Don’t flay the sheep.

Reading, reading, reading

I’m thinking about books.

Heidi’s got a good post about the book situation at her house. (Our house is similar…between a pastor an an ex-grad student…but worse because Erik and I are a little less organized and have a little less space than Tim and Heidi.)

And some blogging friends, prodded by Alex,  have been carefully tracking their reading since January.

I haven’t been tracking here, but I’m realizing I’ve done better with reading in the last few months. Maybe not as much heavy duty theology as I think I should be reading, but here’s a rundown of books I’ve read in whole or put away significant portions of in the last couple of months:

Much of my reading has been aided by the reading list for this conference (two weeks and I’m there!).

1. Open House, Elizabeth Berg
2. Fieldwork, Mischa Berlinski
3. Imposter, Davis Bunn
4. Pearl, Mary Gordon
5. The Known World, Edward P. Jones
6. The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint, Brady Udall

I also started reading mysteries again.

1.  Strong Poison and Five Red Herrings, Dorothy L. Sayers
2. Three Bags Full, Leonie Swan
3. A few of the Kate Fansler mysteries by Amanda Cross

And random other things:

1. A Slender Grace, Rod Jellema
2. Exclusion and Embrace, Miroslav Volf (and, true confession,about 3 chapters, not the whole thing, but, hey, it has to count for something)
3. Under the Banner of Heaven, Jon Krakauer
4. The Return of the Prodigal Son, Henri Nouwen

Since I haven’t been keeping a perfect list, I think there are a few more out there that I’m forgetting.

But 13 books isn’t bad. I feel pretty good about that. If you’re wondering where I find the time, well, I don’t clean my house very well.

I always wonder if I should be reading more heavy-duty theology. But the truth is, I’m still (5 years later) feeling a little burnt out on academic reading since seminary. And, I find that the theology of everyday life is much clearer in novels. I think it keeps my imagination fresher.

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One week later

Easter being early this year has thrown me off a little bit. Now that it’s over and done with, I think I have early-Easter-withdrawal. Usually, the crazy business of May (confirmation, year-end youth group, Sunday School wrap-ups, fitting-it-all-in before summer break) takes over soon after Easter. So soon that I barely notice that Easter is over.

And, yes, for the liturgical snobs among you, I know that Easter really goes on for several weeks. But, let’s be honest, as my colleague Bart pointed out in his sermon last Sunday, the lillies, the trumpets, the full-stop organ pieces, are gone the next week.

But this past week, I can only explain my lackadaisical crabbiness by saying I had some kind of Easter withdrawal.  I’ve felt tired and uninterested.

The weather is not helping, either. We’ve gone from living with ice floes on our yards from a constant freeze-melt cycle to gray, cloudy, wet, and blah. With just a few tantalizing days of sun in between, just to make the grayness that much worse.

Last night, I was dreading youth group meetings, but then things went fairly well: 24 junior highers spent some serious time thinking about the Apostles Creed (although, I didn’t foresee this problem at one of the learning stations with the junior high group: 10 minutes into the meeting, I hear one kid say, “These eggshells smell really bad when you hold them over the votive candles.” There is nothing junior high boys won’t try to set on fire, is there?); and the high school turn out was small, but I don’t care one bit, because they were a lovely group and they talked passionately and thought deeply about the issue of violence.

As far as I can tell, what I really need is an excellent nap. And maybe some good weather.

I think I just need a really good nap.

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Saturday

We are done with the difficult worship: the last supper, the blackness of Good Friday, and the prep for Easter is mostly over: the lillies are lined up and ready, the Easter banners are up, and this morning, we’ll unleash a herd of kids for an easter egg hunt in the church (outside, normally, but inside today because we’ve got 5 inches of snow).

Zora is with grandma and grandpa, and her Easter dress is ready folded neatly in her bag with tights and shoes and everything she needs to look pretty. I have a new blouse to wear with my gray suit. My prayer for Easter morning is written. There are no youth group meetings tomorrow. The only left for me is to bake a cake for family dinner tomorrow. I should probably clean…I’ve got the chance and there are a few corners that could use it.

After two days filled with church work and worship preparation, it feels off to have a day filled with ordinary things.  Shouldn’t we all be huddled at home, or maybe packing off to a monastic retreat?

It seems strange: today, we go about our business and wait for tomorrow.  I wonder: if the men ran from the cross, scared, confused, afraid, if they scattered and regathered in hidden rooms, if they couldn’t bring themselves to come out until Jesus came and beckoned them, they did something out of the ordinary those days. A horrible, sick-to-your-stomach out of the ordinary. But something to acknowledge the event none-the-less.

But the women, the ones who stayed at the cross, the Marys who helped prepare the body, the followers who were tied to homes and couldn’t follow, there were things they had to do, everyday tasks that had to be done, children to bathe and meals to cook, floors to sweep, friends to visit, bread to bake. And they did those things in a fog (not knowing what Sunday morning would bring), but they did them. Like breathing, going on with what had to be done.

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Oh, please let this be the end of the snow

It snowed last night. It’s still snowing. Come on already!

But, I have very good reason to hope this is the last snow:

This morning, we packed Zora up to go spend the weekend with Grandma and Grandpa. (We’ll reunite at Easter dinner, after  all the hub-bub at church has died down.)

She walked to the car, plodded through the snow on the way, and wound up with some of the white stuff on her boots.

Then, in her carseat, she proceeded to pick snow off her boots (the bottoms, mind you) and eat it. Repeatedly. Her narration of the event (‘now is snow in her lexicon):

“‘now, ‘now….MMMMMM.”

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Random Catch Up

It’s time to do a catch-up!

1. I’ve got a sermon that has to go up…it’s a week overdue on the blog. I’m debating if it might be time to put up sermons in mp3 format only, but I know sometimes I have congregants who ask for the text and it’s so much easier to direct them to the blog. On the other hand, mp3 is so much less prone to plagaraization. Any thoughts?
2. Stupid moment of the decade:  For about 2 months I’ve had my mom’s sewing machine on loan…and little projects have been piling up (recycled felted sweaters and hats, a quilt, mending, etc.) because I could not get the thing to work right. Nothing helped. I bought new needles, I readjusted everything, but stitches were skipping, thread was breaking, aghhh…I have never sworn so much at a machine in my life. Finally, two nights ago, I had an epiphany. I was setting the needle in BACKWARDS. Honestly, what is wrong with me? This is the machine I learned to sew on. This problem solved, I think I am entering a new period of sewing creativity. And maybe it will even result in me actually posting some pictures of a few things for Zora.
3. Remember the anti-spread campaign? Well, I just didn’t stick with it and things kept spreading. In February, I decided to take extreme measures and signed up for a certain weight loss program. 15 pounds down. How cool is that? My pants fit again, but they think I should loose a little more…they’re probably right, but then I will be faced with the dilemma of buying new pants. I started the whole thing as a way to save money because I was having to buy new bigger pants. I guess buying new smaller pants is a whole different banana.
4. It’s Holy Week. I don’t feel too busy, but that’s the joy of working on a multipastor staff. Not to say that I’m not busy, but I’m grateful for doing this with a group of supporting players (including my parents–Zora has basically moved in with them for the week.)
5. I do feel dragged down by the stuff some of my congregation has to go through right now. I’m saying alot of “kyries” right now for people who are sick, dying, struggling, full of drama, etc. It struck me during a reading of the Passion last Sunday when I looked out at them and saw so many who were shouldering a whole lot right now.
6. Want to get a sneek-peek at Fox Valley’s Good Friday service? Check out my post on Fidelia’s Sisters. I’ve got an article about the Good Friday liturgy I wrote.

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Not just my senator, but a relative?

I was going to try to keep from going political here, but I can’t resist.

This just in: Obama is part Frisian. Yes, Frisian, those crazy, wild, Boniface-eating folks from the north of the Netherlands.

So, now, not only do I really like the guy, not only is he my senator, not only did Erik and I eat brunch at the booth next to him and his daughters once, he’s kind of a relative.

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Waiting and waiting and waiting

Half of my afternoon at work today: sitting in a coffee shop, knitting while reading some serious, hardcore theology to prepare for next week’s sermon.

I should be happy about this, right? It sounds like the idyllic life of a pastor.

But again (see my previous post), I’m questioning whether this “counted”.

One of the local high schools had a threat of violence today, and so, trying to be a good youth pastor, I let my kids know, via facebook, that I’d be in a local coffee shop for an hour and a half if they needed to stop by and chat about their day.

No one showed up. Either: they’re resilient; they didn’t want to come; they didn’t get the message; whatever.

I’m going to savor the 90 minutes I did have with the theology book.

But it got me thinking about how much of this youth ministry thing is about waiting. (This probably applies to all ministry.) You have to spend time waiting, being accessible, waiting, taking small steps, and waiting for the time when the relationships are deeply and truly there. I have never been one who can aggressively form relationships. I think they take time, happenstance, and the hand of God to form. I can’t force them in my personal life, and I can’t force them in my pastoral life.

In the meantime, I have to wait.

Did that time count? Yes, because part of what I am called to do is to wait.

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40 days update

At the beginning of Lent, I posted about the decision to give something up or not. In the end, in large part thanks to the helpful comments, I went with giving 40 minutes to God per day.

And how has that worked out? Well, if asked me this morning, I would have said it’s worked out miserably. Once again, I didn’t stick to it. In fact, I don’t think there’s a deliberate 40 minutes anywhere in there in the last weeks. Maybe 15 minutes. Once.

But, this afternoon, I’m actually feeling pretty good about the whole thing. I had an appointment with my spiritual director (best money spent out of my expense account!), and came with the following thoughts and questions:

• Does it count as giving time to God if it’s good for me? By which I mean, if it’s really about my being a better person spiritually, does it really count as time simply spent being close to the heart of God?
• Does it count if I’m on the treadmill, because I ran/walked a really tough 40 minutes yesterday while listening to sermons on my iPod (minister-nerd alert!). And that felt spiritual. But really?
• Does it count if I’m relaxing in the sauna after said long run, especially if the relaxing time goes from 20 minutes to nearly an hour, while Erik’s at home manning the baby and I should really maybe be doing dishes or, perhaps, getting something from my ever burgeoning-to-do list at work done?
• Maybe what I’m really asking is this: does it count if it’s self-care? (In fact, about the time Lent started, in a totally unrelated move, I took the drastic step of signing on for the country’s most popular weight loss “club”. This had less to do with God than with the fact that my pants don’t fit. So, I’m eating better, exercising, and then I’ve been on a novel reading mission, which I think is very good for my soul.)

Do you see the pattern here? Yep, someone is focussed on what “counts”.

Here’s the thing: notice, from the previous post about this, that the whole issue of what to do during lent was precipitated by a parishoner asking what I planned to give up.

When you’re a minister, your spiritual health is part of the job description. You just can’t be a good minister unless you are spiritually engaged. Maybe you can be good for a little while, but then you’ll burn out. Ministry is incarnational. You are a living, breathing human being, and what you do and say, how you are, and how you are with God, is your congregation’s business. Your 7th graders are allowed to ask you questions like: “What are you giving up for Lent?” Not just out of curiosity, but because they get to wrap their little hands around your spiritual life and check it out for themselves. I know that sounds invasive, but I’m OK with that.

My whole thing about what “counts” probably comes from a few places:

• an ongoing discussion when I was in seminary about whether or not time spent preparing a sermon was “personal time spent in the Word” and other similar discussions about how much we needed to do to be healthy ministers
• evangelical influences that push robust personal devotional lives, but sometimes make it so formulaic that it can’t possibly work for everyone (an hour a day with your Bible; 20 minutes of prayer every night; a certain amount that is enough)
• the tendency of so many spiritual discipline models to come from people (monks, middle-aged men with really competent house-keeping wives, young single people, older people who have more time on their hands) who are not mothers of 18 month olds (honestly, devoted time is pretty tough…I couldn’t even eat my lunch at the table today because Zora needed me to sit on the floor in her room and eat there while she sat in rocker and read a book…as if she’d allow me to take 40 minutes alone in a chair in the corner…I’d probably be asked to stand on my head while she ran circles around me). Then again, I’ll probably get comments about how everybody, in all sorts of walks of life, are really busy. I know. You’re right.
• Some strange protestant work ethic thing bleeding over into spirituality…if I do enough, if I do more, if I do it right…
• My questioning where the boundaries are between my “work” and my spiritual life…for example, if I would pray for 30 minutes, does that count as personal time, or work time? Probably depends on who you ask.

But notice something else…I may not be pulling off my “40 minutes for God” commitment. However, it has me doing some pretty serious thinking, and asking good questions. So, if Lent is a time for reflection and self-examination, looks like I’ve managed to do some of that.

And, I do seem to be having quite a few moments with God present, little sabbaths that are much shorter than 40 minutes, but sabbaths none the less. My spiritual director had this idea: I need to name these times, maybe even write them down, and think about how to acknowledge them in the moment. I’m thinking I need some sort of every-day prayer of invocation, so that when one starts to happen, I can say that little prayer to name it as a sabbath and to acknowledge the presence of God.

In the spirit of not “counting” everything then, here are a few little sabbaths from the past couple days, no times noted:

• Sitting up front in church and seeing some of my youth group kids hanging out in the narthex, and instead of worrying about when someone was going to ask me “why aren’t the kids on church?” I felt this very deep, transcendent warmth of love for these kids.
• Zora running to the door saying “mama mama mama” when I come home.
• That good time on the treadmill with a few good sermons.
• Feeling completely relaxed and sufficiently closed off from the business of life that my mind could think about important things while I was in the sauna.
• Not as pleasant, but the feeling of being someone who could comfort and do the things that needed to be done when Zora had a stomach bug, knowing she just took it for granted and trusted that we would take care of her, even if it was one of the more disgusting tasks of parenthood.

I need to accept these moments as the places of Sabbath, where I’m at, rather than trying to create something that won’t work for me. And if that’s the only grace I can take away from this Lent, then I think things are going pretty well.

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The most comforting smell in the world…

…is fresh chiles roasting under the broiler. This according to my husband after we made another chili from this book. A chili from every state, what could be better? We’ve been working our way through, mostly following the primary and caucus schedules.

So, a tip for anyone from my church planning to enter the Chili Cook-Off on Sunday. Erik’s a judge, and he likes roasted chiles. A lot. But you didn’t hear it from me.

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Church Supper

My church is hosting a series of Wednesday night Lenten thing-ies. I say “thing-y” because I honetly don’t know what to call them otherwise. Number 2 was last night. I missed number 1 while I was in California.

The other associate and I wanted to do something that involved a meal and was intergenerational.  So we’re cooking up somehting simple, supplementing it with some side dishes folks bring along, and doing something that is somehow related to Lent after the meal. Last week, sand-in-a-bottle art to help us think about the desert. This week, little gardens to remind us to set aside a little garden space in our souls where we can be with God.

But the thing I love most is the meal. It is good to sit together, while kids run all over the room, to help someone else’s 4 year old cut up her meat, to talk about what we did today, to be one big family group spread out over the tables, to debate whether or not to have a second cookie, to take time, and sit, and to need no other outcome than to say we broke bread.

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