Braving The Waters

Good morning! It is not a secret that I am not exactly a morning person. I can get up in the morning and function it just takes me a little while to "be awake". There are a few things and a few times of year that are the "exception to the rule". -Any week that I am counselling or directing camp -Any time I am in WV/Pa visiting family and friends -Hospital or other morning visits with church members Recently I added meeting a friend for a morning walk 2-3 times a week. Today I am adding another. In September my spiritual direction certification classes started. Our entire scheduled was changed because of COVID and not being able to gather in the same space. So we met online and began to get to know each other. It is not easy to get to know people in this way, but it is slowly happening. Even though we didn't get to spend a concentrated week together, we are still connected. This group meetings monthly. early in the morning, on zoom. My Spiritual Direction Cohort

Today began like any other day.  My alarm clock sounded and I hit snooze, twice.  Out of bed, dog out, breakfast made, coffee perking. In the back of my mind I know today is different than I thought it would be 9 months ago.  Today I should be boarding an airplane bound for Atlanta. I am not boarding an air plane, I am not headed to Atlanta.  Today I should be officially beginning my in person classes for Spiritual Direction Certification.  I am not meeting in person rather I am obsessively checking the zoom time so I don't miss it because of the time difference.  Today began like any other day, but today is different.  In one way or another we have all gone through significant changes since 2020 began. In one way or another our lives are different now than we thought they would be 9 months ago. It's perfectly acceptable to lament if things that were supposed to happen didn't, or didn't happen how you imagined. It's perfectly acceptable to rejoice if good things hav

Today I celebrate my 13th Anniversary of Ordained ministry!  There are days (a lot recently with COVID 19 pandemic protocols in place) that I feel like I am new to this whole ministry gig. Then there are days when I feel like I have it mostly figured out and things are moving in the right direction. It's probably, most years, a 60/40 split of feeling in control or spiraling out. The 60/40 split flip flops almost daily sometimes hourly.  Ministry is hard and challenging and life giving and beautiful. It is sorrowful and celebratory. Up, down, praise, lament, struggle, success, regret, and celebration, sounds like the Book of Psalms. So on this 13th Anniversary of my Ordination I thought I'd share a Psalm.  O Holy One, No one told me! No one told me that I'd have to be creative but also traditional,  That I'd have to think both inside and outside the box at the same time.  O Holy One, for those times that line between people loving the minister and people turning on her i

I am an internal processor. I am a contemplative person who needs time to think before I speak. Unless we’ve been friends for more than a year, you probably think I don’t talk very much. My silence often gets me in trouble because my silence is often interpreted that I don’t care. One group has decided that I don’t care and therefore stand, complicit, with the oppressive force. Others think my silence means I am complacent and don’t care enough to even make a comment. The problem however is that I do care, it just takes me too long to get my thoughts together and by the time I have them ready, it’s too late. But it’s not too late. It is never too late to stand up against something that is wrong. It is never to late to stand up for something you believe in. Over the past week I have done a lot of reading, a lot of observing, a lot of praying, and a lot of weeping. Reading, observing, praying, weeping… Communities of color don’t need my tears, They don’t need me to stand to the side and

It has been over 2 years since I've written on this blog. As we approach the end of 2019, the end of one decade and the beginning of the next, the expression "no time like the present" seems an appropriate one as I think about when to "restart" this little space I created for myself on the internet. I didn't start writing here because I wanted to make money or generate a large following. In 2010 when I started this blog, I was serving as an associate pastor and I wasn't preaching every Sunday so I needed a place to write my thoughts not only for preaching but life and ministry in general. I needed a way to get my thoughts out of my head so they didn't just swim around in there causing havock and chaos. But because of my personality I also wanted it to have some kind of "order". Over the years I have tried many different ways to organize this blog, just like I've tried many different planners organize my life...all of them work for a whi

 It is hard to believe that a decade has passed since I stood in front of a church filled with my family and friends and said the vows that brought me into the Order of Christian Ministry. Time flies even if all of it hasn’t been fun. The past 10 years have been a roller coaster . The past 10 years have been terrifying. The past 10 years have been exciting. The past 10 years have been exhausting. The past 10 years have been overwhelming. The past 10 years have been amazing. I thought on my 5 th anniversary I wrote a blog about the top 5 things from the first 5 years but I must have dreamed it or not posted it or somehow lost it on the inter-webs  (according to some people that can happen you know hahaha). So this year in honor of my 10 th anniversary I would like to share 10 of my favorite memories from the last 10 years. It’s a pretty generic list because there is no way to boil 10 years of ministry into 10 exact memories, so here they are. 10 memories.