Spouts, Trickles, and Leaks October 9, 2008

One of the big questions I’ve been wrestling with while I’m here in Bratislava is why am I here?  What am I doing?  Will this work that I’m doing matter after I’m gone?

All of these questions have led me to see how results-oriented I am.  Maybe that’s just the way I am or maybe it’s the product of two years of preparing for accreditation reviews at work and asking myself if the mission is being accomplished.  Goals, outcomes, strategy, plans.  What are we doing?  How do we get there?  How do we know when we’ve gotten to that mysterious place of “there” once we’re there?

My questions, I think, point to the question we all ask and what we all wish for ourselves:  significance.  We want to know that our work has purpose and that we’re not working in vain.  We want to know that what we do matters to someone.  Even more than that, we want to know that who we are matters to someone.

Part of the confusion of my questions is that I think I expected to be doing something different than what I do everyday or expected life here to feel different than it does at home.  Perhaps if I was in the deep dark jungles of Africa or in a culture vastly different from my own, things would feel different.  The big surprise has been that things are surprisingly the same.  Even the landscape looks alot like Tennessee (and there’s a bluegrass festival this weekend?  What?!).

Once again, I think I’ve been approaching my questions from the wrong angle or asking the wrong questions to begin with.  I think came expecting to “minister” to people here, whatever that means.  Perhaps that has happened.  However, I know (warning:  here’s another missions cliche coming up) that probably more is going on in me as I’m learning to trust that God has a purpose in my being here, whether I understand it or not. I’m learning more about what it means to offer my work and daily tasks to Him as worship and praise because this is the work He has placed in front of me to do for this time and place.  Maybe it’s not what I was expecting, bit it’s the place where God has put me for right now.

I’ve been listening to my church’s sermon series on Acts while I’m working.  This past week, the sermon was about how we’re all on mission all the time.  I’m learning that is true.  Whether I’m living in Europe or Bristol or where ever, I’m on mission to know Christ and to make him known.  How I go about doing things that maybe are not my favorite things to do (i.e. cataloging books or taking out the trash) speaks to my faith in God.  As God works in me to increase my faith in Him, hopefully that will leak out from me onto someone else.  Occasionally, I might get to pour out myself in a way that looks like what we think ministry looks like.  More often it seems like my faith is coming out in trickles and leaks of the seemingly mundaneness of everyday life.

Two Prayers June 28, 2008

I was weeding in the literature section yesterday in the library and came across of book of prayers.  These two by Soren Kierkegaard really spoke to me.

Faith

Teach me, O God, not to torture myself, not to make a martyr out of myself through stifling reflection, but rather teach me to breathe deeply in faith.

Your Hand, Lord Jesus

We receive everything from your hand, Lord Jesus.  Your powerful hand stretches forth and turns worldly wisdom into holy folly. Your gentle hand opens and offers the gift of inner peace.  if ever it seems that your reach is shortened, it is only to increase our faith and trust, that we may reach out to you.  And if ever it seems that your hand is withheld from us, we know that it is only to conceal the eternal blessing you have promised–that we may yearn for that blessing even more fervently.

Influences November 17, 2007

Over the past week, I’ve been thinking about influences and people who have influenced my life in some way or another.  The reason I’ve been thinking about that this week is because I had the opportunity to hear two of those people speak this week.

One of those is Katherine Paterson.  She is an alum of King College and the author of several well-known children’s books.  I first heard of Paterson when I was a freshman at King.  She came to campus and did a book signing and lecture.  She came back again to speak at my college graduation.

Since I was an English major interested in writing and teaching and books, I hung on every word of her graduation speech.  I remember writing about it in my journal at that time.  Here’s a snippet of what I wrote ten years ago:

Katherine Paterson’s speech was wonderful also.  She said the we were “children of hope” who could bring hope to those children in the world who have no hope.

 The other person I heard speak this was Louis Giglio.  He is the founder of the Passion conferences.  He was on tour with Chris Tomlin who had a concert in Johnson City.  I first heard of Louis Giglio when I was in Columbia, SC.  He spoke at a retreat for the college ministry I was part of in graduate school.

That retreat happened to fall on the weekend after I interviewed for my first job at Midlands Technical College.  He spoke about finding God’s will for your life which was a timely message for me then.  I’m sure I journaled about it, but I can’t find that journal this morning.  I think I first heard this prinicple from Louis:  God’s will for your life is to lead you to things that are for our good and for His glory.

I’m sure Louis Giglio stated that much more eloquently than I just did.  But the point of these two words of wisdom from these two people is that I was reminded this week of one, how deeply those two ideas have become a deeply ingrained part of who I am and what I believe about God and following His will for my life.

The second reminder was just that God is faithful to lead and guide and shape us.  I also had the opportunity this week to hear life stories from people in my community group at some women at church during this month’s Titus 2 fellowship.  Whether it’s famous people or the everyday people we meet in life, God uses those people to provide words of encouragement at just the right times.

During this week of Thanksgiving, I’m thankful again for the influences that God has placed in my life and for the faithfulness of those people to follow God’s leadership.

 

 

Sock Puppet Church June 27, 2007

One of the things of the many things I have been thinking about lately is the role of the church in communities. One reason I keep thinking about this is that the church I attend is 35 minutes away in a different town. I’ve struggled off and on during the three almost four years that I’ve been part of the congregation with going to church outside my immediate community. I began attending this church because I agreed with the ministry philosophy of the church, “building a community to reach a community.” I have continued to make that 35 minute drive every Sunday because of the close ties and relationships that have been formed there, something that was missing in the church I attended in my local community.

This blog post expresses I think what we all look for in a church whether big or small, near or far. Local community and close connections.

http://blog.beliefnet.com/godspolitics/2007/06/diana-butler-bass-sock-puppet.html