Garden Blogging - What a Difference a Week Can Make!!!

Last Week....This Week.

And the Gardener says, "Wow!!!"

Thank you Holy Spirit

Today was an excellant day at Smalltown Congregation.  During the summer our attendance goes down considerably and the organist and I joke around about the Sunday where it will only be the two of us.  Todays crowd was small but what was amazing was that the people who needed to hear my sermon were there.  Can't go into details but suffuse it to say the Holy Spirit was hard at work this morning.

God is good all the time!  All the time God is good!

He Set His Face

In the movie “Up in the Air” we meet Ryan Bingham, a charming man whose job is traveling from company to company firing people. In addition to his day job he is a motivational speaker. His speech “What’s in your backpack” expounds upon the virtues of a relationship free life.

He begins his speech by asking his audience, “How much does your life weigh?” Then he places a backpack on the table and tells his audience to imagine that they are carrying their lives in the backpack. He goes on, “. I want you to pack it with all the stuff you have in your life and start with the little things the shelves, the drawers, the knick knacks: then start adding larger stuff, clothes, tabletop appliances, lamps, your TV – backpack should be getting pretty heavy now – and you go bigger. Your couch, your car, your home – I want you to stuff it all into that backpack. Now try to walk. We weigh ourselves down to the point we can’t move. Now burn your backpack completely. Exhilarating isn’t it.”

He then tells his audience to fill their backpack with the people in their lives. No he’s not going to tell them to burn the pack this time but he does tell his audience that the weight of all the people in the pack are the heaviest components in their lives. “All those negotiations and arguments and secrets are compromising. The slower we move, the faster we die. Make no mistake, moving is living.” (1)

In the gospel we hear Jesus giving the same kind of motivational speech to those who wish to follow him. This morning’s passage begins with the ominous phrase, “When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem.” A very determined Jesus is about to begin his travels to Jerusalem. He is not taking his eyes off his destination or his goal which is bringing about the kingdom of God. He does not let the fact that he is walking towards his death dissuade him. As a matter of fact this adds to the urgency to his mission so that even though some would not receive him such as the Samaritans, he presses on. As he is walking along the road a prospective disciple runs up to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” You would think that Jesus would be excited to have such an admirer in his flock, but his reception of this admirer is less than warm, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have their nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” We have no idea if this person became a disciple or if Jesus scared them off with the harsh realities of discipleship. Then Jesus sees someone on the road and in the same way he called Peter and James to drop their nets and become fishers of men, Jesus calls out to this stranger on the road “Follow me.” But this person does not drop everything to follow Jesus like Peter and James did. He says to Jesus, “Lord, first let me bury my father.” Jesus tersely replies, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Once again, we have no idea if this person became a disciple of Jesus. Then another on the road says to Jesus, “I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” To which an unsympathetic Jesus says to him, “No one puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the Kingdom of God.”

Ryan Bingham’s backpack speech and the responses of Jesus to his would be disciples are troublesome to say the least. Ryan Bingham and Jesus are encouraging a lifestyle that is free of attachments and burdens. For Ryan the emptying of attachments is all about freedom, freedom from responsibility, freedom from relationships, freedom from being weighed down by anything that would make you have to compromise your needs for the sake of another. But for Jesus the releasing of attachments is not about freedom but rather it is about the cost of discipleship. It is about giving up ones own needs for the sake of the other. We remember that throughout his ministry Jesus was homeless, traveling from place to place depending on the hospitality of strangers as he makes his way to Jerusalem. He had broken ties with his biological family and if someone wanted to follow him he expected them to do the same. His harsh and unreasonable demands tell his potential disciples that you’d better think carefully before making a decision to follow Jesus. You backpack will empty but your work will be plenty because you are doing nothing short of bringing about the kingdom of God on earth.

This is one of the harder texts about Jesus. There are no loopholes around these statements; these pronouncements are not metaphors that can be explained away as something deeper than what is being stated in the text. No, these are direct orders from Jesus that tell us that if you choose to follow in his mission you must be of a single mind and let go of anything that would get in the way of that mission, even the things you hold most dear.

An overarching theme of the Gospel of Luke is the coming of the Kingdom of God, an earthly reality where all of God’s creation live in right relationship with each other. It is the seeing of human affairs as through God’s eyes and becoming agents of establishing God’s reign as God would have it on earth, where those who mourn are comforted, those who are meek inherit the earth, those who hunger are fed, and those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are satisfied. All of us who hear the good news are called to be God’s hands, feet and voice on earth to bring about this kingdom of God on earth. This may mean that some of us will have to make heart wrenching choices in order to make following Jesus our top priority.

Other important matters compete for our attention, both individually and as a community of faith. We all have bills to pay, children to raise, parents to care for, jobs to go to or jobs to find. As a church we also have bills to pay, things to repair, obligations to meet etc. However I wonder if we get so caught up in the dailyness of our stuff that we forget why we are a church. The church is not just a building to get married, buried and baptized in. And even though worshiping God is the most important thing that we do as a community faith, it is not the only reason why this church exists. God called Smalltown Congregational Church into being to transform lives through sharing the good news of the indwelling of God’s Kingdom here on earth. Not just through caring for each other but also in reaching out to those outside our walls who need to hear the good news.

Chuck Lazenby’s partner of over fifty years David had passed away. They had lived a closeted life throughout their relationship and when David died, Chuck had no family or community to support him. He was isolated and his grief led him to give up on himself. One rainy night, drunk and despondent he headed toward Mulkiteo Lake where he intended to drive off a pier. To steel his nerves he pulled into a parking lot on the way to down some liquor. It happened to be the First Congregational Church of Everett, an Open and Affirming church. He walked into the church and he was touched by how he was welcomed into their community. Chuck states, “Those people embraced me like I’ve never seen in a church before.” The pastor reached out to him and Chuck told her his story. She said to him, “Don’t you know that this is an open and affirming and safe church.” He had no idea what that meant. So she explained it to him and he was overwhelmed because for fifty years he and his partner felt that they were banned from the church and here was a community that was willing to accept him fully as he is. This began his road to recovery, healing and wholeness. (2)

My brothers and sisters in Christ, there are many Chuck Lazenby’s out there who are hungering to hear the good news of God’s love and grace given freely as shown to us through the life and ministry of Jesus. There are people who are wanting to join us in becoming God’s hands, feet and voice in bringing God’s justice to the world. There are people who are longing to find a community where they know everyone is welcome regardless of race, sexual orientation, economic means, or even previous religious experience. Smalltown Congregational Church does not exist just to sustain itself. God made us a community of faith with the mission to sustain God’s world.

May it be so.

Amen.


(1) Clifford, Jeffrey, et al. Up in the air. Hollywood, Calif: Paramount Home Entertainment, 2010.


(2) Emery, Drew, Larry Schlessinger, Lisa Halpern, Robert D. Lemon, Felicia Loud, and Eric Lane Barnes. Inlaws & Outlaws. [Seattle, Wash.]: True Stories Project, 2007.

Garden Blogging Update - First Day of Summer

Yeah!!!!  It is the first day of summer and the garden is doing great.  Hopefully it will keep up through the season.  We've had a hot spell in the last week and the garden loved it.  With daily watering, a bit of fertilizer and lots of love here is how my garden is growing thus far.The Cucumbers are struggling, I started them inside and when I planted them, they were "shocked by the outside environment, especially the heat wave.  I thought they were goners but then I fertilized them and they seemed to have revitalized. 

I am very pleased with the tomato plants.  A friend gave me six seedlings and I've added four of my own.  Hopefully this will yield a good crop. 

The lettuce should be ready to harvest in a week.  Yummy!

A marigold getting ready to bloom.

Teh green onions.  Very happy with their development.

Hot peppers.

Cosmos.

Carrots

Herbs and Lettuce.

The herb Basil up close and personal.

Swiss Chard

Lil' guy in repose with disembodied hand and dresser.

The Curious Case of the Gerasene Demoniac

Picture from The Brick Testament

Galatians 3:23-29
Luke 8:26-39

This morning we meet Jesus in the midst of his travels going from town to town to preaching about God’s love and mercy given freely to all. Jesus’ boat has just landed in the town of the Gerasenes which is located opposite of his home territory of Galilee. As soon as he steps on land a naked wild looking man runs to meet him and asks Jesus to remove the demons from him. I imagine the demoniac was a quite a sight for sure: dirty, smelly hair flying all over the place, probably shaky, screechy and all together scary. Luke’s gospel says that he was so seized by demonic forces that he has to kept under guard and bound in chains and shackles. However this man was so strong that he could break the chains and shackles and then he would run into the wilds.
 
While some things in the bible are hard for us to understand in our modern day context, the scariness of this situation is easily understandable. However what is puzzling is how the townspeople reacted to Jesus healing this man. The before and after of the demoniac’s extreme makeover is stunning to say the least. When the people find the man from whom the demons had gone sitting at Jesus’ feet fully clothed and in his right mind, they are not relieved…instead they were afraid. And when people in the surrounding country heard about this dramatic healing they asked Jesus to leave them; for they too were seized with great fear.


What’s up with that? If I were one of the townspeople, I would like to think I would be happy to be rid of this “boogey-man” who lurked on the edges of my town in the tombs. I would be in awe of knowing that there was someone like Jesus who was so filled with the power of God that he could command a thousand demons to leave a man and go into a herd of swine. However when I step back and look at the situation systemically, it becomes easier for me to understand why the group’s first reaction to Jesus was fear. They feared Jesus because he was changing the dynamics of the town by removing the thing that was causing them the most anxiety, the boogeyman in their midst.

Last week I preached about how when a group of people face change, the group’s natural reaction is to resist that change because a group’s natural inclination is to seek equilibrium to keep things on an even keel. Some note that for the country of Gerasenes, having a boogey-man on the edges was part of their equilibrium. “The people had isolated the man with the demon and had given time and expense to guarding and controlling him. This is to say they met the situation with tolerance and management of the demonic among them. Now the power of God [through Jesus] comes to their community and disturbs that way of life. Even when it is for the good, power that can neither be calculated nor managed is frightening.” (1)  The people can’t tolerate the change that has happened. They knew how to deal with demoniac being sick, but they didn’t know how to deal with him being well. The townspeople become upset because they need him to stay sick because that is the only way they know how to deal with him. His being sick is part of what keeps the community going. In essence the community de-humanized this sick man and Jesus’ healing affirmed his humanity and brought him back into the fold.

I remember when I was in junior high I experienced a very awkward adolescence that was complicated by the death of my father when I was in seventh grade. My family had to move to a new neighborhood and so I started eighth grade in a new school. My mom was overwhelmed by the grief of the loss of my father and so attending to the finer things of raising a girl was low on her priority list. I didn’t get the new clothes, make up and fancy hairdo’s that my peers were sporting and at first I didn’t care because I was knee deep in grief over the loss of my father. For the most part I was ignored, but unfortunately there some kids would not leave me alone. Being a new kid and one that didn’t fit in, I was cast into the tombs of the junior high cafeteria, or what was known as sitting one lunch table away from the special ed. kids. Now I’m not going to relive my traumatic childhood memories from the pulpit but suffuse it to say, I was de-humanized by some in my junior class just because I didn’t fit in.

I don’t know if it was because the veil of the grief of my father’s death was lifting or if it was peer pressure (probably a bit of both) but I started caring more about my appearance. I decided to start saving my allowance so that I could purchase my own clothes rather than relying on my mother buy all my clothes for me. I also started going to a professional beautician to get my hair cut. I remember the first day I came to school with my new feathered bangs ala’ Farah Fawcett (yes I know this dates me), the reaction of my peers was legion. Many approved of my new look, suddenly wanting to play with my new locks by French braiding my hair. Some even volunteered to let me use their make up, but I kindly declined because I knew that my mom did not approve of eighth grade girls wearing makeup.

However what surprised me most were the reactions of some of the kids who picked on me during my awkward phase, the ones who made a point of de-humanizing me because I didn’t fit in. I thought that these kids would stop picking on me because I was trying hard to become one of them, but in some ways the bullying escalated. I remember getting pushed into the lockers with such scathing comments such as “I bet you think you’re better than us because you got new hair.” And “You can change your clothes, but you can’t change being a loser.”

As a child I was perplexed, but as an adult I look back and understand the negative reaction. You see, in my junior high (as with most) the kids had set up an informal pecking order. It doesn’t seem like a kind thing to do or even the right thing to do, but for kids who are struggling with the changes of adolescence it is a matter of survival. Everything makes sense when everyone has a place such as the cool kids being on the top of the heap, the brainiacs a little left of center and the rejects on the bottom. However when a kid steps out of their place and improves, for the kids who are not secure in themselves this can be perceived as a threat. For these kids, having someone who is more awkward than they are makes them feel better about themselves. As long as there is someone who is in worse shape than they are, they can at least muster up some worth for themselves by saying, “at least I’m not her.”

We have this same dynamic with the man formally known as the Gerasene Demoniac. As long as the town had a boogey man on the outskirts of town, the townspeople can sigh a breath of relief that there is someone in town worse off then they were. As long as they were putting all their energy into containing this man they could avoid looking at themselves by making this wild man their scapegoat. Jesus upsets this dynamic by making the man whole and holy enough to go back to his home to proclaim to the city how much God had done for him.

I believe that one of the struggles of the human condition is that most of us struggle with a sense of not being good enough. While it is good to strive for excellence in all we do we also need to forgive ourselves for being less than perfect. Unfortunately if left unchecked this sense of unworthiness can overwhelm a group and systemic ways of oppression are manifest in such forms as racism, sexism, homophobia, and other forms of discrimination that serve to lift one group as superior over another.

However as people of faith we can hold fast to our faith in the knowledge that God loves us just as we are. In Paul’s letter to the Galatians he assures his readers that they are justified by their faith alone. This justification, that is God’s salvation that comes by God’s grace, is done by God’s initiative alone. Our faith comes from God and salvation is a free gift of God’s grace and it cannot be earned by any work that we humans do. As Paul states “Now before faith came we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we may be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to the disciplinarian for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith.” (Gal. 3:23-26)

My brother’s and sister’s in Christ the good news is this, it is not our social standing, or the size of our bank accounts or which even which group we are associated that makes us righteous in God’s eyes. Christ teaches us that we are righteous because God created us and God loves all that God has created extravagantly. Have faith in this and clothe yourselves in this sense of beloved-ness and worthiness. Remember that as children of God, there is no longer Greek nor Jew, no longer the in crowd nor the rejects, no longer male nor female, no longer gay nor straight, no longer citizen nor illegal immigrant; for all of us are one in Christ Jesus.

May it be so.

Amen.

(1)  Craddock, Fred B. Preaching Through the Christian Year. A Comprehensive Commentary on the Lectionary Year C. (Valley Forge, Pa: Trinity Press International, 1994.), 311.

Old Wineskins

Romans 12: 1-8

Luke 5: 27-39


Every so often my beloved partner cleans out her side of our closet. This is a joyful activity for her. She relishes in the process of letting go of what is old so as to make room for the new. Then she has fun shopping for that which is new. I on the other hand have trouble of letting go of my old things. It drives beloved partner crazy that I have clothes in my closet that are over ten years old. And as some of us know, when we grow older, we don’t grow up but rather out and so when I try to put my new poundage into my old clothes, they burst just like the old wineskins burst when new wine is placed in them.

We all deal with change differently, some embrace it willingly such as Beloved Partner and others like me try to keep things just as they are. However when ever a group of people face change, its natural first reaction is to resist that change. You see a group’s inclination is to seek balance or equilibrium, which basically means trying to keep things the same in order to keep things on an even keel. It’s like a couple of kids on a teeter totter, in the beginning the teeter totter is even, then one kid goes down, the other goes up. All things being equal gravity will force the kid who is up to come down so that both kids are equal distant to the ground again. So if we think of congregational life as a system that seeks to keep its equilibrium it is easier to understand why it resists changes. This does not mean that the people voicing resistance within the congregation are being mean spirited or stubborn, rather they are vocalizing the natural resistance to change experienced in a system that is seeking equilibrium.

In today’s gospel reading we encounter the Pharisees and their scribes objecting to Jesus openly feasting with the sinners and tax collectors. Not only was Jesus disregarding the purity laws of his time by eating with people who were considered outcast, he was seeking to bring them closer to God through celebration rather than mourning and fasting. Some note that it’s not that the Pharisees objected to Jesus bringing sinners to repentance, what they were objecting to was how he was doing it. They did not think that meals of celebration were appropriate for people who needed to repent. “Jesus defends his disciples by picturing the present situation as a wedding party, where no one fasts. His statement makes clear that the banquet at Levi’s house was a celebration, not an ordinary meal. Jesus is also saying something important about repentance. Repentance does not consist of mourning and fasting. Rather, one’s life is turned around through the joyful discovery of a new opportunity…Again the Pharisees and scribes are ‘grumbling’ because Jesus is eating with sinners. Jesus responds with parables showing that joy, especially joy at a meal of celebration, is the appropriate sign of repentance.” (1) Jesus changes the system by the way he changes his approach to repentance and the Pharisees and scribes try to bring things back to the way they were by telling Jesus there are more appropriate ways of bringing sinners to repentance. Once again it is not that the Pharisees are bad people or being stubborn, they are only trying to bring things back to equilibrium.

Jesus responds to the Pharisees resistance by sharing with them them the parables of the old coat and the new wine too illustrate how the old ways may not work with the new relationships and new experience of the spiritual life that he is creating. It is important to note that Jesus is not making a judgment that the new cloth and the new wine is better than the old. As a matter of fact Jesus is saying that the old coat is worth patching and the old wineskins are worth preserving.  However what I think what he’s trying to say is that if you try to use old ways to deal with what is new, it is like trying to put a square peg into a circle shaped hole, no matter how much you push it’s not going to work. Like the parable says, if you use unshrunken new cloth to patch the old coat, you will make the tear worse the first time you wash the garment. And if you try to ferment new wine in an old wineskin that has been dried out, eventually the old wineskin will explode as the gasses build up in the fermentation process. New wine needs the flexibility of a supple wineskin that will expand as the gasses of the new wine expands. Really this parable is not about old verses new but of the dangers of loss than can happen if the system is unable the adapt to the change. Consider the people who would have been hearing this message at Jesus’ time. As the tailor in the audience hears the parable, he would not be concerned about which cloth is more valuable, instead he would know with certainty that that the tailoring is done carelessly by using a new fabric to patch the old, both the new cloth and the old coat would be ruined by this careless bit of tailoring. The same holds true for the shop keeper hearing about the wineskins. Instead of calculating in his head the value of the old and new wineskins and wine, he would know that he will lose everything, both wine and wineskins if he tries to ferment the new wine in the old wineskin. (2)

So here we have it, we know that systems, groups, and churches by nature resist change and yet Jesus says that change may be necessary in to bring about the reign of God. In 1968 The First Baptist Church of Birmingham Alabama called the Rev. J. Herbert Gilmore Jr. to be their pastor and teacher. Together they sought to embrace the surrounding community and to open their membership to all. The church was located across the street from a low-income housing development and so the church started programs of outreach that served this housing development one of which included a tutoring program for the children who lived there. Twila Bryant who was eleven was one of the first children to benefit from their program. Given the commitment that the church had towards embracing the surrounding community, the fact that Twila was black was not a problem. Eventually Twila and her mother Mrs. Winifred Bryant became more involved in the Christian education program and the worship life of the community. The natural next step to their growing relationship with the church was to apply for church membership. A dream come true for churches that are committed to reaching out to their surrounding community. The membership committee recommended that this family be accepted into membership and it was put to a vote to the whole congregation as was their tradition. The majority of the congregation voted in favor of accepting the Bryants into the church membership but a very vocal segregationist minority objected to this and the standing procedures required that the applications be reviewed by the deacons followed by a two-thirds vote of the congregation. (3)

Now this sounds absolutely appalling to us in our context but remember that in the South at that time segregation was accepted as a natural part of life. It is easy to vilify the dissenters however if we think of this systemically, admitting a black family into a white church does changes the church system and so it is natural for there to be resistance to the change. However this does not mean that the church should not change. Rather than looking at the present state of racial relations within the church as a problem, the church could have looked at this situation as an opportunity as a step towards a new future. The church could have stepped back and discern what new thing is God doing in their midst and prayerfully discern what can they do to adapt to this change.


Unfortunately this did not happen for First Baptist Church in Birmingham. Instead the church was held back by a determined small group of people for their own purposes. At first this small faction tried to oust the pastor, but that failed. Then they tried to fire the whole staff and that failed as well. When the application for the Bryants’ membership was brought to the church community after the deacon’s review, this dissenting minority of active members were able to get enough votes to make sure there would not be a two-thirds majority vote in favor for the Bryants becoming members of First Baptist Church. This resulted in a split in the church where 300 of their 1800 membership left the church and Pastor Gilmore resigned his position because he “could not be pastor of a racist church.” In his final sermon to this church he acknowledged that his position on the race relations had split the church, but he also asked, “Is it worse to be split now by the weakness of man, or to be cut off for eternity by the judgment of God." (4) The old wineskins have shattered and the new wine is lost.

In Paul’s letter to the Romans, he exhorts his audience to be open to the changes of the new things that God is doing even if it is in conflict with they have always done things. “Do not be conformed to this world – but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, that you may discern what is the will of God – what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12: 2) Smalltown Congregational Church has had a long history of discerning the will of God and making changes to work towards building God’s kingdom here on earth. You’ve had female pastors leading this church long before female leadership in ministry was embraced in small rural churches. During the Viet Nam war, you mobilized to become a Just Peace Church and protest the United States involvement in another country’s conflict. And most recently you have chosen to become an open and affirming church in midst of a church culture that thinks that homosexuality is incompatible with living a life of faith. Through all these things you have encountered resistance but in your willingness to hold fast to what God is calling you to be as a community of faith, you’ve shown the world that in all things, the will of God will prevail.

May it be so.

Amen.


(1) Tannehill, Robert C. Luke. Abingdon New Testament commentaries. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1996.108.

(2) Quicke, Michael J. 2009. "Promoting a subversive spirituality: new wineskins and new wine in mission and evangelism." Perspectives in Religious Studies 36, no. 2: 169-177. ATLASerials, Religion Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed June 11, 2010).

(3) Shockley, Donald G. 1970. "First Baptist, Birmingham : a case study of old wineskins bursting." Christian Century 87, no. 48: 1462-1463. ATLASerials, Religion Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed June 11, 2010).

(4) Ibid., 1463.

One Year Ago Today...

Anniversaries are such odd days.  I'm just bumping along doing my thing when I look at the calender and realize that one year ago this day I was in a much different place.

One year ago today I had ended my ministry as Associate Pastor at First Church.  I remember being devastated as my position ended due to church budget cuts.  It was a painful process to leave this church, especially around issues of severance pay (they didn't want to give me any) and tying up the loose ends to the particular ministries I lead.  The last three months felt like one long drawn out fight, a fight to be dealt with justly, a continuous fight with the senior pastor who was trying to diminish the impact I made in the time I served there, and most especially a fight to not drown in the sadness of the grief being expressed by the congregation.

It was like I preached last Sunday:

John 16:20 Very truly, I tell you, you will weep and mourn, but the world will rejoice; you will have pain, but your pain will turn into joy. 21When a woman is in labour, she has pain, because her hour has come. But when her child is born, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy of having brought a human being into the world.

Grief is hard because the process is very much like a woman in labor.  It felt like my emotions were out of control however what I learned is that on the other side of grief is transformation.  Thanks be to God, I am in a much better place.

BTW, here are some garden pictures for your enjoyment!

My neighbor dog friend who likes to stop by and say hi on his walks.

The tomatoes seem to be doing well.

A little basil to go with the tomatoes.

A fine looking pepper plant

Beans beans the musical fruit, the more you eat....oops wrong kind of beans.  ;)

God Standard Time

Psalm 43: 2-5
Jeremiah 29: 11-14
John 16: 16-24

One of my favorite things I like to say is that anything that has to do with the church always moves at the speed of molasses. In a world where most things can be found instantaneously and immediate gratification is the rule, the church seems to go at a pace that is much slower than most. Yes the church is about changing lives radically but these changes happen on God Standard Time, not Pacific, Central or even Eastern Standard Time.

This morning we return to Jesus giving his farewell to his disciples which by the way takes up five whole chapters in the Gospel of John. Seems a bit long doesn’t it, but remember Jesus is on God Standard Time. Jesus’ long goodbye reminds me of the goodbyes that I have had to make in the church setting. Being part of a community of faith is like being part of a family. When one person leaves a family to go to school, be married or be on ones own it takes time for the family to adjust to this change. When the head of the family leaves it is a big shock to the system and more work needs to be done to deal with the change. The same holds true for a church community that has said goodbye to a settled pastor.

I became part of the UCC seventeen years ago through a faith community called Urban Church, UCC in the Midwest. Urban Church were transformative for me for many reasons, most especially because it was the first time I had ever been part of a church that was led by a female pastor. When I first saw Rev. Jane Doe at the altar presiding over the Eucharist my heart was moved so profoundly because I was raised to believe that only men could lead the Lord’s Supper.

At the time I was attending Urban Church, I was going through some pretty rough life transitions myself. I clung to the community of Urban Church like a sailor hanging onto the side of a boat in rough waters. I found stability in the midst of the uncertainty of my life. No matter what was going on in my personal life, I could always count on this community of faith getting together every Sunday morning at 10:00 am with Pastor Jane up front leading us all in worship.

Eventually my life settled down and things became more stable, so much so that I wanted to give back to the church that had given so much to me. I became part of the church leadership by joining the nominating committee and the worship team. I became a regular in the kitchen offering a hand when ever the church held one of its many fund raising breakfasts. I was inspired to work hard because I appreciated what this community stood for not only for me personally but for the world as well. Pastor Jane preached sermons that challenged us and gave us new ways of looking at scriptures through the lens of peace and social justice. She encouraged us as church leaders to use just practices in the way we went about our church work. As a beloved pastor her ministry impacted many of us who were members of Urban Church.

Five years into her ministry at Urban Church, Jane became ill and had to take several months off for medical leave. This was a challenging time for us however we were able to keep the church going in her absence. We were excited to see her back when she returned but clearly she was not the same person that she was before her leave. She seemed to be going in a direction that was leading her away from parish ministry and several months after she returned she submitted her letter of resignation to the congregation. I was stunned when I her letter in the mail. It seemed like her resignation came out of no where. I was sad, angry and confused. I wondered if it was our fault that she got sick and eventually left us. It felt like I was experiencing a death in the family. Even though I only saw her once a week tops, her presence in my life was quite profound. I wondered if I would be able to continue being a part of this church without her there.

For the next three months our community participated in many rituals of leave taking. There were the meetings to wrap up the loose ends of her leadership, the potlucks, gatherings and even a big party on the night before her last service. It seemed so agonizing to me because I felt like it was too long and drawn out. I thought that my sadness would lift as soon as her last worship service was over with us but the emotions lingered on well after her leave taking. It wasn’t until well into the interim time that I realized why I had such an intense attachment to my former pastor.

What I learned was that a strong bond develops between a settled pastor and the members of the congregation. The pastor is present at the events of meaning for their congregants such as baptisms, deaths, illnesses and marriage. Given the importance of this person in a community of faith’s life, losing the pastor is like losing a family member. Feelings of grief appear in individuals and the community as a whole and time is needed to grieve the loss of the previous ministry thus opening the door to a new ministry.

Even though it has been almost a year since Pastor Sue Preacherlady left as your pastor, there is still some sadness and grief lingering in this congregation. She was a beloved leader in your community. As your pastor she solidified your commitments to being a just peace and open and affirming church. For five years she was with you all through your baptisms, deaths and marriages. For some of you she was there to comfort you through the hard times and for others her ministry stretched and challenged you in ways you never imagined.

Now the emotions amongst the individuals in this congregation do vary from individual to individual. For some, especially those who have grown up in the church, it is not hard for you to accept that pastors come and go and that the ministry of the church will continue through the changes in leadership. Yet for others the hurt, sadness and anger linger because it takes longer for them to process their grief. It’s not that one way of processing is healthier than the other, it’s just different for different people.

However the reason why grief is a process and not an instantaneous event is because it is done on God Standard Time. It is like the Jeremiah said in the older testament reading “For Thus Says the Lord: Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit you, and I will fulfill my promise and bring you back to this place.” (Jeremiah 29: 10) There is no escape from suffering however the good news is that it doesn’t last forever. God will take us from the exile of grief into a new day. “For surely I know the plans for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.” (Jer. 29: 11)

The good news is that what waits on the other side of grief is transformation. A new life, a new way of doing things, a ministry of the things yet to come. This is what Jesus preached to his disciples in his farewell speech. Jesus normalizes for them the emotions that they are about to experience “Very truly I tell you, you will weep and mourn…you will have pain but your pain will turn to joy.” (John 16: 20) He compares the grief process to a woman in labor, she is in pain while she is in labor however her anguish turns to joy because of having brought another human being in the world.

In the weeks and months to come as we continue on our interim journey together my prayer is that we be gentle with ourselves and one another. Yes many things have changed in this past year and for some of us the transition has been hard, however if we remember that we are on God Standard Time, in all things God will prevail. Yes there may be pain now, but our hearts will rejoice and no one can take our joy away from us.

May it be so.

Amen.

The Return of Garden Blogging

Here is where I planted all my seed.  Oops, that sounded dirty didn't it?  ;)

Lots of tomatoes planted this year.  Last year all my mater's died cuz of the great blight of 2009.  It was enough to make me want to emigrate from the US to seek greener pastures across the pond.

Hot peppers anyone?  It is my goal to make salsa from my garden.

Gotta have me some cucumbers!

Lil' guy sez, "Dude...do you have to go to the garden again?  Stay home and play with me."