tonight the board of elders at my home church is discussing the possibility of my ordination. i have never felt a stronger sense of calling to pastoral ministry and cannot think of a higher honor than being consecrated for ministry by my own church. however, i have no clue what form my ministry will take in five years or where it will lead me.
i can't imagine preaching and presiding over the sacrament less than twice a month, yet i fully acknowledge the wisdom of my colleague at rectangle who sat me down two weeks ago and said: "you have a family, you are a pastor and you are committed to leadership at rectangle. how much longer do you think you can continue doing all three things well?"
well? sometimes i wonder if i can continue doing all three things at all. of course, that is what i think my colleague was getting at.
i cannot help but preach. i have always been healthiest when i am serving beside and being served by people with disabilities. i adore my wife more than words can express, am so proud of my son and realize that family is the sine qua non of my existence. this is the trinitarian tension of my existence. sometimes i dance betwixt other times i am torn apart.
tonight my eyes welled with the beauty and the terror.
when i try to see the gospel through the clouds of two thousand years of interpretation and four thousand years of judeo-christian history it often feels like i have been struck blind.
when i advocate for the poor and am expected to passionately support failed initiatives alongside services that are desperately needed the haze of hypocrisy covers me like a cloak.
hell, even when i enter an industrial building and glance at the sophisticated masonry, hvac systems and intricate wiring i feel like a neanderthal transported to tokyo.
in this world it often seems that "success" relies upon reductionism and nuance is the precursor of impotence. i am profoundly dissatisfied with the polarities, yet am trapped in the tension between.
Lord Jesus, if you want to these scales, remove them.
yesterday talked with a former colleague about the shifting role that sertoma plays in the disability community. when sertoma was founded in 1976 many of its participants were transitioning out of state institutions and into group homes and other supportive community settings. organizations like sertoma rose up to provide job training for these individuals so that they could make their way in the marketplace just like they were learning to make their way in the local communities.
from facility to facilitation sertoma was able to help some individuals transition into the workforce, but a number, perhaps even a preponderance, of others were allowed and/or encouraged to spend their career working in sertoma's packaging, cedar shim production and recycling businesses. transitioning out of separate institutions and into the community is no small matter, so it is not surprising that many individuals were encouraged by family persuasion, state funding and/or personal choice to go for the gold watch at sertoma.
however, now it is 2009 and the sertoma employees who initially transitioned out of the institutions and into the workshop are either retired or on the precipice of retirement and younger individuals with disabilities have never known anything but integrated disability or rehabilitation services. as a result, the government has reaffirmed their commitment to integrating people with disabilities into the workforce and they are restricting or removing long-term subsidies for individuals who work in workshops like sertoma. this transition makes sense for younger individuals with disabilities, but it is understandably threatening for individuals who have logged 30 years cutting cedar shims and are now wondering whether sertoma's businesses will survive the funding shift and, if not, what role they will play in the marketplace and how they will spend their days.
in response to these challenges, organizations like sertoma are shifting their emphasis from being an employer to being a resource that provides health and life development supports for individuals with disabilities. traditionally, sertoma integrated elements of the institution such as case management, nursing supports, etc., with the elements of a business such as the opportunity to participate in real work, earn a paycheck, follow employee guidelines, etc. in a sense one could say that sertoma is transitioning from an institution - that tries to provide comprehensive services for individuals with disabilities - to a network or a hub that will help connect individuals with disabilities with the employment and life development opportunities as well as the personal supports that they need.
my friend reported that some of the staff members are navigating the transition from the institution to the network well, while others are finding the shift difficult. she said that many of the support staff have worked at sertoma for such a long time that they are as unsettled by the shift as the participants with disabilities are. others, especially the younger staff at sertoma, seem to be making the transition well. but, whether people like the transition or not, my friend said that the "writing was on the wall," and change was coming to sertoma whether people liked it or not.
unexpected revelation somewhere in the midst of the conversation, i think when my friend was talking about the transition from an institution to a network, i felt the shock of revelation and i literally cradled my face in my hands. since sertoma is no longer the quasi-institution that it once was, the staff needs to find out how to network the individuals they serve with the diverse, individualized services they need. sertoma's future is not in building the institution but expanding the network.
in a similar way, my role to play in the church, that community of people who have been called out by God and inclined towards his Kingdom, is not to build the institution but to expand the network.
my role is not to build the institution, although i was trained to do just that by becoming the engaging preacher for a local church that was committed to providing more and better services so that we could build a bigger congregation, expand our real estate and help buttress our brand.
my role is to expand the network, by loving, listening to and collaborating with other Christians and seekers of any stripe so that we can embody the gospel, serve the inheritors of the Kingdom and reflect the awe inspiring unity and delightful diversity of the Three-in-One who was, and is and is to come.
my job is to expand the network. others have noticed this long before now. hell, pastor phil has directly told me on an occasion or two that, whether i realized it or not, one of my great gifts is networking. others, tasked with building up the institution, have noticed it too, and so have parted ways with me and gone off to serve. i'm not going to lie, the separation from the institution builders has been painful for me, since we love the same One and are called to assist, encourage, exhort and accompany the same body. fortunately, this recent, shocking revelation of our divergent roles has served as a bit of a salve for my wounds.
new metaphor, new world i love those who for almost 40 years have built up sertoma and i can see why they grieve the transition of their beloved institution. but, in all honesty, i resonate more with the individuals that are envisioning sertoma 2.0 and expanding the network of resources that individuals with disabilities will need to live a holistic life in this integrated world.
in a similar way, i love those who have built the Christian Churches, Churches of Christ and i acknowledge that without their dedication to the gospel shaped institution, i probably would not be following Jesus, who is the greatest joy of my life. however, my role is not to buttress the institution, but to build a network of diverse individuals who are seeking, expressing, embodying and exclaiming the Kingdom that is here and somehow is yet to come.
i realize that this metaphor shift is simple and something should have realized long ago. however, though i'm late to the show, i cannot fully explain how surprised and blessed i have been by this revelation.
i'm starting to suspect that if you change the metaphor, you change the world.
a couple of months ago a local group of well intentioned, church planting obsessed anglicans asked our andrew the protester how they could balance their passion for evangelism with the biblical demands for social justice.
andrew's response: "if you plant your churches in areas of great need the balance will take care of itself."
i think there is a world of wisdom in the protester's response. in fact, it sounds downright perkinsonian.
out of the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. my friends, this should not be.
last week as we were rushing out the door preston grabbed the sleeve of my 2006 world series jacket, pointed at the blessed insignia and said: "daddy's bird?" "yes," i quickly replied. "my bird?" he asked. "yes!" i immediately responded.
that moment nearly brought tears to my eyes. such great hope.
tonight, as kellie and i keep doing 30 pound curls as we drag our screaming tot back to bed he caught me stealing glimpses of the cards/reds game on the laptop. for about ten bed runs thereafter he kept screaming "baseball! baseball! baseball!" and darting towards the laptop.
My friends and I gathered together at my old apartment in Beverly off Rantoul to celebrate the significant moment of my graduation from Gordon-Conwell. I had just walked across the platform and smiled for the camera with my degree in hand, and said all my departing goodbyes and farewells to all teachers and friends who were close to my heart. After the ceremony my friends and I had two things intensely occupying our mind: beer and food. I worked very hard to get to this moment of closure, so it was crucial that we finish with a toast and celebration.
We broke our group into two tasks teams: Jeff (my friend who came from Dallas to visit) and I were to get the Spirits, and Marcos and Brittney were to get the Food. There are two local liquor joints on Rantoul that are a few blocks apart from my apartment. There is the one owned by Indians, who have the best hours and are super friendly towards me, believing that I too am Indian, and they call me ‘bro’. I went to them for the longest, but I began noticing that their beer tastes bitter and metallic. I can’t explain it, other than perhaps they store it improperly. So I vowed to never again buy beer from them again. I then started going to Chrispy’s liquor next to the Pickled Onion. The store, which has a bit of a dirty, grimy dive feel, has a large neon sign that says “Liquor” that hangs above the sidewalk of Rantoul, and has strange people buzzing around underneath the large sign who smoke cigarettes and seemingly have nothing else to do all day but stare across the street. Chrispy’s has better prices than the Indian store, and I never bought a sour tasting beer from them. But they are super stringent about I.D. rules, so I developed the habit of always throwing my I.D. at them first thing every time I made a purchase, even though they recognized me personally by this point.
Jeff and I brought a Patron Silver Tequila and a twelve pack Ipswich Ale to the counter, and out of habit I immediately threw my I.D. at the lady. She briefly glanced at it from afar, and continued ringing, failing to ask to Jeff for his I.D., which I found at first quite odd given the stringent ID rules of the store. I guessed that perhaps she was about to ask for our ID’s within the next moment, so I pushed my ID which laid on the counter closer to her direction. She then grabbed my ID, went over to some scanner and ran it through, and within a few seconds she came my way, said “It’s a fake, get out of my store,” threw my ID in some cardboard box behind the counter, and ignored my plea. Confused, I left the store and called the police. I explained my situation to dispatch, who responded that “she can’t do that, we’ll send somebody over right away.”
The cop shows up minutes later. He gets out of the car with his Oakley’s on and has a smile that seemed happy, almost as if he recognized me. We greet each other and he immediately asks for my ID. I respond, “Well, I don’t have it because she has it,” thinking to myself “Is this not precisely why you are here, did they not communicate to you why you were being sent?”. He goes “Oh right, she has your ID, so you can’t give me one, ahh.’ “Ahh, yes”. Jeff, who is standing next to me, reaches into his back pocket to present his ID, saying “here is my ID officer”. The cop reacts: “whoa whoa, did I ask you for your ID? Put it back slowly. From now on this is how we are going to operate: you do only what I ask for.”
At this point Marcos and Britney are getting out of the pizza joint next door where they have placed our order. They notice Jeff and I outside Chrispy’s talking to a cop, so they curiously walk up to us. The cop spins around and blurts “Whoa, Hey, who are you guys?” with that same smile and apparent jovial cheer. Marcos extends his hand, “hello officer, my name is Marcos,” and the cop stood back refusing the shake, “I don’t shake hands”. “It is policy for me, you could be a threat”. Marcos, who is about as threatening in appearance as an ice cold beer on a hot summer day, says “I can understand that”, to which the cop replies “I could drop you to your knees if I wanted to. In fact I could drop a man who is twice your size, three hundred pounds to his knees”. With that statement being said, which abruptly fell from nowhere and left us in bewilderment as to what was his point and what does this have to do with anything whatsoever about our current situation, the cop proceeded inside to talk to the counter lady, only just after he lined us up against the car and telling us to “stay put”. I thought it humorously ironic that 30 minutes after my graduation from Seminary I now find myself with the police lined up against a car in front of a shady liquor store on the dirty side of Rantoul.
The cop returns with his bright teeth shining through his grin and a piece of paper with my ID photocopied on it. He first comments that the lady is a loner and her only help behind the counter is about “this big,” quickly questioning the boy’s manhood by extending his pinky finger in reference. He then proceeds to show me the apparent flaws with my ID, which were deficiencies with lamination and margin setting. It scans my age apparently, but didn’t provide some other info that should be provided in her scanner. Behind all the jargon the point was that “it works, but there are problems with it.” But in his wise judgment he left the ball in the ladies court. He said “this is a problem between you, her and the commonwealth of Mass.” (I will note here that he took the time to correct me when I said the state of MA; “It is not the ‘state,’ it is the ‘commonwealth,” he pontificated).
Frustrated at this point, I tried to plea with him that my flight to Texas was in two days. In his brilliantly powerful reasoning ability, he deduced “Ahh, and you cant get on the plane unless you have your ID, and she has it” “Ahh, yes.” It was here where I noticed that his fixated grin contrasted with his eyes that began to move erratically, which betrayed something wild and savage hidden underneath. Marcos acutely observed that he reminds one of the “Cheshire Cat”. He replies “You look like a smart guy, and I hate repeating myself: this is not my problem.” He walks to his car and turns around, guffawing a friendly chuckle and offering one last remark “You know, I am glad that this happened to you. I have a lot of Bad Luck in life, and it is good to see someone else having Bad Luck in their life also. Bye,” and waves his hand farewell.
after the first piece in GIMP, in which the dancers stand directly before you in their brokenness and beauty, lawrence carter-long begins the second piece with the stem of a joke, "so three cripples walk into a bar."
carter-long fails to complete the joke and so trusts the audience to make the connection* between three objects of the joke and the three individuals with disabilities in the crew. look at us, he slyly suggests, as we struggle through the violence, soak up the intimacy, shrivel in alienation and strive before your very eyes.
look at us, carter-long demands, in all of our brokenness, boldness and beauty.
and though our observations could be full of bitterness and our jokes could easily objectify three able bodied assholes, i think you are beautiful. i look at you in all of your beauty, i see the risks you take and i cannot help but be changed.
i suspect that christian homiletics** are the last thing on carter-long's mind when, objectified under the stranger's eye he refuses to reduce the object before him to anything less than beauty. but i think christian preachers*** can learn so much from his self-awareness, refusal of reciprocity and his proclamation of beauty.
lawrence, i echo your assertion that "this has changed me...it has been an honor and privilege to have the time to stop and really look at you."
* a connection i failed to make, by the way, until i read the globe's review ** a five dollar seminary word for preaching *** of which i, in my off-work hours anyway, am one
i am a thirtysomething worker bee who hails from massachusetts. by day i find jobs for individuals with significant disabilities and by night i spend time with my pixie-like wife and share life with my friends at the gathering in salem. my deepest passions are following Jesus Christ, extending God's compassion to the poor and obsessing about the Saint Louis Cardinals.
