Category: Stories

On Words Dying

Yesterday, I read a haunting post from a pastor I follow on Twitter, Jonathan Martin.  You can find the post here and you may well wish to read it first.  It made me think for a long time and made me wrestle with some of my own demons about words.  Not all of them are worked out in this post, mind you, but it is a start.  Thanks, Pastor Jonathan Martin.  I think.

He sat as his desk and listened to the cats fighting three rooms away even as he listened to the voices inside him argue over the need to write.

“Practice,” the old, wise voice that had read masters and novices alike said.  “Put the damn pen to the paper.  Tap away at the crud covered keyboard.  Fill the empty space with some of those things floating around in that jumbled mass of nerves you call a brain.  Get something down so that mess of nerves can at least sort out what is good and what is trash.  Practice.”

“Nah, just wait for your muse to arrive,’ the other voice growled from the depths of the man’s belly.  The man never knew the age of this tormentor but he knew from the rumbles and discomfort where he had taken residence.  The gut.  “Wait for the muse to arrive.  That is, if the jerk ever decides to truly show up.  In the meantime you’ve got plenty to occupy your hands and mind.  For crying out loud, it is almost a New Year and leaves still need raked.  Cookies need baked.  I love the cookies, you know.  Besides, you will be pouring out words in a sermon or two soon enough.  Be content with what they will do.  (Or more likely, what they won’t do.)”

“Practice.”

“Just wait.”

He walked through the house aware of the war that raged between heart and soul, between blank space and filled lines.  He looked upon two cats, one stretched out in a windowsill batting eyes at the roaming person disturbing an important nap, the other, stretched out upon the recliner and oblivious to the footsteps of the man.  Stroking the fur of the undisturbed cat, he heard the restful sound of sleep.  He listened to the silence of words dying.  Again.

Confessions of a Clergy School Holdout

I sat in the back of the room, the wall directly behind me and the exit about three chairs away. Sure, I would have to shimmy past three other pastors sitting in the room if I decided on an early exit, but it was only three and I was almost certain we didn’t know one another.

The speaker’s name and topic are lost to me now. Perhaps it was because I didn’t attend the session with any hope of learning. Perhaps it was because the speaker was really boring. More than likely, though, it was because I did not believe I needed to be there at all. Continuing education offered by the annual conference? It had not been more than three years since I had completed three years of Residency and felt I had more than enough “Conference directed education” during that time. I figured the best CE events had to be “out there” somewhere, anywhere but in my own back yard.

I was a Clergy School Holdout.

In September 2012 I attended the West Virginia Annual Conference Clergy School as the incoming “Dean” of the school. How did that happen? I’m still not sure. I am humbled and honored to be serving in this capacity – much more humbled than honored, I would add. More than that, I was really turned around, so to speak, by attending the school in 2012 and experiencing just how wrong I was about our Clergy School.

I heard three very speakers approach the topic of “Healing” in very divergent ways. I felt myself arguing with some of what they had to say. I found myself nodding in agreement with other things. I found myself engaged with a topic I hadn’t spent a lot of time thinking about since, well, since days I was involved in the Lay Witness Weekend ministry.

More than that, I found myself sharing a space with some pretty incredible people. Colleagues that I had known for years and didn’t get to spend much time with were sitting with me in the sessions. During short breaks, we would catch up. (Admittedly, during boring times in the presentations, we would text!) When we took the longer breaks, I would talk with other colleagues and hear incredible, sometimes heart-breaking stories about ministry and families. Other times, my spirit would be lifted up as a colleague would share that they had been praying for me in my new ministry setting. One time, during a meal in the cafeteria, I witnessed a heated discussion between two people I thought never disagreed. I cannot stress the “heatedness” of their discussion. But then I watched in amazement as God’s Spirit poured out between them in the midst of their differences and they walked away laughing like two co-conspirators in a crime of grace.

During the long Wednesday afternoon “free time” I found myself sitting and sharing stories with a colleague. The minutes piled up and the time slipped away. At some point I remembered that I was angry with this person – but for the life of me, I couldn’t remember the exact reason why that was so.

I found myself carried away during worship. I found myself letting go of pre-conceived notions about what we could offer as Continuing Education in West Virginia. I found that I had attended a continuing education event hoping to learn something, anything about healing ministries in the local church and I was healed in the process.

I am no longer a Clergy School Holdout.

Yes, it is a continuing education event. Yes, it is a gathering of clergy – local pastors, elders and deacons – from across the WV Annual Conference. But it is so much more. It is an opportunity to allow the Spirit to revive something essential as I take a break from the sometimes heart-numbing tasks and art of being a clergyperson.

Of course, this year our Clergy School is about “Ministering Across Economic and Cultural Boundaries.” I couldn’t tell you what to exactly expect in what you will learn, hear and see. It will be different than last year and 2014 promises even more changes, I am sure. Yet in the heart of exploring where the Spirit of God might take us, I am encouraging myself to allow them to happen. (One promise I have made to myself and others though is that the Free Time period will NOT get used for anything else!!)

But I can tell you this – even if I were not somehow involved in the Clergy School, I would no longer holdout on attending. I would attend simply because by opening myself up to learning, I found God ready to give me so much more.

I am no longer a Clergy School Holdout…and I am glad.

You can register online until Thursday, September 13th AND as always, you can still register at the door. Visit http://www.wvumc.org/calendar/clergy-school to learn more and register.

Looking Around…Again

Bluefield Daily Telegraph
Bluefield Daily Telegraph photo of the Sunday afternoon work team.

The dust coming off the building as the hammers and chisels worked away at the painted cement on the brick surface made it difficult to look around much at all.  However, the sweat coming off of my forehead and rolling into my eyes made it necessary to stop every once in a while and wipe.  (At home later that afternoon the sand and grit that had stuck to my sweaty face gave me a free exfoliation as I washed it away.  But it felt good.  It felt really good.)  During those little breaks, I could look around – even if it was a little blurry.

I looked around and I saw at least four generations represented in the work crew.  Youth, young adults, middle age adults and even some into retirement were all working away together to help make a way for a local artist to turn a building into a canvas.  There were people on ladders and people working at just one level.  There was laughter and there were groans.  There was the roar of a bucket truck motor and shouts as people tried to talk over it.  There was and eerie silence when the motor stopped and I could hear car horns honking as people drove by, encouraging us in our work to make our city a little brighter.

I looked around and I saw history repeating itself and prepare to repeat itself yet again.  The man who led the project said to me, “My dad and I planted those trees across the street thirty years ago.  I still remember it like it was yesterday.  Now we are getting ready to cut those trees down as part of this project so everything can be seen better; so the whole town looks a little brighter.”  If I were standing on this same lot thirty years from now, I am sure I could look around and see one of a number of youth who were working that day tell someone, “I remember the day we worked to clean off this wall so this painting could be done. I still remember the dust like it was yesterday!  But now it’s time for a new building so that the whole town can seem a little brighter.  I’m just glad I can be a part of this new day.”

I looked around and I saw one of our youth offering a cold cup of water to a person standing on the street.  She started to give him a piece of pizza from the lunch we shared before the work began and then thought better of it and gave him the whole box.  He took it gladly and humbly and walked away to some of his friends “from the street” to share.

I drove by that lot on my way to the hospital later that day and stopped for just a minute.  The work wasn’t complete, that was certain, but I looked around at what we had completed to see what I could see.  I looked around again and saw…well, I saw that the Kingdom had come near.

Looking Around

In the Fall of 1989, I was headed back to college after a break of a couple of years.  I was a new student pastor – in Kincaid, WV – and a new student at what is now West Virginia University of Technology.  (It was just known as WV Tech when I was there.)  I had spent the summer getting to know my two new churches, was enjoying the “newness” of ministry and really looking forward to getting back and finishing my education.

The first day of classes arrived and I found myself running late to make the trip across the mountain that separated Kincaid and Montgomery.  I rushed out of the house and then back into it to get my book bag and then hurried toward my car a second time.  I got in, started it up and backed up in my parking area (yes, the parsonage actually had a space where you could park four or five cars – the down side of that was that you had a steep driveway to get onto Johnson Branch Rd.) and within a second or two found myself stopping abruptly and unexpectedly as I smashed into another vehicle parked behind me.

Now, if I back up a couple of days I can explain how the vehicle got there… My neighbors across the street were have a lot of company visiting them from time to time and graciously I invited them to park in this nice parking area since there home had very limited parking.  Well, obviously my neighbor took me up on the offer and her brother from Ohio paid the price.    I tore the tailgate right off of his truck as I backed up in a rush that morning not even checking my rearview mirror simply because I had become so accustomed to driving there that I didn’t think I needed to pay attention.

Oh, they were gracious in accepting my apologies and were even good enough to work out a reduced price for me to pay for the damages.  However, no one from that family ever parked in the area again!

Sometimes, I fear that we are so accustomed to seeing certain things around us – or not seeing them – that we fail to notice when something changes.  (How many people have seen the new signs for Princeton?  Has anyone noticed that the dead tree in the fountain area across from the church has been removed?)

My reason for telling all this is pretty simple: If we desire to be the church in the heart of Princeton then one of the main things we will have to do is keep our eyes open no matter how many times we are around our community.  There are countless ways that we can show our love (be the heart) for this community – if we aren’t to busy getting to our destination that we fail to notice what is really happening around us.

Jesus is ready to come back to this community and we can pave the way by spending our treasures – time, talents and resources – where we see the needs.  That is, as long as we aren’t so busy that we back into them and cause damage instead.

The church in the heart of Princeton!  I know we love this place and we love this community.  I just pray that we are ready to be Jesus as each and every opportunity arises!

Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.  Sell your possessions, and give alms.  Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also…You must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.  (Luke 12:32-34, 40 NRSV)

Sunrise…Sunset

Sunrise over Princeton, WV
Sunrise over Princeton, WV

He sat at the kitchen table sipping on the hot Chock-Full-Of-Nuts™ coffee that had just been brewed through the Kuerig™ and read the headlines from the morning paper as he did most mornings.  This pastor noted the arrest of someone for a Meth Lab and a story or two about local businesses.  Then for no real reason he looked up and out the window across the kitchen.

Drinking from his Duke Divinity mug, one purchased from the Baptist Student Union while he was still in seminary, this Methodist pastor took the three short steps over to window and looked out upon the mountains that made up the horizon.  Purple and orange light burst over the edges of the mountains with a dim shade of blue highest in the sky.  He blew across the surface of the steaming cup of coffee and smiled.  “I can’t count the number of beautiful sunrises I have seen from this place,” he said to himself or the coffee because no one else was around.

He continued to stand at the window and watch the changing sunrise as he thought back over the last year or so in his life and ministry.  He remembered the first beautiful sunrise that he witnessed there in the Southern mountains of West Virginia, the excitement he had in seeing it and rushing to take a photograph of it for his family to see.

His mind wandered back to a photo of a sunset that his oldest at-home daughter had taken while she had ridden on top of a bus, a quarter of the world away in Nicaragua several months before.  He remembered the tears she shed as she shared about the photo and the people and the whole experience of being that far way and yet feeling right at home.  She came home filled with tears that flooded our home for several days and when they did stop she had a peace about her that father, the pastor, had not seen in a long time – at least not in himself.  Sometime during those days, he remembered her saying, “Daddy, it doesn’t matter where we are but I would like to see your smile again.”

Watching as the blue of the daylight took over more and more of the orange and purple of the sunrise, the pastor’s mind wandered back to a tennis court and his youngest daughter.  It was a hot day in June and quite possibly the last time they would hit any balls on this court.  They had a great time laughing and chasing each other’s badly hit shots and celebrating the good points that she made.  He even remembered one very lucky shot of his own that left his daughter’s jaw dropping as she tried to figure out how her “old Dad” had hit the ball so soundly. The look on her face brought a laugh to him then and now.

Yet thinking back, he recalled that he had chosen the side of the court facing the sun.  He wanted to see it set – again.  He looked forward to it setting each and every day because it meant the day was over and there would be no more trouble. It may have been a hot summer day, but the sunset signaled something different, something almost wintry.  Night meant rest and he looked for rest like he would look for a lost child – desperately and deliberately.

The coffee cup was on the counter now and he was leaning into the sink, the sunrise almost over and the day well on its way to beginning but he thought back to all those sunsets he watched for the last year or so of serving before he moved.  He knew his fascination with them was more than just the beauty that they might bring.  He knew he watched because he was willing something to end – if not the turmoil he had inside, then at least the day.  So he watched the sunset time and time again.

He rinsed out his cup and put it in the top rack of the dishwasher before he walked back over to the table to straighten the paper.  He took one last look out the window and smiled thinking about the sunrise he had just witnessed.  Was it number 18? 19? 20?  He just wasn’t sure.  He just knew it was strange for a January morning.  He was surprised by them in the summer, used to them by Fall, but now they held a special place for him as he witnessed them in the midst of Winter.  He thought of the coffee, the smile, the rush to get to the window to see as much of the sunrise as possible.  The pastor smiled the smile his daughter had been missing.  He laughed the laugh that he himself had thought lost in a sunset somewhere.  The day had begun and the journey towards home continued.