As ministers, we have all had to learn new ways of doing our jobs during this pandemic. As we can no longer meet at church we are learning to do distance church. This effects every area of life and every church is learning new and creative ways to keep their congregants connected during this time of non-gathering. It has been challenging and rewarding work.
If you have been following “Notes”, you know one of the things Amanda has done to connect her kids and families is a Facebook live show called “Without a Recipe”. I call it “Don’t Do It This Way With Amanda”. But whatever it might be called it is fun. Here is the way Amanda is keeping her kids connected to the faith life of church. Every Friday she does one of these children’s lessons.
This week we during our “Wall Prayer Meeting”, we prayed for many needs in our church body. But we also prayed for renovation of the church and for the opening of Ancient Wells of power.
I believe prayer is something done out of time. That means prayer is not bound to a moment the power of it can be accessed at any time. So let me encourage you to put this video on and join us for an hour of prayer today. Pray for your own personal needs. Hear the devotional thoughts and pray the prayers for the universal church which God puts in your heart.
I have not really been able to sing since the pneumonia. But recently I was asked by THE REACH NEW ENGLAND CHAPTER OF SPECIAL TOUCH DISABILITIES MINISTRY to put together a brief video for their virtual service coming up.
I gave it the old college try Friday. I am definitely out of practice, but at least most of the notes are right.
Just over a year ago God gave me a vision during a Sunday morning service. In this vision I saw a satanic force coming against our church. The Lord showed me that for a season we would be able to thwart this spirit power in the strength God had already given us. But the Lord told me that there would come a time when the enemy would be too powerful for us to face in our own strength. The Lord instructed that when that time came we were to call the church to pray and He would send us divine helpers to strengthen and revive the church.
I believe we have come to that time when we cannot face the enemy in our own strength…. and so we have started THE WALL prayer meetings to call the church to pray and ask God to send us the help He promised. This is our prayer meeting from last Wednesday night. Perhaps you can use it to spend some time focusing your own prayers. Please join us this Wednesday night from 7-8 to pray.
Just over a year ago God gave me a vision during a Sunday morning service. In this vision I saw a satanic force coming against our church. The Lord showed me that for a season we would be able to thwart this spirit power in the strength God had already given us. But the Lord told me that there would come a time when the enemy would be too powerful for us to face in our own strength. The Lord instructed that when that time came we were to call the church to pray and He would send us divine helpers to strengthen and revive the church.
I believe we have come to that time when we cannot face the enemy in our own strength…. and so we have started THE WALL prayer meetings to call the church to pray and ask God to send us the help He promised. This is a prayer meeting from a week ago but perhaps you can use it to spend some time focusing your own prayers.
I have always believed that the journey of life is as important as the destination. In fact, when it comes to self discovery I believe that the journey is even more important than the destination. It’s in the journey that we discover our God given roles. It’s in the course of the journey that we discover where we belong in this vast family we call humanity.
The art of self discovery becomes possible only when we stop rushing headlong towards what we see as the goal…the destination, and when we take time to look around at what the journey means to us. What we understand about the journey, how we look at the part of the journey we are on now, helps us understand many things about who we were made to be. There is no right or wrong in this process of discovery just more and less honest.
I have a friend, for instance, who is being driven by the current situation, of social distancing, to begin managing our church food pantry to meet the needs of elderly people in crisis.
My own reaction to COVID-19 is the understanding that I was made for the secret place. Each day finds me driven deeper and deeper into the place of prayer, the place God and I have dubbed “the sage’s cave”.
As I said before there is no right or wrong in the process of self discovery, there is only more and less honest. I could wish to be more like my friend and start laying out plans to create social reforms that will help in the Covid crisis, but that would be me being dishonest about what is really in me, because I am afraid of the reaction of people when they hear I am being led to pray (because lets face it our culture loves social activists while it sort of scoffs at monks).
I will undoubtedly explore the idea of being honest in the process of self discovery in the future, but for now I simply want to encourage you, my readers, to use this current situation to discover something about yourself you did not know before.
Soooooo. ……WHAT DOES OUR NATION’S EXPERIMENT WITH SOCIAL DISTANCING SHOW YOU ABOUT YOURSELF?
So I spent 19 of the last 36 hours in meetings of one kind or another. It feels like every last ounce of glory and strength has been drained out of my body. Amanda and Brenda are no better off. Brenda was out even longer than I was by about 6 hours.
When people used to ask me what I did I used to tell them I was a “professional meetinger”. That period of my life was annotated by a long series of meeting minutes and action items I had to get done in order to build the Kingdom of God.
The last 36 hours has made me realize that I am not a “professional meetinger” anymore. I still have a deep passion for the Kingdom of God but I realize my job is not to “meeting” the Kingdom into existence any more (if it ever was). I am going to try really hard not to meeting myself into a stupor ever again.
Today when people ask me what I do for work. I am not exactly sure what my answer will be…artist, prophet, pastor, caregiver? What I do know is that I will never again tell people I am a “professional meetinger”. That is a part of my past. It doesn’t fit me anymore.
What do you do when life shifts from march time to a waltz? What do you do when the rest of the world is still marching and you’re waltzing? What do you do when the rest of the world starts noticing that you aren’t marching to their rhythm anymore?
Since returning from The Philippines, my life rhythm has changed radically. There are days when the world still pulls at me and I am tempted to march again. But, most days I am pretty much settled into the slower waltz rhythm that was put on me by God at the end of 2019.
The rhythm is pretty repetitive: My morning’s go one way. My afternoons go another and my nights…well they are still a work in progress but even they have done some major shifting. The framework around all of it seems to be breakfast, lunch and supper.
I am not good at the waltz rhythm yet. I haven’t got all the nuance down, but clunky as I might look, I have changed pace. What I know is that I will not be going back to marching for a while.
People are starting to notice that I am not on the same foot as them anymore. I am OK with that. Everyone else may need to march. I need to dance in order to accomplish what God needs me to do at Cornerstone.
I was praying about it this morning and I felt impressed by the Lord that much of what I am waltzing through is preparation and discovery for the next phase of ministry.
No I am not leaving Cornerstone, people, so don’t worry. God has made it clear that I have work to do in this city still.
But God is changing the nature of the ministry I do. I have known that for a while and have been very open with the whole church about this. He started changing me three years ago and He isn’t finished yet. The change is going at His pace. As with everything else at the church, God has it firmly in hand and He is in charge of the results.
So…What do you do when life shifts from march time to a waltz? What do you do when the rest of the world is still marching and you’re waltzing? What do you do when the rest of the world starts noticing that you aren’t marching to their rhythm anymore?
You figure out how to be the best dancer you can be …and brother you dance!
In this season of intensive prayer leading up to and including Lent, I have journaled many personal revelations/ realizations about my life which I think may mean something to the larger body of Christ.
Here is one thought which came to me on January 31 regarding the idea of “CONTROL”:
It is time for me to learn I do not control God. It is time for me to start allowing God to control the outcomes of my life. So many times, my service to God, my prayer to God, my devotional life before God is about me trying to control the outcomes of my life. My religion, my relationship to God is too often about me achieving some personal goal rather than me totally surrendering to God no matter what the outcome of that surrender is. This insistence on control is a very great sin.
It is time to embark upon the great and terrible and mysterious adventure with God. It is time to resign myself to the current of God’s river and to allow it to carry me away where it will.
Do you ever feel like you are trying to control God?
Notes From the Vicarage 