Take My Hand

My Favorite Present

My favorite present has to be this leather bound gilded Methodist Hymnal from 1849 that my parents gave me... How cool is this??

I was also the recipient of a wonderful cashmere and lamb's wool scarf, as well as a new Canon PowerShot A540 camera!

And, today I'm venturing forth into the mall and various other stores to scout out and purchase a fountain pen.

I've recieved wonderful gifts this year,  and pray that you have recieved the same... both gifts you can see and gifts which you cannot!  (That sounds slightly corny, but I mean it!)   

Christmas Eve

                                             

"God of humility and innocence, God of wonder and miracles, we give thanks today for your power and presence in our midst. In Jesus – his birth, his life and ministry, his death and resurrection – you have shown us that greatness emerges from vulnerability, and that with you all things are indeed possible.

This morning, God, we ask that you guide our journey to the stable. May all your people gather this night around the Holy Family, bringing their hopes, fears, joy, sorrow, delight and love into the circle of adoration. May we hear the angels' song as the birth is announced.  May our voices ring out with praise at the miracle of it all.

Eternal God, in the name of the tiny babe of Bethlehem, we pray for all humankind.  We pray for the strong and the weak, for the poor and the wealthy, for oppressed and oppressor. May we all kneel together at the manger, seeking help, healing and hope.

God of comfort, swaddle us in the safe closeness of your divine embrace and bring us peace. May your name be praised and glorified on this day of wonder, and forever more…"

thanks to www.innerdorothy.blogspot.com for the prayer

Ideas

After this semester ends on Thursday,  I have only got one semester left before I graduate (yay!).  I've finished all of my requirements to graduate -- except for PE -- this semester.  So, while I'm required to be in school next semester from 9:45 to 3:20 on Mondays Wednesdays and Fridays,  and from 8:20 to 3:20 Tuesdays and Thursdays, I must assuredly will be bored out of my mind.

This semester was a challenge to get through in and of itself,  but at the end of the day I knew I was accomplishing something by taking the classes I was taking;  I was allowing myself to finally graduate.  Not so next semester.

Do any of you all have suggestions for what I can do to meaningfully occupy myself? Please?

I have an aversion to the fast food industry and to volunteering in hospitals and libraries.  I've also got a slight allergy to cats, so no animal volunteer work either. Other than that, I'm game. Seriously.

And, I would really like to do something that's not just me sitting by myself.  Otherwise,  I would paint portraits or write a book.  Actually,  I'd be more than willing to write a book but I don't think anyone would want to publish it.

Anyway.

I would greatly appreciate any suggestions for what to do next semester that would keep me from going crazy with boredom or from lack of meaning... 

Giving Our Lives

I'm pretty sure that a significant majority of my posts start off with excuses explaining why I haven't posted anything new lately.  So, I'll leave this one in the minority and state that finals and the end of the semester are just around the corner!

I've been doing a lot of thinking lately on what Christ calls us to do as his followers:

Jesus calls us away from wealth.  That's certainly clear. When the 'Rich Young Ruler' comes to Jesus and asks him what he must do in order to enjoy eternal life,  Jesus tells him that he must keep the commandments.  The rich young man responds by saying that he has kept them since his youth.  Jesus in turn looks him hard in the eye and says, "There's one thing left: Go sell whatever you own and give it to the poor."

I wonder why there aren't more of us doing this?  In today's church and its focus on, and way of languaging salvation as 'giving our lives to Jesus', why is there a disconnect between 'our lives' and the life which we live?  Why is it common in churches (particularly in the USA) for people to recognize and act on our need for a Savior, when at the same time it is not common at all for people to sell all they have -- or even half of what they have, or a quarter of what they have -- and give it to the poor?

Are our actions not even to the slightest extent to be  included in our submission?

I had a brief conversation the other day with some one about this,  and he said to me "Well, we aren't all called to be Mother Teresas."  When he first said that, I sort of breathed a sigh of relief and mumbled to myself, "Thank God!" .  But then,  I wonder what would the world look like if all Christians sold a quarter of what they had and gave it to the poor?  We'd be living in a vastly different world.

I remind myself that the saints are witnesses to what a life can look like when lived to the glory of God.  And I know that I too am called to be a saint, just as we are all called to be saints.  Why are we not trying even just a little harder?

As I type this I have to acknowledge the fact that I'm sitting in a room in a warm house in a nice subdivision, in a nice town in a nice suburb outside of a stereotypically hospitable city, in the United States of America.  My closet is full of clothes.  I have rings on my fingers.  And a television going in the background.  There is more than enough food in the pantry and the refridgerator.

I know that asking questions is not enough;  actions -- of which I have few of this sort -- lend credibility.  Once again I'm reaching for the speck of dust in our eye while I ignore the shard of glass in my own.

However, I take comfort in the fact that words and questions can spur action.

I take comfort in that while the rich young man in the gospel walked away with his head hung low because he just couldn't give away all his wealth,  Jesus looked at him and loved him.

I am not saved by works alone.

Yet,  where among us are the works to the extent that Jesus calls us to?  Why do we give Jesus our lives,  and yet not our wealth -- as the fishermen did -- at the same time?  And why does the church not care?

Photoblog

ht to postsecret.com

NYWC #6

Today has been great too; just like all the others!  I'm completely and utterly spent, but still the day was informative, enjoyable and inspiring.

I went to both of Shane Claiborne's seminars entitled, "The Scandal of Grace" and "Resurrecting Church: Re-Imagining the Early Jesus Revolution".  Both were very moving.  The passion that Shane has for his work and the t(T)ruth behind his work was very clear to me.  I was so enthralled with his words, I didn't take many notes.  So I won't do my bullet points this time.  I'm covinced that this man could very well become my generation's "Mother Teresa".  Listening to him speak was a very humbling experience.

At one point Shane said, "If we lose this generation, it won't be because we didn't entertain them enough.  It will be because we didn't trust them enough."  That really struck me.  He also quoted John Wesley at one point by saying, "If I should die with more than 10 pounds in my pocket, then I should be called nothing but a liar and a theif."  I wonder how the church would look if we truly took that -- and all of the gospel's  calls 'social justice' action -- to heart?  As Shane put it, "the gifts of God are too good to hold onto for ourselves."

I had lunch today with Kenda Dean, which was really great.  Our conversation was refreshing for me. . . I'm so thankful she and I got to meet up.  And, on top of that, there was this really great Brie cheese with carmelized sugar on top.  I had never seen such a thing before. Mmm.

Well,  I'm about to go crash into my wonderful hotel bed.  The rest of the folks I came with are going to update me on tonight's General Session tomorrow morning. . .

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all, evermore. Amen.

NYWC #5

Yesterday --Saturday-- was quite a packed and wonderful (like I've already said) day.  I got up at an ungodly hour after having gone to sleep at an ungodly hour, so the morning seminar I went to is a little hazy, through no fault at all of the presenter's.

The first General Session of the day was great; Philip Yancey spoke.  he had some great thoughts on grace. . . (I hadn't had my Diet Coke yet, so that's all I can say with confidence).

I went to Tony Jones' seminar regarding Emergent and the emerging church in the afternoon.  He profiled three different emerging churches and discussed Emergent on the way.  I think I've got a better handle on what the emerging church and Emergent is.  I still don't know if I could really explain it coherently other than to say that Emergent consists of a group of people who are generally disillusioned with the way that 'church' is done today.  And, also to say that the glue that binds Emergent and the emerging church together is a hope-filled eschatology (as opposed to a dispensationalist eschatology).

Some tidbits that came up that struck me -- for good or for worse, you decide -- during the seminar that I wrote down:

• "Emergent has made God big again"
• "the youth don't want a youth group necessarily, they're already actively and purposefully engaged in the main worship service"
• "community involvement in emerging churches is generally expected"
• "the emerging church doesn't want to 'qualify' truth, we want to live it"
• "everything one does reflects ones thoughts and beliefs about God"

For dinner, I met up with Drew Johnson, a friend of mine and the Dean of the Youth Theological Initiative.  I enjoyed my burger with him!  It always lightens my day when I hang out with my YTI family.

Chris Hill spoke at the evening's General Session.  He unpacked John:1.  Here are some quotes (are you getting tired of all the quotes yet?)

• "John's a weird dude, but God likes weird people."
• "It's just John out there with a grasshopper in his beard...confronting a sin-sick generation."
• "God speaks life into time."
• "We're raising a generation that's looking to us for the answers; we need to point them (away from ourselves) to the light."

The Late Night Theology Session with Tony Jones was great great great.  We discussed time and how our understanding of time affects and engages prayer.  That's all I can really say about that;  my notes are a jumble because I was paying too close attention and not writing.  Some special stuff happened there.  We ended up praying for a little girl suffering from cancer who is not expected to live.  Her situation was mentioned in order to put a face on the implications our discussion has.  At the end of the discussion we all layed hands on the woman who brought up this little's girls situation and we prayed for her as a group.  Praying for her in and of itself was powerful; also the fact that even though we had as a group disagreed in our theological interpretations and view of prayer and time, we came together as one in the practice of prayer was powerful.

May the light of God follow you.

NYWC #4

Alright, so this post will be a tad hurried bacause I'm about to go out the door in order to eat breakfast and make it to Shane Claiborne's seminar on time.  I'll update about yesterday tonight.  But I'll go ahead and say this though:

The Late Night Theology Session with Tony Jones was awesome.  And I mean 'awesome' in the true sense of the word. . .

Peace.

NYWC #3

Wow.  What a day.  It had been exhausting and yet calming at the same time.

This morning I slept in a little (8:30, in case you were wondering),  and headed to the General Session early in order to get a good seat.  Kenda Dean spoke this morning and she did an amazing job.  She expounded upon Samuel's call and Eli's role in that call.  It really was wonderful...  I took notes during the whole thing and some of the things she said that strike out me as I look over them are as follows:

• (In referring to Samuel 3:2) "The lamp of God had not gone out because Samuel -- who was a youth -- was tending it"
• "The Lord often reveals what is better for the church to the younger members of the church"
• "is youth ministry in your church embarassing Jesus?"
• "We need to get the youth out of the youth room and into the sanctuary"
• "Not only do young people have the ability to hear God, they also have the ability to proclaim God"
• "Disorienting dilemmas such as mission trips, retreats and even the sacrament of communion..." (It was the fact that she included communion that got me excited)

Though these highlights do not AT ALL do justice to her talk -- nor do they recapture completely the intent behind her message -- these were some of the things that really jumped out at me.

For my seminar today,  I attended Kenda's.  It was entitled "Numb and Numb-er: Worshiping in the Church of Benign Whatever-sim".  She discussed the findings of the National Study on Youth and Religion.  While I've heard it before, the NSYR names the youth of today's (as a whole) religious view as 'Moralistic Therapeutic Deism'.  And the truth of that name struck me once again.  All in all it was a well worthwile hour and a half.

I had the chance to go eat dinner with Kenda and some folks from Pfeiffer University, as well.  It was nice to get away from the hubbub here at the convention and just sit for a while.  While I wish I could have had the chance to talk with her one on one more,  she and I had some good conversation. She strikes me as a person who knows deep joy.  People like that are hard to find (harder than they should be) in the church. . .

In a lifetime, there are a handful or two of people whom you meet along the way who just sort of connect with yourself.  She's one of those for me. . . it was very cool to hang out with her.

I also met (via Kenda Dean) Mark Yaconelli on my way to the General Session that was tonight and talked with him for a little while.  He seems pretty cool;  I sure did enjoy his book "Contemplative Youth Ministry".

I caught the tail end of Tony Campolo's talk at the GC.  Some of the stuff he said I thought was spot on.  Some of his (or at least my assumptions of some of his) politics I disagree with.   One of the things he said that stuck out at my in wonderfully positive way was this: "You ask me if I mean for you to go back to your youth groups and turn all of your kids into Mother Teresas. *pause*  I have to say yes that question."

Well.  That's all for tonight... I'm exhausted.   I'll post again tomorrow evening.

May the Lord bless and keep you.