Maundy

April 9, 2020

On that night so long ago Jesus gave us a new mandate: to love one another. This year, as we practice social distancing and staying at home, this mandate feels more important than ever. Love one another.

In all the oddness of gathering at our own tables instead of coming to the Lord’s Table, and sharing a Love Feast instead of Holy Communion, we intuitively got it. Love will sustain us through this pandemic.

There were so many powerful moments at this year’s online gathering.

The wind came up as we started – a fluke windstorm that blew the tin roof off my neighbors’ barn and sent us all scrambling to batten down the hatches. It set the stage for the evening, reminding me of how little control we have. We can control our own actions and responses, but we can’t control the wind or the waves. We can reach out in love to our neighbors, but we can’t control their actions and responses.

As we prepared for the Love Feast we named aloud those whom we wished were at the table with us this night – the ones we love most. Parents and grandparents who may or may not be alive. Congregation and community members who were not able to join us. Children – grown children – who are scattered across the country. Family. And in that moment the grief was palpable. Oh, how we miss those we love.

This is the night of love.

We shared the ways we’ve seen love at work. The pink super moon. New growth shooting up through the soil. Visibly less air pollution. Bird songs. Connecting with our school kids. Getting help from our neighbors. Hearing from old friends. Grieving with those who have lost loved ones to COVID-19. Listening to scripture.

Jesus washed Judas’ feet? Really? What are we supposed to do with that?

Love is patient. Love is kind.

Love works in our lives in so many different ways.

Over pancakes and crackers and clementines we shared memories of other meals – and we laughed until the tears ran down our faces. Dad’s Saturday morning breakfasts. Mom’s predictable Jiffy corn muffins. Spaghetti and meatballs without hands (or utensils!). Totally unpredictable left over casseroles on Friday night. Meals made in love. Meals shared with those we love. Love feasts.

On the night Jesus was betrayed we laughed. And it was wonderfully healing.

Time

April 6, 2020

For everything there is a season...
a time to break down, and a time to build up;

 a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance.

– From Ecclesiastes 3

I couldn’t find my planner this morning. My laptop, my phone, and my planner are the primary tools of my ministry. I typically take all three with me to meetings and to my office (wherever I choose to work that day). But it wasn’t with my computer or my phone. When I found my planner, it was laying open to the week of March 16. I had not looked at it in three weeks. 

Time has taken on a strange meaning. I feel like we are waking up to a new reality almost every day. It started with no public worship. Then no school. Then reminders everywhere to keep your distance. Then a stay at home order. And now, wear a mask.

And the virus still spreads. More people get sick every day. More people die. And it hits closer and closer to home. It is truly a time to mourn. A time to weep. So much seems to be breaking down.

And yet. I went looking for my planner this morning because yesterday I reached out to the mom of my reading buddy at B. Everett Jordan Elementary School and asked if we could resume reading together this week. And the answer was yes! We will read together as always this Wednesday – just using a different format. I wanted to write that good news down in my planner.

New growth from seeds planted last week.

While there is a deep heaviness in my heart in these uncertain times, we have been given an extraordinary gift. The gift of time. Time to plant new seeds and watch them grow. Time to strengthen relationships through this shared experience. Time to be creative about how we choose to be together as a community. It is a time to build up. It is even a time to laugh. Yes, and to dance.

It seems to me that the fullness of time comes when we hold laughter and weeping together. My body doesn’t quite know how to live that truth today – the grief is so heavy. Still, I can see the promise of something new – the possibility of this time. So for today, for this time I have been given, I will weep and plant seeds. I will rest in the silence and sing out loud. I will let my dance intertwine both lament and joy.

Called, Part 2

Several years ago I was asked to mentor four young adults who had been approved as certified candidates for ministry by their local church. I had been invited to help them as they prepared to go before DCOM and continue their pursuit of ordained ministry within the United Methodist Church. It was truly a joy to work with these men and women who were answering God’s call on their lives.

I vividly remember one young man who had just started seminary. He was so full of the Spirit! He was a life-long Methodist who had actively served in his church all his life. His fruitfulness was already evident, his passion for Christ was clear, and his desire to serve God’s Church was sincere.

I am sure he would be ordained today if it were not for the fact that he is gay. His calling by God was so strong that he was willing to remain celibate so he could serve God in the United Methodist Church.[1] But the DCOM said no. The Church said no. The Church told him: No matter how clear God’s calling is in your life – no matter how fruitful your ministry has already been – you cannot be ordained. Sadly, he dropped out of the candidacy program and he dropped out of seminary.

This young man is so faithful to the United Methodist Church. Today he still serves in his local church as a lay person. He continues to do great work for God. But I wonder about all the other young people who feel called by God and say nothing to anyone because of their sexual orientation. I wonder about those who leave their home churches to pursue ordination in a different denomination, or who simply leave the church altogether.

I am thankful for my time with this young man because he forced me to recognize my personal fears and biases. I had to wrestle with my own understanding of Scripture and Tradition. My experience with him led me to spend much time in prayer. I wondered: When God’s calling is so evident, who am I to say no? Who are we to say no?

If God is calling a person to ordained ministry, it is good for the Church to verify that calling. If the Church sees a clear calling in someone’s life, the fruits of that calling are abundantly evident, and a person meets all of the other requirements for ordination, should gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, or any other distinguishing marker keep a person from answering God’s call?

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[1] Our Book of Discipline requires “celibacy in singleness and faithfulness in marriage” for all ordained clergy. As someone who could not be married, he chose to be celibate.

Called, Part 1

In the United Methodist Church, a calling to ministry starts in the local church. Once a congregation has affirmed a clear call to ministry in a person, he or she becomes a certified candidate and moves to the district level where the District Committee on Ordained Ministry (DCOM) asks probing questions and looks for fruitfulness in ministry. Candidates who are approved by DCOM move on to the conference level and the Board of Ordained Ministry (BOOM) where the questions are more challenging, the requirements more stringent, and fruitfulness must be clearly evident.

I had graduated from seminary and been approved by DCOM when I was appointed as the pastor at Saxapahaw United Methodist Church in 2010. I was ordained in 2014, following four years of theological reflection with colleagues, hours upon hours of reading and writing (and re-writing) papers, and the daily work of prayer, reflection, and spiritual growth.

The reason I share this background information is because one of the questions before us as we explore the future of the United Methodist Church has to do with ordination.  I’m ordained today, as a woman, because in 1956, after decades of disagreements, The Methodist Church granted full clergy rights to women. Sadly, even now, 63 years later, many local Methodist churches struggle to accept that God could call a woman to ordained ministry.

I’m thankful for the men, both clergy and lay, who looked past gender back in 1956 and affirmed a woman’s call to ordination. I also recognize that there are still many denominations – from the Roman Catholic Church to the Southern Baptist Convention – that still do not affirm the ordination of women. They turn to scriptures like 1 Corinthians 14:33 which says, “Women should be silent in the churches,” to support their position.

As Methodists, while we affirm the authority of Scripture, we also know that texts like this one were written in a particular time and place to address a particular situation. So we turn to the Wesleyan Quadrilateral, reading Scripture through a broad lens and balancing our understanding of Scripture with Tradition, Experience, and Reason.

This practice led to the ordination of women in 1956. Today I wonder if it isn’t time for us to use this same practice to look past sexual orientation and affirm that God calls people from all walks of life to ordination.

Humpty Dumpty

July 3, 2019

I feel like I’ve been dropped, like an egg. Cracked open. Messy. And it isn’t just me. It is the United Methodist Church that I love. Pieces everywhere. Like Humpty Dumpty, all the king’s horses and all the king’s men will not be able to put us back together again. And I wonder what is next.

On the one hand, I am delighted that Annual Conferences across the Southeast have spoken boldly against the Traditional Plan. Forty-one of forty-two delegates from the North Carolina Conference are progressives and centrists. We have clearly voted to affirm our belief that Christ’s Table is open to all. We have maintained our conviction that our diversity makes us stronger. We are unified in our belief that the hurtful language around homosexuality in the Book of Discipline needs to be removed. I praise God for this as we now wait and see what will happen at General Conference 2020.

On the other hand, I stepped out of a session of Annual Conference for just a few minutes and saw a colleague of mine talking with two other colleagues. This particular pastor played an important role in shaping my understanding of small group ministries. Years ago he led a workshop that prompted me to visit his church and see his small groups in action. We spoke on several occasions as he shared his knowledge and ideas. His passion for Jesus Christ was evident and I learned a great deal from him. But he didn’t acknowledge me at Annual Conference. I could see the pain on his face – the voting was not going the way he wanted it to. Seeing him made my heart ache. It reminded me of the pain I felt when General Conference 2019 embraced the Traditional Plan. Broken. Cracked open. In pieces on the floor.

John Wesley stated in his General Rules, “First, do no harm.” Well, harm has been done to all. We’ve created winners and losers instead of one body. We have taken steps that will divide us. As I continue to share stories and raise questions, I wonder: How is God inviting us to reach out to those who interpret scripture differently from us? How is God calling us to move forward faithfully, as individuals and as a congregation? How is God working in us to pick up the pieces and create something new?

Consensus

June 11, 2019

Annual Conference starts tomorrow. For the next four days Mel Hansen-Holloway and I will be representing Saxapahaw United Methodist Church as we worship, fellowship and conduct the business of the Conference. The business includes adopting future goals, programs and budgets, ordaining clergy, and sharing stories.

Every four years the business also includes voting for General Conference delegates – work we will be doing this year. This is always difficult, but this year it feels especially painful. I have two lists: one includes the names of those clergy and laity who are “fully vetted evangelicals who are in full support of the Traditional Plan;” the other includes the names of those who “believe the Traditional Plan does not reflect the future God desires for us as the body of Christ.” Both lists include people I love and respect – people who deeply love God and live lives of faithful discipleship – people who are kingdom builders. And yet we remain deeply divided on the issue of homosexuality.

Last week our Church Council met to reflect on the things we, as the leadership of the congregation, can all agree on. It quickly became clear that we all long to know Christ and make Christ known, and we long to do this together – embracing our diversity and recognizing that our differences make us stronger. We acknowledged our fear of change and our fear of losing people we love.  We also agreed that we would much rather work toward consensus than take a vote.

Consensus building is based on both participation of all stakeholders and ownership of decisions. It is up to the stakeholders – that means you! – to participate. Consensus is reached when every voice has been heard, every effort has been made to find common ground, and everyone agrees that they can live with whatever is proposed. This is much harder than voting. It also feels so much more faithful.

So I ask: Will you commit to praying for our Annual Conference and for our congregation as we seek to be faithful to the One who loves us and calls us friend?

New Saplings

June 7, 2019

Just a few weeks ago (May 20 – 22, 2019) over 600 United Methodists from Annual Conferences across the United States gathered in Kansas City at Church of the Resurrection[1] for a three-day conference called UMCNext. All of those who gathered were united in their opposition to the Traditional Plan, which retains the church stance that the practice of homosexuality is “incompatible with Christian teaching” and strengthens enforcement of church bans on same-sex weddings and “self-avowed practicing” gay clergy.

The participants who gathered agreed to four commitments:

• To be passionate followers of Jesus Christ, committed to a Wesleyan vision of Christianity.
• To resist evil, injustice and oppression in all forms and toward all people and build a church which affirms the full participation of all ages, nations, races, classes, cultures, gender identities, sexual orientations and abilities.[2]
• To reject the Traditional Plan approved at General Conference 2019 as inconsistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ and resist its implementation.
• To work to eliminate discriminatory language and the restrictions and penalties in the Book of Discipline regarding LGBTQ individuals.

This meeting is just one of many similar meetings that are happening across the United Methodist Church as we seek a faithful way forward. I admit that I was hoping for something more than these four commitments. I’m ready for some clarity. I want a plan.

Rev. Tyler Sit, the openly gay founding pastor of New City Church in Minneapolis, and a participant in the UMCNext Conference, likened what happened at the 2019 special General Conference to a giant, old tree that has fallen in a forest, leading to new saplings starting to grow and reach for the light.[3] I love this image of new life coming out of death and decay – it is so full of hope and promise. It also helps me recognize that is too soon to know which of these new saplings will end up thriving – and it may be more than one! So for now we need to nurture all of them, trusting the Holy Spirit to work in us and through us and even in spite of us to show us the faithful way forward.

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[1] Adam Hamilton is the lead pastor at Church of the Resurrection, which is the largest United Methodist Church in the United States. Over the years many of us have read books and participated in studies he has written.

[2] If this language sounds familiar it is because these words are very similar to our baptismal vows.

[3] You can learn more about the conference at https://www.umnews.org/en/news/planning-new-directions-for-the-church