I posted recently about wanting to be a writer. This week I've thought several times: wow, I really should sit and write that down. It would make a great blog post! I can't wait to use that idea for a sermon! And then something else grabs my attention and I move on and don't do anything with it. The moments pass so fast and I never remember them. It's like chasing after the wind. The writing moment is really just a second in my eyes. The writing impulse is the tiniest tic of a hardly-felt nerve. If I gave my body more attention I'd notice it, but I can't usually be bothered. Fleeting and vain is my affinity for writing. I need a way to capture these moments and give them some attention and effort.
What would appeal to my sensibilities is to carry around a tiny little journal, a moleskine notebook to write everything down in, the way Jamal does in Finding Forrester (one of my favorite movies since I first saw it in high school). Except for the fact that I loathe carrying things in my pockets, it would work out well.
So, I decided to try to enter the (terrifying) digital age. I created a Twitter account. Literally for this purpose: to give myself a place to instantly keep and store some of the ideas that I want to go back to and write about later. It's my writer's notebook, if you will, a list of topics I need to come back to when I have the time and intention to write about them... at least, that's the ideal. Twitter is going to be my tool; we'll see if having it increases the labor for which I'm adding it to my toolbox.
Will it work? We'll see!
If you are truly desperately bored, you can find me on the Twitterverse at @pilgrimbarefoot
Sunday, April 28, 2013
Sunday, April 14, 2013
I Am a Words Person
One of the books I'm reading right now is Donald Miller's "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years." Donald Miller's writing has played a pretty important role in my life: "Blue Like Jazz" was one of the three most important books I read in college.
At the end of part three, Don is telling the story about meeting a remarkable man who writes down all his memories. He has, Don says, more than 500 pages of his own memories. As I've written here before, memory is extremely important to me, and I was really struck by the idea of writing my memories down (alongside realizing, as I scrolled through pictures recently, that memory is one of the driving forces in what makes the facebook so popular).
Reading "A Million Miles" is pushing me towards something I've known for some time but been too afraid (and too lazy) to admit, even to myself: I think I want to be a writer.
My last semester at Yale I read Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. While the main themes of the story lean more towards dystopia, bioengineering and pharmaceutical corruption, one of the things that really stuck with me was when the protagonist is forced to go to a "low-level" university while his friend goes to the highest achieving school there is. The reason they are split up? Crake is a science and math genius. The protagonist is a words person.
I am a words person. I love to dwell on the resonance and symbolism of words and their meanings and their multiple meanings. Even though I knew from the start that my preaching class in seminary was taught from the perspective of a preacher who sees himself as a poet (rather than a herald or a prophet, as described in Thomas Long's book) I didn't expect my own style to emerge poetic at all (I don't know what I did expect). But when I think about my own style, I think of it as the poetic.
I wrote a lot of poetry in high school; you can find some of it out there on the internet without even trying very hard. It's probably embarrassing. But it captures my attempts at self-expression, my attempts to put emotion into words. I won't say it was ever a precise attempt, because it certainly wasn't that at all; again, I'm not seeking to hide from my own laziness at any point in thisconfession post. I couldn't even post here once a week during Lent!
This weekend at a TFA summit in Raleigh, I attended a breakout session on Social Entrepreneurship. It was fantastic. The presenters talked a lot about hard work. They talked a lot about reflection. They talked a lot about ideas. They talked a lot about possibility, potential, creativity, and even a little bit about joy. I love all those things (well, again, except maybe hard work). Even more exciting, albeit daunting, was this: Christopher Gergen, when asked how he became a social entrepreneur and why, said that for most people, their 20s are all about purposeful exploration. It's when you get to your 30s that you want to be building something. I'm still in my 20s. One of the things I know I want to purposefully explore in the next few years?
Being a writer.
At the end of part three, Don is telling the story about meeting a remarkable man who writes down all his memories. He has, Don says, more than 500 pages of his own memories. As I've written here before, memory is extremely important to me, and I was really struck by the idea of writing my memories down (alongside realizing, as I scrolled through pictures recently, that memory is one of the driving forces in what makes the facebook so popular).
Reading "A Million Miles" is pushing me towards something I've known for some time but been too afraid (and too lazy) to admit, even to myself: I think I want to be a writer.
My last semester at Yale I read Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. While the main themes of the story lean more towards dystopia, bioengineering and pharmaceutical corruption, one of the things that really stuck with me was when the protagonist is forced to go to a "low-level" university while his friend goes to the highest achieving school there is. The reason they are split up? Crake is a science and math genius. The protagonist is a words person.
I am a words person. I love to dwell on the resonance and symbolism of words and their meanings and their multiple meanings. Even though I knew from the start that my preaching class in seminary was taught from the perspective of a preacher who sees himself as a poet (rather than a herald or a prophet, as described in Thomas Long's book) I didn't expect my own style to emerge poetic at all (I don't know what I did expect). But when I think about my own style, I think of it as the poetic.
I wrote a lot of poetry in high school; you can find some of it out there on the internet without even trying very hard. It's probably embarrassing. But it captures my attempts at self-expression, my attempts to put emotion into words. I won't say it was ever a precise attempt, because it certainly wasn't that at all; again, I'm not seeking to hide from my own laziness at any point in this
This weekend at a TFA summit in Raleigh, I attended a breakout session on Social Entrepreneurship. It was fantastic. The presenters talked a lot about hard work. They talked a lot about reflection. They talked a lot about ideas. They talked a lot about possibility, potential, creativity, and even a little bit about joy. I love all those things (well, again, except maybe hard work). Even more exciting, albeit daunting, was this: Christopher Gergen, when asked how he became a social entrepreneur and why, said that for most people, their 20s are all about purposeful exploration. It's when you get to your 30s that you want to be building something. I'm still in my 20s. One of the things I know I want to purposefully explore in the next few years?
Being a writer.
Thursday, April 4, 2013
To Wash the Feet of a Hurting and Embarrassed World
I was fortunate enough to be asked to preach Maundy Thursday this year at the church that is sponsoring me for ordination. Below is the text I preached from:
Jesus said: You do not
know what I am doing, but later you will understand.
And again,
You also should do as
I have done to you.
May I speak in the
name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
I’d like to tell you,
just for a minute, about my best friend Ryan.
Ryan is a very clean human being.
He is a neat-freak, a
germaphobe, an obsessive cleaner.
He wrote rules for his
housemates and put them up by the sink,
Rules for how to keep
the sponge clean.
Ryan knows that I’m
not going to wear my shoes,
But he still thinks
I’m crazy.
Ryan would never go around barefoot.
Ryan is the kind of
person who comes to Maundy Thursday and says:
No way - no how - no
chance am I taking my shoes off to have my feet washed.
Dirty. Gross.
Unsanitary. Weird. EMBARASSING.
How good of Jesus to
be honest,
As he knelt to wash
his friends’ feet:
You do not know what I am doing, but later you will
understand.
How many times did
Jesus say this that we do not have written down?
How many times should
Jesus have said this?
When the storm raged
all around that little fishing boat,
Jesus took a nap.
When the crowd of
five-thousand was half-starved and far from home,
Jesus sent the twelve
out with two pieces of fish between all of them.
When the Pharisees,
the strictest of all Jews, confronted Jesus,
He told them
straight-up that they didn’t understand the Sabbath.
When a hated
tax-collector was in the crowd,
Jesus broke
everybody’s social rules and invited himself over for dinner.
You go to the nicest house in Oxford
and try that.
When the mob was already
holding their stones, intent on righteous murder,
Jesus dropped down and
drew in the dirt.
When a voice from
heaven announced the start of his ministry,
Jesus fled / into the
desert and disappeared // for forty
days.
You do not know what I am doing, but later you will
understand.
In Bible study last
Sunday morning
Pastor John told us
that when we get baptized
We don’t have to turn
in our brains at the door.
I’m glad for
that. I’m a teacher! I’m glad for that.
But I also know
something else:
A life that follows
Jesus is going to be filled with a whole lot of confusion.
You do not understand what I am doing, Jesus said,
but later you will understand.
Peter did not
understand.
Brash, impulsive
Peter.
Peter,
Who named Jesus rabbi,
master, teacher, messiah.
All Peter could see
was Jesus,
Doing the work of a
slave.
It was a slave’s job
to deal with the feet,
The lowest slave of
the low.
Jesus took his job,
Taking sandaled feet
that trod the dusty, unpaved roads where the animals ran wild,
And washing them
clean.
{Peter did not
understand,
“Lord, not my feed only but also my hands and
my head!”
Peter did not
understand.}
For all that Maundy
Thursday is concerned with our feet,
It says a lot about
our hands as well.
Jesus knew, the gospel
says, that the Father had put ALL things into his hands.
It reminds me of that
song:
“He’s got the whole
world, in his hands…”
The Father had put all
things into Jesus hands.
ALL things.
Justice.
Dominion.
Glory.
Power.
The Kingdom.
Do you remember the
temptation?
“Now Satan took Jesus
to a high mountain.
And he showed him all
the kingdoms of the earth.
And he said to him:
And he said to him:
“All this I will give
to you,
If only you will bow
down and worship me.”
“Love the Lord your God and worship Him only”
Jesus replied.
Satan thought the
kingdom, the power, and the glory were in his hands.
But Satan does not understand power.
When Satan in his
pride grabs for power
He thinks of ruling
and of riches,
Of fury and force,
of might and of majesty,
of command and of control.
Satan grabs power to
lord it over others and force them to serve him.
The temptation Jesus
faced in the desert was a double edged attack:
Jesus dodged one
temptation by not taking the power from Satan,
By staying true to the
One True God.
The other temptation
that Jesus now overcomes
The temptation was to understand power in the way that Satan
seeks to hold it.
The battle Jesus began
with Satan in the desert begins to reach its climax here,
In the upper room at
the last supper.
The Father had given
all things into his hands.
Don’t you know that
even now the tempter was there,
The echo of his voice
whispering in Jesus’ ear:
“Take up the sword
with a mighty hand and oustretched arm,
Attack your enemies,
force the Romans out of Jerusalem,
Set up a kingdom of
great power and glory
Put all the nations
under your feet!”
In that moment,
When Jesus had all
things in his hands,
He did not stretch out
a mighty arm,
But he knelt and took
up stinking, filthy feet.
Jesus understands
power.
Power is to be used
for the sake of love.
“He loved them to the end,” one translation
says,
Or in another “He
showed them the full extent of his love.”
He took off his outer
robe,
Tied a towel around
his waist,
Knelt before them to
do the work of a slave,
And used his hands to
wash their feet.
And he said to them:
“You also should do as I have
done to you.”
What has Jesus done
With his
hands?
He has done the work
of the lowest of the low.
He has ensured that
they are clean in their body and their spirit.
He has anointed the
feet of his friends
That he knows will flee from his suffering.
That he knows will flee from his suffering.
I was with my friend
Ryan one Maundy Thursday.
The bulletin for that
service told us that we were free to have our hands washed
instead of our feet.
And Ryan, germaphobe
that he is,
Instantly said “no way
am I taking off my shoes.”
I peer pressured him,
Embarrassed him into
doing what everyone else was doing.
I understand that many
of you may feel now as Ryan did that night.
No way am I taking off
my shoes.
Dirty. Gross.
Unsanitary. Weird. EMBARASSING.
I know you may not
believe it,
But even I know how
hard it can be to accept having your feet washed.
I know it can be truly
humiliating to take off your shoes
And allow someone to
go so low as to wash off your feet.
One of the most
humiliating experiences of my life was having my feet washed.
I was out in the grass
playing soccer with my friends,
And of course, I was
barefoot.
We played for hours in
the mud and the grass.
At one point, a friend
kicked me with her shoes on and cut open my foot.
It wasn’t that
painful, so of course I kept playing!
But when I went to
return to pick up my backpack from a classroom,
I passed by a friend
of mine.
She was shocked at the
sight of my feet,
Bruised and dirty and
still slightly bleeding.
She forced me into a
bathroom – a women’s bathroom! –
And made me sit on the
sink so that she could wash off my feet.
I was just like Peter:
No! Stop!
You don’t have to do
this!
I’m not worth this
kind of love.
Friends, the lesson
from 1 Corinthians is clear:
We must be humble as we
come to this altar to receive,
To discern the body
and blood of the Lord.
We must proclaim the
Lord’s death until he comes.
Friends, we are used
to coming to this altar.
But tonight, we are
invited to come forward not once, but twice.
One time will seem
familiar.
We come to kneel at
this altar,
To receive communion.
But when we do that
tonight,
It will be after the
first time we come,
When we come to we
have our feet washed.
We come to receive
communion
After we have been
humbled,
Embarassed, and even
humiliated,
After we have come to
realize
We do not deserve this
kind of love.
This is no empty
religious ritual.
We are coming forward
to meet the hands that hold the whole world in place.
The hands into which
the Father has given everything.
The hands that truly
understand that
Having power means to
love.
That having everything
means being invited to serve.
That the true kingdom
and power of God is NOT of this world,
But calls us to die to
this world.
To come to the altar
unsure, confused, and even embarrassed.
Calls us NOT to
understand,
But to stretch out our
own hands,
Weak, empty and frail,
And to hear the words:
The body of Christ,
the bread of heaven.
The blood of Christ,
the cup of salvation.
Then we will be called
to get up, on our feet, and to go out
To love and serve the
Lord with gladness and singleness of heart,
To do to others as has
been done unto us.
To be the hands of
Jesus,
Seeking not our own
power,
But filled with love,
To go out into a world
that is confused, broken, hurting and embarrassed,
And to wash its feet.
Amen.
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Jehovah Jireh
The last two days have held a number of small, simple reminders for me about God's provision.
I'm not normally an anxious person. However, all the factors concerning my ordination process have created anxiety for me. It's easy for me to identify why: I'm not in control of anything. It's no different now than just before Advent: if progress is going to be made, it's going to come from the whirlwind of God's grace, not from my own feeble efforts to make things move. I knew that going into "the process;" but I didn't know how much it would stay true throughout the process!
"The process," basically, involves oodles of meetings and paperwork. I had to get a four page document filled out by my primary physician... but I didn't have a primary physician. I have to fill out a lengthy (30+ pages) for a psychological exam that ALSO has to be completed by March 15th by a psychologist / psychiatrist who only offers appointments during normal business hours. The vestry had to approve and sign my application for postulancy. My Parish Discernment Committee had to go well. I had to get official transcripts from both my educational institutions.
My transcripts went out on the day I faxed the forms to Houghton and Yale. My PDC has gone exceedingly well; at every meeting someone has said "You were born to be a priest!" I found out that the deadline for the psychological exam is actually later than March 15th, so I'll be able to complete it during my spring break; I won't have to miss any work to get it done. Finally, even though the doctor's office I ended up going to told me it could take as long as two weeks to process my paperwork and get my records, they got them over the weekend and my meeting took a scant 90 minutes.
At any point a serious delay could have happened to keep me from moving forward. And while I'm by no means assured that TBOAPE (the best of all possible events) will take place (i.e. that I'll be ordained by next June), my anxiety decreases with every mini-step that I accomplish. Whether or not I finally get ordained in the Episcopal Church, I can see with a new clarity that God's grace is guiding my steps and providing for me.
Many of my friends in the Wesleyan church can point to a youth camp or a revival or a sermon experience where they "heard a voice" calling them into full time ministry in the church. I've never heard an audible divine voice in that kind of context, at least not that I can remember. But when wonderful people sit in a room with me and agree with me that God's grace has been given to me it confirms the inner call that I have slowly learned to listen to: that all my passions and interests are for God's work, to try to be more like Jesus in the world (or at least exactly who Jesus wants me to be).
Again: I'm not normally an anxious person. Probably, living at home and then being in college and then graduate school, the number of possible anxieties I've faced is relatively small. I haven't, if I'm honest with myself, had to look for God's grace that hard. I haven't had to rely on God's grace all that much: it was everywhere, abundant, the foundation of everything that I had or knew. Now that I'm an "adult," however, there are so many more things to worry about: the "process," finances (so I should have worried about these a bit more), jobs, automobiles... and fitting faith into all that mess.
I feel like I'm learning a new skill. Or at least practicing one, on my own, that others provided and exercised for me: the skill of naming and claiming God's grace in my life. The skill of being able to honestly and thankfully say the words to the song I learned growing up: "Jehovah Jireh, my Provider, Your grace is sufficient for me. My God shall supply all my needs, according to his riches in glory. He shall give his angels charge over me. Jehovah Jireh cares for me."
I'm not normally an anxious person. However, all the factors concerning my ordination process have created anxiety for me. It's easy for me to identify why: I'm not in control of anything. It's no different now than just before Advent: if progress is going to be made, it's going to come from the whirlwind of God's grace, not from my own feeble efforts to make things move. I knew that going into "the process;" but I didn't know how much it would stay true throughout the process!
"The process," basically, involves oodles of meetings and paperwork. I had to get a four page document filled out by my primary physician... but I didn't have a primary physician. I have to fill out a lengthy (30+ pages) for a psychological exam that ALSO has to be completed by March 15th by a psychologist / psychiatrist who only offers appointments during normal business hours. The vestry had to approve and sign my application for postulancy. My Parish Discernment Committee had to go well. I had to get official transcripts from both my educational institutions.
My transcripts went out on the day I faxed the forms to Houghton and Yale. My PDC has gone exceedingly well; at every meeting someone has said "You were born to be a priest!" I found out that the deadline for the psychological exam is actually later than March 15th, so I'll be able to complete it during my spring break; I won't have to miss any work to get it done. Finally, even though the doctor's office I ended up going to told me it could take as long as two weeks to process my paperwork and get my records, they got them over the weekend and my meeting took a scant 90 minutes.
At any point a serious delay could have happened to keep me from moving forward. And while I'm by no means assured that TBOAPE (the best of all possible events) will take place (i.e. that I'll be ordained by next June), my anxiety decreases with every mini-step that I accomplish. Whether or not I finally get ordained in the Episcopal Church, I can see with a new clarity that God's grace is guiding my steps and providing for me.
Many of my friends in the Wesleyan church can point to a youth camp or a revival or a sermon experience where they "heard a voice" calling them into full time ministry in the church. I've never heard an audible divine voice in that kind of context, at least not that I can remember. But when wonderful people sit in a room with me and agree with me that God's grace has been given to me it confirms the inner call that I have slowly learned to listen to: that all my passions and interests are for God's work, to try to be more like Jesus in the world (or at least exactly who Jesus wants me to be).
Again: I'm not normally an anxious person. Probably, living at home and then being in college and then graduate school, the number of possible anxieties I've faced is relatively small. I haven't, if I'm honest with myself, had to look for God's grace that hard. I haven't had to rely on God's grace all that much: it was everywhere, abundant, the foundation of everything that I had or knew. Now that I'm an "adult," however, there are so many more things to worry about: the "process," finances (so I should have worried about these a bit more), jobs, automobiles... and fitting faith into all that mess.
I feel like I'm learning a new skill. Or at least practicing one, on my own, that others provided and exercised for me: the skill of naming and claiming God's grace in my life. The skill of being able to honestly and thankfully say the words to the song I learned growing up: "Jehovah Jireh, my Provider, Your grace is sufficient for me. My God shall supply all my needs, according to his riches in glory. He shall give his angels charge over me. Jehovah Jireh cares for me."
Saturday, March 2, 2013
Ashes, Dust, and Candle Wax
Last week at youth group a wonderful young priest came and spent time with us to teach us about Taize and prayer in the style of Taize. After a shared meal and a lot of talking, we went into the sanctuary. She pulled out an entire bag of tea lights, and I was immediately delighted. Not only are candles important to me, but just a few weeks earlier my wife and I had led a session on prayer where we had talked about how just the simple act of lighting a candle can itself be a prayer. It was a happy harmony of lessons on prayer for our students. It's tough to know, just seeing them once a week, how much they are internalizing what we expose them to, but I'm pleased to think the Holy Spirit is at work even in our sometimes haphazard plans.
Anyway, because of that night I ended up sending the link to my Advent Triptych to that priest, as well as the woman who runs our youth group. One of the quotes that I had in mind as I was writing that sermon is from a notecard my dad keeps on his bedroom door. He has it as a Jack London quote; an internet search will question the validity of the reference. In any case, this is what it says:
"I would rather be ashes than dust!
I would rather that my spark should burn out
in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot.
I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom
of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.
The function of man is to live, not to exist.
I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them.
I shall use my time."
I've long assumed that I would also rather be ashes than dust. I'd like to think I've lived most of my life burning brightly; I've certainly burnt out a number of times. Only God has kept me from many more!
The frenzied and frenetic fiery pace I kept in high school, college, and even seminary (to a lesser extent) probably came straight from my 8th grade teacher's echo of this credo: "Suck the marrow out of life!" I think his quote may have been the first time I heard someone say something that gave me language for what I was already thinking: "Suck the marrow out of life." He described the way a dog will not just eat the meat off a bone but crack it and break it and suck all the marrow out of it, all the nutrients, consume it completely. I still remember him telling us that when our head hit the pillow it should be with a sense of accomplishment, with the knowledge that we had done all we could for the day, maybe with a tinge of exhaustion. The craziest week of my life I averaged between 3 and 4 hours of sleep over 8 days; I had mono a few months later, and slept for 17 hours a day. Ashes, never dust.
With my senior sermon in mind, I've been re-examining my feelings about this quote. I've had a very difficult time with one of my co-teachers at school. I think things are working themselves slowly out. I don't think I'll ever be friends with this teacher, but at least we are attempting a new pattern of working together with our kids interest in mind, which is not what was happening for the better part of the year, in ways I won't bother to describe.
One thing has recently happened thought that made me just furious. When I heard about it, I immediately came to a decision (as a good EC teacher) that I would simply start to document everything I did, so that I can prove myself to be beyond reproach. I didn't opt for confrontation (I never do). I didn't let it go. I chose a "middle way." I didn't choose to confront my co-teacher in anger like a flash-in-a-pan. I didn't choose to ignore the issue.
I didn't choose ashes. I didn't choose dust either.
Now I'm not saying I'm above reproach in any way in this situation. I'm also not even saying that the decision(s) I'm making concerning this situation are all correct. But what I have reflected on is that rather than ashes or dust, I'm choosing to be just what my senior sermon gave me language to do: candle wax. I choose the slow burn. I choose to glow. I choose to be moved with the wind but not extinguished by it. I choose to act, but only as much as I can do at one time rather than trying to do everything all at once. The model I preached about has become for me a via media.
I won't exactly say that this is the Holy Spirit's work, redeeming my sinful tendency to blow up or to hide. I'm not convinced enough that "holy" really describes anything about my situation. I don't really even have any answers right now. But I'm praying and learning and reflecting. Perhaps above all I'm hoping, hoping that a slow burn will flicker brightly, and not be overcome by the darkness.
Anyway, because of that night I ended up sending the link to my Advent Triptych to that priest, as well as the woman who runs our youth group. One of the quotes that I had in mind as I was writing that sermon is from a notecard my dad keeps on his bedroom door. He has it as a Jack London quote; an internet search will question the validity of the reference. In any case, this is what it says:
"I would rather be ashes than dust!
I would rather that my spark should burn out
in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot.
I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom
of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.
The function of man is to live, not to exist.
I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them.
I shall use my time."
I've long assumed that I would also rather be ashes than dust. I'd like to think I've lived most of my life burning brightly; I've certainly burnt out a number of times. Only God has kept me from many more!
The frenzied and frenetic fiery pace I kept in high school, college, and even seminary (to a lesser extent) probably came straight from my 8th grade teacher's echo of this credo: "Suck the marrow out of life!" I think his quote may have been the first time I heard someone say something that gave me language for what I was already thinking: "Suck the marrow out of life." He described the way a dog will not just eat the meat off a bone but crack it and break it and suck all the marrow out of it, all the nutrients, consume it completely. I still remember him telling us that when our head hit the pillow it should be with a sense of accomplishment, with the knowledge that we had done all we could for the day, maybe with a tinge of exhaustion. The craziest week of my life I averaged between 3 and 4 hours of sleep over 8 days; I had mono a few months later, and slept for 17 hours a day. Ashes, never dust.
With my senior sermon in mind, I've been re-examining my feelings about this quote. I've had a very difficult time with one of my co-teachers at school. I think things are working themselves slowly out. I don't think I'll ever be friends with this teacher, but at least we are attempting a new pattern of working together with our kids interest in mind, which is not what was happening for the better part of the year, in ways I won't bother to describe.
One thing has recently happened thought that made me just furious. When I heard about it, I immediately came to a decision (as a good EC teacher) that I would simply start to document everything I did, so that I can prove myself to be beyond reproach. I didn't opt for confrontation (I never do). I didn't let it go. I chose a "middle way." I didn't choose to confront my co-teacher in anger like a flash-in-a-pan. I didn't choose to ignore the issue.
I didn't choose ashes. I didn't choose dust either.
Now I'm not saying I'm above reproach in any way in this situation. I'm also not even saying that the decision(s) I'm making concerning this situation are all correct. But what I have reflected on is that rather than ashes or dust, I'm choosing to be just what my senior sermon gave me language to do: candle wax. I choose the slow burn. I choose to glow. I choose to be moved with the wind but not extinguished by it. I choose to act, but only as much as I can do at one time rather than trying to do everything all at once. The model I preached about has become for me a via media.
I won't exactly say that this is the Holy Spirit's work, redeeming my sinful tendency to blow up or to hide. I'm not convinced enough that "holy" really describes anything about my situation. I don't really even have any answers right now. But I'm praying and learning and reflecting. Perhaps above all I'm hoping, hoping that a slow burn will flicker brightly, and not be overcome by the darkness.
Sunday, February 24, 2013
Perfect Love Casts Out... Procrastination?
I have a tendency to procrastinate. I'm much more efficient working on a deadline. Projects that I know about months in advance tend to get my full attention in the last week (or 48 hours) before they are due, no matter how important they are: term papers, sermons, financial paperwork. I have a lot of trouble escaping the tyranny of the everyday, the tyranny of the semi-urgent to deal with the truly important. I actually think the same fear is the reason I can't ever completely clear out my e-mail inbox: I'm afraid, for whatever reason, of completing everything in it. Of being completely caught up. It's a different sort of fear, I think, but it controls my actions nonetheless.
Needing fear to crack the whip and force me to work definitely impacted my long absence from blogging.
As I've thought about that this week (in response to working on my loan deferment paperwork and student IEPs at work), I've begun to realize that I'm easily motivated by fear. Fear of failure, fear of public shaming, fear or financial consequences.
In 1 John the confident assertion leaps off the page: "Perfect love casts out fear."
What does it mean for me that I can't do my work until I'm afraid of failing? Do I love my work? Or do I love success? Do I work for the Lord, or for human approval? Why do I wait so long to do my IEP prep work? Do I love my students, or just my job / paycheck?
Perfect love casts out fear.
Must I have to face my fears before I can overcome them?
Perfect love casts out fear.
Can I overcome my fears? How should I pray to overcome my fear? How will my life and work look different when that fear is gone?
One thing I've wondered is whether or not my thoughts on this topic lean towards some pop-psychology need to be a "self-actualized individual." Should I be totally in control of my own motives and desires and actions? It seems unlikely I can achieve such a state.
I don't yet have answers, or even direction. What I do have is the collect for the Second Sunday in Lent:
"O God, whose glory it is always to have mercy: Be gracious to all who have gone astray from thy ways, and bring them again with penitent hearts and steadfast faith to embrace and hold fast the unchangeable truth of thy Word, Jesus Christ thy Son; who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever."
In response to the collect, I want my prayer to be: "Father in heaven, have mercy on me for all those things I have left undone. I have not loved you with my whole heart, and have not loved my neighbor as myself. Cast out my fear and help me to work for you with gladness and singleness of heart, being strengthened by your Holy Spirit. Change my heart God, so that I may repent and turn to you. In your perfect love, cast out my fear. Amen."
Needing fear to crack the whip and force me to work definitely impacted my long absence from blogging.
As I've thought about that this week (in response to working on my loan deferment paperwork and student IEPs at work), I've begun to realize that I'm easily motivated by fear. Fear of failure, fear of public shaming, fear or financial consequences.
In 1 John the confident assertion leaps off the page: "Perfect love casts out fear."
What does it mean for me that I can't do my work until I'm afraid of failing? Do I love my work? Or do I love success? Do I work for the Lord, or for human approval? Why do I wait so long to do my IEP prep work? Do I love my students, or just my job / paycheck?
Perfect love casts out fear.
Must I have to face my fears before I can overcome them?
Perfect love casts out fear.
Can I overcome my fears? How should I pray to overcome my fear? How will my life and work look different when that fear is gone?
One thing I've wondered is whether or not my thoughts on this topic lean towards some pop-psychology need to be a "self-actualized individual." Should I be totally in control of my own motives and desires and actions? It seems unlikely I can achieve such a state.
I don't yet have answers, or even direction. What I do have is the collect for the Second Sunday in Lent:
"O God, whose glory it is always to have mercy: Be gracious to all who have gone astray from thy ways, and bring them again with penitent hearts and steadfast faith to embrace and hold fast the unchangeable truth of thy Word, Jesus Christ thy Son; who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever."
In response to the collect, I want my prayer to be: "Father in heaven, have mercy on me for all those things I have left undone. I have not loved you with my whole heart, and have not loved my neighbor as myself. Cast out my fear and help me to work for you with gladness and singleness of heart, being strengthened by your Holy Spirit. Change my heart God, so that I may repent and turn to you. In your perfect love, cast out my fear. Amen."
Sunday, February 17, 2013
When Perfection Stands in the Way of Competence
I got scared of blogging.
I remember when I was a senior at Houghton and I was following the blogs of a few friends who went to different seminaries from my program. I was excited at first to keep up with their lives, how they seemed to be changing and how excited they were about starting the next track in their lives. I quickly became frustrated: it seemed like their blogs became sermon blogs, and I didn't hear anything else from them except the assignments they were preparing for classes. It wasn't the same feel, and I (for the most part) quit following them.
When I started this blog in Advent '11, I was determined not to let the same thing happened to me. I wanted to blog at least every other week, to keep the discipline of writing a part of my (spiritual) life. Instead, it became exactly what frustrated me about my former peers: a sermon blog.
Much more than I expected to, I loved preaching. I loved using / finding / feeling my voice in a community, helping and challenging and maybe even changing people (by God's grace!). I liked to quietly call my community out on some of their ~smaller~ sins. I liked to challenge people's common (mis)perceptions about God. I liked to articulate the unique ways that I saw my life of faith. My dad predicted when I was at Houghton that I would love it: "You've taken all this in like a sponge since you were little, and now you need to start letting some of it out!"
Loving preaching, I started appreciating my own writing. That should have been good for my blog!
However, I got a lot of very positive feedback on my preaching as well, from peers AND even from professors. It fed my not-exactly-small vanity. Since I graduated, I've only written once or twice. I've attempted and thought about writing many more times, but never actually sat down to write. My mind was working, but I wasn't applying myself.
Just recently I've started putting all this together. Essentially, I've realized I quit writing here because I'm not putting up material that has been checked and edited... and most importantly, that has been praised. In my vain (note the double meaning here) desire to be a good writer - to be a perfect writer - I've become a complete non-writer!
Perfection stands in the way of competence. The vain desire to be perfect paralyzes effort. The need for praise inhibits self-esteem. Fear of failure, or worse yet, success, feeds laziness. I'm struggling with all of this: in my writing, in my teaching, in my relationships, in my prayer life. In the words of an inspirational video that made its way through TFA circles at the beginning of the year, I need to give myself permission to suck. I need to be willing to try and fail. I need to embrace the laughter that came after the following exchange during my CPE:
Supervisor: "What's the problem with being wrong?"
Me: "You... I'd... I'd be wrong!"
*~laughter~*
Well, a new season of the church year, a new commitment. I commit to writing here once a week.
I remember when I was a senior at Houghton and I was following the blogs of a few friends who went to different seminaries from my program. I was excited at first to keep up with their lives, how they seemed to be changing and how excited they were about starting the next track in their lives. I quickly became frustrated: it seemed like their blogs became sermon blogs, and I didn't hear anything else from them except the assignments they were preparing for classes. It wasn't the same feel, and I (for the most part) quit following them.
When I started this blog in Advent '11, I was determined not to let the same thing happened to me. I wanted to blog at least every other week, to keep the discipline of writing a part of my (spiritual) life. Instead, it became exactly what frustrated me about my former peers: a sermon blog.
Much more than I expected to, I loved preaching. I loved using / finding / feeling my voice in a community, helping and challenging and maybe even changing people (by God's grace!). I liked to quietly call my community out on some of their ~smaller~ sins. I liked to challenge people's common (mis)perceptions about God. I liked to articulate the unique ways that I saw my life of faith. My dad predicted when I was at Houghton that I would love it: "You've taken all this in like a sponge since you were little, and now you need to start letting some of it out!"
Loving preaching, I started appreciating my own writing. That should have been good for my blog!
However, I got a lot of very positive feedback on my preaching as well, from peers AND even from professors. It fed my not-exactly-small vanity. Since I graduated, I've only written once or twice. I've attempted and thought about writing many more times, but never actually sat down to write. My mind was working, but I wasn't applying myself.
Just recently I've started putting all this together. Essentially, I've realized I quit writing here because I'm not putting up material that has been checked and edited... and most importantly, that has been praised. In my vain (note the double meaning here) desire to be a good writer - to be a perfect writer - I've become a complete non-writer!
Perfection stands in the way of competence. The vain desire to be perfect paralyzes effort. The need for praise inhibits self-esteem. Fear of failure, or worse yet, success, feeds laziness. I'm struggling with all of this: in my writing, in my teaching, in my relationships, in my prayer life. In the words of an inspirational video that made its way through TFA circles at the beginning of the year, I need to give myself permission to suck. I need to be willing to try and fail. I need to embrace the laughter that came after the following exchange during my CPE:
Supervisor: "What's the problem with being wrong?"
Me: "You... I'd... I'd be wrong!"
*~laughter~*
Well, a new season of the church year, a new commitment. I commit to writing here once a week.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)