I'm at that age where ghosts of my past keep popping up where I least expect them, reminding me of what could have been, and a little bit of the journey I expected to take when I was younger.
The journey since has been nothing like that. As a young convert to Christianity, I sincerely believed I was meant for ministry. To me that meant being a pastor somewhere, or a missionary; really, anywhere God wanted me.
And I started off with that in mind. I went briefly to a small Baptist Bible College, but was struck by the inherent hypocrisy of a school that did not allow students to attend movies, but said nothing when the students would gather together in their homes and watch the same movies. It's more likely than anything that the college was just not a good fit for me, but I really didn't see any other option at the time.
And then I moved back home for a span of three years, continuing my college experience, but being stifled by the intricacies of the student loan system. A technicality made it a monumental hurdle to get financial aid until I was 24, and I was unwilling to jump those hurdles.
Then came family. It wasn't long until I was a parent, and put that on the backseat at a number of low to mediocre paying jobs, putting in long hours. All that became important in that stage in life was holding through to the next paycheck.
Then a series of steps led to where I am now, finished with a degree, but not really in the direction I had once considered, and with the thoughts of "ministry" I had when I was younger all but over. In sum total, my "career" in the pulpit lasted all of three sermons as part of a group of people who filled in for a rural Oklahoma church. The disappointment of never being able to launch in something that was very dear to me, something to which I have always believed that I was called, left me bitter. And it didn't help that I was watching as many of the churches I saw were completely being swallowed up by a materialism and secularism that were certainly not Christ's intent.
But gradually, time has led me to understand that ministry is not confined to the face in the pulpit; that there are a lot of ministers out there that nobody will ever see, and that for reasons not completely known to me (although I know some of them), that just might be God's direction for me. That maybe, just maybe, the marks I leave on those around me won't be seen until after I'm gone. And that, while I may never preach another sermon from a pulpit in my life, that doesn't mean that I'm not preaching through my actions.
I don't feel comfortable sharing the opportunities that have opened up for me lately. I don't feel it's right. But it's my prayer that somehow my life can steer more over time towards Kingdom work than the tedious work often needed to sustain ourselves in this life.
But what I've had to come to grips with is the fact those opportunities have always been there, they just come without applause.
And I'm OK with that.
Sunday, December 28, 2014
Friday, December 26, 2014
Reflections at Year's End
I haven't yet read the conclusions of Ryan Bell's "A Year Without God". But I have appreciated all of his posts throughout the year. They have challenged me, angered me, inspired me. I have found much solace in his skilled presentation and intellectual honesty in asking some of the questions we would often rather avoid.
Mr. Bell, if you ever read this, I thank you. And if you ever happen by a certain burg in Northeastern New Mexico, the coffee's on me.
I wanted to write these reflections prior to reading Bell's, because I want them to be free of the color I might find in his. I admittedly have not read many of these atheist/humanist authors, and have little interest in doing so, but that doesn't mean that I don't find validity in it.
So, introduction aside, here are my year end thoughts, jumbled as they may be:
The first verse of the Bible begins, "In the beginning, God...". Proceeding through 807,361 words in 66 books of the canonical Scriptures, it ends with "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen". (Rev. 22:21).
In the beginning, God... In the end, grace. Something to think about, and something that has had deep and profound meaning through the year, as I watched some people dear to me struggle with some difficult, life altering realities that I will not discuss in depth here because it is simply too soon.
This was a very, intensely painful year for me. But then growth often is. I have shed a lot of tears in the past 360 days, and as the year winds down, I find myself wondering if the current quiet is a genuine peace or merely the calm before the storm. I found myself withdrawing increasingly inside myself because of genuinely feeling that I lacked a strong support group.
And through it all I found comfort in the words of Mr. Bell. Not because I agreed with some of the explorations that he made, but because I highly respect anyone who is willing to step so far outside their comfort zone in order to examine who they personally are. For everything I endured, I am sure it paled in comparison to some of his struggles. And, sadly, it showed some of the inadequacies of "traditional" evangelicalism.
And it was in that climate that I felt compelled to renounce evangelicalism. When I saw, for a second year in a row, the media centered on the shooting of an unarmed person of color, it called into question whether there was anything left worth redeeming in today's church. I've long struggled within around the conflict between the evangelical gospel and the social gospel, which gets you branded a liberal, a communist, or worse. And in the course of renouncing evangelicalism, I had to question whether I was, indeed, renouncing the church.
But there was something in that: Christ loves the church enough that He gave himself for her. That means, for better or worse, my struggle is not against the church, no matter how imperfect she may be.
In the beginning, God. In the end, grace.
Personally, this was the year that I realized that any aspirations to the American middle class are gone. That I can't pour enough money into my education to make that happen, and that it's done. And that I should learn to be comfortable with what I have, because it likely will not improve much.
After much bitterness, I'm surprisingly OK with that. Of course it helps that, in addition to my small income streams elsewhere, I am doing something I truly, genuinely enjoy.
This has been a truly special year on many fronts. I will post more between now and year's end, but cannot help going back to the discovery above: in the beginning, God... In the end, grace.
Mr. Bell, if you ever read this, I thank you. And if you ever happen by a certain burg in Northeastern New Mexico, the coffee's on me.
I wanted to write these reflections prior to reading Bell's, because I want them to be free of the color I might find in his. I admittedly have not read many of these atheist/humanist authors, and have little interest in doing so, but that doesn't mean that I don't find validity in it.
So, introduction aside, here are my year end thoughts, jumbled as they may be:
The first verse of the Bible begins, "In the beginning, God...". Proceeding through 807,361 words in 66 books of the canonical Scriptures, it ends with "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen". (Rev. 22:21).
In the beginning, God... In the end, grace. Something to think about, and something that has had deep and profound meaning through the year, as I watched some people dear to me struggle with some difficult, life altering realities that I will not discuss in depth here because it is simply too soon.
This was a very, intensely painful year for me. But then growth often is. I have shed a lot of tears in the past 360 days, and as the year winds down, I find myself wondering if the current quiet is a genuine peace or merely the calm before the storm. I found myself withdrawing increasingly inside myself because of genuinely feeling that I lacked a strong support group.
And through it all I found comfort in the words of Mr. Bell. Not because I agreed with some of the explorations that he made, but because I highly respect anyone who is willing to step so far outside their comfort zone in order to examine who they personally are. For everything I endured, I am sure it paled in comparison to some of his struggles. And, sadly, it showed some of the inadequacies of "traditional" evangelicalism.
And it was in that climate that I felt compelled to renounce evangelicalism. When I saw, for a second year in a row, the media centered on the shooting of an unarmed person of color, it called into question whether there was anything left worth redeeming in today's church. I've long struggled within around the conflict between the evangelical gospel and the social gospel, which gets you branded a liberal, a communist, or worse. And in the course of renouncing evangelicalism, I had to question whether I was, indeed, renouncing the church.
But there was something in that: Christ loves the church enough that He gave himself for her. That means, for better or worse, my struggle is not against the church, no matter how imperfect she may be.
In the beginning, God. In the end, grace.
Personally, this was the year that I realized that any aspirations to the American middle class are gone. That I can't pour enough money into my education to make that happen, and that it's done. And that I should learn to be comfortable with what I have, because it likely will not improve much.
After much bitterness, I'm surprisingly OK with that. Of course it helps that, in addition to my small income streams elsewhere, I am doing something I truly, genuinely enjoy.
This has been a truly special year on many fronts. I will post more between now and year's end, but cannot help going back to the discovery above: in the beginning, God... In the end, grace.
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