CategoriesSpiritual Conversation by

You’re not listening

It was one of those weeks—cluttered with noise, burdened with endless to-dos, stretched thin with distraction. Sitting alone at the large wooden table in our familiar coffee shop on Whidbey Island, I found myself lost in the swirl of my own busyness. The world hummed around me, yet I felt distant, untethered.

 

Then came the question—gentle yet piercing, one that refused to be ignored. 

“Are you following Jesus?  Are you truly a follower?”[1]

 

I knew the answer I wanted to give, the one my heart longed to be true. But honesty whispered otherwise. 

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CategoriesEncouraging, Spiritual Conversation by

Interlude Questions Matter

In a recent blog, Rob (Loane) talked to us about connecting the “answers” with questions. For many years, my work put a grant in our hands that allowed us to develop campus ministry leaders in two ways: leadership practices and spirituality. As a group, we loved times for “shop talk,” when we opened the floor for new ideas, innovations, and methods for spiritual formation on college campuses. The ideas would flow, copious notes would be taken, and many of us returned home with a “plug and play” mentality about what we heard from our peers.  

 

Over time, however, we needed to remember that best practices are “answers” or “responses” to questions that emerged out of local issues, contextual problems, or partial “solutions” in vivo, that is, in life lived on a campus in Indiana, upstate New York, urban LA or Minneapolis, small town Kentucky or metropolitan Dallas. We discovered that “answers” in the form of new programs or practices are not universal but specific to place, setting, staffing, ecclesial identity, and practical movements in the story of the ministry itself.  

 

A new campus pastor might bring something new to the table that a long-time pastor might have tried years before. A large staff team might initiate multiple complex plans that a campus pastor with a part-time assistant could not. Once again, questions matter.

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CategoriesFamilies, Spiritual Conversation by

When autocorrect got theology right

The calls started coming about a month ago. “Jerry is having trouble breathing; they’ve taken him to the hospital for oxygen.”  Jerry is my older brother. During the late stages of pregnancy, my mother experienced complications that caused the loss of oxygen flow to his brain, resulting in life-altering mental capacities for him. He was what we might call today “mentally challenged,” what people cruelly called then “retarded.” He was, in other words, a survivor of a birth-related brain injury.

In truth, his abilities were challenged, causing him to be placed in the “special” class and mainstreamed in public education in suburban Chicago. It was a class comprised of many people with various forms of disability, only to be ridiculed because they might not be articulate in speech, might laugh at the wrong time, be unable to complete sentences, drool, or have bodies with spastic motions at unexpected moments. Because they were “special,” they were often treated badly on the playground, in the hallways, or just walking with us through town; mothers even “protected” their own children when they saw Jerry and me walking the sidewalks. More than once I even told mothers to “shut up,” as they called him “retard.” “Shut up” was a phrase not allowed in our family home.

Jerry was a special needs child. His life changed within only a few months of what appeared to be an otherwise normal pregnancy. Until age 16, he was in the public school system, but nothing was offered beyond that age. Eventually, he moved to a group facility in southern Illinois where he lived just short of 50 years. Read More

CategoriesCompanioning Others, Spiritual Conversation by

Little Walker’s trip to the boardwalk

A story

Little Walker’s favorite place in the world is the boardwalk in Ocean City, New Jersey. If you have ever been to this boardwalk in the summer, you know the extent of the crowds of people – it is exhilarating. For five-year-old Little Walker, with amusement rides and snacks and so many people, a night spent on the boardwalk was his most favorite thing to do. All day long, he told everyone he encountered, “I am going to the boardwalk tonight!” So when dinner was done, and the dishes were all washed and dried, he headed up to “the boards” with his parents and little sister, his aunt and uncle. Little Walker could barely contain himself as he entered the scene: Ferris wheels and boogie boards and flashing billboards, skateboards and strollers, Steel’s fudge and Mack & Manco’s pizza and Shriver’s saltwater taffy, the sounds of the Atlantic Ocean in the background, and wave upon wave upon wave of people. Absolutely wonderful!

But when he smelled that smell–hot caramel popcorn!–and spotted the Johnson Caramel Popcorn shop (his dad’s favorite place on the boardwalk), and excitedly looked back for his dad, but could not find him or anyone else in his family, the whole scene turned on Little Walker. The lights, the noises, the smells, and the faces all began to press in upon him and terrify him. The excitement was gone. Little Walker was lost.  Read More