This week has been interesting. One church moves me on in the interview process and another turns me down. There really isnt any reasoning, simply that they are pursuing other candidates. I have then received two generic letters of rejection, one I had sent information to, the other I probably was matched up with over the computer database. Where I talked about rejections being a way for God to close doors, I still bang my head against those closed doors. I still get frustrated with both the process and God. Why can't a call come so much more clearly? Did Isaiah or Jeremiah receive confusing messages before God actually called them to be the prophets they became to be? Or, did God simply communicate much more audibly to those who did not have technology to distract them, were young and actually listening, or what? Its hard to know. Its hard to listen. Its even harder to trust.
A few weeks ago the church I am doing my student pastor at talked about delayed answers to prayer. In the delay, where we think God is simply saying no or not answering our prayer, God is actually preparing the answer. Just as Job acknowledged the need for a mediator, that mediator would not come until much later on when the time and place where exactly right. Just like he pray for Jesus to return, the series of events is being set into place for the time and place to come for Jesus' return. Just like I pray for a placement, God is in the background preparing the congregation for Kadra and I. We have no idea what that will look like, and believe me when I say it could look like about a thousand different options. None of which do we really have a feel for. None of which do we see clearly. And I have no idea where God is calling us next.
Please pray for our discernment and God's preparation. And pray that the answer will come quickly. It seems like my sleep and body are taking a certain toll during this preparation process. And so it goes. So we wait. Jesus, come quickly. Holy Spirit speak. And God send.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Round Two
Praise be to God as I move into the second round of conversations with Knox Presbyterian in Overland Park. I felt like the conversation with that committee went very well, and apparently they agreed for they got back to me nearly two weeks sooner than they had suggested.
Kadra and I are excited to see where God is calling us. Please continue to pray for our placement and the transition over the next year.
Kadra and I are excited to see where God is calling us. Please continue to pray for our placement and the transition over the next year.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Taking Deep Breaths
I received an email from the church in Pueblo that I interviewed with last Thursday (Feb 10). It basically said we feel like it went well, but we still have a few more interviews to go through this coming week. The way I read it was "We fee like it went well," Deep breath, as I ready myself for a nice let down thinking the email would say "but we have decided to move on without you." Fortunately, this wasn't the case, but like always, it got me to thinking.
Why am I so worried to hear a no? We all seek affirmative answers in our lives whether the answers affirm our abilities, create a welcomed outcome to a heavy burden, or simply want to he an affirmative answer to our prayers. Kadra and I's prayer have been for God to be creating a place to which we will go after Seminary where God has called us since before time. We want to so badly for any church to call us and hire us, but we do not want to consider the doors that God is closing. As we have found in the past, closed doors only lead to how glorious the door that is opened. God's negative answer is hard to deal with because we are not God, we cannot see into the near to even far off future that God has planned for us that is far greater than any "other side of the fence" that we can think of. The grass may seem very green at any church that we interview with, but the green may only be a part of the carpet that is rolled out for an inquirer for that church.
The reality is that there is a plan. We dont know it, and as much as I wish I did know God's plan, I simply am not God. Its why the Bible refers to God as the Holy Other, or what the statement of "I am" simply means: "I am and you are not." I am the Aplha and Omega, beginning and end, a lion and a lamb, the priest and the sacrifice, holy and just, and loving yet full of wrath. All of these things accumulate to the God of our lives that is at work reconciling us to God's Triune self.
Yet, we still fear a negative answer. We still hope for an affirmative answer. But we cannot imagine the highth nor depth that God loved us in sending the Son. So in the negative answer, we look to the Holy Spirit to lead us to the affirmation that is the call in all of our lives to live for God and love our neighbor. All else is in the details.
So, regardless of a yes or no answer, God has always provided for the birds and the bees. So why do I, do we, worry?
Lord, lead us. Lord, call us. Lord, send us. And all the while, Lord comfort and love us. Amen
Why am I so worried to hear a no? We all seek affirmative answers in our lives whether the answers affirm our abilities, create a welcomed outcome to a heavy burden, or simply want to he an affirmative answer to our prayers. Kadra and I's prayer have been for God to be creating a place to which we will go after Seminary where God has called us since before time. We want to so badly for any church to call us and hire us, but we do not want to consider the doors that God is closing. As we have found in the past, closed doors only lead to how glorious the door that is opened. God's negative answer is hard to deal with because we are not God, we cannot see into the near to even far off future that God has planned for us that is far greater than any "other side of the fence" that we can think of. The grass may seem very green at any church that we interview with, but the green may only be a part of the carpet that is rolled out for an inquirer for that church.
The reality is that there is a plan. We dont know it, and as much as I wish I did know God's plan, I simply am not God. Its why the Bible refers to God as the Holy Other, or what the statement of "I am" simply means: "I am and you are not." I am the Aplha and Omega, beginning and end, a lion and a lamb, the priest and the sacrifice, holy and just, and loving yet full of wrath. All of these things accumulate to the God of our lives that is at work reconciling us to God's Triune self.
Yet, we still fear a negative answer. We still hope for an affirmative answer. But we cannot imagine the highth nor depth that God loved us in sending the Son. So in the negative answer, we look to the Holy Spirit to lead us to the affirmation that is the call in all of our lives to live for God and love our neighbor. All else is in the details.
So, regardless of a yes or no answer, God has always provided for the birds and the bees. So why do I, do we, worry?
Lord, lead us. Lord, call us. Lord, send us. And all the while, Lord comfort and love us. Amen
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Calling God for a Placement
Today I had my second interview. This time simply over a tele-conference, which had a much different feel. It was far more personal than the first, which was over skype, and it felt more like community. Which begs the question as to how to discern this call business, where on the one hand I want a job, but on the other God has known where we would go after seminary all along. We are simply waiting to find out where that is and where we will become a part of the missio Dei that is God working in the world.
It will be interesting to see how long it takes for the first two interviews to give their results, but in the meantime I wait and pray. I have no inkling as to where God is calling us, but I know we will prosper there. So until I find where that is and God makes it clear to us where we are going, I wait in anticipation on my knees in prayer to the All Mighty.
It will be interesting to see how long it takes for the first two interviews to give their results, but in the meantime I wait and pray. I have no inkling as to where God is calling us, but I know we will prosper there. So until I find where that is and God makes it clear to us where we are going, I wait in anticipation on my knees in prayer to the All Mighty.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Finding a Call
So far, I have survived one interview.
It has been strange to sit and answer the questions that are thrown at you one after another. I want something far more personal, but I know that these churches are interviewing way too many applicants at once. Yet, the interview does hardly any justice to one's talents and potential.
One question was about one's involvement in their community. To answer that is to assume that I have had time for community in the past few years as I have averaged 16 credits a semester. I am unsure my answer will hardly do justice to the question or to the wanted reply, but still I put forth my ambitions, what I would love to be involved in, and ultimately challenged to more involved. And we wonder why burn out is so high amongst pastors.
With that being said, it needs to be said that pastors, or soon to be pastors are not Jesus. Jesus left us community because it takes the entire church body to do what Jesus did in his few years of ministry. Where the pastor can point the way to show how this is to be done, they cannot be the only one doing it. So yes, I am involved in the community. I am a pastor who prays for God's voice to be heard in your household. I am the pastor who preaches that we are all called to be part of the priesthood. And I am the pastor who ultimately says that we are all called to carry our cross. And though this call may be intimidating, it is no more intimidating than the yoke of Americanism Christian's take on in the states. This American yoke is heavy, burdened by business and noise. But, when we take up our cross, we set ourselves against Americanism - We take on a yoke that is easy and a burden that is light.
So church, take up your cross. And my involvement in the community is no longer one of my own, but is the church being the body that Jesus called us to. I am simply the messenger to remind you of the body's mission.
It has been strange to sit and answer the questions that are thrown at you one after another. I want something far more personal, but I know that these churches are interviewing way too many applicants at once. Yet, the interview does hardly any justice to one's talents and potential.
One question was about one's involvement in their community. To answer that is to assume that I have had time for community in the past few years as I have averaged 16 credits a semester. I am unsure my answer will hardly do justice to the question or to the wanted reply, but still I put forth my ambitions, what I would love to be involved in, and ultimately challenged to more involved. And we wonder why burn out is so high amongst pastors.
With that being said, it needs to be said that pastors, or soon to be pastors are not Jesus. Jesus left us community because it takes the entire church body to do what Jesus did in his few years of ministry. Where the pastor can point the way to show how this is to be done, they cannot be the only one doing it. So yes, I am involved in the community. I am a pastor who prays for God's voice to be heard in your household. I am the pastor who preaches that we are all called to be part of the priesthood. And I am the pastor who ultimately says that we are all called to carry our cross. And though this call may be intimidating, it is no more intimidating than the yoke of Americanism Christian's take on in the states. This American yoke is heavy, burdened by business and noise. But, when we take up our cross, we set ourselves against Americanism - We take on a yoke that is easy and a burden that is light.
So church, take up your cross. And my involvement in the community is no longer one of my own, but is the church being the body that Jesus called us to. I am simply the messenger to remind you of the body's mission.
Finding Vocation
So my search has begun. So my search goes on. So I wonder, so I wait.
And yet, we have to believe that God has a purpose for our lives. We are not random substances placed on this earth, trying to figure out why we are here. We have a purpose. Our purpose is to love God and love neighbor. Everything else comes out of that. And yet, we have different abilities that will ultimately place us in a vocation of God's discernment. But the process to get there is far too hard, too exhausting, but I believe that each of us have been called to be whatever it is that God wants us to be far before we had even been conceived.
Trusting this truth is far more difficult.
May God show each of us where we are called. May we find God's purpose for us, and may we be called to the vocation that God prepared for us before we were even born.
And yet, we have to believe that God has a purpose for our lives. We are not random substances placed on this earth, trying to figure out why we are here. We have a purpose. Our purpose is to love God and love neighbor. Everything else comes out of that. And yet, we have different abilities that will ultimately place us in a vocation of God's discernment. But the process to get there is far too hard, too exhausting, but I believe that each of us have been called to be whatever it is that God wants us to be far before we had even been conceived.
Trusting this truth is far more difficult.
May God show each of us where we are called. May we find God's purpose for us, and may we be called to the vocation that God prepared for us before we were even born.
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