The Prophetic Voice

God created us to live in community, in relationships with people who love us, who challenge us, who hold us accountable. I am never more sure of that fact than when I work on sermons with one of my friends.

First, a confession: As a pastor, I tend to allow myself to get busy or distracted all week long, and I often find myself on Friday morning in a coffee shop trying to mix up a sermon with less preparation and less organization than the task requires. It's like going to the refrigerator at 6:00pm and pulling out whatever ingredients I can find, then trying to put together a healthy meal from whatever is in there. Thanks to the Holy Spirit, this occasionally works, but the sermons are a bit slapdash, and this gives the congregation and the worship less respect and attention than it deserves. The sermons start sounding too similar to one another, they start to reflect my own biases and laziness WAY more than any sermon ever should.

This is why, as a preacher, I need community. I need accountability. I need this friend. Because she will force me to work harder, to wrestle, to really engage with the text not only from my perspective but through the eyes of the many diverse folks in the pews. She pushes, prods, and pokes holes in what seem like brilliant ideas. She challenges easy theologies. She shakes metaphors and illustrations to see if they can withstand the reality of people's lived experience. She will not let me get away with easy answers. She is the prophetic voice that calls me, and often our whole congregation, to account for our words and our actions. It's uncomfortable, it's difficult, but it is often what I need most.

If not for this friend, my sermons would often be finished a little earlier. But they would also be weaker. They would be straw-man sermons that could not hold up to the scrutiny of real people living in the real world.

All of us need these prophetic voices. We need someone who will tell us, with love, that we need to look again at who we are, what we say, and how we live. We need someone who has the courage to speak up and who cares about us enough to help us be better. Individuals, churches, communities, nations need these voices: they wake us from our lethargy and hypocrisy and call us to do better.

Today, even though my sermon is far from finished, I am thankful for a friend who cares enough about me, about this congregation, to challenge me. And I wish there were more people in the world with the courage and care to be prophetic.

Up in Smoke

It's gone. Those were the only words I could come up with when, on Tuesday, I discovered that my home church in Ohio had burned to the ground. All I could think of were the things that had been lost: the site of so many memories, the items that held so much tradition, the sacred space that had been almost my home for the first seventeen years of my life had disappeared in a matter of hours.

Anamnesis

I remember so many important moments in that church. The pews were the site of so many naps, so much coloring, so many childhood hours spent doing everything except paying attention. I went to Vacation Bible School in that church, eating snacks and playing games in the Fellowship Hall. I remember countless potlucks, Kiwanis Pancake Suppers, and Rotary Spaghetti Dinners, gathering around tables with community members of all ages. The classrooms were where I learned the Lord's Prayer, where I became acquainted with the books of the Bible, where I had Girl Scout meetings and MYF gatherings. I remember painting walls and pulling up carpets as training for mission trips. I played in the nursery for years, and can still picture the furniture and toys that had filled that room.

I used to go exploring through the church while my mom counted the offering. My sister and I discovered that, if you used the right pair of safety scissors, you could pick the lock and climb up to the bell tower. We figured out how to get into the organ pipe storage rooms, we crawled under pews and climbed secret back staircases. We uncovered the long-forgotten chair lift and we knew all of the best hiding places for Sardines.

But the Sanctuary... the Sanctuary was my favorite space. It always struck me as the place where God lived: a holy space, but a comfortable one, too. Over my 17 years there, I sat in just about every spot in that room, from the front-center pew as an acolyte to the back corner of the balcony as a youth. I remember going to children's time on the chancel steps and playing trumpet in the choir loft on Easter Sunday. The lectern there was the first place I ever read Scripture in public. I was baptized and confirmed in that Sanctuary, and I stood before the altar there to give the benediction just after I first announced that I was discerning a call to ministry. I learned to play the organ there, while bats flew laps around the ceiling above me.

For seventeen years, that church building was my second home. It was familiar enough to walk in the dark; I knew every inch of the space, every smell, every shadow was as well-known to me as my own reflection. When I moved away to go to school, and then to take my first job, the church was always one of my first stops on my return. I longed to get back into my home church, back among my church family.

Intercessions

I always assumed that I'd be able to go back. And it was always my church home. When I went to college, that seemed a temporary relocation, and I always came home to my church. My seminary days were the same. When I moved to take my first church appointment, I knew the churches I served would never be my home. As a pastor, I'm a member of an Annual Conference, not a congregation. But in my heart, I never left. That big sandstone building was my sacred space, and the people within it were my family.

That is, until Wednesday. On Wednesday, that sacred space disappeared. In a matter of hours, flames destroyed all of those familiar items, all of the rooms I once wandered, until all that was left was a sandstone shell. After the fire, the pictures showed what looked like a ruined medieval castle with stone walls crumbling around a pile of ash and unrecognizable detritus.

I was devastated. I have grieved as though for a beloved friend. For that church building was a friend, in a way. It was a place that saw me through struggles and joys, the constant that allowed me to change and grow within it. There have been tears, and there will certainly be more as the days and weeks go on. There is a loss, not only of the past, but of the future. I will now never be able to be married in that place. I now no longer have the option of presiding at that table in the stole of an ordained elder. And that is difficult for me to accept.

Doxology

But I am trying to give thanks, as well. I am trying to thank God for the gift that the building has been for me and for so many others in the congregation and the community.

I give thanks for those who, more than a century ago, gave funds and support for the building of a church. I give thanks for their vision, and for the way God worked through them to provide for generations to come.

I give thanks for a solid sandstone frame that withstood years of frigid winds, torrential storms, blizzards, and steamy summers, sheltering those within as they weathered physical, political, emotional, and spiritual storms.

I give thanks for old, stained carpets crossed by hundreds of feet as worshipers came forward to pray, to receive ashes, to be washed in baptismal waters, to be fed at the communion table, to light candles, and to sing God's praises.

I give thanks for carefully carved pews, worn smooth by countless hands and backsides, that supported worshipers of all ages and backgrounds. I also give thanks for pew cushions, added later, that made that support so much more comfortable.

I give thanks for dog-eared books, Bibles, and hymnals, from which generations of faithful, questioning, and doubting folks read words of theology, history, and praise.

I give thanks for paraments, altar cloths, and banners that displayed the liturgical year so that we could understand it.

I give thanks for stained glass windows with pictures of Bible stories and names of long-forgotten donors, windows that showed that the Light of Christ can be colorful and energizing.

I give thanks for the baptismal font, capped with a dove, which sat always in the chancel reminding us of the Holy Spirit's presence in our worship and, through baptism, in our lives.

I give thanks for the altar table, where so many holy feasts were blessed by Christ's presence and shared by God's people.

I give thanks for chipped dishes over which holy conversations were held and upon which delicious meals were served.

I give thanks for wrinkled choir robes and sheet music, from which songs of praise poured to praise and lift our souls to our Creator.

I give thanks for items now forgotten, and for a building that housed a century of activities both sacred and ordinary, people in all stages of saintliness and sinfulness, and moments of tradition and transformation. I give thanks for what the building that housed Ada First United Methodist Church was.

But I know that a church is not a building. I know that, even without that beautiful building to house their activities, the church will go on. They will heal. They will find hope. They will rebuild. They will thrive. They will grow. Through God's grace, they will continue to be the faithful, fruitful community I have known them to be. They will journey on with the guidance of the Spirit, and they will be in my prayers, as they always have been.

That's What I Said.

Matthew 16:15: "Jesus said to them, 'But who do you say that I am?'"

You are God in the flesh.

You are a human being who has experienced what I have experienced.

You are God seen face-to-face on earth.

You are a human being who laughed and cried and prayed with friends.

You are God who leaves fingerprints on our lives.

You are a human being who ate and drank and shared a table with strangers.

You are God who challenged the religious and political leaders.

You are a human being who embraced outcasts and sinners.

You are God who has existed through all time.

You are a human being who died a human death.

You are God who breathed life into creation.

You are a human being who rose from the dead.

You are God who reaches out with grace and mercy.

You are a human being who taught us to love and forgive.

You are God and human, the bridge between God's kingdom and fallen earth.

You are Creator and Savior.

You are Love Incarnate.

Amen.

Love Letter

He said to him, " 'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment." - Matthew 22:37-38 NRSV

Dear God,

I love you. Not just for your gifts, though I marvel at the beauty and wonder of your creation and I am thankful. Not just for your word, though I enjoy poring over the Scriptures you have given.

No, I love you for who you are.

You are endlessly patient. I know because you put up with me. You call, and even when I'm not paying attention, even when I intentionally ignore you, you keep nudging my consciousness, trying to reach my heart with your grace.

You are just. While the world shouts, pointing fingers and calling names and pushing agendas, you quietly hold out even scales, measuring everything against your holy standard, and pouring out mercy when we would tip the scales to hatred.

You are compassionate. You hear the cries of the hungry and promise that in your kin-dom all will have enough. You see the oppressed and the downtrodden and promise that you will bring liberation. You feel the pain of the sick and the outcast and promise that someday you will draw all your children into your healing embrace.

You are love. Within yourself, you are perfect mutual love: unity and diversity, three and one, a divine dance. You are love that reaches beyond yourself; you surround and envelop every living thing, you make relationship possible. Even when we would put up barriers and try to keep your love only for ourselves, you reach over around and through our walls and touch all of your creation.

I love you. Please make me more like you. Awaken me to your call. Rouse me to work for your justice. Soften me to share your compassion. But most of all, teach me to love as you love. Fill me up with you, with love, that your Spirit would pour through me and splash joyfully through the lives of everyone I meet.

Amen.

Powerlessness

Hurricane Irene roared through the East Coast and left a lot of us without power. At my house, it went something like this:

6:00pm - 2 Hours without power: I knew we'd lose power, but it's a little scary in the dark with the rain pounding and the wind roaring outside.

8:00pm - 4 Hours without power: I really hope my cell phone battery doesn't die before it's supposed to wake me up in the morning.

6:00am - 14 Hours without power: My lead pastor calls to say that we're having worship this morning, even without power. I groan, not because I don't want to have worship, but because it is SO early and SO dark.

7:00am - 15 Hours without power: Charlie gives me guilt-inducing puppy-eyes when I consider leaving him home alone in the dark after the storm, so I take him with me to church. He stays in my office during worship.

12:00pm - 20 Hours without power: The line at Chipotle is INSANE, but the scene is the same at every restaurant in the area that has power.

5:00pm - 25 Hours without power: I don't want to open the freezer or refrigerator, since I don't want to let the cold out. So I'm faced with non-perishable food options. I begin subisisting on Cheez-Its and Pop Tarts... and I began to notice the similarities between Hurricane-diet and stoner-with-the-munchies diet. (Note: I've never smoked weed... I consider this common pop-culture knowledge.

8:00pm - 28 Hours without power: There is nothing to do except read by candlelight, and my eyes are getting tired. So I'm going to bed at 8:00pm for the first time in years.

8:30am - 40.5 Hours, still no power. I wake up alarmingly rested after 12 hours of solid sleep. I discover that neither my apartment nor my church has power, and I consider moving into Starbucks. But in the end I only stay there for a few hours.

1:00pm - 45 Hours, still no power. I take over a friend's apartment who still has power. I consider becoming a squatter in her place, but I'm pretty sure I don't match her decor.

7:00pm - 51 Hours, still no power. I sit on my balcony, enjoying the cooler autumn-ish air. Without power, the people in my apartment complex have been forced outside. Neighbors are talking to each other and walking their dogs together, and I actually had a conversation with someone from the building next door that I'm pretty sure I've never seen before. I start to think this is actually sort of nice, having community with my neighbors.

10:00pm - 54 Hours STILL no power. I use my laptop to watch a DVD just to avoid going to bed too early. I still go to sleep before midnight.

1:17am - I wake up in a complete state of disorientation when there is suddenly noise and light in my apartment. All at once the lights turn on, the television jolts to life, and the air conditioning begins to whir. Charlie looks at me like, "I KNEW you'd been holding out on me! You totally could have used your opposable thumbs to flip the magic switches and turn the lights on days ago, you've just been doing this to punish me!" I frown at him, turn everything off, and go back to sleep. Because, when you're sleeping, power doesn't matter much.

Rock You Like a Hurricane

This weekend I faced a first in my life: my first hurricane. I wasn't sure how to prepare for the storm, so I started asking around. And the signals were...mixed. The newscasters kept telling us to prepare, to buy batteries and food that we could store and prepare without power, and to fill the bathtub with water in case the water was shut off. They kept claiming that the storm would be terrible and we needed to be prepared for the aftermath. On the other hand, most of my friends and coworkers said that all of this storm talk was exaggerated, that we wouldn't actually lose power or have major issues, and that people were freaking out about nothing.

So, unsure what to do, I didn't really do much to prepare. I figured I'd just eat whatever was around my apartment and make do with the candles I already had. That is, until I started watching the hurricane coverage on TV, and I started to see the storms rolling in and the wind picking up. And I started to worry. So I decided to just run over to my Target and pick up a few essentials.

Target on the morning of a hurricane is surprisingly similar to Target on Christmas Eve. The store is similar: all of the essentials have disappeared. But instead of empty shelves where twinkle lights and stockings should be, there were racks devoid of batteries and shelves emptied of bottled water. It seems that the whole city was out of D-batteries, and most places ran out of bottled water. The pre-hurricane shoppers were very much like Christmas Eve shoppers: frantically rushing around throwing things into empty carts, unable to find what we really want, so we're grabbing whatever we can. Instead of carts full of flashlights, batteries, bottled water, and bread, we fill our carts with scented candles, gatorade, and Pop Tarts. We don't make eye contact with each other, either. We look away in shame and pretend we're not scrambling.

So, with a case of bottled water, a box of Cheez-Its, some Pop Tarts, and applesauce, I returned to my apartment. I got out my candles and lighters, watched a movie, and watched the winds picking up outside my window. Then, a little after 6:00pm, the power went out. That left me with a difficult choice: be in the darkness, or light all the scented candles and overwhelm myself with odors. I chose the latter, and I read a novel by the dim, fragrant candlelight. But with the darkness, I was sleepier than usual, and I went to bed before 9pm.

And by the time I woke up in the morning, the storm had passed. So, my experience of the storm was more of an enforced quiet evening. The aftermath of the storm, though, is another story... for another day.

Newsletters from Home

I believe that all church newsletters carry a drop of grace within them. We who work in the church often bemoan their deadlines and complain about the necessity of writing a column and preparing articles and fitting all the pieces together. But there is something beautiful in the way a church newsletter can gather the flotsam and jetsam of our life together in community.

Today I went to my mailbox and found that my copy of "The Sower" had arrived. "The Sower" is the newsletter from my home church, and to me, it's like getting a letter from an old friend. My heart still catches a little when I see on the back cover my own name with "Rev." in front of it. That title is used for me often, but there is something more powerful about being recognized as a pastor by the people who raised me and taught me to love the church.

"The Sower" is an ordinary church newsletter. It announces upcoming meetings and chronicles the events in the lives of church members. It includes wedding announcements and reports from the trustees, thank you notes and schedules of events. It even gives a list of members' birthdays for the month. But in each of those things, I see grace. The announcements and birthday lists invite all who read it to be a part of this common life, to share their joys and burdens and to care for one another. The finance and trustees reports show what we can do when we work together. Between lines of ordinary text, I read, "There is love here: love for each other and love for God. This is the love that we share lived out."

Perhaps I see that most especially in "The Sower" because it reflects the life of my home congregation. It records the ongoing adventures of a community that is dear to my heart. These are, after all, the people who embraced me from my childhood. This newsletter tells a tiny bit of the stories of the people who taught me The Lord's Prayer and sang along as I stumbled my way through hymns on the piano. These are the people who asked me, week in and week out, about how school was going, who checked in on me when I went away, who sent cookies to me every one of my seven years of higher education. So when I read the church newsletter, I see their faces, I celebrate with their joys, and I mourn with their losses.

Theirs is not a perfect church. There is no such thing as a perfect church. Churches are, after all, made up of ordinary, broken people. But there is a beauty and a grace in this and every church as God draws diverse and imperfect people together and weaves us into one body. There is a power in people loving God, loving one another, and reaching out in love to a hurting world. That is what the church is. And in this newsletter, I glimpse the church.

I don't always see that. Usually when I look at church newsletters, I see them with a critical eye. I am used to going over the newsletter of the church I serve with an editor's eye and a red pen. Perhaps that is why this particular newsletter spoke to my heart so deeply. You see, this June issue of "The Sower" contains the last column by our current pastor, Wayne. And his column was powerful for me, not just because of his beautiful words, but because of the person I know who wrote them.

I remember when Wayne first arrived in our congregation. I had really liked his predecessor, and, as a grumpy junionr high student, I was not ready to welcome someone new. I resented him before he even opened his mouth to preach his first sermon at our church. But Wayne disarmed me with his warm smile and subtle humor. His sermons told stories, wove poetry, and drew together the stories of our community with the events of the world and the narratives of Scripture. I got to know him better over mud and hammers on mission trips. Moreover, Wayne's notes of encouragement mailed to my home, words of wisdom over coffee, and engagement in the life of our small town taught me to understand the intersection of faith and life in new ways. When I came home from college and told Wayne that I had discerned a call to ministry, he responded with joy and an offer of guidance. For all the years after, Wayne and his wife, Fern, lived out that offer. They helped me get connected with the larger church and introduced me to the idea of Annual Conference. They followed up with me to see how the long journey through "the process" was going. They offered suggestions for books to read and courses to take. And when I shared with them my struggles with my home conference and my call to move to a different conference, they supported my decision wholeheartedly.

But the greatest gift Wayne and Fern gave me was their example of ministry with grace, passion, and longevity. They loved the church and community and showed their love through relationships with people and engagement in our structures. They encouraged small, incremental changes in the life of the church that, over more than a decade, yielded powerful new ministries and greater inclusivity. They are not perfect, but for a decade they have loved and striven to show the presence of Christ to our little community. I hope that through my years of ministry I may do the same. I hope that, forty years from now, I will be able to have the same joy and gratitude for the privilege of ministry and the beauty of the church that they show now as they retire.

I rejoiced in the example Wayne and Fern have provided and in the beauty of the church as I read "The Sower" this morning, and particularly as these beautiful words from Wayne's column sank into my heart:
"The gretest rewards of life have been to have been trusted with the vulnerability of persons' lives. You have blessed me with participation in your births and baptisms, your weddings, your divorces, your grievings, your graduations, your retirements; your confessions and your daily mundane lives. At their best, these have been a rehearsal of the trust persons had with wounded lives as they met Jesus. I have been rewarded in seeing the joy you took in the joy and well-being of others; and in seeing your sharing a journey in the valley of the shadows of life. I have been rewarded to see you persist with graceful spirit and effort in stressful, even hostile, situations. This is a sign of Christ's resurrection in you."

Wayne's words remind me, church newsletters remind me: In the church we journey together in grace toward the glory of God. Soli Deo Gloria indeed!