pray. Then, we will figure out the next step.

I have to admit that I love this.

But I would guess that it gives us a certain sense of helplessness, this entire tragedy, this whole crisis. It is all so completely out of our control, and I know that we are a people who like to be in control of things. We are also a people who like to respond with "doing." We like to go and clean up or rebuild or do something.

Prayer seems so passive.

I wonder how many people, how many Christians, how many United Methodists have actually responded to this crisis with prayer. Gutteral, passionate prayer. Desperate, longing, bewildered prayer. How many of us are falling on our knees throughout the day as we are continuously overwhelmed by the news, by the grief, by the destruction? How many of us are praying fervently for a call to serve in some way, for a call to help in the restoration and the healing?

How many of us actually see prayer as an action?

(By the way, prayer is still the first response but not the only response. The United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) is accepting donations for recovery and development. 100% of the money that you donate to UMCOR goes to the actual project; there is nothing taken out for overhead. You can donate through your church or do it online here.)

A taillight or a headlight?

I have been pondering this week about what would've happened if John Wesley and Martin Luther King, Jr. had met.

Granted, they lived in different centuries and different countries. But as I have been reading Rev. Dr. King this week after reading so much Wesley last week, I wonder if anyone has ever looked closely at their writings and work together. (If you are reading this and know of anything related, please let me know!)

Rev. Dr. King gives me that same feeling of heartburn that I blogged about last Friday. His words make me shake my head and respond out loud. I've had a tough time trying to pick small tidbits to share daily with my bible study group, because I feel like entire paragraphs and pages are necessary and soul shaking. And I've written about three blog drafts in the last week that I have then saved instead of posting, because I can't seem to express this feeling I have when I read Rev. Dr. King's work.

I think that my favorite document by Rev. Dr. King is the Letter from Birmingham City Jail. One reason I love it is because he speaks so explicitly to the church, to people who claim to follow Jesus Christ. It seems that the life of discipleship is the heart of much of King's work, but this letter writes it plainly, sharp and simple as an arrow.

This is the passage I highlighted today for my bible study group, and it is such a great text to have soaking in our heads on Sunday:

"In the midst of blatant injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white churches stand on the sideline and merely mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities. In the midst of a mighty struggle to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice, I have heard so many ministers say, “Those are social issues with which the gospel has no real concern” and I have watched so many churches commit themselves to a completely otherworldly religion which made a strange distinction between body and soul, the sacred and the secular.

So here we are moving toward the exit of the twentieth century with a religious community largely adjusted to the status quo, standing as a taillight behind other community agencies rather than a headlight leading men to higher levels of justice."

-Letter from Birmingham City Jail

Have we learned anything since Rev. Dr. King wrote these painfully true words? Are we spouting the same old "pious irrelevancies" while people are struggling and dying in front of our eyes? Is the church today a taillight or a headlight?

Triflers and the trivial

"Do nothing on which you cannot pray for a blessing. Every action of a Christian that is good is sanctified by the Word and prayer. It becomes not a Christian to do anything so trivial that he cannot pray over it."

-Random John Wesley quote (meaning, I don't know where it's from)

“May it not be one of the consequences of this, that so many of you are a generation of triflers; triflers with God, with one another, and with your own souls?”

-Sermon 4 “Scriptural Christianity” (1744)

A generation of triflers; ouch.

I read this last week while I was preparing to preach and while I didn't bring in up from the pulpit, it has been stuck in my head ever since. John Wesley was definitely not a man who wasted time on anything that he considered trivial. He was a man driven by urgency, the urgency of the gospel.

We talked about this last week as we discussed the Gospel of Mark as a whole. The word "immediately" is characteristic in Mark, occurring over and over again, and this makes the gospel feel urgent, pressing.

I wonder if we truly grasp the urgency of the gospel, the drive that God has to make all things new, the overwhelming passion of God to complete the work that God has begun in us and in the world that God has created.

There are many days that I look back and think, where did the day go? How is it 5:00 already? or 11:00 already? What have I been doing? And I wonder if I am really using the time that God has blessed me with to the greatest extent that it can be used.

I know this: I do not want to be a part of a generation of triflers. I don't want to waste my time on the unimportant, the petty arguments, the pointless discussions. I don't want to waste my time surfing the web or channel surfing. There is no time to waste! If I can't pray for God's blessing in it, maybe I shouldn't do it, no matter how small it is.

What would it be to live like this?

Heartburn: A Side Effect of Methodism

No, I'm not just referring to the abundance of food in a Methodist gathering and the sluggish way you might feel when you waddle home afterwards.

I'm talking about the burning deep down in my heart that I get when I read, well, just about anything of John Wesley's.

I have been reading a good deal of John Wesley here recently, catching up on a some books that I have owned for a few years but haven't read. This inspired me to term our Wednesday worship services in the month of August "Wesley Wednesdays" because the burn that I felt as I read some of Wesley's work could not help but get expressed in the sermons that I preached. A combination of John Wesley's sermons and the book of James...that's enough to light you on fire!

I have also recently been working on the Bible study that I am designing for my ordination application. I have chosen, between the options of Mark and Job, to teach from Mark and to focus on the Way of Discipleship. As I have been working on this, praying about it and immersing myself in preparation, I had a thought that felt particularly inspired. Since we are talking about discipleship, what if we also heard from folks who lived their discipleship in powerful ways over the years, not just disciples from the biblical witness but those who have lived the faith since then?

I looked at my outline, nine weeks worth of Markan texts teaching about and calling forth discipleship, and started brainstorming about nine disciples whose life embodied or embodies this radical kingdom lifestyle. I will say, shaking my head, that I never cease to be amazed at the way that God works, and how beautifully everything comes together for God's glory!

So everyday, I am emailing the Bible study group with quotes from the weekly disciple. The week's quotes are particularly focused on the texts that we will discuss at the end of the week and they all express discipleship in the person's context.

Week one, of course (you all knew this was coming!) is John Wesley.

And we are back where we are started: heartburn. This week I have been combing through his sermons, journal entries, and notes about him to pull out tidbits and quotes for my class, none of whom have studied or read much of Wesley's works.

I get drawn in to this work and find it hard to stop. I read his sermons and shake my head, reading parts out loud and saying things like, "preach!" or "well." I just can't help myself. The Spirit of God continues to move in his words even today, over 300 years later. My heart burns within me as I read the challenging words that he spoke to people in his sermons and then instructed his lay preachers to preach as they rode their circuits.

It wasn't an easy word then, and it isn't an easy word now. I was reminded today as I read through his journal entries in May 1738 how often he was asked never to come back after he preached in a church, especially in well established, significant churches. Over and over again he writes about how he preached in such and such church and then was asked never to return. So the next day, he did the same thing. And then the next day. And then the next. The establishment wasn't too crazy about him. And this is particularly interesting because for his whole life and ministry he worked against the notion of starting a new church. He had no desire to split from the Church of England, but rather, he called people to faithful discipleship within the church, even while he was eventually willing to preach in fields and marketplaces to people who the established church did not reach.

I could go on and on, but perhaps I will save the rest of my heartburn for another blog.

And stay tuned for nine weeks worth of interacting with a few of the men and women who have inspired me and many others over the centuries in the way of discipleship.

Palpable Pain

Since moving to the Shenandoah valley, I have become a Shakespeare junkie.  

Shakespeare had never really been my thing, until I found myself living 20 minutes away from the Blackfriars Playhouse, the world's only recreation of Shakespeare's indoor theater. I went to see The Christmas Carol, which they perform every year in December, but my world wasn't rocked until I saw Cyrano de Bergerac in May. Ever since then, I find myself drawn to this theater whenever I have a free night.

The acting is outstanding and I often find myself moved to hysterical laughter or gut wrenching tears, sometimes in the same show. Shakespeare didn't write his plays to be read in classrooms, he wrote them to be performed on stage, and I think it is impossible to approach understanding of his brilliance until you have seen his work incarnate.

This afternoon I attended a performance of Titus Andronicus, which is said to be Shakespeare's bloodiest, most violence work and is very rarely performed. The feeling I sat with throughout the entire show was: pain. Gut-wrenching, want to tear your heart out pain. The pain was palpable on the stage and even in the audience, where all of us were affected by the depth of grief, hatred, and evil that almost every character exuded.

Theater is a powerful medium because unlike film, a theater goer is a participant, a part of the story that is being told. It is very difficult to remain aloof or apart from live performance, especially at the Blackfriars, where the actors intentionally draw the audience in and make us part of the play's world.

So I walk away from the theater today feeling a deep sense of loss and grief in the pit of my stomach. Having witnessed the evil that comes from revenge, which is the basic plot of this play. Having seen the ways that cycles of violence only beget more violence, pain, and destruction. To think that this entire tragedy might have been stopped by the forgiveness, the pardon of Titus at the very beginning. And yet, Titus found it necessary to uphold the practice of retributive justice, let the punishment fit the crime.

I will not come to see this show again, though it was brilliant. I don't think my heart could take it. I come away with my heart broken by the way that a lack of forgiveness can give birth to pain and destruction beyond compare, without end.

May we learn to forgive.

My Call to Ministry

If you would've told me five years ago that I would be pastoring a church, I would have laughed. But much of my life is like that, unexpected in the way that grace often is.

I always have a hard time with this question, because my understanding of call goes back to the very beginning of my Christian story. Or maybe that is just very Methodist, since we believe that all bapized Christians are called to ministry.

I was baptized as an infant at Kingsway United Methodist Church in Springfield, MO. My parents, however, were not really into church, so with a couple of exceptions, I was unchurched as a child. I had my awakening to faith when I went to camp the summer before 6th grade, and when I came home from camp, I immediately got involved in the church.

We moved to Virginia when I was a sophomore in high school, which was traumatic but a blessing. As I started to look at colleges, my main focus was the physical therapy program. I knew that whatever I did as an occupation, it would be ministry because of the way that I did it. I felt compelled to help people learn how to walk again, after accidents and injuries, and I figured that I would work in clinics and lower income settings so that I could be in mission.

As I worked my way through college, however, I was miserable with my path. Cellular biology was the turning point; or, at least, that semester was, the spring of my sophmore year. I had a hard time believing that I would be so miserable if I were really following my call. I took one class that year in the religious studies department: Black Religion with Dr. Mark Wood. I loved it! Essays and not scantrons! Reading and interacting with the texts and my classmates! It was like coming up for air if you are drowning.

I began to really discern whether I was going in the right direction. I was active in leadership at my home church as well as the Baptist Student Union on campus. I loved this one class. And yet, in my other science classes and volunteer work in the hospital, I was miserable. I talked with my campus minister, Bill Berry, who had no doubts about my call to some kind of ministry. And I signed up to go on the study abroad trip with Dr. Wood to Havana, Cuba.

The two weeks in Cuba changed my life. When I got on the plane to come back to Virginia I knew two things: 1. I was going to come back to Cuba, and 2. I was not going to be a physical therapist. It's funny to look back on this, because this was not a "mission trip," not a churchy trip at all. But I felt God's presence so strongly in Havana, and I heard God speaking so clearly through the scripture I was reading.

When I returned to school, I changed my major to religious studies. I felt called to be a missionary, to work with people in Latin America or specifically in Cuba as we struggled to be the people of God in the world. After I graduated, I went to Guatemala to study Spanish, knowing that I needed to be fluent for my call, and then to Wesley Seminary. I felt the need to be ordained, though I did not plan on being a pastor.

My sense of call was further refined in seminary when I went to First United Methodist Church in Hyattsville to serve as a pastoral intern. I had never even considered the possibility of being a pastor. And yet, as I served at this amazing church, I discovered gifts that I never knew I had. It was another awakening experience, another great surprise of grace.

When I worked at the hospital in Washington D.C., I told this story to one of my colleagues and she said: "You are just like St. Francis!" St. Francis of Assisi heard God's call to "build my church" and thought that God meant that literally. So St. Francis found a broken down church and began to rebuild it. He later realized that God meant for him to rebuild the whole of the church, not the physical building. I heard God's call to help people learn how to walk, and so I began a path toward physical therapy. It wasn't until later that I realized God was calling me to help people walk in a much different sense, as disciples.

My call story is long because God has transformed me along the way, refining, polishing, and sometimes scrubbing with microbeads. And I don't feel like it is finished. In many ways, I continue to seek God's call everyday and to discern where and how God wants me to serve in ministry.

I do know one thing for sure, I am here only by the grace of God. I am constantly amazed that God would bring me here, that God would care so much for me as to call me to serve and to provide for me throughout my journey. I echo Paul's sentiments, "But by the grace of God I am what I am, and God's grace toward me has not been in vain" (1 Corinthians15:10).

Biblical Personality

One of the last days that we were in Brazil, Mario asked me if I would give him my Bible.

The Bible he was referring to is a pocket-sized NRSV that I have travelled with for probably 10 years. The feature I loved most about this Bible was that it had a zipper, so that the pages didn't get creased or bent in my suitcase or backpack, and it also allowed me to keep all sorts of mementos inside.

Of course, I told Mario I would give him my Bible when we left, so the night before our departure, I cleaned out all of the clippings from this Bible. I had a ticket from last year's mission when we rode up the train to visit the Cristo Redentor statue in Rio de Janeiro. I had my nametag from the event that I attended on the border in Mexico. I had a creased song sheet from back in the day when we led music at Frank Pais camp in Havana. I had a bulletin from my grandfather's funeral. I had a note from a young girl in Cuba. I had a boarding pass from Miami. I had a sheet of star stickers from who knows when. But I left a mark on the Bible, the masking tape nametag from last year's trip to Brazil, afixed on the outside leather.

In my experience, every Bible has a personality. I have a rose colored NIV that is terribly beat up, full of different colored underlining and dates that I read certain passages. I got that Bible when I was in sixth grade, right after I had an awakening experience to faith and committed myself to follow Jesus Christ, and I used it up until I graduated from high school. When I went to college, I got a hardback RSV, and my campus minister commented that this meant I was going to seminary, because that was the version all the seminarians read. I laughed at him; I wasn't going to seminary. When I was in seminary (who is laughing now?) I bought a cheap paperback NRSV, which is what I currently have beside my bed. It is absolutely falling apart; everything after Acts has become unbound and falls out if I'm not careful. (Side note: this is a great way to learn the order of the books in the New Testament!) I have written all over it, questions, dates, connections, themes.

It is sad to me when I think that many people's Bibles don't have a lot of personality because they are not used. You might not be as tough on your Bible as I am, but is there evidence that you have read it, studied it, grappled with it, been challenged by it or changed by it? Of does it still look nice and pretty, up on the shelf collecting dust or safely protected from wear?

When I gave my Bible to Mario he asked me, what is the first passage I should read? Good question. (And may I add, that this is a young man who recently turned 18). After a moment, I said decisively: Isaiah 43.

"But now this says the LORD,

he who created you, O Jacob,

he who formed you, O Israel:

Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;

I have called you by name, you are mine.

When you pass through the waters,

I will be with you;

and through the rivers,

they shall not overwhelm you;

when you walk through the fire

you shall not be burned,

and the flame shall not consume you.

Talk about personality.

Use it or Lose it

It was a tough week at the gym last week.

Those who know me well know that I am a gym rat. I'm at the gym at least 5 but usually 6 days a week. It's what keeps me sane and gives me stress relief. I'm a big fan of group exercise, because I have found that I push myself much harder when I am surrounded by others. I take zumba, which is a dance workout that is latin based, but my latest love is body combat, a rockin' kickboxing, martial arts class. It is hard core, emphasis on the word hard, and a fantastic workout.

But then I went away for about three weeks, to Brazil on a mission team, to Blackstone for a residency event, and to Richmond for my brother's wedding.

Hence, last week, my first week at the gym in three weeks, was a tough week.

I'm always amazed at how quickly one can lose the edge. I've been building up stamina for months, working hard and pushing myself, and after three weeks away I feel like I'm back at square 2. It was all I could do to keep up for the whole class, and boy have I felt it in my back, arms, and legs!

I think this rings true about the most important things in life: when we step away from them, even for a short time, we rapidly lose the ground that we have spent months building up.

The spiritual life is definitely this way. John Wesley would call this backsliding, when we get lazy or busy and neglect the spiritual disciplines, when we neglect our relationship with God and the way that this relationship intentionally calls us into relationship with others, when we lose our focus on God's will and call for our lives we start sliding back. And unfortunately, we all know that it's easier to slide down the hill than it is to climb back up.

Summer, while it is fun and spontaneous and unstructured, seems to be time rife with backsliding. There are so many other things to do, that worship takes a backseat to going out of town or "enjoying" the day off (a strange and un-Christian understanding of sabbath). We don't offer any Bible studies at the church, instead we take a break. And I would hazard a guess that many of us often take a break from the personal, spiritual disciplines that we practice as well.

But following Jesus Christ is an everyday commitment, with no breaks and no holidays (though there are holy-days). It takes focus and determination. It takes reordering of priorities and quite honestly, the reordering of life. It takes our response: to God's call, God's initiative, God's grace. It takes practice, which is one of the reasons why we work on spiritual disciplines. It necessitates community, to keep us accountable and to surround us with encouragement (again, it's all about group classes!)

May God keep us focused so that we can continue to press on toward the goal!

VBS fun

At this moment, we have finished Day 4 of Vacation Bible School, and I can already feel the weariness setting in. Day 4 is a tough day, because by this point in time, all of the kids are tired and cranky, since many of them are staying up later than usual to come to VBS. They are also feeling more comfortable and bold, which is both a positive and a negative. It's positive in that they are singing the songs with confidence and dancing freely. It's negative in that they get a little too free and push the limits, every limit they can possibly push.

But VBS is so wonderful!

Tonight, I had a little girl, I would guess 5 years old, come stand next to me and tell me, "I love Jesus" in the same kind of way she would say "I love my mom."

Then a little boy who is 7 said, "Pastor Kristin, aren't you going to stand up and dance?" And so of course, I stood next to him and he became my dance partner.

A teacher told me about her niece, who heard someone mention Brazil on the radio today and said, "Hey, that's where those kids live!" (We have been talking about the kids in Brazil every night because our VBS offering is going to the Shade and Fresh Water Project.)

All of these little moments, strung together, make the chaos all worth it. What a blessing!

On God's Mission to Brazil

Well, it has been a wild and crazy week because I have been preparing to leave tomorrow with a mission team from my church to Fortaleza, Brazil. We went to Fortaleza last year for the first time and were very blessed to connect with the brothers and sisters at Aerolandia Methodist Church. When we returned home, we felt God leading us to develop a partnership with this particular congregation, so here we go, returning one year later.

It is a really fun team this year, with 6 people returning from last year's team and 5 new folks. What a great mix! We have been sending facebook messages with the young people at Aerolandia for the last few months, and everyone is eager to see each other face to face. There's nothing like returning to friends after being away.

There's a good chance I will not be blogging on my personal blog, because we will be keeping a team blog while we are there. I invite you to check it out> www.calvaryinbrazil.blogspot.com. We will be updating everyday with stories from Brazil and photos of friends and activities.

Like I said, I have been running and running trying to get everything together and done in the last week. I can't wait to get on that airplane!

Feeling thankful

Last night I had one of those moments of deep gratitude.

I was at the men's church softball game, where our team was playing the Baptists. Friendship Field is the name of the field where the men's and women's softball teams play here in Stuarts Draft, and it is THE place to be on just about any evening in the summertime. Friendship field is actually in the middle of a vineyard; think "Field of Dreams" and replace the corn with grapes.

Softball games are a staple of small town life. I sat over on the Calvary side with several of the wives and children of the players. The smaller kids were all playing in a big pile of sand by the scoreboard, burying a beetle and filling up a huge pixie stick with sand, then mischeviously asking us if we wanted some candy. There were at least eight or nine folks with dogs, both big and small, who were also socializing here and there. The bleachers were packed last night with people watching the game and talking about life.

It was the perfect night for softball; hard to believe that the next day was the beginning of July. There was a delicious breeze in the air, and I actually wished that I had brought a jacket with me. The game started at 8:00, so we watched the sun go down over the outfield. The sunset painted the sky various shades of pink, yellow, and blue.

It turned out to be a great game, and our team won. As I walked to my car, parked by Row 4 of grapes, I stopped for a minute and looked out at the mountains, dark blue in the twilight, and the crescent moon just above the skyline. I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude, for that particular moment in time, for the beauty that was so incredible. What a blessing it is to witness and be moved by beauty. Thanks be to God!

The Master Gardener

Yesterday I finally got around to trimming the bushes that had overgrown and were taking over my back porch. I have a love/hate relationship with yard work. I put it off as long as possible and have a hard time getting motivated to do it, and yet, once I start playing in the dirt and clipping away at the bushes, something deep inside of me feels calm and peaceful. I know with my bones that sitting on the earth is good for the being.

I think I spent a good hour cutting back the two bushes, and it was quite dark by the time I finished. As I clipped, I couldn't help but think about the theolocial significance of pruning. In John 15, Jesus talks with the disciples about God's pruning task. Jesus is the vine and the Father is the vinegrower, the Master Gardener if you will. We are the branches that are to abide in the vine, and the Master Gardener prunes such branches so that they will bear fruit.

I thought about all of this as I trimmed away. My bushes were completely out of control. They were wild and crazy, taking over the deck, pushing away the other flowers. They looked terrible and uncared for. I spent a long time trimming them (I am NOT a master gardener), trying to get them balanced, healthy, ordered, and beautiful. When I finished, they looked great!

The tendency I also have to watch, however, is over-trimming. Anyone who has ever gotten a bad haircut will tell you that at a certain point, you are cutting away too much and doing more damage than good. When you cut away too much of a bush or a plant, it looks bare and ugly.

I do believe that God continues to prune us, to cut away at things that are unhealthy, unnecessary, unruly in our lives. Spiritual disciplines are a way that God does this. As we spend time in prayer, fasting, worship, tithing, and as we spend time with the poor, we begin to notice things in our lives that are at best distractions and at worst, unhealthy addictions. We notice that we spend more time watching television than gathering with the body of Christ to worship. We notice that we spend more time on the internet than interacting with our families. We notice that our thoughts are consumed with gain, with money, with possessions, with stuff, with guarding what we have and getting more of it instead of giving freely and living simply.

And then of course, there is Scripture. As I used the big clippers, I couldn't help but think about the Word of God being a double-edged sword, and how great that sword would be at pruning! As we read the story of who God is, what God has done/is doing/will do, and what we are to do about it, it is like holding up a mirror to our own lives. Yeah, I think that Scipture is probably even better than the very cool electric bush clipper that someone let me borrow last year!

What needs to be trimmed away? What needs to be seriously cut back?

At the end of the night, I felt satisfied with my work. I imagine that God probably enjoys the gardening work; that God enjoys ordering our lives, giving us healthy discipline in which we can find freedom, creativity, and life. I am sure that God loves to see our beauty as we are shaped into the magnificent creation that we are intended to be.