Today was a day of contrasts.
I watched five hours of college football with the guys and played horse during halftime. We pigged out on snack food and yelled at the television.
Then I spent the evening with the ladies at craft night. Yarn and glitter, cross stitch and crochet hooks. And lots of chocolate.
Whew. Talk about whiplash.
NaBloPoMo… National Blog Posting Month
I’ve been out of the habit of writing on a regular basis, so this is going to be a great practice for me!
Today, I’m following a prompt from RevGalBlogPals to blog about a group of friends that have been a part of my life.
I have known some of the ladies in this group since I was in Kindergarten, others since third grade and beyond. But our lifelong pact was sealed on a summer afternoon in our teenage years when we painted some initials on an old mailbox.
We were hanging out and creating a little space of our own on a friends’ property. We had walked there through the cornfields after that last day of school and were getting ready to kick off an amazing year. I’m not sure where the mailbox came from, or even what we did in the space the rest of the year, but I remember how we spent an hour rearranging the initials of our names to finally find the perfect word: JSTACK.
Since then, we made it through high school and a few relationship ups and downs. We had similar friends and three of us took the same guy to dances at various points. We laughed and cried. We made the stupidest videos (thank God YouTube wasnt around yet). And then we graduated and went separate directions.
We never lost each other, however. And now, after 20 years of friendship, we have a yearly weekend gathering. Every time we walk in that cabin door, we pick up where we have left off. Relationships, children, graduate school, moves, career changes… Through it all, we know who will always be there for us. No matter what.
#1 – I seek praise, sympathy, solidarity through social media. The smallest, most insignificant thing could happen and my first instinct is to post it so that other people will comment and respond. It is attention-seeking behavior that often slips into a self-centered focus. Having to constantly fight the urge to post has led me to wonder what I’m getting out of those posts… and what others are as well. Sometimes, it is an authentic search for community and others to share the journey with. Sometimes it is race to see who has the biggest sob story or frustration of the day. These past weeks have reminded me of my insignificance. No one really cares what I had for breakfast or about a stubbed toe or that I shared an article. I’m just not that important. And I shouldn’t be.
#2 – Most of my news comes from social media. When I hear of breaking news, I search for the topic on twitter instead of turning on the television. The variety of sources, the mix of images, video, stories, personal reflections, global perspectives is amazing. I just don’t get the same depth of information watching one news channel go on for hours at a time about a single event, and when you flip stations between the networks, the information is often similiar with only slight colors of perspective. As Ukraine and Russian and the Malaysian flight disappearance have made headlines, I have largely been out of the loop of what is happening in the world.
#3 – Many of my conversations with close, personal friends, happen on Facebook. While texting is part of my communications toolbox, I rarely call or email these individuals. I never realized how much I rely upon Facebook groups for keeping in touch with a circle of friends – whether they are colleagues or my girlfriends. I had to write a clause into my lenten discipline that allowed me to continue using the Messenger part of Facebook (which meant I had to download the app), because I realized I would be completely out of the loop on conversations about health, upcoming events, and personal struggles. Not being on facebook and able to follow posts on group pages has left me feeling fairly isolated from those I am most connected with.
#4 – I pray a lot through Facebook. Whether they are shared prayer concerns among colleagues or simply reading the everyday struggle and hopes of friends, family, and colleagues, I am frequently moved to pray as I interact with posts and snoop on people’s lives. Not having that source of prayer material at my fingertips, however, has led me to pay attention a bit more to the people around me… the guy sitting on the park bench, the people in line. I find myself wondering what their story is, what they hope for… I haven’t worked up the courage to ask yet, however. I’m not sure if I’ve always been an “overhearer” of people’s lives or if this is something that a social media culture has developed in me and others around me. And sometimes I wonder if that extension of ourselves into the public space is good or not. I hesitate to lift up a prayer out loud on the bus, but I don’t when I’m commenting on a friend of an acquaintances post. It’s something to ponder.
#5 – I enjoy watching sports with social media. I enjoy the quick stats and the commentary that is often far better than what is on the television. I like the sense of solidarity in amazing plays and in bad calls. Yet, with the Iowa Hawkeyes basketball team being told to stay off of twitter because of the criticisms, I also recognize how brutal it gets out there. The things we yell at the television in the quiet of our own homes now are the things we post online in public in the heat of the moment, without tempering our emotions and remembering it is, after all, just a game.
#6 – I’m following the practice of celebrating Sundays as “little Easters” and not fasting from social media on those days. In the past two weeks, I’ve largely used those days to dump pictures and a quick narrative of the highlights of my week, as well as to quickly skim my group pages, catch up where I can with friends, and have left very few comments. I might have spent a total of 2 hours on facebook between those two days. The time I spend in my typical week on social media must be astounding. I’m sure there is an app somewhere to monitor it, but I’m afraid to look.
#7 – I use Facebook and social media equally for work and for personal matters. Conversations with friends and co-workers happen simultaneously. I’m more aware of that fact as I try to occasionally use it for work-related items (like updating our facebook page for Imagine No Malaria), but the distinction is so blurred that I have tried to avoid it or batch post. I think it would be worth it to do some hard work of creating new lists on facebook to better discriminate what I post and to whom so I could use it for both in a better way.
#8 – this is NOT going to be a permanent fast.
I have never been great at long-distance relationships. I have no idea how my husband and I made it for two years apart at two different times in our dating life… except for the fact we made a really, really intentional effort to talk once a day on the phone and racked up a lot of credit card debt buying plane tickets.
When I was younger, we occasionally had the opportunity to have an overseas pen pal and I think I sent a grand total of one letter. My grandma and I have sent letters back and forth, but when it really comes down to it, she does a lot more of the writing than I do. Writing letters has never really been my thing. Emailing back and forth to keep in touch was somehow easier, but even then, I was hardly the person to initiate the conversation.
Heck, I don’t even really like to talk on the phone with people.
Give me a person to person conversation over a cup of coffee any day.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t work when you live far away from those friends and family you crave spending time and sharing stories with.
Right after Christmas, a group of my girlfriends and I got together for breakfast at a dive bar. We had huge breakfasts and a round of mimosas and after months of not seeing each other dove right into the conversation and updates. And even in three short hours, we were able to connect, go deep, and that time together was so precious.
Sometimes you need that girlfriend to laugh with about something stupid or that friend to commiserate with over a shared struggle. Sometimes we just need to get stuff off our our chest in a safe, loving, supportive space.
But when your best friends live far away, what do you do?
We committed to trying something new. We pinky-promised to text more often. It probably looked pretty funny the four of us standing in a parking lot… grown women making a pinky-promise. But that was always us… the weirdos 😉
Maybe it is a strange thing to try but we just needed to intentionally make an effort to keep in touch. Silly stuff, serious stuff, anything really. Just to keep the lines open. Any time. Any day. Just to remind one another we are here.
Good thing I have unlimited texting, because I think I have already sent/received more messages in the last week than I did all of last month. Sheesh, I missed my friends.
**uploading some older sermons as I sort through files. This one in particular was a joy to write and I was blessed by the opportunity to share this day with my dear friends.**
Friends, we are gathered here today to celebrate an institution.
Now, that may seem like a boring and cold thing to say… but I assure you, nothing about today will be boring or cold =)
Institutions form societies. They mold us as individuals. They enhance our ability to be fully developed human beings. Institutions carry within them the values we hold most dear… the values that we want to pass on to the generations that follow us.
The institution of the family brought this man and this woman… in fact, all of us men and women… into the world. Each of you who have played the role of a parent or grandparent or a sister or brother to these two, have helped to make Ben and Kayla who they are today.
The religious institutions in their lives formed in them a deep sense of justice and love. Their wrestling with faith enabled them to ask questions about what it means to be faithful, about who their neighbor was, and about what it means to be a child of God.
Without the educational institution – well… Ben and Kayla never would have met. Some of us gathered here today witnessed the beginning of their journey together at Simpson College. They discovered their common values, they laughed and love together, and each step since that first one has brought all of us here.
Today, we witness them enter into the institution of marriage.
On the back of your programs, there is an excerpt from an important court decision in the state of Massachusetts.
Marriage is a vital social institution. The exclusive commitment of two individuals to each other nurtures love and mutual support.
Civil marriage is at once a deeply personal commitment to another human being and a highly public celebration of the ideals of mutuality, companionship, intimacy, fidelity, and family. Because it fulfils yearnings for security, safe haven, and connection that express our common humanity, civil marriage is an esteemed institution and the decision whether and whom to marry is among life’s momentous acts of self-definition.
It is undoubtedly for these concrete reasons, as well as for its intimately personal significance, that civil marriage has long been termed a “civil right.” Without the right to choose to marry one is excluded from the full range of human experience.
In beautiful and poetic words, the court reminds us that this institution of marriage is a public celebration of the ideals of mutuality, companionship, intimacy, fidelity, and family… it fulfils yearnings for security, safe haven, and connection that express our common humanity. These values – these ideals – are what bring us together today.
Any of us who know you – Ben and Kayla – know that your love has been a mighty and blazing flame for many years now. We know that your love needs no ornament or stamp of approval from any religious or governmental body in order to be real. We know of your commitment to one another, of your mutual respect, of your willingness to allow your partner to be who they are and yet love them anyways. We know that your love cannot be bought – that it is genuine and true – honest and holy. In fact, had we not gathered here today… and perhaps some of you thought we never would =) … Kayla and Ben would still be two individuals bound together by commitment and nurtured by love and mutual support.
But we do gather and we do celebrate, because a deeply personal commitment is not all that is important to them. Ben and Kayla believe that making these promises in public benefits the community. They believe that marriage brings stability to society. They believe that the honest, simple, and holy thing we call love is meant to be shared. By stopping at this place in their journey together and gathering before you, they mark the importance of the relationship that they share. They measure how far they have come and leave a reminder to all that follow of what marriage means to them. Here in Iowa, we don’t necessarily gather cairn stones to mark these moments… but we do like to put up billboards along the side of the road.
So, looking back years from now, we might remember that this billboard, from this moment, says: With God as my helper, I choose to live my life with this imperfect, flawed and terribly wonderful soul. I choose to take on the obligations and the joys of a shared existence. I believe that the ability to make this choice and to be faithful to it, is one of the highest and most esteemed values of our society.
The promises Ben and Kayla make today – and their living out of those promises – are themselves a witness of the importance of this institution and the joy they seek by entering it.
They believe that the benefits and obligations of this beautiful institution should be available to all that choose them…
Being married today in Iowa – they not only are publicly celebrating their love and the ideals of mutuality and fidelity and connection… they also celebrate the ideals of equality and justice.
So let us join them in their journey together and mark this moment with celebration…
Let us celebrate that we have the ability to bind ourselves together with the partner we choose.
Let us celebrate that many waters cannot quench the love two people have for one another.
Let us celebrate this beautiful institution of marriage and all of the good that it stands for. Amen and Amen.
I grew up surrounded by Republicans.
As we baled hay in the fields and made pies in the kitchen it was Rush Limbaugh blaring on the radio between farm reports. I was surrounded with suspicion about Clinton and rumors and scandal.
I also had this idea of my mom as the rebel Democrat… secretly keeping her views to herself… it sparked my curiosity… I don’t know if I was right, but that was always my impression of her political views. I’m baking cookies with her tomorrow and I’ll have to ask.
I wasn’t quite sure what to think… but I listened, and loved my family, and didn’t let politics get in the way.
I headed off to college and found myself entrenched with the Democrats. Actually, many of them farther left than democrats. I began to care about different issues, found my voice, and struggled with how to engage those with whom I disagreed.
But I have always been a fence walker. Whether I myself leaned one way or the other, I felt like my role was to navigate the space in between.
In college, that was the space between my more conservative friends of faith and my more liberal friends of action. I hung out, freely and comfortably, with both.
In seminary, it was the space between young and old… between an LGBT community and a church that wasn’t quite sure what it meant for them to belong… between lay and clergy.
In ministry, it was bring folks to the table of different sides and trying to distance my own personal beliefs so that I never closed off myself to others because of my opinion.
I have always been a good listener. I see multiple view points. I understand how and why people disagree… only I cannot understand why they do it so vehemently. 10 days after an election, I watch those who gloat and those who mourn. And what I really want to do is round them all up in a room and have them talk about what their hopes are… because they might see that they are not so different.
And there really is not so much difference between your view point and mine. Pragmatically, we’d probably do the same thing in a given situation. We just emphasize different parts and set different priorities. That is okay. We can still be friends. We can still be family. We can still worship together.
I’m standing right here… in the middle… not because my heart is here – but because this is where I can best meet you. And when I think of it that way… that is where my heart had been all along.
This has been an insanely busy summer… vacation, a new nephew, mission trips, fundraisers, cleaning at the church…
So I have tried to make my summer a bit easier by working through Romans with the congregation.
Ha.
In some ways, it hasn’t been that bad. Each piece kind of follows on the one before it, so I am continuing a train of thought about grace and mercy for us and others all summer long.
But last week, I combined chapters 9 and 10 and talked about how Paul was just aching in his bones with grief for his brothers and sisters who had rejected Jesus Christ.
I asked the church to think of their friends or family members who were resistant to the gospel or had left the church or had never been told about the good news of Jesus Christ. I asked them to think about the people their own hearts ache for.
I know that there are many who have personally expressed to me concern about a loved one. I have commiserated, having a husbad who isn’t really into God himself(see “Lost My Religion“).
But there was something about what the Holy Spirit did in that sermon that really moved people. Everywhere I looked, people were wiping their eyes, trying not to tear up, or digging out a tissue.
I think there are so many people in this world who really want to share their faith and share the love of God and they just don’t know how. They are afraid of rejection, they are unsure of their own story, and they “know” their family too well.
Just watching those tears come last Sunday opened my eyes to the real need for a group who is interested in learning about faith sharing. In practicing faith sharing. In having a community who is just as genuinely heartsick as they are to tell others about the love of God they have found.
I have one lesson plan that I have written about evangelism and the gospel of Mark, but it is more of a thinking sort of study, than a heart/practical look. Any suggestions of places to start?
For the last month or so, we have been reading Paul’s letter to the church in Rome. In prison, sick, struggling, shipwrecked, he just hasn’t had the time or resources to make it to Rome personally, so this letter contains everything that he thinks those people of faith in Rome need to know.
He wants them to take this letter and not only be strengthened in their own faith, but to carry this letter to their friends and neighbors and everyone they meet in Rome… and to offer to them the grace and love of Jesus Christ.
Everything we need to know about the road to salvation is right here in this letter. We’ve talked about much of it in these past weeks. All of us – no matter who we are – are under the power and control of sin. There is nothing we can do to escape it – not ritual, not the law, not ignorance, nothing.
Nothing, except Jesus Christ.
Paul writes that his faithfulness makes us righteous. His faithfulness makes us worthy of salvation. While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us and by his blood we have been reconciled to God.
And so, faith and trust in Jesus Christ helps us to die to that old power of sin and now live under the power of grace. Faith and trust in Jesus Christ helps us to say no to sin and yes to God’s ways. It’s not a magic fix, and it is not an easy journey, but through Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit, the victory is ours already. Now we wait… but always knowing that no matter what happens, the love of God in Christ Jesus is ours.
That’s it… That’s the “Romans Road” as some people refer to it. Believe and trust in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior and salvation is yours.
But what happens in this next part of the letter, Romans 9 and 10 is that Paul shifts directions.
He starts writing to the Romans about a deep sorrow that he feels over a particular group of people who have not been able to trust in these words about Jesus:
In selected verses from 9 and 10:
At the same time, you need to know that I carry with me at all times a huge sorrow. It’s an enormous pain deep within me, and I’m never free of it. I’m not exaggerating—Christ and the Holy Spirit are my witnesses. It’s the Israelites…If there were any way I could be cursed by the Messiah so they could be blessed by him, I’d do it in a minute. They’re my family. I grew up with them. They had everything going for them—family, glory, covenants, revelation, worship, promises….
Believe me, friends, all I want for Israel is what’s best for Israel: salvation, nothing less. I want it with all my heart and pray to God for it all the time. I readily admit that the Jews are impressively energetic regarding God—but they are doing everything exactly backward… After all these years of refusing to really deal with God on his terms, insisting instead on making their own deals, they have nothing to show for it.
Paul’s heart is breaking for his brothers and sisters, his neighbors, and even those people he has never met, who think that they have to earn their way to salvation. His heart is breaking for all of the people who think they are unworthy of God’s love. His heart is breaking for those people who believe that because they have done good in this world that salvation is theirs…
I know that each of us in this room this morning, has someone in our lives that our heart breaks for.
I want you to take just a moment and think about that person.
Maybe it is a spouse or a child that wants to do it their own way, and not God’s way.
A brother or sister who has always had it rough in this life and just can’t accept that God would love them after everything that has happened.
A dear friend who has left the church and left the community of believers and now is disconnected and alone in their faith struggles.
We could probably spend hours today naming those people in our lives who are separated from the love and grace of God that is in Christ Jesus.
I’ll admit it myself. My heart breaks for my own husband who is this jumbled mix of pride and doubt all at the same time. And I know that I can’t make that decision for him. I know that I can’t let it all go for him. And so I pray. And I love him even more.
We feel this way… this aching in our hearts for our brothers and sisters in this world… because we know how amazing it is to experience Christ’s love.
So, when was the last time you actually told that person how you felt? When was the last time you laid your own fears of rejection aside and asked them to just look at your heart and see the deep love and compassion and genuine concern that you have for them?
Here’s the thing. You could lay out the Roman Road for them. You could give them a lecture or hand them a tract or read to them from the bible… but when was the last time you looked that person in the eye and said –
Whether or not you are ready
Whether or not you want to let God in your life…
I need you to know that I love you and that my heart breaks sometimes because you have not yet experienced the joy and the freedom that comes from letting God in.
That love I have for you will never go away.
And God’s love for you will never go away.
Whenever, if you are ever, ready to experience it too, I’m here.
We have to actually speak the words. We have to carry that message of love and salvation to our friends.
As we heard this morning in the scripture that Colette read, “ If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raise him from the dead, you will be saved.”
So when is the last time that you carried that message to someone you loved?
When was the last time you sat and wrestled with someone who was unsure of God’s love in their life? Or helped them to see that they could chose to let Christ rule their hearts rather than money or status or culture?
As his heart is breaking for the people he loves… Paul writes in verse 14 (and I invite you to follow along):
But how can they call for help if they don’t know who to trust? And how can they know who to trust if they haven’t heard of the One who can be trusted? And how can they hear if nobody tells them? And how is anyone going to tell them, unless someone is sent to do it?
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| Photo by: Jesse Therrien |
It’s a good song… but it’s not a good motto to live by.
Every person, in every place, including our own families and circles of friends, needs to hear the good news about Jesus Christ. Will you let Christ send you?
