I spoke recently with a young woman who is going through a painful transition.

She is claiming some space from a long-term relationship.  Part of that space claiming is moving to her own place.  I think I’ll say that again:  Her own place.

How many of us have had such a thing?  For many, having physical space to claim as our own has never happened.  We bump from home to college to friends to partners and often, so very often, we never have the chance to breathe in space that is not peopled with the needs, wants and desires of others.

I am proud of this young woman.  Proud because she is listening to the wisdom of her heart; the wisdom that tells her it is time to learn new things about herself and about life.

And oh, I join the others who have expressed envy.  I am one of the have-always-lived-with-others who sigh deeply when hearing about her studio apartment.  I love my life and my people and the gift of my man next to me each night.

And, yet there is this always within me; a longing for that place of my own arranging, my own adorning, my own.

Maybe that’s what the spiritual journey is all about:  Finding that place.  Not a place we control, but a place where we know that the arranging, the adorning, the inhabiting is ours.

In such a place, we settle in with ourselves and with our God and know ourselves to be home.

I have spent most of the morning listening to insipid recordings on automated phone machines.  I would scream, but no one would hear me!

It feels dehumanizing.  Clearly, I wouldn’t be making calls if I didn’t need to speak with the party I am calling.  Jumping through the “press one” hoops is like entering a maze.  Desperately you hope for resolution, but the possibility that you will be wandering for hours in the world of transfers, accidental hang-ups and dead ends is real.

There ought be a special prayer for those who have to summon the courage to get service.  Whispered with fervor, maybe the prayer would have much to do with patience granted, robotic sensibilities keen, answers, and – dare we ask for miracles?? – a HUMAN voice on the other end of the line.

God grant me the serenity…………….

There was a homecoming yesterday at church.

One of our long time members was present in our midst as we celebrated her life at her funeral.  She had endured much:  Parkinsons and blindness and Alzheimers.  Her family had moved her from Richfield in order to care for her closer to their homes.  But even after her move they had sent cards and photos and letters in order to maintain connection with her beloved church.

So we celebrated her life yesterday.  Part of the worship service was watching a photo montage unfold on the screen at the front of the church.  There she was, pigtailed and then lipsticked and blue-jeaned and ultimately husked and retreated from her world.

And always there were people around her loving her and joy radiating from her face while she canoed and loved and lived.

What sacrament, this thing called living.  We get placed into the arms of what we come to know as family and we learn and grow and bump and live and our story gets written and eventually told.

So relish the chapters.  Sometimes we feel stuck in the never-will-I-live-into-better parts of our lives.  But always those chapters walk with us and beckon to us; the chapters that speak more of joy and love than of loss and pain.

The life we celebrated yesterday meant the world to those gathered.

That’s enough.

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads This blog is doing awesome!.

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 3,100 times in 2010. That’s about 7 full 747s.

In 2010, there were 56 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 122 posts.

The busiest day of the year was November 2nd with 53 views. The most popular post that day was About.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were richfieldumc.org, facebook.com, ohamerica.us, alphainventions.com, and blog.caritas.org.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for e thoughts, elizabeth macaulay wordpress, emacaulay.wordpress.com, wordpress emacaulay, and “groth music scholarship”.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

About June 2008

sniff October 2010
1 comment

soul hunger December 2010
4 comments

jumble November 2010
1 comment

rolled r country October 2010
3 comments

At a training I attended a few months ago I encountered a great bit of teaching.

Peter Steinke is a trainer and teacher who has dealt plenty with churches.  And anybody who deals plenty with churches deals plenty with conflict and finding ways to work together as the Body of Christ.  Steinke has written godsend books about how to navigate church systems.  When I am feeling near overwhelmed by the tangle that is church, Steinke is gift.

So at this training, he had this story to tell about how to navigate church conflict.  He told the story about a friend who was working in Alaska for the summer.  He was engaged by a fishery to process fish back in the days when that work was done by hand.  He watched for a while, overwhelmed by the flash of knife and his own incompetence and inability to enter the filleting fray.

He shared that anxiety with a seasoned worker.  What the worker’s advice was is this:

“Just get the fish on the table and go to it.  You will find and learn your way.  If you don’t get the fish on the table, nothing will get done.”

The metaphor helps me when considering how to navigate challenges and conflict at church.  Often I coach myself:  Get the fish on the table.  By putting issues in the open where they are seen and felt and concrete, things get done.  We find our way.  We learn from each other.

And we have that greatest of gifts as we go about the cleaning up of the fish of conflict:  we have the teachings of Jesus to guide us.  He was really clear about how to deal with snarl.  Matthew 18 is bedrock:  Talk to your kin in Christ about the ways you are feeling overwhelmed or hurt or frustrated or confused or concerned.  Put the fish on the table in order that you share the power of learning and stretch together.

So we are living as best we can the way of table fish.  It’s messy and smelly and we’re getting better at it as we practice and trust.

It is holy communion.

I’ve been thinking a lot about soul hunger these days.

What is it this over-stretched world of ours needs in order to feed soul?  For many, that answer lies in church buildings and pews and the community we call “church”.

Others have been put off by the organization calling itself church.  For years they have heard words of condemnation emanating out of organized Christian outposts and they want none of it.  Rather than do the hard work of interpreting long-used language in order for it to be meaningful in ways life-giving, many don’t even try to find soul food in church.

I smart about that.  I want to argue.  I want to say that “we aren’t like that here!”.  We welcome all, we seek to see the Christ in all, we want people to know the glory of their messy humanity and the power of joining together with other imperfects and we want to learn and work together in such a way that our lives and our world are transformed.

But how to get past the barbed-wire of unsafe many have put around the thing called “church”?

I’d welcome your thoughts on that.

I just read my daughter’s Facebook post and I am heart happy for two reasons.

First, she mentioned that she had been at a performance of Handel’s Messiah at a cathedral in Denver.

Leah was raised by a father who conducted choirs and a mother who sang in a semi-professional choral ensemble.  Every year at this time of year our children could count on Christmas concerts to attend.  At the high school, at various venues in Duluth and the surrounding area, our children heard harp and voice spin seasonal beauty.  And the Messiah?  Well, that was a favorite at home. Whether it was the Mormon Tabernacle Choir or the Arrowhead Chorale, we heard the words of scripture set to song and string and the unfolding of the Jesus story.

So Leah took herself to a concert to open herself to that heart rhythm. 

And at that concert she heard a transgender artist sing “And Who May Abide the Day of His Coming”.

There.  In the midst of a story-telling centuries sung, new hope for God’s people shines.  For unto us a child is given;  A child who grew to be a man who knew and taught that the bounds of God’s grace is Hallelujah material for all people and sing that grace we must.

I wish I had been there to hold her tiny hand and share Kleenex.

It is a fabulous day.  We have had a major snow dump and wind sweep and we’re socked in.  I love it.

Today we ventured out to get the necessaries for such a time.  We were out of coffee.  It was not fitting.  And, our  snow blower was broken and after many nursings was declared dead.

So off we went to the local hardware store to get a new snow blower and to the grocery store to get the goods of happy life.

We got stuck in our alley.  There was nothing to be done, since the snow was up higher than the bottom of our four wheel drive car and we were going nowhere.

So, out of the back of the station wagon came the new snow blower, and we blew out the alley in order to find our way to the garage.  It was a hoot.

Today has been spent nesting.  I’m not sure if there will be church tomorrow.  The big choir do scheduled for worship has been postponed to Epiphany Sunday.  If we do have church, it will be gentle and savored by the few who love the challenge of clomping through drifts to share survivor stories.

Living in Minnesota is so fine.  Sometimes the elements trump our best laid plans.  That works for me.

Being a pastor is crazy making work.  It’s true.

We exist, we pastor folk, to be in the midst of the community called church whilst being outside of the community called church.  We juggle many functions in our day and many of us love that variety and always-changing life.

And we’re oddities.  So it is really fun to gather with colleagues who understand the teeth gnash and the soul soar of ministry.  I meet once a month with a crew of folk I am proud to call friends and we swap stories and listen and share our care for each other and the movement that has meant our lives.

An article in USA Today speaks of the importance of attending church and having relationships within that church.  People are happier and better able to withstand the jolts of life when they have a sense of connection with others that is spiritual in its weaving.

I am blessed to be pastor to a church that provides that network of care for many, including their pastor, while it empowers outreach for many.  And, I am blessed to be pastor held by a network of clergy colleague friends who care for me and empower my ministry.

Friends matter.  They just do.

This is life tonight at church:

Over my head, children are ruckusing while practicing for the Christmas pageant in two weeks.  Energy is high high high and prayers for patience are deep deep deep.

The bell choir is learning “Fum, Fum, Fum” so their clangs and staggered melodies are making their way through the floor into my office.

In the fellowship hall there are pinatas being crafted by an intergenerational crew.  Strips of paper are soaked in gunk and rubbed onto balloons and the span of decades between participants seems to sweeten the air.

A meeting just broke up regarding the refurbished organ.  There are decisions to be made:  what kind of flooring, what kind of new carpet, what finish for the pipes, what, what, what?  We seek to come to greater wisdom by sharing around the table and we laugh plenty. 

There is a Disciple Bible Study group of 12 engaging with scripture and each other as they will for some thirty weeks to come.

And, tuning up in the sanctuary are the instrumentalists for the upcoming Lessons and Carols to be shared at 9:00 AM this Sunday during worship.

This is church.  It’s a holy sort of chaos.  Thanks be to God.