I'll Keep On

I'll keep on.  We listened to this song on our Wesley mission trip over spring break.  It spoke to us because were were exhausted from early mornings and long subway rides.  This evening the chorus of this song was helping me finish week 9 day 2 of this running program I'm trying hard to stick with.  The past two runs (well more like dragging myself) are 40 minutes.  That's a really long time for me to try to run with this tall girl body of mine.  The last six minutes seem to be the hardest part, and they seem to last at least twenty minutes longer than they should.  "I'll keep on....I'll keep on."  It popped into my head and helped me finish.

I'll keep on seems to be the theme of my environment these days.  For my students there are three weeks of school left.  Keeping on for them means finishing up projects, papers, and tests.  They're focused on summer jobs and securing internships.  At Wesley we are working on next years roster for leadership and already thinking ahead to what will happen in August when we have that exciting opportunity to start a new church (again and again).  

The Wesley House Board of Directors met yesterday.  We spend time sharing where God has been present in our lives.  I love that part, because so often we get caught up in the business part of things that we don't just celebrate God.  God is moving up here in this ministry.  Students are taking on new tasks, leaps of faith in sharing their gifts or stretching their comfort zones.  Even in these last few weeks we have had new students attend and "stick" with us.  I truly believe these are little sacred gifts in the midst of the weariness that comes from a 7-day/week ministry including two major mission trips for the last nine months.  I know it's the end of the year because I keep hearing my name being called even when nobody is there.  It's in my ears!  

When we start to really reflect on the facts from the last two years at the Wesley House we all come away with this deep understanding that God is up to something huge.  We are so challenged by the scarcity mentality of our WMI Conference that it's easy for me to get to a very negative space.  Everyone in conference leadership of this great denomination that I love and serve is so afraid, so focused on the numbers adding up that they're missing out on the power and might of what is happening with our college kids.  Where have most of the young clergy come from the last ten years?  Campus ministry.  And my treasurer challenges me with the question, "Do you believe that God will provide?"

In case you didn't know, our conference ministry shares pay for the salaries of our five WMI campus ministers.  I'm an expensive director because I'm an ordained elder and have to be on the conference insurance plan.  This year that will leave a couple thousand dollars for us to put toward the costs of running our buildings.  All of our programming expenses we are raising through covenant partnerships with local churches and people.  The problem is that in the next year our conference leadership is proposing a 40% reduction in funding.  Nothing says "we don't want you here" like cutting a ministry's funding by nearly half.  

In the meantime your Wesley Directors are being radically accountable to what we do.  We document nearly ever moment of time we spend with students.  We relay numbers of active participants in every single event.  We spend our time planning worship, offering pastoral care, searching for funding sources, connecting with local churches, drinking coffee and laughing with students, and crying out for someone in conference leadership to recognize that this is good and right and necessary for the very survival of our beloved UMC.  And then we are subtly told that it's not enough as our funding decreases and we are threatened though our "output" increases.  

My identity is wrapped up in this vocation.  Who I am is a United Methodist.  My theology is rooted in the principles of grace, mercy, and love.  I believe in what John Wesley was hoping to accomplish....a movement, not a religion.  And now I find myself in this heartbreaking place.  My colleagues and I are literally kicking the walls - not because of the lack of money - but because the very system that defines how we live out God's call on our lives is so broken, so angry, so passive-aggressive and short-sighted that we are choosing to perpetuate the broken power-hungry system rather than minister to the very generations that will carry our beloved UMC beyond the next 20 years.  

My soul has wrestled with this tension all year.  For the first time in my life I've questioned my loyalty to my church.  But here's the thing....in the midst of this nastiness I am overwhelmed with God's movement in the lives of my students.  In the midst of wondering if our doors will close we are stepping out to create a food pantry for the university.  In the midst of the scream of "not having enough" we receive a check in the mail.  Surrounded by the overwhelming frustration of trying to prove viability God gives us life, God gives us more students than we can handle, God gives us the ability to see beyond the now and into the future.  

So we keep on.  We keep sharing the stories, praying for new opportunities for ministry, embracing the young adults who are in the midst of figuring out faith, and life, and church.  I want my denomination to be a place like the Wesley House.  I want all pastors to have colleagues like I do, who are steeped in creative ministry ideas, who are silly and kind and brilliant.  Most of all I want to live out this call in a system that has integrity, faith, and hope. 

I wonder how many of your lives have been touched by a campus ministry.  I wonder what it would look like for all of us to get up on the floor of annual conference and share those stories.  I wonder what our denomination would be like if none of us had ever experienced the care of a campus pastor or young adult camp counselor.  I wonder....and I keep on.

Stubborn

Hey, it's Palm Sunday!  I've always loved it, how about you?  Palm Sunday means kids waving palms processing around the church, it means singing songs we only get to sing once a year, it means excitement and celebration.  My favorite telling of the story is from the Gospel of Luke (chpt. 19).  I love it because the disciples and everyone on the streets are cheering so loud that it makes the Pharisees angry.  They tell the Jesus and his friends to be quiet and Jesus explains that even if they were quiet the rocks would cry out.  I love it!  I love the idea that even the rocks will cry out in praise because Jesus coming into town is that important, that exciting, that awe-inspiring! It always makes me reflect on the role of praising God in my life.  

Today I heard a wonderful sermon on the role of the donkey-giver in the Palm Sunday story.  As I was listening I got to thinking about this donkey.  I get the significance of the donkey in the story as another reminder of Christ's humility.  I get that it would have seemed absurd to the people for their King to come riding into town on it, that it would have made them celebrate all the more that this King was like them....a King for the people!  But then I get to thinking about the donkey.  I'm no cowgirl, but I'm pretty sure that riding a donkey through town in a crowd of people might not go so well.  

I rode a donkey once.  I'm pretty sure it was an act of animal cruelty, but it was to raise funds for something.  I was in high school and it was donkey basketball.  My donkey literally went to the circle in the center of the court and stopped.  He wouldn't move forward or backward.  He was just done.  I tried everything I could think of, only to have him drop his head down and send me to the floor.  I think he was mad that he was supposed to carry around all 5'11" of me.  It became a cycle of getting on, standing still, getting thrown off....getting on....and so on.  He was stubborn.  

I'm stubborn too.  I've been trying really hard lately to be more focused on God's presence in all situations and less on what I want/desire.  I am pretty used to controlling things in my life, and with a great ambition to succeed and for my ministry to succeed I sometimes forget that it's not about being perfect, it's about trusting God and having faith.  This seems to be a lesson I learn repeatedly.  Maybe I'm more like the donkey than I want to be, too stubborn to realize how much God is at work in the details, how each person I encounter has a story that will now be intertwined with mine if only I slow down long enough to let it.  I've also been realizing lately that if we do our best to 'bloom where we're planted' we might be surprised at what God can do.  Rather than always looking ahead to the next big thing, or trying to do something huge to make the world a better place I really believe it's about doing our best where we are, right now.  

Jesus had much more to deal with than a stubborn donkey, he had to constantly deal with stubborn people who didn't want to change, who thought he was too radical, too different.  He didn't follow the rules the way the religious leaders would have liked.  He healed on the Sabbath, spent time with the untouchables, and didn't seem to get discouraged in the face of adversity.  He loved people.  He loved ALL people.  And that is why there was a parade when he rode into town...and a cross waiting for Him at the end of the week.  

If we really want to be like Jesus we can't play it safe.  We can't always be looking for a better church, more money, more power.  If we really want to join in the parade shouting "Hallelujah!  Hosanna in the highest!" we can't be quiet about loving radically.  If we love like Jesus we will be embraced and celebrated in the midst of nasty people who aren't willing to change or embrace the new things God is doing in our midst.  If we want to be like Jesus we must bloom where we're planted.  In the midst of the known God interrupts with Jesus-size-opportunities.  In the midst of the stubborn, wanting-things to-be-a-certain-way-situations, we have to trust the leading of the Spirit more than our own desires or experiences.  

So tonight I'm praying that I'm more like the cheering crowd and less like the donkey.  How about you?  

I'm afraid I'm excited!

Friday is the day our Wesley House mission team heads out to NYC.  It's going to be quite the trip as we come face to face with the reality of homelessness and hunger in the city.  It's going to challenge us to pray with people we've never met.  There's definitely some anxiety brewing these days as we finish up the final details and pack our bags.  It's exciting.  It's a bit terrifying, I suppose.  

I've always loved playing sports.  Part of my love is rooted in this same exciting, fearful tension.  Getting out on the basketball court was so exciting, but there was always a little bit of fear in the mix too, especially as you looked over to the tallest player on the other team.  In volleyball I was pretty much terrified to play in the back row, knowing that I'd have to pass the ball and never being totally sure it would go the way I wanted it to.  But it was SO exciting to be in the front row and be able to pound the ball back in the other team's faces.  (That doesn't sound too pastoral, does it!)  Joy, excitement, and a little bit of fear.  

I imagine the early followers of Christ were filled with this same mix of emotions and adrenaline.  It must have been quite thrilling and a little scary to journey closely with Jesus, or to be a part of the growing movement of Jesus-followers.  Things were certainly tense as the Pharisee's frustrations erupted and tensions grew.  But imagine the sheer joy of the paralytic who could walk, the blind man who could see, the sick who were healed!  

When we choose to live a life of faith in Christ we too encounter many tensions.  In the midst of the most joyous experiences, transforming connections with the Holy Spirit, and sacred moments of worship we are also aware of a world filled with greed, sickness, and death.  We cannot escape the tensions, we are called to be faithful in their midst.  We are called to take those leaps of faith, to trust in God, to rest on those foundation-experiences of Christ's movement in our lives.  We are called out of those comfort zones into the often scary unknown.  

I am excited about the experiences we will have in NYC on this mission trip, but I am even more excited to watch as my student's lives are changed because they willingly step out of their comfort zones.  I realized today that while I have always found my role as a pastor to be a both challenging and wonderful, this gig as a Wesley directly definitely has been the most challenging "job" I've ever had.  At the same time however, the challenges of the job come alongside the greatest movement of the Spirit I've ever experienced.  God's really working in these young lives and it's pretty darn amazing.  

How are you being challenged to step out of your comfort zones?  Where is God calling you to take a leap of faith?  How might the unknown actually offer a time of strength and excitement?  

Let's take the leap.....

Breathe.

Today being a pastor meant sweeping and mopping floors, cleaning closets, grocery shopping, cooking dinner, preparing for and leading worship, and lots of praying.  Sometimes my days aren't filled with lots of Holy Spirit moments that move mountains.  But it's in these days that I realize how blessed I am to be serving where I do.  It's ok to wash dishes because it means that people have found a meal at the Wesley House.  It's good that the floors are gritty from salty sidewalks because it means that people have found a warm place to study and hang out.  It's ok that the heat is turned up too high upstairs because it means that someone needed a warm place to take a nap and they found that on the couch in our worship space.  

I am reminded often that we live in the Holy Spirit's movement.  These everyday tasks are done with our lungs filled with it, we breathe it in and out.  It is the movement of God in us and around us.  This helps ground me when I get to overthinking things that I can't control.  It helps me stay open and loving during tough conversations and situations.  

The song above is one that we sang in worship tonight.  It's a great song, hope you like it!  As I came home tonight I turned on the debate.  What a fiasco.  I marvel at this process, at the statements that are made, at the people rising up to support Donald Trump.  What is our world coming to?  Yikes. 

And again I am reminded that God is alive, we can have hope for the future.  Thanks be to God. 
And as the song says, "All the Earth will shout your praise, our hearts will cry, these bones will sing.....Great are you Lord!"  I long for that day, how about you?

Blessed are the flexible.

At the Wesley House we often say our motto is: "Blessed are the flexible."  I think maybe this should have been one of the Beatitudes.  Something like "Blessed are the flexible, for they shall live a life drama-free."  To find the ability to be flexible in situations can sometimes be really difficult, especially when in our heads we might be saying, "If only they'd listen to me,"  or "my way of doing this would be so much better."  

I wrote recently about our "Alternative Spring Break" Mission Trip to NYC.  These spring break trips are really important to our mission and ministry.  They not only help to open up student's perspectives by visiting a new place and meeting new people, but they allow for intense worship and team-building opportunities.  It is sort of like a spiritual-growth retreat on steroids.  It works.  When we return we are exhausted but we are ready to share about what we experienced and bring back the same passion for service to our campus and community.  For me this trip has meant a ton of planning...and an intentional focus on being flexible and trusting in God.  

Upon returning from Haiti and beginning our new semester in January I received a call that the church that had agreed to host our trip would now be unable to do so.  WHAT?!  You see, finding an inexpensive place for 25 people to stay in NYC was extremely difficult, not to mention the rest of the project-planning and travel plans.  Just when I was ready to begin looking for a different location I remembered that I'd forgotten something pretty important.  

Woe to those who go to great depths    to hide their plans from the Lord,who do their work in darkness and think,    “Who sees us? Who will know?”  Isaiah 29: 15

This Scripture has been a part of our small group study this week.  It is amazing to me, that though I believe God is a part of our very being, I often get to a place of operating on my own.  I can get so busy working for God that I forget to include God.  Can you say, "CONTROL FREAK?"

Right at the end of my mission trip NYC rope I just did a quick Google search and ended up talking with a non-profit that sets up trips like this.  Lo and behold they had a group cancel that day and just the right size of space opened up.  They've planned every detail of a trip that is going to be amazing, uncomfortably challenging, and rooted in prayer at every single detail.  

Lesson learned again...talk with God first.  If we share the desires of our hearts with God first before we make plans we may just encounter something far beyond what we think can happen.  Blessed are the flexible that can trust in a God that cares about even the smallest things in our lives.  

What are you so in control of that you've forgotten to let God in?  

My prayer for those of us who can own our control-freak natures is this:  May the God of 
abundant freedom show us how to release our control, deepen our trust, and live freely into the potential God has for us!

Trust.

Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love,

for I have put my trust in you.

Show me the way I should go,

for to you I entrust my life.    

Psalm  143:8

Tonight at pub theology we talked about trust. In these days of constant information overload it is interesting to think about who/what we trust.  It is always fun to talk about these things with my students who have a much different experience of technology than I do, and probably much different than those of you over 50 years of age.  When I was growing up I never wanted a cell phone, knew what text messaging was all about, or had a Facebook page to update.  My friends found out what I was up to when I got to school in the morning or while we were getting ready to play sports or just hang out.  It didn't matter to me how many "likes" a photo got or who was saying what about things.  Our identities these days can get pretty wrapped up in all of this false-publicity.  It is easy to place our trust in these more shallow opinions of others rather than taking seriously the development of friendships and relationships. 

In addition to all of this we hear over and again stories of senseless violence, lives taken too soon and we begin to wonder who we can really trust.  We have probably all watched those Dateline episodes where people assume a false identity on the internet only to end up being predators of some sort.  What are we to do?  

I believe all of this really impacts our ability and understanding of what it means to trust in God.  When we are not really certain how to fully trust another person how can we learn what it means to place our full-trust in God?  In my experience this can be a real stumbling block for spiritual growth.  But I think it really boils down to the same thing I mentioned above:  spending time developing a deep friendship.  

I pray we all have at least one friend in our lives (maybe it's your spouse) that you know you can trust your deepest/darkest secret to.  That one person that will laugh with you, cry with you, and truly keep a secret when you ask.  This type of relationship takes tending, doesn't it?  As in marriage, this deep friendship takes commitment, communication and intention.  

Do we take as much time to develop this deep trusting relationship with God?  Do we spend more time seeking to know God in Scripture and prayer than we do checking our Facebook posts for likes?  Before we send that forward out declaring that Jesus is Lord, do we really think through what it means to submit to Jesus as Lord?  

Though our pub theology conversation was pretty wild tonight it made me question in who/what I place my trust.  How would you answer that question?  In what do we place our worth?  

Trust God from the bottom of your heart;    don’t try to figure out everything on your own.Listen for God’s voice in everything you do, everywhere you go;    he’s the one who will keep you on track.  (Proverbs 3:5-6)

A simple prayer for tonight:  In You O Lord, help me to put my trust.  In You O Lord, help me to find strength and courage greater than fear.  In You, O Lord, may I learn what it means to fully love and be loved fully.  Amen.    

 

Cake.

One of the things that continually amazes me is how generous people can be.  I realize not all people are generous. I've met many people who think money is the truly the root of happiness, or that prosperity is equal to security.  I woke up early this morning with my "To-Do" list running through my head.  I decided to just go ahead and get up rather than lay there and ponder.  As I was folding laundry, doing dishes, and getting ready for the day I turned on the news.  Immediately I heard the news that a man had gone on a shooting spree in Kalamazoo, killing six and injuring two.  Senseless killing, lives shattered for no reason.  It's scary and horrible and impossible to understand.  

My next move was to go to church.  Today was a big day for Wesley House as we put on our lunch and cake auction fundraiser for our spring break mission trip.  I felt such pride in my students as they showed up early on a Sunday morning to sing some songs in worship, serve lunch, and sell cakes.  They are such good people, kind, compassionate, and strong.  No, we don't always get along seamlessly but when it matters most we know that we are together because God is doing something great and we learn about ourselves as we grow together.  

This is my second cake auction and I can't believe how much people are willing to spend for the cake they want!  Then I realize that it's not about the cake, it's about the students and the ministry.  It's about the recognition that if we want the world to be a better place we must invest in the young adults of today.  When the world is spinning out of control I am always so grateful for the time I spend with these "kids".  They remind me that God is at work, alive, and moving.

"For everything, absolutely everything, above and below, visible and invisible, rank after rank after rank of angels—everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him. He was there before any of it came into existence and holds it all together right up to this moment."  Colossians 1

This Scripture tells me that even when I don't understand a situation in my life or in the world I can trust that God has not abandoned us.  It helps me to realize that when our actions are rooted in love and generosity we catch glimpses of the Kingdom of God, the one that's not overwhelmed with sin and darkness.  I want to be motivated by the kind of generosity that sees the good potential in other people, the spirit of giving that doesn't ask "what's in it for me?" or look through eyes filled with skepticism.  God doesn't limit us by our circumstances or our talents, God offers us endless possibilities.  These possibilities aren't always comfortable or even clearly understood, but when we look through eyes that trust in God we can live out of a mentality of abundance rather than fear scarcity.  

Tonight I pray for the people in Kalamazoo.  I pray for the people in Syria.  I pray for parents who have lost children to senseless acts of violence rooted in power, for all who grieve.  I pray for this crazy world, for the reformation of the mental healthcare system, for people who are lost and lonely.  In the midst of this prayer I see the light of God shining in this generation of young adults.  I see strong leaders being raised up that will do all they can to impact the world for the better.  I see students who face deadlines and midterms yet give of their time and talents, in order that they have the opportunity to serve and build relationships with the homeless and hungry in New York City.  

You are going to get tired of me writing about this, but if we as the Church don't put our energy, time, and resources into those who are younger we will only perpetuate these cycles of violence and tragedy that we face today.  The Christian church will become obsolete, caught up in it's own self-righteousness.  

So tonight I am grateful for the people in our community that are not only generous, but loving.  For people who spent $200 on a cake in order that students come into contact with the life-changing Holy Spirit while on a mission trip.  I pray that the eyes of our hearts can be opened up to God's work in our midst, to opportunities to be generous in love that others might come to know God's love in and through us.  

How have you been generous in love today?