The Vestry Retreat was going on last weekend and going
well as there was an easy feeling between us. The church has plenty of problems
but none that produced anxiety. We approached the planning for the coming year
with awareness that changes would be made but change is the norm for living on
earth. We cannot go back to the past and
nostalgia has never been our long suit.
| Wright House, Kill Devil Hills |
We were at the Wright house, the cottage owned by
the Judges and loaned to us for the day. It was a place full of memories for
me. Almost 10 years ago this was the venue where the whole of the search
committee had interviewed me. Pat had fallen in love with the group that had
come to visit us in the previous church and had warned me not to screw up the
interview because she really wanted to be part of this church. I was pleased
with what I had seen but I thought it was much too soon for me to make a
commitment. My prayer was that I would be actively listening to what God wanted
for me and for the church. I was sitting in a seat with my back to the windows
overlooking the beach and ocean as the committee fanned out in a semicircle
facing me and the windows. I knew that the ocean was beautiful and I could hear
the cries of the seagulls but I wanted to focus on what was happening in the
room.
After several hours of questions and discussion, the
chair of the committee asked me to give a homily which I had been asked to
prepare. My calm evaporated as quickly as the World Series hopes for the
Chicago Cubs evaporates each summer after Memorial Day since 1908. I froze as I
remembered that I had indeed been asked to prepare a short homily. I asked for
a moment of prayer. In that moment I asked that my mind be cleared of all the
noise of the gulls, which had seemed to get louder since I had closed my eyes.
Panic threatened to overwhelm me until I remember the Sermon on the Mount where
Jesus says: “Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow
nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are
you not of more value than they? And can any of you by worrying add a single
hour to your span of life?” (Mt. 6: 26-27)
The Spirit calmed me as it spoke
through me of the need that both the committee and I had about not worrying
about the outcome of the search process. Our task was to trust God for help in
discernment. This was not a sales job by them or me; doors would open or not,
what was important was that we remained faithful to God and to ourselves.
I do not know what tomorrow will
bring for me or for this church. Doors will open or not but the task remains
for us to stay listening to God’s Spirit each day.
Shalom:
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