coming back to the point (and packing our bags for re-entry)

I haven't flipped the calendar yet, but I've been thinking already about the moment when I will tomorrow.  It's because I'll be able to see clearly that we are entering our last week of Sabbatical.  We've already been reflecting on the activities and highlights of the past weeks, and are beginning to anticipate what it will be like to "re-enter" our lives and work in Vancouver.  Gideon said today, "I am ready to go back but I will miss it here."  And Levi said, "I miss our living room in Vancouver."

So, each of us is eager to go back for various reasons.  We have missed the Farmer's Market every Saturday, and the new playground at Trout Lake.  We miss our neighbours and will be happy to bump into them on the sidewalk.  (We miss sidewalks for that reason!)  We miss seeing the babies in the church... how much they must have grown since we left in April!   We miss the eclectic, familiar congregation which we have grown to love so much.  We miss the worship in our congregation.

We are even looking forward to the routine of going to school in the fall, knowing that the rhythm is good for our family.  

But once we are back, we're sure that we'll miss the flexibility of sabbatical, the unforced rhythms and the daily delight of being together without interruption.  We've loved the freedom to take another book from the pile, with the permission to sit coffee in hand, and delve into another topic.  We've fully embraced the joy of evenings at home, the pleasure of putting the boys to bed without hurry, knowing that we can recline in the quiet living room with a glass of wine and the time to unwind.  

Which goes without saying, I suppose, that I am sort of dreading the return of meetings.  I once came across a trailer for an old British comedy called "Meetings, Bloody Meetings."  Having watched only a few minutes of it was enough to spark side-splitting laughter.  The parody of a disengaged, unprepared chair person and a room full of equally unprepared attendees was as funny as it was tragic.  

What seems to go without being said about church meetings is that they must happen.  But why do we do them the way we do?  I don't just mean to wonder about our unswerving loyalty to the guidelines for meetings a la Robert's Rules.  I understand that if we didn't schedule the gatherings the way we do or record and conduct them the way we do, that we might spiral to the poor depths of misery experienced in the "Bloody Meetings" by the employees in the comedy.  However, what is so sacred about meetings that we repeat them the way we do?   

The best meetings, in my mind, are the ones that are held ad hoc in response to a particular need, or that somehow deviate from the agenda so that we can discuss what really matters to people in the church.  I know it's important to discuss administrative details, and for this reason it's necessary to have scheduled meetings, but I believe we have mistakenly overlooked some of the more important matters, the things which our people really find to be close to the heart.  Somehow, we've agreed that it isn't necessary to have a clearly articulated vision or purpose as a congregation.  But for how long can we go on this way?  

One of the things I gleaned from the conference for Women Speakers early in the spring was that any time a speaker does not clearly articulate her objective, the hidden objective will take over.  75% percent of the time listeners will not be able to identify what the main point of the talk was... even as they are heading out of the auditorium. In fact, 50% of the speakers can't identify the objective of their talk/lecture/sermon unless they have clearly stated their point ahead of time.  The point worth noting is that whenever the hidden objective takes over due to the absence of a clearly articulate objective, the hidden objective is usually not a good one.  

How many of us can clearly articulate what the point of all of our meetings is?  Why are we actually gathering?  What is the thing burning in our hearts?  What has prompted us to forego a potentially sacred, quiet evening in our homes to sit around a table in a dark basement poring over an agenda?  

What about our prayer meetings?  Do we dare talk about the ratio of time spent in our administrative meetings versus the time spent in worship and prayer meetings?  What does that say about what's really important to us and where we feel our decisions are actually made?   Is this the way we want it to be?  Without having made a clear objective, it's possible that the hidden objective has already taken over... the hidden objective of asserting control over decisions and "progress" according to our pre-established ideas of what ought to happen in church, which is usually based on what has happened in the past.  

But are we prepared to crack open the possibility of allowing things to look different than they have?  And will we be willing to train ourselves to approach decision-making from a posture of worship and prayer rather than from a desire to maintain control while leaning on rational-logical-responsible protocol?  

I'm reminded of Paul's letter to Timothy where he gives instructions about how God's household of faith ought to conduct themselves.  Paul is wise and rooted in Christ, so compassionate toward the  community of believers and firm about his convictions that the church must cultivate purity and godliness.  Doing things with order and decency is good, as he mentions to the Corinthians, but the real value is being firmly established in Christ.  

Paul writes: 

¹⁴ Although I hope to come to you soon, I am writing you these instructions so that, ¹⁵ if I am delayed, you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth. ¹⁶ Beyond all question, the mystery from which true godliness springs is great:

He appeared in the flesh,
    was vindicated by the Spirit,^[d]
was seen by angels,
    was preached among the nations,
was believed on in the world,
    was taken up in glory.

Does what we do spring from our contemplation of this mystery?  If it doesn't, what is our activity rooted in?  And if we are not actively pursuing the command to love with a pure heart, good conscience and sincere faith, what are we doing? 

____________________

"If you are walking backward, away from something you think is a mistake, you may be right in supposing it is a mistake, but for you to be walking backward is never right.  You know what happens to people who walk backward....  We are meant to walk forward, not backward, and reaction is always a matter of walking backward." - J. I. Packer  

miles to go: how to let the road speak

We've been on the road lately and have put a lot of miles on our little grey van.  We've settled into some good driving routines and have found that some of our best learning moments have taken place on the road.  I know: some of you with young children may be wondering how in the world that could be possible.  Shouldn't we be bracing ourselves for the chaos that's likely to unfold within the vehicular confines of our mini-mini van?  Shouldn't we be forewarned about the potential for excessive noise and attestation coming from the back rows?

Perhaps.

I'm not saying that it's always sublime.  But what I am saying is that some of our best conversations, some of our moments of sweetest clarity have come as we all roll down the road together, heading in the same direction in more ways than one.  Enjoying the scenery, literally and internally.  And casting a quick glance into the rearview mirror to see just how far we've come.

It is marvellous to observe the major shifts and some of the subtle nuances between the ecoregions in Western Canada.  From Vancouver to Alberta, we travel up from the Pacific Maritime coastal eco-zone to the prairies.  Through desert and up over the Montane Cordillera.   The way the light shines in each area and the particular range of colours shifts between the various places.  We marvel at the hues of green and blue on the coast and the yellows in the prairies... the dusty golden yellow of a harvested field after the snow has melted and the canary yellow of the canola fields at the height of their bloom.

And it is marvellous to consider the various geographies of our life vocation... the nuances of the call to parent and the call to pastor, the role of the daughter and the role of the son, spouse to each other and friend to friends.  We notice the subtle shift from one territory to another, somehow continuous and somehow totally different.  How easily we move from place to place, and between all the roles we are permitted to fill.

We also marvel at how easily we travel.  No borders, no patrols or check-stops or questioning.  Only a very brief intermission at the gate to the National Park to pay a small entry fee while being reminded not to feed the wildlife.  Otherwise, we have no fear of traveling.  It is a privilege, an adventure.

But I have wrestled with this, knowing that there are an estimated 200 million people who have moved across borders for reasons that are beyond unpleasant, for fear of their lives, with no particular final destination and often no plan for getting there.  Can you imagine the stress?  Travelling with young children?  Leaving everything behind?  Not knowing exactly where to end, unsure of the possibility of ever going back?

Those of us with the Western mindset of "Road-Tripping" have this entrenched and privileged view of movement.  We go mostly where we want when and how we'd like.  We set out the map before us and draw our route.  This highway, or that one this time?   ... This is my question: What is it going to take for us to realize that there are so many millions for whom geographical movement represents terror and uprooted lives?  Instability and loss?  

I guess I'm going from road-trip to guilt-trip here.  But what option do we have?  We could possibly continue on the road more frequently travelled - the one which takes us to our preferred destination.  Or, as we so often hear, we could take the one less travelled.  But what about another option?  What if, instead of living AS IF our traveling was unrelated to the global movement of so many others, WHAT IF we take the path of greatest resistance and walk our way to meet those who are hoping to be met - not on some road, but on some unmarked passage.  Perhaps when we stop living AS IF and beginning wondering WHAT IF, we might begin to really see something new.

I'm saying two things:
1) Let the road speak.  Listen carefully, observe with great attention.  Be shaped by the shape of things around you.
2) Get off the road to really travel.   Be ready to anticipate the needs of weary travellers.  Get ready to  say no to the hankering to see the next destination.  Consider what benefit might occur from "staying put."

Off the beaten path, in the bright light of the Prairie made even brighter in a flowering canola field.

Our little Mazda MPV loaded down with gear and bikes south bound on the QE2 in Alberta, following my brother and sister-in-law's white Sienna.

To remember well, sit down!

I talked to someone recently who confessed that he often thinks about what he writes more than he actually sits down to write, as if the more he thinks about it, the better whatever he eventually writes will be.  I laughed a knowing kind of laugh.  It's exactly what I've been doing: thinking about all the things that I want-need to write about and putting it off until it's just right.  The problem is, of course, that it can't become anything, let alone good, unless you first sit down and begin somewhere.

Someone else once asked a famous writer how they ever got to where they were.  That writer responded: "Apply a** to chair."  As if that was all there is to it.  Flannery O'Connor said that if if she felt she had nothing to write, she sat down every morning, in case something inspiring might be given to her.

Inspired by those greats, I've found a good chair and have applied myself to it.   Here goes...

Highlights of our days have been filled with the following:
1) Driving back and forth to BC for John & Tuyet's, and Joel & Fiona's weddings.
2) Reading lots of books:  fiction, non-fiction, history, field-guides and maps
3) Receiving coaching/spiritual direction
4) Meeting up with other pastors
5) Talking
6) Praying
7) Learning about issues that people face when applying for refugee status, both in Canada and overseas
8) Hearing firsthand about the experience of gay couples in the church
9) Engaging in paradigm-shifting discussions about character formation and maturity
10) Visiting with John & Eileen and Rich & Elsy, who drove all the to Central Alberta from Vancouver.

Also, since I last wrote we've received opportunities to:
1) Learn the art of bee-keeping
2) Preach at my home church
3) Go hiking around Lake O'Hara with several of my aunts, uncles and cousins on my Dad's side and Gideon who demonstrated goat-like abilities when he easily hiked 16km in a little less than 24 hours.  What a kid!
4) Spend time with my cousin who work at the Canadian Embassy in Beirut as one who reviews refugee applications.
5) Train for a 10K run (to take place this coming Sunday morning with Trev and my three brothers)
6) Harvest food from our garden which we planted in May!  We picked peas, beans, beets, celery, potatoes, lettuce, carrots.  So sweet!
7) Watch the DVD series "Body and Soul" based on the Heidelberg Catechism (something we hope to share with the church in the fall)

8) Go fishing on Gull Lake

9) See a cow moose with her twin calves grazing in a ditch in Northern Alberta

10) Witness our boys catch and marvel at the dragonflies which proliferate on this hilltop 

11) Learn about history and culture of the Canadian Arctic

12) Reconnect with family members on my Mom's side of the family.  

Philip discovering that it really was Trev/"Daddy" behind the mask!

Jumping with joy in the garden.

 Preaching in WoodyNook, the church I grew up attending in Lacombe, AB.

Visiting with friends who came to Canada as refugees from Iran in the '90s.  

In between all of those things, we've talked and talked.  We've had time to have extended conversations, the kind that can explore an issue from many angles.  We've had time to revisit questions and ideas and wonder about what will come next.  We've had time to wrestle with questions that have, up till now, only been latent.

We've worshipped and our hearts have soared.  The sun has shone brightly on us and the rain has fallen generously on our garden and has sent our roots rain.  So very good.