broken things

I’m flying home from a meeting of our General Board of Church and Society (more about this later), in Washington, DC. The flight has been long enough to read a book I’d been wanting to read, and it moved me.

Sara Miles’ Take This Bread honors the mysterious, transformative power of sharing in the body of Christ—communion, wherever it can be found, meeting the hungers of our world. Our faith us bodily—at the center of our worship is Christ’s broken body, giving us life. Church is real when we become the bread.

I’m looking forward to our congregation’s planned community family meals at the Normal Heights church just after Easter. I’m eager and hopeful that they will be communion, too. I’ve been frustrated and disappointed with myself that it’s taken us long to get to this place where we will host them.

But, I remind myself again, that mystery is really, quite completely, beyond our control. This past week, I was playfully and seriously advocating attempts at relinquishing control. (Really, that’s already a given; I just need help remembering not to waste my time seeking after the illusion of control…)

I struggle, though, at knowing what it looks like to press on and to organize, without ever believing I’m in control. I still remember deep frustration with a then-boyfriend who refused to work on things: “It’ll work out if it’s meant to be,” he said, shrugging off my attempts to negotiate real obstacles in our relationship. I don’t ever mean to abdicate responsibility, but I do mean to tap into a confidence, power and hope that doesn’t depend on abilities alone.

At the heart of the difference is my recognition that I’m a part of God’s mystery, and a part of an unfolding story of the Church that is better than I could think up on my own.

Which, it will not surprise some of you to hear, brings me to my frustration with strategic plans, measurable outcomes and annual assessments.

My UM church is anxious about its decline, and aware of the growing burden of maintaining the structures and commitments we have in place. “Ineffective” clergy are often blamed for our problems, as we continue to lose numbers of members, and struggle to employ those we have ordained. We all know folks who we judge to be ineffective, who seem to be doing just enough to get by and wish they could afford to retire. But, really, they’re not the folks around me. The clergy I know well are dedicated, hard-working, imaginative, often-frustrated innovators, doing the best of what they can to be in faithful ministry in a compliated world.

I have this sense that we’ve created a good part of the problem. And, I think our efforts to help clarify the problem have made it worse: I blame our systems of assessment.

Periodic evaluation of our effectiveness is a good thing—self-reflection and conversation with others to talk through the ways we’ve failed and succeeded helps us grow in ministry, and remain faithful to God’s call.

Mostly, though, I think we reduce our serious evaluation to things that are easier to count and further from the heart of what gives us life. We chart changes in attendance and membership, count hours spent in continuing education opportunities, and ask what measurable objectives we have pursued.

Ministry has never seemed to me to be something I could measure in a quantitative sense: the most wondrous, transformative bits defy objective analysis. Like the oft-celebrated heart-warming experience of John Wesley, the best stuff exists just beyond our reach. Sometimes, it takes years to take root. Other times, I get to step into someone’s life just in time to see a dramatic conversion that was years and many earlier communities in the making.

To be asked to reflect on those interactions and then to fill in rather trivial, fact-like details makes me feel like the church doesn’t trust me, and also like the body of Christ has missed the point.

In the end, we have to trust each other—that what we’re doing is a part of something impossible to measure, made real in relationships and lives that cannot be quantified in objective terms. The pressure to “factify”—to reduce the unquantifiable into something that can be carefully and seemingly objectively measured—is constraining us by keeping us focused on things that don’t really matter.

Besides, I’m still on my soapbox about our distraction with anxiety over death of the United Methodist Church, all while we’re preaching freedom from our slavery to sin and death in our communion liturgy and in Christ’s resurrection.  

It's almost Holy Week.  As good a time as I know to think about brokenness, to reflect on what is at the core of our faith and practice and to make a change.  Thoughts?

8 reasons I oppose Proposition 8

On our November ballot here in California, we will be asked whether we support a proposition that would remove the right of same-sex couples to enter into legal marriage.  As a heterosexual, married, Christian woman, I oppose this proposition for many reasons.  Whether you agree with me or not, I would be honored if you'd consider these 8 reasons why I'm voting against it.  In my mind, any one of them is enough reason to vote against this proposal.

1.  This is a matter of legal rights, not a referendum on how religious people should interpret marriage.  As a part of a nation built on ideals like justice and equality, I see no reason to restrict the legal rights of people to enter into the marriage contract with one another.   I would like to live in a California that affords rights, not one that adds clauses into its Constitution to deny them.

2.  This proposition has nothing to do with the rights of homosexual people to have children. Regardless of marital status, gay and lesbian people are already raising children.  I would contend that it does our society good to have children being raised by people who are married--that the commitments made in marriage tend to help create home environments that are more stable, especially because of the way the community beyond the couple understands what it means to be married.  Allowing same-sex couples to continue to marry in California will give greater stability to families, not less.

3.  Heterosexual marriage does not need protection from same-sex marriage.  I do believe that heterosexual marriage needs work in our culture--too many marriages end in divorce.   It is a challenge to succeed in marriage--I struggle with the difficulty of separation during deployment, with my own independence, and much more.  My marriage is not, however, threatened by the marriages of same-gender couples.  I wonder what we believe we're protecting marriage from?

4.  Our understanding of marriage, in the church and under the law, has been continuously evolving.  I celebrate that, as a woman, I enjoy rights to choose my own spouse (as well as the right to choose not to have a spouse and still own property) that have not always been available to women--certainly not always in our biblical tradition.  I also celebrate that marriage does not exist only for the purpose of having children.  I give thanks for the love shared between couples that have chosen not to have children, and between couples that have been unable to have children.  I delight in couples far beyond their child-bearing years who are able to marry.  There is not an unchanged understanding of marriage stretching back through the Bible, nor through our nation's history.  The Supreme Court's decision to extend the rights of marriage to same-sex couples is another change in this evolving history.  There is no one "original" understanding of marriage that we can preserve. 

5.  I have been blessed and enriched by same-gendered couples.  Both as domestic partners and as married couples, they have shown me what mutually-life-giving, committed relationships can look like.  Often persevering through immense challenges, they have demonstrated how married couples can care for each other and strengthen one another.  These couples have been a blessing to our communities, too.  I welcome ways that we can do more to honor committed relationships and let them be an asset to our communities.

6.  Opposing this proposition does not mean that clergy are required to perform same-sex marriages.  As a pastor, I always have the right to refuse to marry a couple.  Opposing the proposition does not compel churches to change their definitions of marriage.   Already, many churches have requirements for marriage in that church--such as requiring both spouses to be members of the church.  Churches can continue to define their own rules for marriage, even without this proposition.

7.  This restriction of rights does not belong in our Constitution.  In my mind, a Constitution exists to provide rights, not take them away.  

8.  I am bothered by the fear-inducing tactics used by supporters of Proposition 8.  The Gospel of Jesus Christ demands that we move past our fears to dare to include more of the world in God's love.  I refuse to be convinced to restrict legal rights to members of our community because I am afraid.    I do believe that there is real evil in the world, and that this campaign is distracting us from work is necessary for God's kingdom.  Over and over, Jesus commanded us to care for the poor.  Never once did Jesus speak about same-sex marriage.   Proponents of this initiative are asking us to be afraid of the wrong thing.  We have a lot of work to do if we want to follow Christ's example of love for our neighbors.  This Proposition will not help us in that work. 

in remembrance

Sharing communion last Sunday, with a congregation divided by our US border fence, reminded me just how much work remains to be done in remembrance of Christ.  Our border much more easily dismembers the human community.

The broken bread, handed through the fence in violation of the US Customs rules our Border Patrol says they're to enforce, became a vivid symbol of our own division.  In sharing it, we mark our belonging together.

It seems to me that whatever border policies we might choose for our national interests are irrelevant to our call to see one another as brothers and sisters in Christ across this fence.   In our Christian practice, if we are going to take Christ's salvation seriously,  we must be willing to share this sacrament across anything that might seek to divide us.

Of course, once you've shared in holy moments together, it's hard to imagine advocating for a policy that would treat others as anything less than people of infinite worth.

I suppose that's part of why I love communion so much: it makes Jesus real.  Sharing the broken bread helps me know and taste that Jesus really meant those wild and crazy things he said.

transformation (worth more than a hill of beans?)

I have a whole bunch of blog posts swimming around in my head.  Mostly, I haven't committed them to actual words yet.  So, in that spirit, I start this post with a picture.  I don't have any deep thoughts to accompany it; I just thought these beans had wonderful colors.  They came out of the garden as I was tearing out the last of the summer garden.

After the help of many friends and a load of compost, the winter garden is now doing its underground magic.  There's something daring about starting with seeds.  It feels much more dangerous and beautiful than seedlings from the nursery.  And it reminds me that garden life starts with dried up, dead things: seeds from old plants and a pile of decaying compost.
Speaking of dying things, or at least, things dying to their previous selves, I've been taking note of the gulf fritillary that love my passionflowers, and enjoying their transformation.  I caught this one in the act of making its cocoon.

Thanks to recent conversations with Colleen, my dad and others, I've been pondering the transformations that may be life-giving for the church.  As I read the communion liturgy, proclaiming that Jesus Christ saves us from "slavery to sin and death," I mourn the way our own, institutional fear of dying seems to occupy much of our attention.  As people of resurrection, I pray that we might trust more (and more fearlessly) in new birth.  

And, as Colleen helped me consider just this morning over coffee, birth is not simple, clean or solitary.  I wonder what it would look like for the church to put more energy into the life-giving, painful, uncontrolled process of helping prepare for new life and new birth?  (Perhaps we should put energy into dying well?)  I suspect our priorities would need to shift a bit, and that we'd need to be open to a considerable bit more uncertainty.

I wonder what our caterpillar is thinking as it forms this cocoon.  Does it have any idea what life might be like on the other side?

crossing over

So, in preparation for this Sunday's worship and sharing the story of Moses leading the people of Israel across the sea, I've been trying to think of other dramatic and transformative water crossings, from the world of film.

So far my list includes:

-this clip from Man from Snowy River where Jim Craig follows the wild horses on down the edge of the ravine and through the snowy river.

-Into the Wild, where Christopher McCandless crosses a river to get to the bus where he makes home in the Alaska wild, and then gets trapped by that same river when it's risen.

-The Mission, where Robert DeNiro's character keeps trying to carry an incredible load of armor and things up the waterfall, as if penance; he finally gets cut free from it.

Who can help me with more?

jazz worship

I've been playing with ideas for how to name and promote jazz worship this November, and I came across this gem.  I couldn't resist posting.  It comes from here.

Several years ago, in my Bible study at the Rescue Mission, the women there talked me into going through Revelation with them.  One day, as we were beginning conversation about end-times, I asked how they thought we'd know if Jesus were coming.   I was imagining we'd have rich conversation about how to discern what's "real."

"There's gonna be trumpets," one woman said, without missing a beat.

I guess she didn't grow up in the church with the sign.

flattening worship leadership

I've been contemplating two ways to make worship leadership and participation more communal.  I've had fun thinking about them, and thought they might be even more fun to think about together, with you:

-Using text messaging to share prayer leadership.  What if, during worship, people to text their prayer, it would appear on our screen, and be shared by the community?  I love the opportunity to share prayers, but feel like our "joys and concerns" time often creates a sense of insiders/outsiders that isn't overly welcoming to new people.  And, it sometimes takes a lot of time.  (I like the idea that texting might push us to say things with fewer characters.)  

I think something like Twitter would be cool, but I'm not much of a tweeter, so I don't know if it's best; if people have to create an account, that would be lame.  My other current best idea is to ask people to text message to an email address; it could be received by the computer running MediaShout with our projector, and cut and paste into the presentation.  I'm sure churches are doing this already, but it's certainly not the norm in ours.  I think it would be nice to think about using text msgs for praying, though.

-Xerocratic worship leadership.  "Xerocracy" is my new favorite word.  It comes from Critical Mass bike riding communities, and refers to the practice of making decisions based on who has the convincing photocopy; the hierarchy-free Critical Mass community apparently chooses its rides by xerocratic decision.  So, I'm thinking, what would xerocratic worship leading look like?  What if folks just showed up, and the person with the best worship design would lead?

Dangerous to the power of clergy like me, I know.

But, as I explored the idea on Wikipedia, it seemed to sound a lot like one of my favorite moments at General Conference this past May: when we elected a new group of Judicial Council members based on the unofficial, last-minute, communal and authentic hallway networking of a bunch of delegates, who had $20 to spend a Kinko's to help make their consensus known to others.  There was no name on the flyer, which was passed among delegates; it honestly came from no official group.  Xerocratic-style.  And, there, it prevailed over much better-funded efforts to keep our Judicial Council dominated by the same folks who brought us exclusive and Spirit-limiting decisions for the past 4 years.

I wonder how to help cultivate that spirit of investment, participation, authenticity to the people involved and innovative revelation in our weekly worship...

(I'm also excited to be headed out on my first Critical Mass ride this Friday!)

a few words to help me organize the week ahead

The NYTimes had a piece on Jon Stewart this weekend, noting that he's among the most trusted sources of news in our country. I think that doesn't scare me at all. Because, with good comedy, he's taking us closer to important issues than most main-stream news is willing.

I particularly liked the last bit of a passage quoted from him, at the end of an explanation of why they're interested in tough subjects:

"Everyone here is working too hard to do stuff we don’t care about." -Jon Stewart

the state of marriage

I've been pondering the meaning of marriage more intently than usual in the last few months.   At General Conference for our United Methodist Church, my sub-committee looked at revisions to our definition of marriage.  Here in California, our Supreme Court's decision has broadened marriage to include same-sex couples.  And, most recently, I've been pondering the implications of the marriage proposal on last week's Bachelorette finale.

I don't know if it's wise to attempt deep interpretation of the Bachelorette, but the absence of the words "marry" or "marriage" in the proposals of the winning suitor struck me as strange, on a day when I'd gathered earlier with other clergy to talk about how we might respond to the legalization of same-sex marriage in our state, even as our church prohibits clergy from conducting such services or hosting them in our churches.

As many same-sex couples make the move to claim legal marriage, a TV show aimed at arranging marriages features people who avoid the term.  Jesse, the winning suitor, chose other words for describing the commitment he wished to enter into, both as he asked the Bachelorette's father's blessing and as offered her a diamond ring from bended knee.

I can imagine many plausible reasons for his avoidance of the words of "marriage," fear of the conventional commitment it involves certainly being among them (for an unconventional, snowboarding suitor, especially).  I wonder if "spending forever with" sounds more genuine in a culture where marriages don't last a lifetime as often as they do.  

All of which is a stunning reminder to me that we heterosexuals don't need to worry about same-sex couples destroying marriage.  We've done a pretty fine job on our own, I think.  (And, for the record, I'm not thinking that shows like the Bachelorette do us any favors.)

All this came on the heels of scripture lessons in our Sunday worship that tell of Rebekah and Isaac's engagement, in Genesis 24.  A biblical model for arranging marriage that's far from what I count as desirable.  Not wanting his son to marry a Canaanite, Abraham's servant prays that he might meet a woman at a well who, by drawing water for him and his camels, would prove her worthiness as a bride for his master's son.

  

If we were really interested in protecting marriage, I suggest we spend some time honestly talking about what we know as good (and, even, holy) about marriage. I think too many things are too easily confused.

Separated from Matt by his deployment, I'm aware of how grateful I am for the support we get from so many others in our marriage.  Clearly, I don't know what our relationships would be like if we were not married, but I know that I am thankful for the ways our being married helps sustain us and our relationship.  Marriage helps name and define our relationship to the wider community.  It means that the Army communicates with me, and that I receive opportunities for benefits.  More importantly, it has meant that a whole community of people, many of whom were present as we made covenant with one another, do things to help us sustain our relationship in the midst of many challenges.  And, that the two of us see God as having a role in sustaining us in this covenant.

My hope is that our relationship is also a blessing to the community.  I sense ways that we strengthen and improve one another.  The challenge of sharing in lifelong covenant with another person demands I work at cultivating skills and grace that make me a better person.  I believe that marriages, like other commitments made (formally and informally) among humans can be of tremendous benefit to us all.

I do believe that God created humans in such a way that we're enriched and improved by our belonging together in relationships of commitment.  As our church's Social Principles already state, I do not believe that marriage is essential.  Or that marriage exists for the purposes of procreation.  I celebrate marriages with or without children.

And, certainly, I celebrate that marriage is no longer a transaction of property, transferring ownership of a young woman from her father to her new husband (though lingering insistence on including a "giving away" of the bride suggest we've not totally abandoned this...).

I look forward to a day when our states and our church will both recognize marriage between people of the same gender.  And, when we'll let these relationships of commitment strengthen us all as we struggle for justice, peace and other such good things that serve God.

I also look forward to a clearer cultural understanding of what marriage is.  Something beyond diamond rings and elaborate parties.  Something that gives us an idea of how we're called to shape our lives around commitment beyond our immediate selves, and to be a part of relationships that serve the broader community.

what a long strange trip

Since I posted last (sorry for the delay) it's been a bit of a wild ride. I was away at our annual gathering of clergy and lay leaders from UM churches in the area, sweltering in Redlands' heat. I love Annual Conference; despite the frustrations that come with it, I deeply treasure the time together with friends. This year, I definitely noticed the absence of two way-cool folks who had been my roommates in years past (Krista in Germany and Erika in pregnancy-land). But, of course, I'm quite grateful for the new and deeper connections I made with others. This time together is a wonderland for an extrovert like me.

And, I'm feeling good about my place in the church--deeply honored, even. The Reconciling Ministries folks gave me their annual award for my role at General Conference, advocating for a more full inclusion of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered folks. That's a deep and unexpected honor. And, I'm now the Chair of our Order of Elders. Plus, my name got lifted up with a few others as a potential person to be endorsed as a candidate for election of Bishop. A crazy idea, which I've decided to read as lovely affirmation of my leadership. It's nice to feel valued, especially by a group of people I respect and look up to so much.

Riding high on all that, I came home to a nice visit from my brother, who's passing through in his summer travels. We don't get nearly enough time together these days, as he's all the way in Pennsylvania.

Unfortunately, while we were having dinner at my in-laws home, someone broke into our house again, this time stealing a bunch of stuff, including laptops belonging to each of us: my brother, my roommate and me. This time, it feels less like a disturbing personal violation, but more frustrating. I'm tired of this.

I'm trying to decide if my lack of a sense of violation speaks well of my reaching a place where possessions are not the most important thing, or whether I'm just numb from having too much to deal with. Happily, I got a call from Iraq today; talking with Matt certainly adds more comfort and assurance.

Plus, the banana tree in the backyard flowered, which means it's fixin' to make real bananas. And tomatoes are forming all over, growing and tempting us with hints of yellowy color as they promise to turn red.

upon reflection

Now that I've started getting more than 5 hours of sleep per night, some of the craziness of General Conference seems, well, crazier.

Take, for instance, the fear-mongering arguments floated for why we should preserve a pastor's right to deny membership to particular people (in recent times, a gay man...).  Folks suggested that, unless we preserved this right, we might have Klan members in our churches.  (As if we haven't already.)

I've been imagining this possibility, and it seems to me that this is exactly what church is for.  For sinners and all those who need help being made perfect in love.  For people who want to claim new identity in the body of Christ--membership in the sense of belonging together, flaws and all, as we seek to live into our calling from God.  What better place is there for us sinners and folk who carry hatred and prejudice in our hearts?

(I should also say, incidentally, that I don't label homosexuality as sin, so their arguments seem especially absurd.  But, just for the sake of argument, let's run with them...)

Denying membership to people seems to me to make church into an "irrelevant social club."  That is, if we have to have things figured out and straightened out in order to join, we become like a club of folks who've earned membership by good behavior.

I prefer to think of church as a place where we belong from the beginning, whose welcome comes from the God of infinite grace, who has power to transform us all into something more loving and beautiful than we've been on our own.

The "irrelevant social club" argument was given on the floor as the scary image of what we might become if we open up the possibility of redefining marriage to include same-gendered couples.  But I think we had it in totally the wrong place!  We're like an irrelevant social club when we suggest that God's including love and transforming grace aren't big enough for some people--that we need to keep them outside of the church community or we might be destroyed.

That's absurd.

So, here for your viewing pleasure is a picture of me on the big screen at GC, looking a bit like a trouble-identifier, I think.  My new friend Steve from NC emailed it to me.  ;)

how do we get there from here?

I'm back from my trip to General Conference and to see Matt before his deployment, and I'm wishing I knew how to get to somewhere else: away from this horrible war in Iraq, and toward a church that gets over its homophobia and finally, fully includes and affirms gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered folks.

Both seem too often driven by fear--fear we've been tricked into.  And now we have to live in this meantime, trying to get to a better way.

more moments from general conference

Yesterday, our votes to retain existing language about homosexuality were depressing.  It would be hard to choreograph a more wrenching moment that we had on the floor: after the vote, as reconciling folks stood in the balconies, the conference business went on to a report from the judicial council.  As the Secretary read the long report, people slowing began standing on the floor in solidarity.  And then voices from the balcony began singing "Jesus Loves Me," and it moved around the hall.  The layers of sound were incredible--the drone of a church mired in long technicalities, detailing out the ways in which its bodies would protect their own power, layered over voices from the margins, singing an affirmation of God's love.  Powerful.

Another powerful moment was when Ellen Johnson Sirleaf spoke.  It was truly beautiful, hopeful and a wonderful symbol of the best fruits of good mission and ministry, empowering people like her to be about the work of transforming the world.  As she leads Liberia in the wake of too many years of violent rule, she's building hope.
Here's our friend JJ getting interviewed by UMNews.  It's a good thing they interviewed today, after some healing and hopeful actions by Reconciling folks and by our Bishops.  We all had much better things to say today.
And, I ought to say thanks to Ken, who's been helping me start my days with a Texas waffle.  Who knew: they have waffle makers here that make state-shaped waffles.  Incredible.  

at the end of the day

It all looks a little fuzzy and confusing.

My question of the night is: why haven't we come up with a better way of moving through legislative proposals than Roberts Rules of Order?  There's gotta be something better.

Anyhow...here's a shot of one of my favorite passages in the book of proposed legislation.  It's a little blurry, but maybe that adds to the effect.  I took the shot around 10:30 tonight, before we spent another hour slogging on.
Here's the bus ride back to my distant hotel.

Now, sleep.

But first: a happy birthday shout-out to ForeverKC.  (Recognizing that, technically, it's not her b-day anymore, at least in Texas.  The party in California could still be going on.  But it would have to be without her, since she's partyin' down here at the ol' General Conference, too.)

My little bright moment of the day was the 10 minutes in which we took a "recess" from our formal meeting for the purpose of genuine discussion.  The tone of the meeting changed in our little sub-committee.  My desires that we would create more space in our definition of marriage and of what healthy, holy sexual relationships might be didn't come true, but the conversation was much better.  

I'll take what I can get...

Here's hoping for the Spirit's movement tomorrow!

looking back and ahead

I just came in from walking some friends out to the gate (after a lovely evening of "Idol Gives Back" and some homemade tangelo sorbet), and the two guys hanging out next door yelled over that our place is looking nice.  We should have more like ours on the block, they said.

All of which I interpreted as a way of saying that it's nice to live in a neighborhood where people invest in making it a beautiful, delightful, life-giving place.  There's a new billboard on the corner about the pain caused by gun violence, which reminds us also of the pain already caused by murders on our block.  

So, I feel like tonight is a good time to celebrate our house.  As a sign of hopefulness for more beautiful things that might be cultivated in the community.  Check out how far we've come since we moved in:

I've been excited about real progress we're making toward opening a coffeehouse in the neighborhood--a place for our church to practice hospitality, and for community to gather around tasty, hot beverages.  Tomorrow, we're going to embark on our first real look at some real estate.   Kinda cool to think how things might just grow, as we seek to figure out what non-traditional presence of "church" might be most needed and useful in this crazy, diverse community.

It's good to be here.

a dream about general conference

I've been spending more and more time thinking about our United Methodist General Conference lately, trying to prepare myself. I really do mean to find a multi-vitamin I can start taking now, in an effort to establish some kind of baseline health to prepare myself for the physical trial of 10 days of 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. (at least) meetings and worship and gatherings. In a strange city, staying in a hotel that is annoyingly far from the convention center where we'll meet, while eating the food that's available in such circumstances.

Besides how to prepare myself physically, I've been obsessing over wardrobe choices. And trying to get myself into faithful, resilient and grace-filled attitudes.

So now seems like a good time to share my dream for General Conference. I alluded to it before, but here it is, in long form:

On or about day 9, exhausted from long days of conferencing and stressed by the absence of a day of sabbath, the assembly will grow weary.  Lifeless, even.  Like a convention center of dry bones.  As if the wheels of our machinery were clogged by the mud of too many confusing counter-proposals, lost in motion upon motion in the intricacies of Roberts Rules of Order, our assembly will slowly turn to a halt.  No one will move, and no one will quite understand what's going on or know how to move forward.  At that moment, in the shear silence, something like the rush of a mighty wind will suddenly startle us, bringing our tired bones to life.

"What was that?" my neighbor will ask.  "Did I miss a vote?"  

"I don't know what it was," I'll respond, "but it sure felt good."

All of a sudden, the movement of the Holy Spirit will have lifted the wheels of the denomination from our bog, and set us on a rock.  Suddenly, mysteriously freed from the conversation we'd felt embedded in, we'll know how to use the gracious work of Jesus Christ to free and embolden our members and congregations in ministry.  Freed from the bonds of hurtful language, of restrictive rules and judgmental attitudes, we'll feel the indwelling of the Spirit, and she will compel us to go outside.  To do the work of the church in the world, and to love God and all our neighbors boldly.

Then, we'll start to see God's kingdom ever more clearly.  Folks who had been known for their opposition to one another will reconcile with a gentle embrace.  All God's children--gay, straight, old, young, rich, poor, from all over the world and of all different colors--will know that they belong as a blessed and useful part of the body of Christ, and will know that they need every other one of those people who had seemed so different from them.   The United Methodists who work for Caterpillar and the General Board of Church and Society will together instigate a parade; led by children from Israel and Palestine, every in the parade will together use tractors and bulldozers to prepare fields in which everyone--everyone--in the area will plant vines and fig trees that they will enjoy, and no one will make them afraid.  People will happily give up their power to others, inviting the least among us to choose how we will use our resources, and, like those people at Pentecost, we will share, as anyone has need.

And the world will never be the same, once it has tasted and seen how good, how powerful, how transformative the amazing grace and Spirit of our God can be.  

That's my dream.

easter mosaic

Just cause you asked (okay, so just Deb asked), here's the mosaic we made in worship on Easter.  It was fun smashing the old plates, and fun to put them together, too.  

This is the before-grout pic:

And after-grout.
At first, I was kinda bummed that it's hard to make out the cross, but I've grown to think I really like the way the cross is broken apart, sent out, re-made with our pieces.

(We used a water-based liquid-nails-like-but-less-toxic adhesive from the hardware store to glue the pieces on individually, so we didn't have to figure out how to spread mortar during worship, or keep in wet.  I'm pretty happy with how it all worked--remarkably smooth for involving 140 people in creating it during a "regular" hour-long worship gathering...  The lumpiness added significant challenge for my grouting work later, but I don't think it ended up too bad.  It's a bit lumpy, though--so it wouldn't really work well for a table surface.)

4 little thoughts

This Sunday night, my mind catches these three (okay, four) things:

-How did I never notice that there's a $.93 store on my street?  Ninety-three cents!?!?  I gotta believe this odd amount means that, with tax, everything is exactly a dollar.  Which makes it feel like a dollar store in a way that most aren't.  But kudos to them for unabashedly marketing it for just what it is: a $.93 store.  I love my neighborhood.

-Church community can be really beautiful.  There was a really nice moment for me in worship today, in the midst of one of our periodic bluegrass banjo-driven Sundays.  While singing "Will the Circle Be Unbroken?" the background images were a loop of stills from various pieces of church life that I put together a couple of years ago.  I noticed three beloved people who have died since making the loop; instead of feeling awkward, it felt really lovely, like we were in an unbroken circle, indeed.

-Our anemone moved this week.  I didn't know anemones could move.   Noticing it not in its usual location gave me a bit of a scare: I'm a little insecure about my ability to be faithful in aquarium custody during this deployment.  I worried something had happened.  Thieves, again, perhaps?  Rationally, breaking in to our house to steal an anemone seemed absurd; I'm not always given, immediately, to rationality.  But apparently, especially when their living conditions become adverse (as happens when I get a bit lazy in adding new water to the aquarium and the pumps and filters begin to create more splashing bubbles near the surface), anemones can pick up and relocate.  Somehow, that seems really hopeful to me.  I love resilience.  I also like the little alcove the anemone has claimed as home (and, consequently, the clown fish, too).  It feels cozy.

-Thieves, however, have found my dear husband's laptop.  How sad is it when someone's stealing computers and ipods out of the tents of Army Reservist training for deployment to Iraq?  That's just wrong.  And pretty sad that the personal belongings of folks in the military are not safe while they're in the U.S., on base.  The Army should give them a way to keep their things secure...it's not like they're getting paid so much they can just write off these things.

potential

I spend the first part of today studying and discussing proposals that will come to our church's General Conference next month--suggestions of how to change the church for the good.  (Not all suggestions seem to think that the same changes would be good...)

And, this evening, I've been studying and scheming about which seeds to plant in my garden.  I've narrowed it to:

2 kinds of corn, 4 kinds of beans, 2 melons (even though I know my soil is mostly clay and they'd be happier in sand), 3 pumpkins, 2 kinds of zucchini, okra, 2 eggplants, leeks, turnips, chard, spinach, lettuce and some herbs.   (Did you know that you can grow a watermelon with ORANGE flesh?!?)

Perhaps seed packet descriptions and petitions to change the church aren't so different: hopeful descriptions of possibility that may or may not actually take root in beautiful ways.

(This is making me ponder, a little too deeply, what might be the church equivalent of the nasty little horned bugs that like to eat my plants.)

There are these very brief little "rationale" statements after General Conference petitions that have about the same depth as seed descriptions.  (That is, they tell you about the lovely orange flowers but not about the plants nasty habit of spreading itself all through your garden.  Or its susceptibility to powdery mildew.  Or its demand for a whole lot of water.)

So, here's hoping we'll have the wisdom to wade through all these pages of legislation and find what will grow the Kin-dom of God!  I'm sure thankful to have companions on this journey.

like cream without its cookies...

My sister-in-law came to hang out the other day.  We joined some other friends in a rousing game of Cranium, and then a little RockBand action.  And ate ice cream.  Thing is, someone forgot to put the cookies in the Cookies and Cream container we bought.  For real.

All of which tempts me to muse about how, now that Matt's deployed, I feel like cream that's missing its cookies.   

I hope that sweet metaphor doesn't make you want to toss your cookies.

In other news, I'm grateful for the lenten group I've been meeting with at church.  It's an odd mix of people, but we've gotten to a place that's beautiful and tender.  It's a little bit like I hope church community will always be--a place to take this stuff seriously, and to really struggle with that means.  All the while knowing that somebody's got your back.  It's not like any other class I've led here before--a bit more like retreat community, but not even exactly like that.  Refreshing.

Almost as energizing as laughter over a birthdays cake (not a typo--it was for 2 people) in the office today, as momentum began to gather for an idea I shelved a while ago: worship using ikea-style pictograms as liturgy.  My dear coworkers thought it would be fun to illustrate the 10 commandments with pictograms.  (I thought it all sounded a little naughty.  I mean: the international sign for "do not commit adultery"!?!?)  Sacraments might be easier.

But, who are we kidding.  I have no time for pictograms.  I have 1500 pages of petitions to General Conference to be reading.  Like, I suppose, most things that are worth doing, I had no idea what I was getting into when I registered myself as someone willing to be elected to our delegation.  

My new hope: we'll be so buried in paperwork and worn out from days upon days of plenary gathering (with no day off in the middle--hey: isn't Sabbath one of those 10 commandments?) that we won't know how to block the Holy Spirit when she blows through the Fort Worth Convention Center.  Who knows what might be in store for the United Methodist Church?!

And, who knows where those cookies ended up...