God of the auto save, we come before you this morning in a fit of rage. You inspired tremendous words in this humble author, a humorous prayer about how difficult it can be to take children to a crowded place like the science center. You guided his thoughts and inspired his words to craft something he was really proud of. And then, the Enemy, who calls all technology home, decided that it was a perfect time to reset the computer, thus causing all work to be lost. Father, forgive this weary writer for the salty language that escaped his lips. By your mercy, allow his children to forget what they heard while they were sitting next to him playing their video games. And more over, Lord remind us that nothing is ever truly lost. In your grace and mercy, more inspiration always follows. Help us to manage our anger, and also to appreciate the goodness of your gifts to us. This we pray to you, God who never forgets, in the name of Jesus Christ our savior, and in the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
The Theology of Starting Over
Wow. I used to have a blog. And then I didn’t. And then I did again. And then I didn’t. Over and over and over and over again.
So why restart now? Why would the internet possibly need one more middle aged white guy spouting off what he believes into the empty void of interspace?
A few months ago, I started a new gig as the Pastor/Head of Staff at Beulah Presbyterian Church, the church that I grew up attending as a child. It’s been a wild and surreal experience already, walking through the hallways that still smell the way they did when I was a teenager, only now the monkeys are running the circus. It’s been the perfect mix of incredibly nostalgic, but also a really good challenge, being the head of staff and working with a team of people to accomplish our goals together. It’s a wild and wonderful ride, and while there are for sure some challenges that consume a lot of time and energy, is such a beautiful work to walk this Kingdom road with this team that I’m just really happy to be a part of it.
While all of that is true, I’m learning a few things. Firstly, that having a staff and being their leader takes a lot more time than I think I originally had anticipated. Which means that something is always getting bumped back toward the end of the week, and in my case it’s been the sermon and any discipline of writing. The last few weeks in particular, I’ve been writing my sermon on Saturday night, burning the midnight oil and just trying to get words on paper so that I have something to say when I step in to the pulpit the next morning. Let me level with you all: I hate that feeling. Some pastors talk about writing their sermons on Saturday night with a perverse kind of bragging, like there’s some kind of medal for procrastination. If there were, I’d be the undisputed champ, but my soul would absolutely be crushed. I love to write, and I love to write well, and I hate when the writing process is rushed. So, my writing needs some time, some practice, and some intentionality.
Hence the blog.
You, dear reader, are like my first draft in so many ways. My hope is to make a regular habit of writing posts like this, looks at the daily news, prayers like I was writing for a little while there toward the end of the blogs last iteration, and maybe even some other funny ideas kicking around in my head. They will be my first drafts of trying to make sense of the world around me, and how God is active in it. They will be my first drafts of prayers, of trying to express to everyone what I’m most wanting to express to Jesus. And they’ll be my opening reps, an attempt to loosen the ketchup bottle of writing to get things flowing before I’m writing in other places.
I hope you don’t mind!
Of course, I don’t have the best track record to promise that this will keep coming at all, but I hope that we can build something sustainable. As always, and especially since there’s a bit of a new audience around here, feel free to drop a note in the comments and let me know what you’d like to see around here. For now, it’s Thursday, and I’m in a coffee shop, and there’s a sermon to be written. Let’s get cracking!
A prayer for when your kids fall asleep in the car on the way home from a fun day.
God of rest and recreation, who gave us six days to do our work and at least one to rest, we give you thanks this day for a trip to grandma and grandpas. We give you thanks for their neighbors who are out of town, and let us use the pool. And Lord, as a father in love with his children, I give you thanks that they are slumbering peacefully in the backseat of the car on the way home. Grant that they may always feel this level of safety and comfort in my presence, and grant that I never ever take for granted a single blessed moment of this wild calling to be a dad. If it's not too much to ask, dearest Lord, let them also not be too grumpy when they wake up at home. In the name of the God who gives us Rest, Jesus His Son, and in the power of the Holy Spirit, Amen.
A prayer for when you see a bald eagle flying over Panera on your way to get coffee.
Lord of majesty and might, who crafted each corner of the world and holds it in your grasp, I come to you today full of awe. Thank you for a moment of experiencing your creation in a new and refreshing way, even in the middle of a suburban strip mall. May my eyes always be open to the goodness you have for me. May I never be ashamed of standing slack-jawed looking toward the sky. And since I'm behind on my sermon once again, may the coffee flow freely and bountifully. In the name and for the sake of Jesus Christ our Savior and in the power of the Holy Spirit, Amen!
A prayer for a trip to the zoo.
Lord of all creation, we give you thanks this day for all the wonders of your world. Especially this day we thank you for the zoo, where we can see animals which would otherwise rip us to shreds so close we can see their breath. We humbly ask that the tigers, penguins, and elephants especially be active and close to the fence, so that we might think today with dad was super cool. And we ask Lord that a trip like this will remind us of how beautiful a world you have placed us in, and inspire both old men and their children alike to care for this planet that we call home. In your name, through the power of Jesus the Son, and in the majesty of the Holy Spirit we pray. Amen.
A prayer for a grumpy morning.
God of patience and grace, who always puts up with me even when I am at my worst, be with me this day as I am struggling with living in a joyful moment. May the Advil flow as freely as the coffee, and may it cure the pounding headache that will not relent. Allow me to be patient this day, as the only power outlet open in the Panera is next to the table of old men who are very loudly trying to remember every single friend they’ve ever had’s name. Help me to be patient when opening e-mails from cranky folks who are likely blissfully unaware of my current mood. May I be a vessel of your grace today, as you pour in to me love, patience, and forgiveness, may I pour it out to those around me and to give some to myself. Your mercy is new every morning, and I look forward to starting this day over again. In the name of the Creator, Savior, and Advocate, Amen.
A prayer for when one's children graduate kindergarten.
Just and merciful God, for whom a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years is like a day, where on earth did the time go? How is it possible that these little people who I feel like just arrived on the scene are already singing a song with their classmates, receiving diplomas, and moving on to first grade? Your ways are higher than our ways, to be sure. Grant us both the ability to recognize that it is only kindergarten and that there’s a long way to go in their school career, but also Lord let us savor every single second of a childhood that is passing entirely too fast. Guard our hearts, and allow us to be intentionally present with our children this summer. In the name and for the sake of the Father of Time, Jesus Christ his Son, and in the Power of the Holy Spirit, Amen.
A prayer for the unofficial first day of summer:
O God of the seasons, who causes the rain to fall and the sun to shine, we give you thanks this day for an end to winter which seemed to drag on forever and evermore. Let us not complain about how hot and muggy it may be today, lest we be reminded of how often we complained when it was cold and snowy. Instead Lord, allow us to be present to all this season has to offer. Allow us to be present to running through a sprinkler. Allow us to be present to the sound of an ice cream truck. Allow us to be present with our children when they are home from school. Allow us to be present to all the new life springing up around us. To you who hold the seasons, we pray in the name of Jesus Christ our Savior, and in the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen!
A prayer for putting your children on the bus the week of yet another mass school shooting.
Loving and caring God, who will not let even a sparrow fall to the ground without your tender care and concern, watch and guide over my little ones and all every single child who is making their way to school today. May their school be what it is meant to be, a place of learning and joy, not a place of bloodshed and violence. May we their parents watch over them with continued vigilance, and may you calm the nerves of all of us who walk a bit more on edge today. This we pray to you in the name of the Prince of Peace, through the power of the Holy Spirit, one God forever and eve. Amen.
A prayer after the school shooting in Uvalde Texas
Oh God, you are the source of our comfort when our tears will not cease to flow. We ask that you strengthen our nation not only to deal with our grief, but also to have the courage and the conviction to change our policies, our institutions, and our way of life, so that we may no longer have to wait to live in the peaceable kingdom, but instead build it with the aid of your Son Jesus Christ. Unite our actions, and our prayers through your Son, the Prince of Peace. Amen.
ALL THE RIDES ARE HAPPENING RIGHT NOW!
Greetings bloggers!
It’s been a hot minute since I’ve posted here on the J Blog. Things have been all over the place. We had a lovely week of vacation in Delaware, followed by a lovely week of stay-cation to recover from the week of vacation, followed by coming back to work and trying to dig out from a million tasks that had piled up, leading me to wonder why we go on vacation in the first place. So, with a bit of that all behind me, it’s time to talk about my second favorite thing ever.
Bikes!
With the pandemic causing all kinds of uncertainty at the beginning of summer, a lot of rides that I would typically have geared up for and hit were cancelled. But as things calmed down, the fall rides opened up. At the moment, they’re all still there, but I’ve got my eye on you delta variant.
Mclain Farm Gravel- This Saturday!
To warm up a bit, my good friend and fellow lunatic David and I will be hitting up this gravel ride in Ohio. We’re doing the small track, which will still clock us in at 35 miles and darn near 4,000 feet of elevation. I have been doing a little bit of hill climbing on the new gravel bike, but to say I feel underprepared is a understatement. I’m just sitting down after a sub-1000 feet of climbing ride, and my legs feel like jello. So…I’m nervous.
DC to Pittsburgh
After that, I’m leaving on Wednesday to drive to DC, and then bike my way home. This is something that I’ve wanted to do for a while. It’s going to be part cycling experience, to be sure, but it’s also going to be many parts prayer retreat/spiritual discernment. I’ll be doing most of the ride solo, and so I’ll have a lot of time at night in the tent to pray, to think through what’s going on here at the church, to discern where God is leading me in this season of life. I’m really really excited about it! David is actually going to start in Pittsburgh and ride to DC, so we’ll pass each other in the middle, so I won’t be totally alone out there should I come across a mechanical or something like that.
The Quick and the Dead- September 25
Here’s the ride that’s going to end me. We actually rode this guy two years ago, but it was a much smaller and different route. It nearly broke me in two. So naturally, because they made it longer and harder, we’re going to try again. This sucker clocks in at 53 miles, and 6,395 feet of elevation. The map on Ride With GPS thinks that it will take me four hours, and that is just absolutely adorable. My only saving grace in this ride is that instead of white knuckling down all the gravel descents on my road bike, I have Percy the Adventure Bike (TM) ready to rock and roll.
That’s a whole lot of riding back to back to back! My hope is to take a camera along with me and make a few videos of these experiences, but that’s always my hope and it rarely happens, so stay tuned.
I know this is all about cycling, but what are you looking forward to this fall? What adventures await you?
God Sightings
Greetings bloggers!
Hot off the heels of our rather quick vacation, we are right in the hot middle of our Vacation Bible School here at Laboratory Presbyterian Church. The entire building has been turned in to the beach, because our volunteers are awesome, and we’ve had about 45 or so kids join us each night to hear stories about God, dance and sing, and enjoy each other’s company. In spite of an outsized need for caffeine for this tired pastor, it’s been a tremendous week of ministry so far.
My job has been to run the middle school group, which as far as I’m concerned is the best possible job available here at VBS. These kids are right at the point in life where the questions are starting to get bigger, the thinking getting a lot deeper, and their desire for God is getting stronger. Throw in a few games and some outrageous snacks, and you’ve got a recipe for success. Now, I’ve never been much of a cirriculum guy, preferring instead to write my own, so thus far at VBS I’ve been kind of winging it. There’s a schedule, sure. But it’s very much written in pencil. I know some of the big points I want to hit along the way, but I’m mostly letting the journey take us where it wants to take us.
But that said, one of the big points I want to hit along the way is a practice I stole from a previous Vacation Bible School experience, that of God Sightings. With the littlest of kids, it always starts out with them having seen God in a butterfly in the park, or the way their dog licked them when they got home from VBS that day. Which, while we as adults might scoff at a little bit, I kind of wish I saw God more frequently in the butterflies around me or the way my dog licks me. The truth is that while we might be looking for God in the big moments that come with sunsets and orchestra scores, God is available in the everyday kinds of things that we are all too often oblivious to because we’re stuck in our own heads. But these kids are on it. They know exactly where to find God. Everywhere.
What’s that line about from the mouths of babes?
This year with the middle school has been no different. They are seeing God in creation all around them. They are seeing God in their friends that surround them every day. They are seeing God in the walls of our church, sure, but they see God way more outside those walls.
And so part of the reason that I lead these teenagers in this practice is because I want them to get used to noticing God places, and to get used to telling other people about it (Presbyterians…struggle with this). But I also want it for me. I want to be able to see how they see God in the everyday kind of things, in a way that I wish I could.
How do you see God these days? Where has he shown up for you lately?
Premium Rush
Greetings bloggers!
This week, Sarah and I get to do something that we haven’t done in almost two years. Starting tomorrow, we’re going to drop the boys off at my parents, drive out to Philadelphia, and visit with some friends and my cousin, who will be inking us both with some dope new tattoos. In other words: we’re going to travel for fun! I couldn’t be happier to get out, to see some friends and family, and to just relax a little bit.
Relaxing in pastoral work is an interesting thing I’m coming to learn. What I want most out of these three days to get away is to be totally and completely present with Sarah and those we’re visiting. I don’t want my mind to wander to an unfinished sermon, or the VBS teachings I have left to write, or any of the piles of paperwork sitting on my desk right now. And so the only way to truly relax this next week is to get everything done before I go.
Which means this is a very busy couple of days!
All of this hints at something that I’ve been toying with the last few weeks: this tension between what it means to work and to get work done, but also what it means to be content with who I am and what I bring to the table. On the one hand, I’m a huge geek about productivity. I want to have my to-do list in order, organized, and efficient. I have a process for writing my sermons which generally takes all week (so trying to get it done in two days is remarkably frustrating). I have spreadsheets and brainstorming documents that help me figure out who needs pastoral care, and when, and where. Being a pastor is a profession, so I want to be a professional.
At the same time though, I never want all that “doing” to get in the way of the truth of what Jesus told us in scriptures. His is a yoke that’s easy and a burden that’s light, and if we experience anything differently it’s not because he put it there. As everyone’s favorite heretic (said sarcastically) Rob Bell has said, Jesus calls us to be human beings, not human doings. This is one of the most counter cultural things we could come across. Our world rewards people who are so busy that they have little time for anything else, including family and recreation. So how do we balance this faithfully?
I think, at least in my life, the trick is to make sure that the doing never gets confused with my identity. This is level 7 hard, but absolutely worth it. I am a pastor by trade, and so it’s important that I am organized and productive and all of that good stuff. But it’s also important that I remember that I don’t need to do one blessed thing for Jesus to actually love me. I already have that. I support my family by the work that I do, and the paycheck that it affords me. But I should never get so caught up in my work that my family suffers as a result. Time with them is what grounds me to who I am. I do my work, but I am not only the work I do.
How do you make that distinction in your own life? Or, maybe as a bonus question, how do you procrastinate when you don’t want to do any of the work that’s in front of you? Me? I like to write blog posts…:)
Tiny Prayers Part One: Thanks.
Greetings bloggers!
This afternoon I was reading The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence, and this pair of lines grabbed my attention super hard.
When an occasion arose to exercise some virtue, he committed himself to God, saying, ‘Lord, I cannot do this unless you enable me.’ Then he received more than sufficient strength.
I loved that little prayer! As a pastor, I think it’s a vocational hazard both in public ministry and in my own private spiritual discipline to heap up big and wordy prayers, to make it sound like I’ve got some sort of deep insight and knowledge, or that a prayer doesn’t count if it doesn’t last for more than a few minutes. But that little prayer, “Lord, I cannot do this unless you enable me,” I love it! It’s so tiny, but it would have such impact to be able to lift that one up when something comes along that I need to feel God’s enabling power.
And then I turned the page, and found that a tiny and simple prayer is exactly what Brother Lawrence was going for:
He said that we ought to relate to God in the greatest simplicity, speaking to Him frankly and plainly, and imploring His assistance in our affairs as they happen. In his experience, God never failed to grant help.
That! That’s what that tiny prayer he offered up was all about, relating to God in the greatest simplicity. For all the time, effort, and energy that I pour in to writing prayers for worship services, or praying with people in hospitals, or in my own quiet times with God, I’m starting to feel a bit convicted today that I’m over-complicating things.
So, to complicate something that’s all about over-complicating things, I wanted to tackle a little bit of a series on the blog. I wonder what kind of tiny prayers are out there that we could explore together. Something that’s so wonderfully simple, but opens up brand new worlds for us in our relationship with Christ. And the first in the series is one that I’ve noticed about myself in the prayers that I’ve been offering up lately, I always want to start and end here:
(I don’t know why that’s a pickle, but I love it!)
I noticed when I was looking back at how I’ve been leading prayers in worship, particularly the prayers that I’m working off the cuff for, that I seem unable to start a prayer anywhere but with gratitude. Even on days when things are heavy, when the prayer concerns of the congregation are dire and concerning, I always want to start with gratitude. I want to start with gratitude for the day. I want to start with gratitude for the air in my lungs. I want to start with gratitude that after a season of a global pandemic we can actually all gather together in the same room and worship God for a little while. Looking back, I seem to always start with gratitude.
Truth be told, in thinking about it, I’ve had the opportunity to pray with a few folks at their death bed since I’ve started here at LPC, and even there, even in the valley of the shadow of death, I’ve started my prayers with gratitude. Gratitude for a life well lived in some cases. Gratitude that we could gather together as a family in others. Gratitude for doctors and nurses who have been incredibly kind during a difficult season. Gratitude all around.
Of course, this isn’t the only tiny prayer. Usually saying “thanks” is followed by the deepest needs of our hearts. But what if we always started there? What if “thanks” was always the starting gun? What if “thanks” was the kind of tiny prayer that we take with us wherever we go? What if “thanks” were the first word on our minds when we were stuck in traffic? What if we were grateful for that slow person in the grocery store? What if we said thanks when we turned on the news at night? Bonus points if we could manage to say thanks for the people our chosen news network deems “the other side.” What if we just carried this tiny prayer around with us wherever we went?
Thanks.
So people of God, what are you thankful for today? What can you say thanks to God for in your life?
I'm not as young as I used to be: A mission trip story
Greetings bloggers!
When I was interviewing for the call at Laboratory, I was asked if I would be willing to be the male leader on the high school mission trip that June. I said I’d have to see how the timing all worked out, but I enjoyed youth ministry so I was happy to be able to dip my big toe in the waters and give them a shot.
That was in early 2020.
Thanks to COVID, an entire year passed before I was able to load up the car, crank up the stereo, and head out for my first mission trip as a solo pastor. This is no small thing my friends! I have been a youth worker long enough to be able to spot the poor soul solo pastor who has made his way on the youth mission trip. They look a good bit like a sheep that has suddenly decided to go swimming in the duck pond. They don’t belong. They know they don’t belong. The kids know they don’t belong. But everyone tries to make it look like they really do belong. I so badly never want to be that guy, so there were some legitimate questions headed in to this one. Do I still have my youth ministry chops after more than a year on the bench? Can I keep up with the kids? Am I even a little bit cool? I mean, my whole vibe is just owning how not cool I am until it seems kind of cool, but can I even pull that off any more? I don’t have a Tik Tok, and that app is probably like three generations old at this point anyway. I am indeed rusty.
Sure enough, there was some rust to kick off before I could hit my stride. For starters, sleeping on a cot is a young man’s game. That first night felt like a herd of miniature donkeys was kicking my C4 vertebrae all night long. That plus the never ending flow of Tums that was required by our nightly dinner menu made me feel like I could apply for Social Security at any moment. But after the first day or so, I got my sea legs under me.
Our job was to work with a summer camp for underprivileged kids in Harrisburg. They threw us right in with a karate class. I have always wanted to take karate since I was a little kid who was a bit too in love with the Ninja Turtles, so I was game. It was easily one of the most fun mission trip experiences I’ve had in a while.
Look at that form!
Through it all, I got to build some really solid relationships with kids that (once again, COVID) I just haven’t been able to connect with yet in this church. I got to remember that while the mission work is important and good, it’s those conversations between the official “things” that the Spirit does its best work. And while I used to bounce back from these in a day or so when I was in my 20s, and I am really NOT in my 20s anymore, I wouldn’t hesitate to go on another mission trip, even if I have to bring my dentures along with me.
As always, and as has been the theme of this blog since it’s reboot, the question on any good mission trip is where you saw Jesus at work in your midst. I saw Jesus in the faces of these inner city kids who don’t often have people show up just to hang, and without agenda. I saw Jesus in the leaders that were pouring their guts out to make sure the trip was everything it needed to be for everyone. I saw Jesus in the guy who sold everything and moved his family in to a house in Harrisburg so that the community could use it. And I for sure saw Jesus moving and working through these teenagers who willingly gave up a week of their lives to serve. I don’t know if any of them knew what they were getting themselves into when we left, but I know they all saw some evidence of Christ while they were there.
And, they let me sit at the cool kids table.
Where have you seen Jesus at work this last week?
It really is that simple...
Greetings friends!
One of my absolute favorite things to do is to sit down and talk to pastors. There is something about this weird work, this endless string of Sundays that require sermons, the odd ways in which this job grants us permission to be a part of every aspect of a person’s life, whether it’s their wedding or their funeral or just a normal Tuesday, the way that we can work incredibly long and weird hours but the job is never actually done, and the only people that really understand the work on a deep level are those that are in the work themselves. And so I love to get together with my weird tribe.
You have to be careful here though. There are some people in our tribe who, when they get together like this, will only complain. They’ll complain about the long hours. They’ll complain about the person who said something rude or insensitive about the sermon they preached that week. They’ll complain about the bridezilla they had at their last wedding. Believe me, I can complain with the best of them about anything and everything. But that’s not what I’m talking about here. I’m talking about sitting down with someone to admire the beauty of our weird and wonderful calling. These are conversations that usually, at least one, someone at the table smiles and says “You know what I mean, right?”
I had one of those lunches today.
We talked about all kinds of things. Youth ministry. Seminary classes. Pastoral transitions. Coming up with a new sermon, and how we try to stay fresh. We were all over the place. But this particular friend and I share a penchant for theological dorkery. We love to read Barth and Lewis and Niebuhr and Bonhoeffer. We are those sick puppies who love to debate the mechanics of salvation, or the doctrine of the trinity, or the creeds our church has chosen to adopt. Round and round and round we can go.
I told my friend today that I had actually been reading The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning. I read this book when I was in college, and it smacked me square between the eyes with something so profoundly simple and unrelenting that it was hard to really believe it: That Jesus loves me exactly the way I am. This is important language to make sure we get right, because a lot of us will say that Jesus loves everybody, or that Jesus loves us, or that Jesus loves the whole world, all of which is true. But it’s another thing entirely to come right out and say that Jesus loves me. It’s different because I know me. I don’t know everybody else’s mistakes, I don’t know our collective shortcomings, and though I can see some signs of it I don’t exactly know what kind of trouble the world is in. But I know me. I know what I’ve done, what I’ve left undone. I know the ways that I’ve failed people. I know the ways that I meant to say one thing but wound up saying it exactly wrong. I know the look of pain in people’s eyes when I’ve gossiped and it gets back to them. I know me, and I know how messed up I am. And Jesus loves…me?
My friend and I had a great conversation around how we theologians love to outsmart ourselves sometimes. We talk a great game about the incarnation and transubstantiation and eschatology and soteriology (all of which by the way are big words that theologians like me use when we want to sound smart, and I just squeezed them all in to one sentence! Look at me go!). Even for me, when I’m talking about Jesus’ love I tend to take it to one of these places. I’ll talk about Jesus and how much he loves us by talking about salvation and the mechanics of that and who’s saved and how you do that. But what if it was really just this simple: Jesus loves me, and is willing to do whatever it takes to keep us together?
Here’s the good news: It really is that simple.
I know this will be shocking to long-term readers, but let’s think of this in terms of a bicycle. While I’m riding a bicycle, there are a lot of mechanical things going on even in a relatively simple machine. The tires need to have air in them, and a particular amount of air at that. The cables that run from my shifters to the derailleur need to have the just perfect amount of tension in them to make sure I can shift the way I want. The brakes had better have pads on them otherwise I’m going to meet an untimely demise at the bottom of the hill. And to be sure, as a bike-nerd I love to geek out over this stuff. I like to look online at all the different kinds of parts and upgrades and tips and tricks that you can get in to while riding a bike. My bike had better be well maintained, or it’s going to fail on me. So there is for sure a time for geeking out over bike parts, and there is a time for maintenance.
But…and this is something it’s easy to loose sight of…there’s also a time to just ride your damn bike.
There is a time for theology. There is a time for trying (key word: trying) to understand how God works in the world. There is a time for getting answers to some of the most deep and meaningful questions that humans have been asking since the beginning. There are times when we’re searching for answers to why questions that we know darn well will never come. There’s a time for all of this, and thanks be to God there are geeks like me who love to spend our time dwelling in all of that.
But today, in this wonderful moment: I want to just bask in the simple truth of it all.
Jesus loves me.
He always has.
He always will.
Did we mean busy when we were staying "normal?"
Greetings friends!
First, a wee bit of housekeeping. In addition to the blog being back, Season Three of Roughing the Pastor dropped yesterday. Check it out here!
As mentioned in a few previous posts, things are opening back up here in the ‘States, thanks to the vaccine. The number of places I need to wear a mask is dropping lower and lower. Church is starting to look like what church usually looks like. I no longer fear that every cough I have is going to wind up killing me. My personal favorite: I’ve been eating in restaurants more and more, learning about places like Krency’s here in Washington. It’s a classic old school diner in every sense, and I absolutely love it down there. Though I should say, when I’m at Krency’s I very frequently sit in the very same booth, eat the very same meal, and play the crosswords from the physical newspaper I get each day. I believe I am now 92 years old…
When things were shut down, the question most people asked me was when I thought we were getting back to “normal.” I have answered this question the same way so frequently that I’m truly starting to believe that it’s cliche, but I don’t think we’re ever going to see the normal we used to know. We as a nation have been through a national trauma, in fact we’ve been through a few of them. I heard it said that you can never step in the same river twice, and that feels like where we are now. The world is vastly different than it was in February 2020, and by the way, so are you and I. Normal as we knew it is gone.
And yet, it feels like there’s this push in the culture toward…doing. We need to do stuff. We need to go out more. We need to work more. We need to shop more. We need to just be doing and doing and doing. I’m starting to think that when we said we were looking forward to going back to normal, what some of us were really saying is that we were looking forward to being busy again.
Busy-ness is a drug in the American culture if you ask me. For some folks, it’s how we justify our existence to our neighbors. If you listen really closely to those people in your life who are complaining about how busy they are, there’s usually a tone of bragging in their voice. Some people might even be smiling when they tell you how overwhelmed they are. We have a fear of missing out, to be sure. But I think we’ve also let the protestant work ethic, whatever that is, get so far ahead of itself that we haven’t stopped to ask why. And lest you think that I am sitting here in my office throwing stones, the only reason I’m writing about any of this is because I see it so clearly in myself right now. A few restrictions get eased and all of a sudden my calendar is working overtime. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. I think busy-ness is a drug I’m hooked on, and I for one would like to get off.
I think much of my thought of the way to fix this has to do with stating your values, and then intentionally living in to them. For instance, I know that next week I’m going to be away on our high school mission trip, so this week I’ve made sure to block off 1 on 1 time for each person in my family. As is always the case, to say yes to something is to say no to something else. Saying yes to a couple of hours with my son this morning means that I have to say no to a little bit of extra sermon prep time. Saying yes to a date with my wife on Friday night means I might have to pack a wee bit earlier for the trip. But before any of that can happen, I at least need to sit down and name my values, prioritize my time, and make sure that I’m saying no where I need to so that I can say yes to the things that matter to me in this season.
What are you saying no to so that you can say yes to something else? What’s been keeping you busy these days?
With eyes to see...
Greetings bloggers!
I had every intention in the world of updating this blog every single Tuesday and Thursday, and you’ll note that after only one somewhat successful week, the wheels fell off the wagon.
Let me try to explain.
Tuesday, I had a meeting in the morning at a diner. Easily my favorite part of the vaccine situation and being able to finally be out in public, by the by, is the ability to go eat at diners. I don’t know why this is a thing for me, but it really is. Anyway! It was a breakfast meeting, and I wound up getting to the diner way more than the other person. So I ordered a cup of coffee. What happens when you’re in a diner and you get a cup of coffee? The waitress keeps bringing you more coffee. This may be part of the reason I’m so excited to be back in the swing of things! Anyway, she brought another cup. And another. And another. I’m pretty sure at one point she refilled my cup of coffee, I took one sip, and then she refilled it. I was flying pretty high.
I finished up the meeting at the diner, and started working my way back to the office. While I was driving, I took the time to call a friend I hadn’t caught up with in a while. Somewhere in there, between the coffee and the phone call and the windy roads of Washington County, I made myself super super carsick. Not like, about to yack at any moment carsick. But just that horrible terrible no good feeling that comes from being nauseated always. No problem I thought, once I get to the office and get some fresh air and stop moving, things will settle down.
They didn’t.
They didn’t settle down the next day either. Or the day after that. Or the day after that. It got a little bit more manageable as time rolled on, but to be sure I’ve spent the better part of the last week feeling carsick almost the whole day. This, I can tell you what you already know, was patently miserable.
So I wasn’t blogging.
I wasn’t really doing much of anything to be honest. I got out on the bike a few times and put in a few rides with friends, but otherwise all I really wanted to do was sit on the couch and not be disturbed. I plugged through the rest of the week, until Friday when everything clicked together as to what was going on. My eye doctor called and reminded me that I had an appointment this week.
Upon further review, my eyesight had gotten bad. Really bad. Like everything was a blur and I wasn’t really paying attention to how bad it was bad. And I suppose this happens to us, doesn’t it? It wasn’t like I woke up one morning and my eyes were in bad shape. They had slowly over the last year been getting worse and worse and worse and worse, until one day I finally realized that they were a problem. And it turns out not a small one either! The doc today gave me the typical choices between one and two and all of that, but no matter what she did with my right eye it just didn’t seem to matter. Turns out I’m developing astigmatism. Huzzah!
Obviously, this is all very fixable. A new prescription, some better contacts, and a bit of time to stop the world from spinning, and I’ll be right as rain. But it all got me thinking about those little things that creep up on us. It can be the good habits, or the bad ones just the same, that slowly slowly slowly over time start to change us in ways we may not notice. And I do believe it can work for our benefit as much as it can work toward our ill. If I take up a daily cookie habit, slowly over time I’m sure I would start to see some ill effects on my health, in much the same way that if I added a daily exercise routine I would slowly start to see improvement. The same is true of our souls, isn’t it? The occasional passing negative thought can turn in to a sour disposition almost before I’ve noticed that anything has changed. Doing my level best to be positive in all situations can turn a soul around for the better given time. It’s those little things that can often do the most harm, or the most good.
So my friends, what little things are you working on today? How can you make tiny adjustments in your soul for the good of the kingdom?
Everything I have is Yours.
Greetings bloggers!
Look, one thing I despise more than anything in the world is when the casual hockey fan, the kind of soul that watches maybe one game a year and thinks they know everything, decides that all of the collective blame for a team’s failure can be pinned on the goaltender. This casual hockey creature seems to only be able to identify that as a unique position, and so if something’s wrong it must be their fault. In reality, hockey is a complicated sport, and a whole host of factors can go in to a team not doing well, not advancing in the playoffs, of falling apart.
However.
I just want to go on record and say that everything that befell the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Year of Our Lord 2021 was the fault of Tristan Jarry. Can’t blame the coach. Really can’t blame the core. Can’t blame COVID, much as I might want to. That was a solid playoff team that was as strong down the middle as I’ve seen in many years, and they just gave up way too many soft goals. But the good news for you who are reading this rebooted blog is that I won’t be complaining about the Penguins for a little while. We’ll watch this ship sink, and get ready to build the next one.
Yesterday, before the mayhem of a hockey game, I was at work and decided to take a few moments to read the daily lectionary outside on the bench outside my office. It was cool and clear, so a bit of time spent outdoors really hit the spot. I’ve been just reading the Psalms and the Gospel lections, and trying to do my best to imagine myself being a part of the story. Yesterday was an easy enough story to place myself in, as I read the story of the Prodigal Son. What really hit me hard though was at the end:
“Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing. So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. ‘Your brother has come,’ he replied, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’
“The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’
“‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’” (Luke 15:25-32 CEB)
Jesus is obviously telling a story, and in this one it’s pretty easy to sort out who the father figure is:
There is untold nuance and intricacy to this story which I’m not going to get in to here, because I have to preach every single week and I have to save some of the good stuff for when this story comes up in the lectionary. But what hit me right between the eyes yesterday all over again was something that Rob Bell once pointed out. Of all the things Jesus could have God say to us, of all the things the Father could say to a disappointed and frustrated older brother, too caught up in his own righteousness to be able to celebrate his brother’s return, too focused on what others are doing wrong to be able to celebrate their success (ok, I’m laying it on thick here, but I’m looking at you American Church), of all the things the Father could say to such a person, He says
You are always with me, and everything I have is yours.
To anyone who would tell you that God is punitive, to anyone who would tell you that God is against you, to anyone who’s vision of God is more judgmental than even they are, read that line again. You are always with me, and everything I have is yours.
How can you read that and come away with anything less than love?
For me though, that was the challenge. As a pastor I’m always reading the Bible exactly the way I tell others not to read it. Don’t read it for information. Don’t read it like a text book. Don’t read it looking for another new angle on your sermon, Pastor J. Read it in the way that allows the Bible to read you. And that’s what happened on that bench yesterday. Those words somehow found their way passed the dam in my head and to the river of my heart. Everything God has is mine, not at all because I deserve it, but because God is generous on a level that doesn’t make sense. God is generous toward the sons that run away. God is generous toward the older sons who don’t want to celebrate. God is generous toward pastors who spend too much time getting in their own way. And God is generous toward everyone who’s eyes are on this page.
He may, may, even be generous with certain goaltenders.
My friends, how has God been generous with you this day? Where have you seen God at work in your life?
Recovery Day.
Greetings bloggers!
Some of you perhaps are wondering when I will unleash my anger at the events of last evening, whereupon I witnessed the most perfect, tape to tape pass I’ve ever seen in a hockey game, only the pass was from OUR OWN GOALTENDER to THE GUY WHO SCORED THE GAME WINNING GOAL after our TEAM OUTSHOT THEM BY MORE THAN DOUBLE. While I’m sorry to disappoint, those thoughts at this moment in time are still stewing in the internal kitchen, while I am desperately trying to surpress the emotions that I am feeling and try to enjoy that my team has even made the playoffs at all. But still…here’s a live look at what happened to my soul last night:
No, instead of talking about the MOST BEAUTIFUL TAPE TO TAPE PASS I’VE EVER SEEN, I’d like to talk about everything that happened before that on Monday. You see, this weekend was one of “those” weekends in ministry. They come around every now and again, where the stars all align correctly and every event in the world happens at the same time. Our youngest youth group was having a sleep over. There was a Girl Scout ceremony the very next day, which was followed by a graduation party the very next hour. And then on Sunday it was Youth Sunday, which is always great and also always crazy busy to prepare for. There was much running around during a block of time that is usually reserved for my days off, to rest, recharge, and reboot. As a result, my tank was totally empty on Sunday afternoon.
The Original Heretic Rob Bell once taught that we as humans have a whole bunch of gauges, like a car. There’s a food gauge, a physical energy gauge, an emotional gauge, a mental gauge, all of that stuff. But there’s also this gauge that so few of us pay attention to, when your spiritual gauge runs low. It happens to pastors all the time, usually at the end of a weekend like this past one, but as with most things in life, we pastor’s aren’t special. It happens to everyone. The Spiritual Gauge seems so be empty when we have given of ourselves to the point of depletion, and we find ourselves needing to refill before anyone can ask anything of us again.
In cycling, when you are putting together training plans, you need to budget for recovery days. You can’t train full gas all day every day, or you’ll actually do lasting damage to yourself and your physical abilities. So you have to build in rest and recovery days, where you don’t ride or even workout. Some of the books I’ve read have even suggested on recovery days you should do your best to stay off your feet as much as you can, though I’m sure the people who wrote those books don’t have children in their house. If you work yourself to failure, you will absolutely come across failure.
Wouldn’t you know it, but this is a spiritual issue as well.
Remember the Sabbath day and treat it as holy. Six days you may work and do all your tasks, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. Do not do any work on it—not you, your sons or daughters, your male or female servants, your animals, or the immigrant who is living with you. Because the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and everything that is in them in six days, but rested on the seventh day. That is why the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. (Exodus 20:8-11)
God seems to know, enough that it makes it in to the Top Ten, that we are going to need recovery days. “Heck,” says this commandment, “God needed a recovery day after all that creating business.” Who are we to think that we are any better than what God has asked of us?
Yet, we struggle with this, don’t we? All day yesterday, as I was home from work (with a massive headache by the way from lack of rest), I had a gnawing sense of guilt. I should be at work. I should be writing a sermon right now. I should be clearing out my e-mails. I should be…I should be…I should be… Like we have somehow convinced ourselves that we are robots in the assembly line, where we can work and work and work endlessly and never need a rest. God himself has told us that we need rest, and yet we have convinced ourselves we do not need to. What is wrong with us?
Lately I’ve been trying to listen to the invitation of Jesus in my life, as he is calling me to rest easy. He had his own approach to this idea of rest:
“Come to me, all you who are struggling hard and carrying heavy loads, and I will give you rest. Put on my yoke, and learn from me. I’m gentle and humble. And you will find rest for yourselves. My yoke is easy to bear, and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30)
Jesus will be our rest. Jesus will be our recovery. Jesus will be our healer. Not so that we can carry no burden at all. You still have to show up to the work that you are called to. But it’s easy work, and the yoke is light, especially if we allow ourselves to recover well.
Where do you need to recover this week? What kinds of things do you do to recover and reset?