jesus bread

First, an apology, if anyone should feel the following post is sacrilegious, please forgive me and know it's not intended.

 

So here I was last week at our special evening event for renovate that we held as a teaser of things to come and give us opportunity to practice and flesh out who and what we'll be as a church community.   We had just finished cleaning up the sanctuary and putting things back and someone reminded me to put away communion. 

 

Quickly I take care of the elements, at least I thought I did.  I actually ended up carrying around the bread in a napkin and taking it with me out to the car.  (You know how you can be carrying something and not even realize you still have it in your hands?  Well, I do, because my mouth is usually in motion and not paying attention to what's in my hands.  Anyway…)

 

The next day I didn't use my car, so it wasn't until Monday when I left for work that I realized I still had "Jesus bread" in my car.  By now it had been exposed to the air for a while, in the heat, and it was stale, brittle, hard.

 

As I drove down the road, I began to think about the fact that I had "Jesus" in the car with me, but it was not impacting me.  I could drive all over town and not realize that Jesus was with me.  Though it was special and an intimate worship time Saturday, the experience of the communion from Saturday night had not remained.  Like stale bread.

 

How quickly do we let the bread of life become stale in us?  Do we live our lives without recognizing his presence with us, even in the car, at work, in the home?  May God grant us is refreshing, restoring, renovating spirit everyday, that we may not forget that from him comes all life and sustenance.  God, teach us how to practice honoring your presence everywhere we are and at all times.

wordle

found this thing called "wordle" on Emergent Village...
played around with it using some phrases of a post i wrote about renovate. i like it:

circles

The other day at work I looked out the window of one of the offices and saw two really big birds, I don't know if they were hawks or what but they were circling in the air.  They made large circles, and as they did, each cycle took them a little bit higher.  I've heard about birds doing this before as a way of gaining height, but had never really watched them.  They kept doing this until they were too high for me to see through my window. 

 

It made me think about how many times in life we feel like we're "going around in circles."  Maybe its in those times when we're frustrated watching the same scenery, that actually God is helping us to "catch the wind" that is actually taking us up to where the real currents of our lives are and propel us to the future.

 

Don't know, but it encouraged me and thought I'd pass it on.

reasons for writing

How fast a couple of months go by.  I can't believe it's been two months since I last blogged.  There have been some precipitating issues that have caused my retreat from writing, but it should not have stopped me.  It shocks me that I've been so lax in writing.  Yet, I'm not surprised as recently my writing has begun to be vulnerable and I'm scared at times to plunge the depths of my own vulnerability, especially on a public level.  And on top of that, recently my writing and love for blogging became a target of accusation and attack.  So the thought of stepping back out of the boat of safety and conformity is cause for a bit of trepidation. 

 

But writing is important to me.  Blogging has been a spiritual discipline for me.  It is a place where I have worked out some of my most frustrating or puzzling struggles with life and faith and church and such.  It's not an easy place as a pastor to put yourself on the line like that.  Especially coming from the old paradigm that the pastor/leader must portray themselves as having it all together, without doubt and fear.  (The reasoning is "who would follow someone who doesn't have it together?" But I find that I can trust better someone who knows they are not all together perfect rather than one who falsely believes their God's next chosen son.)

 

Even if no one ever reads what I write, it's important that I write.  That I pray through my issues in the spiritual practice of journal/blogging.  It's more about me than the others who will read along with my journey.  Not that I don't want to hear from those who walk/read my journey.  I do.  But it is more about the audience of One who hears and knows before keyboard is struck or word is thought.  I need His attention to these words.  I need to hear His voice in response.  I need to feel His hand on my shoulder as I wrestle through these things. 

 

So if you read these notes I make along the journey, welcome, drop me a line occasionally, especially if I drop off the radar as I have of late.  Tell me to keep at it.  We need traveling companions.  Thanks for reading.