My mom bought me this little church with a candle in it that is sitting on the bathroom counter. I can see it from my bed as I type.
There is something comforting about the light flickering softly. The room dark except for this little ceramic church lighting up the walls with gentle shadows.
In some ways, this little ceramic church, reminds me of all the reasons I ever felt called to ministry in the church. The idea of church as 'home,' functioning as a safe haven from all the darkness and brokenness in the world.
So many things seem to be going right at Hope. New ministries are slowly taking shape, relationships are beginning to deepen as faces and names become more familiar, and my office is busily decorated with various project-piles strategically placed all about.
But in spite of all the progressions of settledness this week has been overshadowed with a dark lining of random tears and insoluble feelings of emptiness. This week I gave a difficult sermon for World AIDS Day and spoke about all the people in the world suffering from the stigma imposed on them from ignorance and fear. I lifted on high the model and life of Christ which demands nothing less of us than to walk forward in solidarity with all people who are plagued with symptoms of a broken world; isolation, rejection, a permanent status of invisibility.
It brought me down to a place I haven't been in awhile. Topped with all the emotional residue from moving my family and beginning a new position, the reminder that I am called to serve and live in a world of such apparent brokenness has seemed incredibly overwhelming as a zealous justice seeking servant of Christ.
In a conversation this week with a more experienced clergy person, I was given the wise advice that my call will become easier once I learn to accept that ministry may not be about changing the world as much as it is about changing the worlds of individuals. Its something I have actually been told a few times before by various people. And its a thought that I have been pondering for the past few days hoping the resignation of my dreams to change this world would bring relief to an untimely depression.
But in the midst of prayers and reflections I still find God to be a relentless force living restlessly in my soul. A force pulling me closer towards a place upon which I can almost envision that "Unthinkable World" in which all oppression in reversed, all those who are hungry are fed, and all those who are broken are restored to wholeness. But with what I am to do with that vision remains and may always remain a mystery....
I really wish I had the ability to resign. Or the choice retire. That I might just be satisfied working nine to five or feel rewarded by ordination or fulfilled through genuine affirmations. But echoing in the background of all the cravings of wishes for an easier path are the reminders that God depends on us to not give up on our call to change this world yet knows that even in our most seemingly unproductive attempts we will undoubtably change lives.
What would God do if we all resigned our dreams of changing this world?
I think God depends on Her Disciples not to resign our individual dreams to change the world but to live in that cold and sparse land of striving to create God's Kingdom on earth. And in the struggle to discover what that looks like for each of us is when we most will need the refuge of the warm glow of the church and the uniting hands of the Body of Christ to carry us forward.
