#reality

Most Fun Is Sticky

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Well the Lillie VI family ( my son’s family) is adjusting to life at The Vicarage. Jetlag is a real thing folks especially for two year olds. Sevy (Joseph Elon Lillie VII) has been up most of the night all week, which means his parents have been up most of the night all week.

We have been trying to keep him up, but when Sevy gets tired he pretty much just collapses and nothing can wake him.

So we have been trying to do some events that keep him active. We went to the farm the other night and got homemade ice cream and watched the animals.

His father and mother have been taking him on walks around town.

And yesterday they bought him some coloring and sticker books.

What I am learning is that most fun is sticky…at least for two year olds.

CLIMATE HEADACHE

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This summer has been sooo humid. We have had rain just about every other day. One system moves in followed by a small gap of good weather and then we are right back in.

We had two yellow alerts at church on Sunday. The first was a tornado watch at the beginning of worship and the second was a flood watch in the middle of my sermon. Both turned out to be nothing but the fact that we have now had three alerts this summer in Northern MA speaks to the volatile nature of our planetary climate.

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One of the personal effects of our crazy weather pattern is frequent headaches from the constant change in air pressure. I have one today and it is laying me low.

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WHAT DO YOU DO TO DEAL WITH WEATHER RELATED HEADACHES?

They’re back!

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Well, the Lillies are back from South Korea. My son, his wife and their son arrived home on Saturday afternoon with no mishaps, except the loss of their stroller. My daughter-in-law managed to keep my grandson entertained with the people movers while my son tried to find out what happened to said stroller.

We have spent the last few days, catching up, looking at pictures, and doing some small business errands while Joe and his family recuperate from Jet lag.

I Need To Deadhead

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I need to deadhead the Lilys in the gardens. It is an easy job.

Sometimes, I get overwhelmed by the scores of easy jobs that seem to exist in my world.

Do you ever get overwhelmed not by the difficulty of the work but by the sheer amount of easy work there is to do?

The Ones Who Carry the Song

/ joseph elon lillie / 4 Comments

The kids and grandkids came over last evening. We took a walk to the playground with the kids and while the girls were sliding and climbing my daughter Melanie and I had a conversation about singing. I can’t sing like I used to. I am out of singing shape and my voice doesn’t obey me as it once did.

There was a time when I sang for a living. The congregation expected me to carry its song, and my bosses (the lead pastors) were expected to carry the vision. The song serves the vision and in a perfect world breathes life into the vision so the people are inspired to follow the vision’s path. I guess that is a little heady, but it is a good metaphorical explanation about the place of worship in a church congregation.

I am no longer the worship leader. I am the lead pastor. I now carry the vision and the song is carried by others.

Jody Clapp, our lead worship director and a deacon in the church

Melanie Franklin one of our worship leaders

Patrick Cortiss one of our worship leaders and an assistant at the Worship Room.

Jon Bauver one of our worship leaders and the director of the Worship Room. I am glad for those God has commissioned to carry the song now.

FIGHTING THE “DING”

/ joseph elon lillie / 4 Comments

I recently watched a documentary on the addictive nature of social media called THE SOCIAL DILEMMA

It raised a lot of questions in my own heart about how I am using time OR if it is even me using my time or perhaps Social Media is using my time for me.

I have begun making adjustments since watching this show.I have decided I will stop scrolling. I will use messenger for communication only. I will create my articles and videos and do a certain amount of reading based in targeted building of my own platform.

You know what? The whole bell “ding” thing described in the documentary is real! As soon as I put my phone away for a half a day and stopped watching Youtube and Facebook videos, I started hearing the “dings” of articles coming up that I “must watch”.

Has that always happened and I just didn’t notice it before? Or is my phone’s AI “intentionally” trying to drag me back to it? Either way…. I am a little freaked out by how I have been trained like Pavlov’s dog to respond to a bell on my phone and start scrolling again as soon as I hear the “ding”.

Have you seen the video? What do you think?

Storyworth, the New Lawn Mower and the Smoke From Fires

/ joseph elon lillie / 1 Comment

I have a few random updates for you from The Vicarage today.

For Christmas last year, I bought my mother a subscription to the Storyworth App. I haven’t written much about it these last few months because I sort of fell off the story making wagon. But we have gotten back to it these last few weeks. I have been listening to stories about Mom’s first boss, Josephine Martin, and about how she got her first car. As with most things with Mom these days the stories come in small bits and pieces which I have to put together like a puzzle at the end, but that is half the fun really.

Yesterday I got the new mower set up and running.

It is so quiet. I love the fact that it is electric.

I did the front and side lawns last night. Those are my mowing boots.

Even Amanda got into the fun today. She doesn’t have mowing boots.

We are working hard to get ready for the arrival of Joe, Kristine and Sevy in just fourteen more days. I even bought three easy ups for use as family comes in to say hello to the returning Lillies.

Today the sky is extremely hazy and humid. According to our phone apps this is all due to the fires up in Canada.

I have been awakening in the middle of the night these last several night with severe muscle aches and headaches. I had to get up to take Motrin and stretch at 3 A.M. this morning. I didn’t even consider the cause, until breakfast, when my daughter asked if I have been sleeping with my window open.

Well that’s all for today. It is time for me to spend some time practicing tomorrow’s sermon.

A Calling

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I love what I do and I love the way I am doing it now.

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Getting here has been a life’s journey. I have always felt called to this thing called ministry (well since I was twelve anyway). The calling is necessary. The calling keeps you going when you don’t love what you’re doing or the way you’re doing it.

Honestly, there have been many times I have not loved the ministry. There have been even more times when I did not love the way I was doing ministry. I thought about giving it up more than once. I even tried it a couple of times. The calling did it’s job and called me back.

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I’ve had jobs before. I’ve even had what I would consider careers before. The ministry is not either of those things and I guess it’s both. It is a calling. It has a job component and it consumes more than enough time and energy to qualify as a career. Still, there is more to it more than job, more than a career. Ministry has an element of destiny attached to it, a hope a predestined future.It’s not a fate you can’t escape, but a direction you shouldn’t try to escape.

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I have embraced the call, I have made peace with the call, I have come to love the call.

Ministry is my call, my destiny. What is yours?