WRITING AGAIN

Back in the fall I made a commitment I didn’t keep. That was to get back to my writing projects here at the Vicarage. There was a time before I became what I am now that I considered being a professional writer. I gave up working on that part of me.

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The other day I was reading an artist’s blog and she was talking about how she had been out of the art scene for a while because of… life. The blog was all about how she had begun reconnecting with her talent in small ways simply by drawing or painting some small object a few times a week.

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I thought, “This is what I am supposed to be doing, but I am not.”

I had to ask myself why. I have concluded that it is because I am not prioritizing even a few brief minutes to the work. I tell myself I am too tired. It’s not important enough to get into my schedule. I have too many other things to do and cannot give myself the time to even exercise my mind in this way.

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In the end I realize these are all excuses. I am not too tired. I am letting laziness rule me. This work is important. It was once important enough that I considered making it an income stream. I am learning that the more I exercise my mind with healthy hobbies the more productive I become at the work of my calling, so there is no good reason not to begin exercising my writing muscles again.

These are just exercises in thinking and putting thoughts to keyboard; So last night I took a few minutes and began jotting down some words, flow of thought. The piece is below and it is about me and my father.

INFLECTION 35. INFLECTION 57

Birthdays have never effected me much. Mostly they were just numbers in a series. 16 didn’t feel very different from 15 other than the fact the State recognized I was old enough to start driving. Honestly, that didn’t excite me much. 18 was the same as 17 except for the whole registering for the selective service thing. 21 passed me by without even a tip of the hat. I was married and in Bible college. The “BIG 21”. celebrations so many people make of that birthday never even crossed my mind.

I do remember 35, though. It was a tough birthday. I wasn’t prepared for it. I thought it would just pass me by like every other birthday, but it didn’t .

I can only speculate what changed, but when I turned 35 the weight of what I at first called “adulthood” suddenly fell on my shoulders, and that weight was HEAVY. In fact it was crushing.

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By 2002 I had 3 kids ages 13, 12 and 11. I had been married for 15 years. I had owned two homes and been through three careers, finally settling on the work of ministry. It’s not like I was suddenly introduced to adulthood that year. I had been adulting as far as I understood it for over a decade. But honestly….

Maybe, it was that, in 2002, for the first time I felt a sense of permanence. Maybe, it was at 35 that I first understood my course was set and I had passed the point of no return.

Maybe, it was at this point I understood that I was going to follow the call of ministry no matter where it led me.

Maybe, for the first time I was clear on the fact that the calling was not about “professional ministry”, but about a walk of faith with God that would cause me too fulfill an office of the church no matter what my job ended up being.

Maybe, it was in this year that I began to fully realize I was answering destiny’s call.

Maybe that was what felt like a weight.

Maybe it wasn’t the weight of “adulthood” I felt at 35, but the sudden realization I had been caught in the full influence of destiny’s rip tide.

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Maybe….

maybe…

maybe….

There are a lot of maybes as I look back. I am certain that whatever hit me at the age of 35 almost drowned me…. could have drowned me with all that it set in motion….maybe even should have drowned me….BUT GOD.

35 was an inflection point for me.

2002 was not the year of actual change, but as I look back it was the year when all the changes that have played out since became certain. I felt it back then. I just did not understand what it was I was feeling.

I only mention all this because here I am having just passed a birthday…my 57th birthday and I am feeling 35 again…not in a “I am returning to my youthful self” way…but in a “Here I go again” way.

I sense that the tide of destiny is about to take over again. I sense that this time it may be more than just me standing at an inflection point. I sense we not just me are at an outpouring and upsurging all at once of ….BUT GOD.

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SABBATICAL DAY 5: CONFERENCING

This sabbatical feels different from my last. During the last sabbatical my mother was just entering the most intensive part of her medical need. Travel was not really an option. Now Mom is gone. I guess I could go anywhere I want, but I don’t really have any desire to go anywhere.

I know many people think of sabbatical as a vacation. I don’t. I see it as a necessary change of life rhythm for the purpose of clarifying vision. I really need that. I feel more deeply than ever before that I need to see what is coming down the road. More than that I feel like I am commanded to it.

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One thing I did learn about sabbatical from last time was that the rhythm and events of sabbatical are only truly determined by God. I made intricate plans last time and God intervened heavily in my plans to change them. I didn’t get done all that was on my list, but I know now I did get done what I needed to do.

This time my plans are not as detailed, but I feel like I have come closer to matching God’s plans for this sabbatical. This first week of sabbatical was given to prayer and conferences. I attended several prayer services at TWR House of Prayer as they held their annual growth conference. Yesterday I was at Liberty Church in Shrewsbury MA for their L2L conference. Today I was at my own church for our Better Man Conference. I have pages of notes to pray through this next week as I seek vision from them for our church.

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This next week I am spending time in deep prayer, in working around the Vicarage, and in planning administratively for the church: I have budgets to do; missions job descriptions to update; and infrastructure plans to consider; I also think it is time to fill out the paperwork for the next step in my ministry licensing process.

My son and his wife are signing papers this week on a condo so I am beginning a big fall cleaning as they prepare to move at the end of the month. It feels like threads are coming together and I am beginning to see the tapestry, streams are blending in a divine confluence. I certainly am not the only one sensing this. I don’t even understand the bigger parts of it, but I am very clear on the fact that I need to understand my own small part of the stream. I think much depends on it.

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DO YOU FEEL THIS NEXT YEAR WILL BE DIFFERENT THAN THE LAST?

FEELING LIKE AN ELDER

I remember the first time I felt like an adult. I was thirty-five. I was married and had three teen-agers, but it was the first time I actually felt like I had moved from childhood into adulthood. I couldn’t find a rhyme or reason for why my mindset suddenly changed back then. Honestly, until I suddenly felt like an adult I didn’t know I didn’t feel like an adult. For the most part I was acting like and adult. I was paying bills. I owned a house. I was working hard. But not until I was thirty-five did I realize I had the position of an adult… the authority of an adult. It was the first time I felt like I was ready to take on life. The first time I felt like I could take on life and life didn’t just have to happen to me.

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Something is changing again. It is just as strange and unexpected this time as it was when I was thirty five. This time I am moving from adulthood into feelings of being an elder.

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Maybe it is my mother’s passing, maybe it is that I am entering my fourth year as a lead pastor, maybe it’s that all my grandchildren are now talking and the last of them is potty training, maybe it’s that the children of the children I had in nursery Sunday School are now getting ready to graduate, maybe it’s a lot of things, but I am beginning to feel old. I am feeling these days like an elder.

I guess I am one. There is more snow on the chimney now than soot. I feel it in my bones. I feel it in my energy level. I feel it like a new power in my soul. There is weakness in it…and strength.

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I am feeling my age in ways I was told to expect (but refused to accept). I can’t seem to do what I once did as easily as I once did it. I feel weaker, but I also feel a new kind of strength, an assurance, a wisdom, a grace I have not had before that makes me feel that I can do just about anything. I just have to begin learning how to do it differently and maybe a little more slowly.

So how about it? What advice would you give to this new old guy?