The Cost of Freedom

Last monday we had a meeting between the leadership of our church plant and our partnering church (aka Mother Church). In the begining there was a desire to be closely linked as an integrated multi-site church. This reality never developed and we are now moving towards being a more autonomous campus still under a multi-site model (for those that have done some reading in this area we have gone from the Community Christian Church approach to the New Life Christian Fellowship model).

One week later the joy of the meeting came to a halt - cue the sound of a needle scratching across a record - as I was informed that my ordination was going to be put on hold for this year by the mother church.

I would be crazy to say that the two are related but it sure feels that these things come in pairs. In fact I haven't really been pursuing my ordination at this point (as Charles Spurgeon 'splained it, ordination is 'empty hands being laid on a n empty head') but it was nice to be put forward and then it hurt to be unceremoniously dumped. Oh well, I still get to do the thing I love and feel called to in leading the folks at SouthGate so I will justy focus on that and move on.

Migwec,

Jeff

The Cost of Anger

I was away for a week doing some consulting for a group of provincial departments and crown corporations. I still do a little HR consulting on the side because (1) church planting isn't a get rich quick scheme and I have three kids a mortgage yada yada yada and (2) it keeps my head in the real world. I always book these junkets as holidays so I have severely abused the precept of Shabot over the last few years (something to be rectified in the New Year) but a change is as good as a break and I generally come back recharged.

During this particular set of meetings I decided to stay in my hotel and use the evenings as a time for prayer and rest (something sorely lacking in my real life). As I prayed I was amazed by the amount of anger that poured out. As I prayed there seemed to be a flood of faces and situations that I had pushed to the backburner over the last five years. It hurt to revisit these things but they had obviously never been dealt with and so I let it fly. It was very freeing to have a psalmic prayer time - a real Robert Duvall in the Apostle "sometimes he talks to God sometimes he yells at God" type of prayer. It made me think of all of the lost productivity and sideways energy expended. It has left me walking in numbness.

A while back I was at a lecture where Martin Robinson posed the question "Are you changing the Church of England or is the Church of England changing you?" It was a story he told that was to prompt us to ask the same question in our own contexts. As I have thought about this I have to admit that I have begrudgingly changed and become bitter not better as I have served. I have gone from 'happy go lucky' to extremely cynical in less than 5 years. Once a "young bottle-rocket and pepperpot" (an actual reference from a former professor) with a future in the academy I now am an oft-bitter, middle-aged guy with a slight shuffle in his step!

It has not been all bad but I carry some wounds (as we all do I imagine) that need to be healed. I am looking forward to this healing process in the new year even though I suspect it won't be easy - as I discovered during my angry prayertime.

Anyway thats my rambling for tonight and I have included a picture from my sketchbook (I will do this from time to time) that was inspired by Dr Robinson's question.

Migwec

Although the congregation I lead is in the southern most part of suburban Calgary I still have an office and some responsibilities at our downtown campus. It is funny to think that when the church was built in 1912 there was a considerable amount of noise regarding building a church so far out in the boondocks!

In many ways ministry is ministry. I started in youth ministry and then used alot of the skills in my role as an associate pastor looking after adults in the inner city - most of whom were marginalized because of language and/or poverty issues. I now use those same skills as the lead pastor of a newly developing church in suburbia. That being said I was hit with some of the differences late at night while I was in my downtown office.

Tonight, I passed by our custodian who was carrying a huge plumber's wrench - I asked him if there was a problem in one of the washrooms and he matter-of-factly replied (in a calm, smooth Sudanese accent) "No I'm taking out the garbage - last night some guys tried to hold me up for my car keys and I called the cops on them. But I told them that if they try it again tonight they will not be so lucky as me calling the police!" Not ten minutes later I was carrying some files from a room where my old office was and I noticed a light on in the office building across the street and there was a woman assembling her office furniture with nothing on but a skirt!! You just don't get these things in surburbia!!

It got me thinking about a night that pretty much sums up inner city ministry for me. It was a spring night and I ad led our evening service. At the time it was a service geared toward people with little to no church background, largely from the international community that surounded the church. It was great! I thought my message went well, the fellowship was great and when I walked out there was a cluster of men standing on the steps of the church. I recognized them as people at the service and one of our worship leaders. They were praying for one of the men (a member of the communist party when he was in China) who had just accepted that God was real and Jesus really did have a place in his life. It was awesome. It was everything I worked for; everything we dreamed of as a ministry team. I floated around the corner of the building to hop into my van for the ride home and almost walked right into a couple of homeless guys (who I also recognized) using the side of my van as a urinal!! Aaaahhh, the visceral smell of downtown ministry. They assured my wife and I they only hit the tires and not to get bent out of shape (though not actually in those words). I laughed the whole way home.

In a way I miss the surreal reality of downtown (if you can have sur-reality). No one put up much of an effort to hide that they didn't have it together. I know for a fact that there are many of the same struggles where I now minister. Abuse is rampant: physical, emotional, chemical, sexual... but it is tucked away behind a two car garage and the trappings of the good life so nobody sees it. Downtown I would watch the guys buy crack on the street corner across from my office before they would come to try and hit me up for a safeway voucher or transit passes.

I truly thank God that he has given me so many experiences: growing up on a reserve, teaching in universities in North America and Asia, ministering in the inner city and now planting a church in a suburban setting. I just pray he will also give me the wisdom to learn from these experiences. I also pray he will continue to give me the strength and encouragement to keep 'learning.'

Migwec!

I decided to put up a different picture because my daughter laughs every time she sees my other photo. She's only two, and she is right I do do look goofy in the picture - I really don't have much to work with. So this is an attempt to look more pensive and brooding. I also know that if I don't shave tonight my wife will do it while I sleep and so I thought I would immortalize my shaggy attempt at a beard through blogging.

I haven't done much blogging lately, most of the posts are from a journal I kept during my time in SW China. I think I have avoided it because I prefer to be seen as a 'roll-with-the-punches, happy-go-lucky' guy and I haven't been able to pull that of over the last year. On Sunday mornings and Wednesday evenings the public/ministry persona can pull it off, but when I pause to journal/reflect I can be a bit of a sad sack - so I stopped writing.

Over the last month I have been amazed with how a friend has blogged his way through a difficult time and so I thought I would blow the dust off the keyboard and try to get back in the game.

This means there will be a gap between my last posts that really happened in the summer of 2005 and all of a sudden it is now November of 2006. That gap represents a 'long dark tea time of the soul' as Douglas Adams might label it; but it also represents some of my happiest times as well. I am the fully delighted father to three children (Mason 7, Micah 5 and Maggie 2) and husband to Juli. I am leading a community of people -most of whom have been called out of the margins- that are struggling to find God in new ways. It has been an incredible. As I look back on it I have enjoyed a 58 week long roller coaster ride and now it is time to step into the line up for the next ride.