Prioritizing

I've been here about twenty months now, nearly two years. In many ways, I've gotten into the groove of things. I more or less understand what I'm supposed to be doing in terms of daily, weekly, and monthly responsibilities. I have a semi-regular rhythm of study and sermon preparation and meetings. I'm not fluttering around like an idiot anymore, wondering what needs to be accomplished for the week to go by without a serious lapse, and that means that I'm more efficient with my time. My new planner-to-end-all-planners has been a significant help with that too!

Anyway, now that I'm more efficient, I have time to do some of the longer-term, big-picture things I've dreamed about. That's great...except that I can't seem to figure out what exactly I should be doing. There are a whole lot of possibilities, and a whole lot of needs. I see a lot of potential growth areas. I would like to offer more opportunities for group prayer. I would like us to have regular Bible studies. We need some sort of youth program. I want to spend more time thinking through our worship services and planning them so that they're accessible to all ages. I'd like to encourage more service to the community and a fuller sense of stewardship.

This may seem obvious to some of you, but it's taken me a while to realize: I can't do all of these things. I don't have time to do all of these things. We don't currently have the energy coming from the congregation to do all of these things. It's not even helpful for a congregation to try to change all of these things at once.

I've always been a bit of a gypsy, so I think that part of my problem is that I am unaccustomed to thinking in the long term. I'm coming up on two years. Two years is a long time for me. I'm a little annoyed that I haven't set the world on fire yet, and even more annoyed that I'm unlikely to do so in the next year, two years, five years...I don't even know how to plan in a way that is slow and deep. I know how to plan sudden and jolting.

So, I'm trying to discern where to focus my energy in the coming year, and I don't know what to do, because I want to do too much, and that wanting makes me actually do too little. Paralysis. Peh. And I'm also worried that once I decide what I'm going to do, some other area will suffer, and then people are going to think I'm not doing my job or something. But, again, not choosing something and going with it is likely to ensure that I end up not actually doing my job. I really wish there was some sort of clear direction or energy for one area coming out of the congregation, but there's not. I don't want to do it all myself. I don't think that's a healthy way to be a pastor, for me or for the congregation. But I do have to do something...don't I?

Sometimes I wonder if pastors ever got to be just what is described in our call forms, and not corporate programming whizzes. That genius CEO model gets a little overwhelming, and I'm pretty convinced it wasn't quite what Jesus had in mind. But that's a side note.

So, yeah, I don't really know what to do. I'm feeling better about being here than I ever have before, and I'm excited about the possibilities. But I know not where to begin.

The Bible and Me

A little over ten years ago, I fell crazily, obsessively, head over heels in love...with the Bible, specifically with the Gospel of Mark, and with the Jesus I met in its pages. Before that, I had curiosity about religion and spirituality - mostly curiosity of the skeptical sort. Then, suddenly, I had this relationship with these words and this Word, and it's been a relationship that has both enticed and demanded more of me than any relationship with a human being.

That doesn't mean that I don't sometimes find the Bible - and God, for that matter - troubling and infuriating. I do. For a while I thought this was a serious problem, either in my own faith or in the Bible. For a while I thought this problem could only be solved by either just deciding to accept it uncritically, or tossing the whole thing out the window. Over time I've come to realize that this truly is a relationship, one in which our embrace of each other can be alternately tender, passionate, hesitant, and rough. Sometimes it's a hug, and sometimes a wrestling match. Whatever our relationship may look like at a given moment, the grip I have on it and it on me never leaves me unchanged.

All of that would probably make more sense if I could explain exactly how the lectionary text for this week changed me. I can tell you that it did. I can tell you that, as I said in my sermon this morning, I started seeing Bartimaeus everywhere, and Jesus appeared a little more clearly too as a result. Other than that, I have no words to describe the internal alteration.

Oh, and there's also this. As much as I sometimes whine about being tired of hearing myself preach and preparing a sermon or two every week, I'm just really, really glad that I have a job that requires/allows me to live intensely with these words and this Word on such a constant basis.

Going Back

Autumn used to be my favorite season. I still love it on some days. I still love sweater weather, changing leaves, the first games of the hockey season, dressing up for Halloween; I still love the brisk, sunny days, when they come.

This fall, however, has been short on brisk, sunny days. October has looked almost entirely the way it looks today as I peer out my window instead of writing my sermon. Gray. Dreary. Wet. Cold. Windy. These sort of days have a unique capacity for making me feel like I am still back there, sitting in a cemetery. A few drops of particularly cold rain on my face, a gust of bone-chilling wind through my coat, and I am there again. The cheerless weather was fitting then. The frigid rain and howling wind were, I thought at the time, the only possible right conditions for that situation. Enduring that awful weather, even embracing it, was part of healing.

If I was still in Indiana, I would go back to the cemetery today. There wasn't a headstone yet when I moved away. I would like to see a name on the grave. I would like to see if they chose some other words as well, some one-line descriptor of his life.

Someday I will see, but that day is not today. Today I will sit inside my house, because I hate the feel of cold rain on my face and the wind cutting through my coat, and because I have other things to do than go back in time. Today I will finish my sermon, and then I will put on my costume and go out, and I will not wallow, except long enough to write this post, because when something like the weather takes me back, it seems right to go there and remember, just for a few moments.

Hair

My house is Dog Hair Central. I don't know where all this hair comes from. My dog has short hair. Her coat is shiny and healthy. She doesn't appear to be dropping hair like a chemotherapy patient, but she must be, because there is always hair EVERYWHERE in my house. I've been cleaning today, and I swear I have emptied a whole other dog's worth of hair out of that vacuum. This frustrates me, and makes me wonder if one of the hazards of living in an old house is that there are many crevices that trap the hair - and then spew it back out five minutes after I've vacuumed. It's a minor irritation, not a crisis situation, but it's always there. No matter how much work I do to get my home clean and in order, there is still the hair.

That's kind of how life is going lately, too. I've had no big crises, but lots of little nagging things that just keep popping up. Just when I think I've gotten rid of them, there they are again, creeping out of the cracks. Things are going fairly well, overall. Church stuff is moving right along. I'm feeling generally good about my work and my place in this community. Life seems fairly balanced at the moment, which is kind of a new thing for me. And yet, there are always those minor, grating things.

Sometimes I wonder if dog hair, and its life equivalents, show up to remind me/us that no matter how well everything seems to be going at a given moment, this world is still a depraved place. Irritations are just part of the gig. Anyway, I'm going to return to cleaning now, because even if my house is depraved, I still feel like I should minimize the visible dog hair.

Terror

I've recently read several blog posts in my online community about pets dying. I feel like I should call or write or do something, but the truth is, I can't even read the posts. I can usually respond appropriately to the loss of people. But for some reason, I cannot respond at all to the loss of animal companions, especially dogs.

I have recurring dreams about my dog, the Queen of New York, dying. I wake up in terror, and I know I've been shouting her name in my sleep, because I usually find her standing over me after such dreams, looking at me like she wonders why I've called her with an urgency usually reserved for those times when she's run into the road or disappeared into a cornfield. I stare at her in those early hours as though I'm not sure she's really there. I wrap my arms around her and squeeze until she squirms (she is definitely the dog of a space-loving and physically reserved human). In fact, even as I've written this, my heart has begun to race and my lungs to tighten. The mere thought throws me into panic.

Perhaps it seems a little silly to some of you, but the thought of Laila being gone is one of the few things that really freaks me out. She is the only one who was homeless with me while I was looking for a call. She's the only one who made this cross-country move with me to a place where I knew no one. She's the only one who is there when I wake up. She's the only one who is here to see me work sixteen hour days and dance around the house in my underwear. She's the only one who hears me mangle "Love You Madly" on my guitar and laugh hysterically at an email I've received. She's the only one who sits with me when I sob my eyes out when I'm lonely or discouraged. She's the only one waiting here to greet me when I come home, and she's the only one I say good night to on my way to bed.

Someday she'll die, and given the facts of life, it will probably be when I'm still alive, and I suppose I'll deal with that when it comes. But right now, I can't. I'm trying, but I can't.

So, I write this highly inadequate apology to my friends who have lost their companions. I have no words. Your loss has somehow become my own fear in such a way that I can't bear to even tell you how sad I am for you. I hate that it's all about me and how much anxiety I feel, and I hope to work through that someday, but right now, all I can say is that it hurts, and it's not even my loss. I'm sorry.

Spiritual Pilates

During seminary, I took up Pilates for a while - or at least, some adapted version of Pilates that did not involve that machine that looks like a medieval torture device. I really liked it, and I'm not sure why I stopped doing it, but anyway...One of the things I noticed about Pilates is how, when I was doing it, it didn't really feel like I was doing anything particularly strenuous. It was all about "stabilizing your Core." Once my Core was stable and engaged, stretching in unusual angles and breathing well came naturally.

Granted, the next day, my abdominal muscles felt like I had spent six hours doing crunches. My whole body had been pushed and pulled in some very unusual and sometimes uncomfortable directions - even when I didn't realize it at the time.

Life has felt a bit like Pilates for me lately. I've found myself in all sorts of situations that felt perfectly natural at the time. However, the reflection afterward sometimes aches, and then I know - I've been stretched something good.

I'm living between worlds at the moment. Most of my time is spent in Church World, with Church People. There is a certain set of assumptions amongst the people in Church World, and some of those assumptions have to do with who I am and how I should behave and what I should think, as a pastor. My role there is fairly well-defined, even if some of the expectations chafe. I'm comfortable in that world, even though I'm fairly atypical there. I know how to function amongst Church People, because I am a Church Person.

Then there is other time which I spend in Non-Church World, which is mostly populated by musicians and assorted people who hang out in the bars where the musicians play. The Non-Church People also know I'm a pastor, and they have their share of assumptions about that fact as well...but they're different assumptions. My role in that world is less defined, and the expectations more varied. I'm comfortable in that world as well, even though I'm pretty unusual there, too. After all, I spent a good share of my adult life as a musician and bartender. I know how to function amongst Non-Church People, because I've been one of them, too.

It's the collision of these worlds that causes the stretch - and the stretch goes both ways. Flex, extend. Flex, Extend. Non-Church World makes me more conscious about being holistic, relevant, vulnerable, and open when I'm in Church World. Extend. Church World makes me more cautious, intentional, responsible, and compassionate in Non-Church World. Flex. As a result, I find myself focusing, as I did in Pilates, on locating and stabilizing my Core. Once my Core is engaged, I can stretch in some unexpected directions, and I have the space to breathe well, regardless of which world I'm in at the time.

I still feel stretched, pulled and pushed between my two worlds, and sometimes, the next day, I ache right down to my Core. In my lazier moments, I wonder if I should rethink my residence in one of these worlds. I wonder if being a pastor means that I should stay away from Non-Church World and focus on my congregation. I wonder if the fact that I still enjoy Non-Church world means that I shouldn't be a pastor. I wonder if it wouldn't be easier if I could just fit a little better into someone's expectations of me.

On the other hand, Pilates made me stand a little straighter and move with a little more grace. It made me more consistently aware of my Core - that part of me that had to be trained into being my constant guide. It was the ache that told me that it was working.

If I claim that faith in Christ is my Core, perhaps it too needs to be trained and worked into stability. Maybe it's only by being stretched between two worlds that my Core is truly engaged as my constant guide. And maybe the ache is exactly what tells me that God is working.