spring – Salvaged Faith

What season do you inhabit?

Posted on July 6, 2015Leave a comment

Today in my organic ministry class, we were invited by Diane Glass to notice what season best describes our hearts, our relationships, our work.

It is one thing to notice the physical and environmental season that surrounds you… even on a cool and muggy July day. But I had never considered the seasons as a metaphor for my internal life before.

Personally, while I do not feel like I am coming out of a winter time, I do sense the awakening and longing of spring.

I am sensitive to the new life all around me: new babies and expecting friends.

I have the sense in my marriage during this time of renewal of a clean slate, a fresh start, and of nurturing a different way of being with one another.

Even our home, which has been lived in for a year now, is finally ready for some projects that feel like they have potential. We are preparing to finally put up curtains, refinishing some cabinets, deciding what kind of a space and environment we want to create. Outside, I’m doing clearing work and imagining a different sort of landscape and discovering what might be showing up.

So, how do I honor this “springtime” ?

Like with the crocus blooming, I can take delight in these signs of spring.

I can be curious about what I am discovering and learning, open to possibility, listening more carefully.

I can intentionally decide what to nurture and what to pull; where I want to really invest my time and energy.

And I can, like every farmer in the spring, test the waters, throw out possibilities, be flexible, expectant and hopeful that what is beginning will eventually bear fruit.

Longing for Crocus…

Posted on February 11, 2013Leave a comment

17 months ago, I planted nearly a thousand bulbs at our parsonage. While that sounds like a lot, let me tell you, a bag of 100 crocus bulbs are cheap and they plant easily when the soil has already been worked up and is ready. It was a lot of hard work, but the results come spring were stunning. Tulips, daffodils, allium, crocus, wolf’s bane. Purples, oranges, yellows, whites. Glorious sweeps of color.

When we moved in October, I knew that the bulbs were staying in the ground. First of all, I wasn’t sure how many would actually repropigate… although I have high hopes. I also knew I didn’t have the space to plant them in our rental house. And it was nice to leave a place better than we found it – to leave a gift of life and joy for the families that will come after ours. Pastor Matt and I had coffee the other day and he was excited to hear that the tulips planted near the house were their wedding colors.

At the same time, as the snow turns to rain, and the grass starts to emerge from under the blanket of white, I’m peering out my window looking for those pops of purple. A few weeks early perhaps, but a good warm spell just might wake them up. I’m peering out my window for crocus that were never planted.

Then again, I also don’t know what surprises await me in the flower beds surrounding the garage. Everything was dead and dried up when we moved in… I might just have a surprise of my own.

I planted, Apollos watered, but God made it grow. (1 Cor. 3:6)

We never quite know what seeds have been planted ahead of us and what has been lying fallow until another came along to water.

In ministry there are constant discoveries – purple crocus bursting forth in the midst of the cold, dark ground. Everyday I get phone calls from people who have hearts for mission and who are excited to join this effort to end malaria. In so many cases, it was not me who did the work, but district leaders, faithful lay people, inspired pastors who have been planting and watering.

This is a time in this work I’m doing, however, where I know we are still waiting. There is so much just underneath the surface, just about to burst forth and while it is exciting to know and trust and believe that God is working in our midst and stirring up our hearts… at the same time, I’m ready for it all to be made known. I’m ready for armfuls of tulips and daffodils and for whole lawns covered in crocus. I’m ready to see the fruits. I’m ready to hear that we have reached our goals, surpassed our goals, and to hear about all of the lives being changed and transformed, both in our backyards and on the other side of the world. I’m ready to see the glorious day when a child no longer dies from malaria.

I look out my window and the grey sky says back: not yet.

Not yet…

but soon.

spring is just around the corner

Posted on February 5, 2012Leave a comment

This evening I placed my order for seeds from Burpee.

I could almost feel the dirt between my fingers as I poured over images and reviews and mapped out the different parts of the garden. There may be a chill in the air tonight and snow might be in the forecast, but all I can think about is spring and color and the taste of a ripe tomato.

Gardening has really been a spiritual experience for me these past couple of years. It is hard work, down on your hands and knees, working with the earth. Watching the miracle of life come from a tiny seed reminds me of the gifts we recieve every day from our Creator. Nurturing the plants… but mostly pulling the weeds… has reminded me that our faith life needs to be tended as well in order for growth to happen. I have experienced joy from sharing the fruits with others and simply looking out over that bounty with thankfulness.

This year, my vegetable garden will expand a bit, but I’m still going to use the same basic “bag-gardening” design I started with.

What is new will be flowers. I have done flowers in the past in the beds leading along the front steps. But between the tulips and other assorted bulbs I planted last fall and the seeds that I just ordered, there should be color everywhere!

My first big project will be to start the seeds inside. I have had terrible luck with this in the past. We dedicate our guest room for the planting – mostly because we can control the temp (nice and warm) and because we can close the door and the cats won’t bother the seedlings that way. But unfortunately, I tend to forget about things I don’t see. And forget water and things like that. Bad for growth.

So I’m mentally wrapping my head around the idea that in two weeks, my gardening year starts. Those tiny seeds being tended inside will be my babies. And while it’s not as backbreaking work as tending the plants outside, they require dedication and attention and I am going to give it to them!

beginning again

Posted on May 4, 20092 Comments

Spring is here in full force and that makes me want to be outside… but it also reminds me that winter has been a time of sloth.

I got up this morning and worked out with wii fit. I did yoga and strength exercises and then finished with a little bit of cardio. I know it’s not much – but if I do a little everyday, that will add up to a whole lot more than I’m currently doing.

I’m also trying to get up at 7:30 every morning. I’m going to use my mornings off to garden, spend time reading on the porch, and getting chores around the house done. I’ve just realized that when I get home from church I don’t want to do ANY of those things and so they just don’t get done. If I stick with that schedule, I’ll have three mornings a week to myself.