Jerusalem Jackson Greer's Blog, page 4

Last Christmas…

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Remember when I blogged in real time? Me too. Those were the good ol days. Simpler times. Or so I like to tell myself. In truth they were just different times. They were just as full, and stress-filled, as ordinary and as magical as these times. Just differently so.

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The world was different. My awareness of the world was different. Our home life was different. My work was different. My faith was different. Our zip code was different. (And now I have typed different so many times that it looks weird…)

Anyway, those were those days, and these are these days. And these days my posting is sporadic and delayed, but still something I love and value and can’t quite let go of. This blog is a sort of anchor to who I am, who I was, and who I hope to be. It is a place I know I can always come back to – as a reader and a writer, and so I hold on to it – for better and for later.

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Which brings us to last Christmastide. Christmastide 2017.

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Last Christmas was a tough one, that I remember.

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Last Christmas was the last one with Wylie living under our roof as a kid. Not a college kid, not an adult. Just a kid.

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Last Christmas was the Christmas that my not-so-secret wish that we would be able to adopt Brother and Sister and the Twins (yes 4 kids at once) began to unravel like cheap garland.

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Last Christmas was weird because the church was in a transition and I felt like I was walking on a marshmallow surface all the time – never quite finding my balance.

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Last Christmas was the first one spent with our amazing Small Group.

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Last Christmas was when doors began to open in my work with The Episcopal Church.

Last Christmas was when we brought the goats home.

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Last Christmas was weird. And hard. And still completely 100% Christmas. Still beautiful.

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Advent arrived and we waited.

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I decorated. We baked.

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And then Christmas arrived and we celebrated.

Tears and joy and mixed together like butter and eggs.

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So far this Christmastide is another mixed bag. Lots of waiting. The heartbreak over the kids not as acute, yet still felt. Different style of tree. No baking as of yet. Wylie being home is magic. The New Year feels as if it might be filled with twinkle lights.

Maybe I will get this years pictures posted before years end. Maybe not.

Peace and love my friends.

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Retro Christmas Bites and Old Photos

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Every other week a small group from our church gathers together in homes to break bread with glad and sincere hearts, (and lot of laughter thanks to the lightly controlled chaos made by the dozen or so kiddos we have running around!) 

Somewhere around our second or third gathering we discovered that we are a group of foodies, and so we began to design our bi-weekly potlucks around themes. Whomever is hosting sets the theme, and then everyone pitches in! 

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Last Advent, (and every single one since 2013)  forever and ever amen) I was missing my Nana, and her amazing Christmas Eve spread, so I asked to host our early December gathering, and set a theme of Retro Cocktail Party (light on the cocktails, heavy on the cocktail food) and everyone brought their favorite appetizers – retro inspired if possible.

I made her infamous Shrimp Tree and Tuna Ball (all set out on her vintage Christmas tablecloth)  and others brought goodies such as pinwheels, pigs-in-blankets, deviled eggs and more. Plus tons of sweet treats. It was delicious and I cannot wait to host again this year.

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Nana’s Tuna Ball Recipe for Christmas Eve

Ingredients:

1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, softened.1/2 cup thinly sliced green onions.2 Tbsp mayonnaise.1 tsp garlic powder1 teaspoon lemon juice.Dash salt.1 can (6 ounces) tuna, drained and flaked.

Directions

Mix together all the ingredients with a blender. Form into a ball and wrap tightly in plastic.Refrigerate one to two hours.Serve with crackers (my Nana always served them with Chicken in a Biskt’s)



[image error]Nana in her green Christmas moomoo and Grandaddy in his red Christmas sweater on Christmas Eve.  Both items of clothing live with me now…



[image error]Eating some tuna ball around the very same Christmas tablecloth.
(And for the record I thought I was the size of an elephant, and now I think I am that size… body dysmorphia is bizarre…)

The end of autumn and other things

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Autumn weather is finally here.  Just in time to wind things down and move towards Advent. Rumor has it there will be a freeze tonight. I gathered up what could be the last of the pumpkins and zinnias, and I am anxious for Sweet Man to get home from his trip to L.A. so he can get the wood stove up and burning.  I love coming home on a cold, crisp, dark night and seeing smoke coming out of the chimney.  One of those little things that reminds me of the miracle that is Preservation Acres and our life here.

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I have been trying to Hygge it up with lots of cozy blankets, slow food, and candles. Also, extra-cozy clutter. Is that part of Hygge?  That’s a thing right? I love that Christmas decor is in all my favorite local shops, but I just can’t start decorating until after Thanksgiving, so up went the Grateful banner instead.

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Miles performed his last march as part of the JR High marching band. Next year he will be in SR high and life will move from #thursdaynightlights to #fridaynightlights. We are now solidly a band family and part of a band family community, which is such a gift. Who knew that our way into community here would be through our kids?

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October was an intense month for traveling, speaking and consulting, not to mention all things band (tournament month baby!) My last travel until mid-December was this past weekend in Memphis, which meant I could drive and hit my favorite spots such as Ikea and the Pottery Barn/Williams-Sonoma outlets.  This meant I was able to eat my beloved Ikea meatballs and look for inspiration for our bathroom remodels (coming Spring 2019!)

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This is the tub I shamelessly climbed into to test. It is not an Ikea tub (they don’t make those – yet) but it is one I have looked out several times. I wanted to make sure that my not-tiny self would fit. And guess what? I did

Return of the Mummy Dogs

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Once upon a time, back in our city days, when we lived at Casa D’Lovely, our family would host an annual Halloween Hoopla. Over the years it grew into huge party filled with kids and adults in custom, complete with a rowdy game of bobbin’ for apples, some sort of epic battle (usually Lord of the Rings/Harry Potter/Star Wars inspired) and some serious trick-or-treating. Also there were Mummy Dogs. Always. 

When we moved to the country the parties ended and so did the Mummy Dogs. And the decorating for Halloween – because for some reason Halloween decorations (unlike their Advent/Christmas counterparts) don’t bring me any joy on their own – they require an event.

So for 4 years we had been pretty  Spookless around these parts. Until this year. This year, we brought them the Mummy Dogs for our Small Group’s Halloween- inspired dinner, (but this time Miles made them instead of me. My, how times have changed. The first time I made them he was still in diapers…) Also, in addition to the Mummy Dogs. I even put out a few Halloween Decorations including some of my banners for the Shoppe days. 

Moving to the farm has been amazing and strange and lovely and surprising –  in good and hard ways. Including  around issues of community, While we didn’t completely lose our city community by moving 45 minutes away , changing schools and going to/working at a new church, it did significantly change things.  The people we used to see weekly or monthly we now see once or twice or three times a year.   Which I don’t love, but also can’t seem to remedy.  Our lives move in such separate orbits now, that getting together requires the moving of mountains, which is doable but not often. 

But now, after a year of hosting a church Small Group and doing the work of digging into our little town and building friendships, we are finally forming a new community here. And more than ever I am convinced that regular, on-the-calendar, gatherings are essential. That creating a rhythm of intentional community is as important  a spiritual practice as creating a rhythm of prayer, a rhythm of worship, or a rhythm of rest.  

Like Jack Kerouac, I  believe in “a good home, in sane and sound living, in good food, good times, work, faith and hope.”  But I also believe that all of these things take intention. None of them just crop up without making room, without being really purposeful, without staying the course.

I have more to say on all of this, especially about what loneliness is doing to our culture, our kids, our country, and how we as Christians must/should/need to respond, and what part having a Rule of Life and community both play into all of this, but until I form those thoughts, I want to just lay this down here on the ol’ blog and celebrate the return of the Mummy Dogs and a community with which to share them.

Thanks be to God.

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Just Live

 

[image error]This is my friend. A writing pal. This fellow traveler whom you might have heard of. Her name is Shannan Martin, and way back in the day, in the cave-drawing, hunter-gatherer decade of the blogasphere, she was known as Flower Patch Farmgirl and I was known as My Little Life and then Jolly Goode Gal (because, hello Enneagram 7.)  In those ye old days of yore, Shannan was happy fixing up her farmhouse and I was happy fixing up my city cottage.

And then, we weren’t.

At the very same time that God began to whisper strange somethings about moving into town and over the wrong side of the tracks into Shannan and her husband Cory’s hearts, God began to nudge Nathan and I towards farm-life. Of course it was a nudging that I – in typical fashion – twisted and distorted to the point that God had to stop and take a breathe, before shaking me and my assumptions up like kinked-up necklace. Flinging me back and forth upon my own self until all the knots and bends fell out, and I surrendered to “being thankful for what I had without asking for anything to change.”   Which of course is when things changed.

The Martin’s moved to the city certain that God had a calling for them there.

The Greer’s moved to the country certain that God had a calling for them there.

And then after the flurry of moving and building (them) and remodeling (us) and digging in and fervent hopes of seeing God at work and earnest desires for transformation … crickets.

Now, I need to interject something here. A sort of confession.

When Shannan moved to town and we moved to the country I was a little confused. And maybe a tad jealous. And definitely filled with FOMA (that’s fear of missing out, Dad).

Because what Shannan was doing was so much cooler (sorry Shannan – don’t cringe!) And edgier (double sorry) and maybe even holier (yeah, I am not apologizing for that one.)

The Martin’s were leaving their beloved farmhouse, the little town they fit into, and moving to a neighborhood on the wrong side of the tracks, a city away, where they knew no one, where their kids would go to a failing school and they would join a tiny, faltering neighborhood church.

Meanwhile, we were leaving city, and our diverse, urban school, and our struggling neighborhood church, to move to a mid-century farmhouse, in a tiny, conservative, and safe town (where we knew no one,) so I could work at a thriving church one town over.

More than once it crossed my mind that Shannan and Cory were better at listening to the heart of God than Nathan and I, and more than twice it occurred to me that they were at the very least much more noble.

And yet.

We knew, had known for a decade, on a gut-and-soul level that we were called to a rural life, just as S & C had known they were called to Goshen.

So we went.

And if you have read this blog or At Home in this Life,  you will not be the LEAST bit  surprised that not much has gone as I expected. Not that I don’t love certain things about farm life – I do. But.

The truth is, despite the obvious loves -the chickens and the goats, the pumpkins and the picnics, – I have struggled to figure out why God called us here. What we are supposed to do with this place, with this gift that is Preservation Acres.

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Which is why, sitting in the Des Moines airport at Gate A2, waiting for a flight home, I began to cry as I read these words of Shannan’s…

I had evolved from the fresh-faced farm girl living my version of the American Dream with a side of Jesus. I’d become the gutsy, subversive, city-loving advocate. The new neighbor. My kids went to a new school. We lived in a new house.  On and on it went, my fists closing around this latest rendition of my identity, just as they had before. But as people came into our lives and left us, as the carpet wore down in the sorry way carpet is prone to disappoint us, it became harder to ignore. We were no longer new. We were just here. The headline had faded. The sparkle dimmed. 

Our earlier questions—Where are we going? Why are we going? and Will we ever fit in?—were replaced with just one: Now what? Surely God did not lead us here just to live.  – Shannan Martin, The Ministry of Ordinary Places

Surely God did not lead us here just to live.

There they were. The words that I had been whispering under my breath for a year.

Surely not.

Because like Shannan said, We were no longer new. We were just here. The headline had faded. The sparkle dimmed. 

And boy howdy, had it dimmed. Keeping up with eight acres, the ongoing house remodeling (start, stop, start, stop stop stop, start), new animals and more new animals and all their structures, the gardens, on top of working full time plus+, added travel, launching a kid into college and another into the high school years, and family illnesses had turned out to be a lot more more than I had anticipated.

Occasionally we have been able to host what I would consider meaningful events here at the farm  – gatherings of friends and neighbors- but most of the time life here on the farm is just life. It is work. It is time consuming. It is daily. It is smelly.

(And neither Martha Stewart nor Joanna and Chip Gaines, has sent me their staff to help. So daily and smelly it has been.)

Surely, there was something much sexier, hipper, or radical on the horizon. Surely. 

All I needed was the plan.

What is the plan God? Just show me the damn plan.

Like Shannan I  “waited for a to-do list, an ironclad set of instructions, complete with cross-referenced scriptures. I trusted him to clear a path, then sat shell-shocked when he showed me my seat.” 

And like Shannan, but different, because, of course, God is bringing me ’round to something obvious. Something right under my nose:

I brought you here to live.

Just live.

And PS-  I already gave you the to-do list. Note, that it also applies when you are happy about where you live. See below: – God.

This is where you are. 

Build houses.

Plant a garden.

Be married.

Raise your kids.

Work for peace in your community.

Work for your communities prosperity.

Pray for your community.

Don’t listen to motivational speakers and or model your life after reality television.

Do not be tricked into thinking you need/deserve/have to have more.

(Oh, wait it doesn’t actually say that. But it does say to not be tricked by so-called prophets and fortune tellers. Close enough?)

Settle.

Don’t worry- I’ve got this.

I have given you a plan for your immediate future*, and it is a plan full of hope. *See above.

So keep talking to me. I am listening.

If you need me, look for me. I am here.

You can always find me.

– Jeremiah 29:7-14 (paraphrased)

These are the words that I am going to have someone paint on a very large canvas because apparently I need them WRITTEN IN BOLD and hung on the wall so I don’t forget them. (Writing a whole book around them was apparently not strong enough a lesson, sorry S.)

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So, here I am. In this life. A life I wanted, but one I don’t always understand.

Which means, I think, that like Shannan, but different because of course, I reckon I am here for the lessons of just living.

I can get on board for for the Ministry of Ordinary Places and ordinary life – on the farm, in our tiny town, in our thriving church, in the life as a band mom, and morphing jobs, in feeding of the animals,  and the painting of rooms, and the fixing of the unsexy air conditioners, and the making of lunches. Over and over again. Repeat. Or I can keep pitching a fit about  how things “should be” – and we all know how that works out (insert broken foot and collapsing roof.)

This time, I am going to hedge my bets and go with getting on board.

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The coffee table on the left is Shannan’s. On a Monday morning, on the wrong side of the tracks in Goshen.

The coffee table on the right is mine. On a Monday morning, on the farm in Shady Grove.

In both places God’s call  to us is the same; to live fully – not just exist – where we are.

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PS-

Whether you are encouraged or terrified by the idea that God is calling you to be fully present where you are, instead of where you thought you should be,  you should order Shannan’s book and read her story – you might find God is calling you like Shannan, but different – of course.

 

Some of the Summer of 2018

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If you follow me on Instagram, I apologize. You have seen all of these photos.

If you don’t, hey! It’s your lucky day!

One of the one thousand things that keeps me from blogging is the whole picture issue. Instagram filters and my iPhone have made it incredibly easy to take good photos, edit them quickly, and then post them instantly – on Instagram. Which is great. Until I go to write an old fashioned blog post and realize, that sadly, I have not picked up the big camera in months, and that everything I want to share is already hanging out in the Insta-sphere. And I think “well, no one wants to see those old things again.”

Except I do. And I will. In five years. In five years, in five months, in five weeks,  I will not want to scroll back through my Insta- feed to remember this summer.

And it’s my blog, and has been for 12 years? 13 years? So here we are. Redundant pictures to help my aging brain remember.

 

 

[image error]This summer was a complicated one. Beautiful and hard and busy and messy.

To prove it here is the tattoo I got while at The General Convention of the Episcopal Church in Austin, Texas.

I got it on my last night, at a tattoo parlor called All Saints by an artist named Austen. I kid you not.

 

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Here is a picture of eggs and tomatoes. That is what I eat in the summer. Lots and lots of eggs and tomatoes. And these little plates from Joanna Gaines are the perfect size. Also, they are so cute.

 

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In addition to gathering eggs and tomatoes, I also pick a lot of flowers because Sweet Man grows them for me.

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Besides all the traveling I also got to do some fun book related things like making prayer flags with a local book club who read At Home in this Life. We had so much fun that the hours flew by. I really need to take my own advice and stitch more often.

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I lead a garden themed VBS at church, which included making a worm farm.

 

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We went on a very short, very mini-vacation to Memphis.

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We did touristy things like shopping and museum visiting.

This museum was hard and worthy.

Particularly hard as it seems as things are going backwards right now.

[image error]The animals have been busy as ever. This is Mighty Chicken. He is a Bantam Rooster and he is hilarious.

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We have been putting the goats to work on doing some underbrush clearing, and they are knocking it out of the park. Yay goats!

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And finally, we took this kid to college.

I don’t want to talk about it.

(Except to say that he is very happy and I will survive – or so I am told.)

 

Thank you for indulging me with this redundant scrapbooky post. Happy Monday!

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Annual Back-2-School Tearjerker 2018 (it’s worse than ever)

Only a few more years of these to go.

Hold me.

Let’s start at the very beginning…

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Wylie, Kindergarten

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Miles, Mother’s Day Out,

Wylie, First Grade

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Miles, Mother’s Day Out,

Wylie, Second Grade

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Miles, Pre- K

Wylie, 3rd  Grade

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Miles, Kindergarten

Wylie, Fourth Grade

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Miles, First Grade

Wylie, Fifth Grade

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Miles, Second Grade

Wylie, Sixth Grade

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Miles, Third Grade

Wylie, 7th Grade

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Miles, Fourth Grade

Wylie, Eighth Grade

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Miles, Fifth Grade

Wylie, Ninth Grade

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Miles, Sixth Grade

Wylie, Tenth Grade

 

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Miles, Seventh Grade

Wylie, Eleventh Grade

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Miles, Eighth Grade

Wylie, Twelfth Grade

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Miles, 9th Grade

 

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Wylie, College Freshman

 

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Hang in there brave parents of college freshman. We can do this. Or so I have been told.

Also, give me all your tips for parenting one child only. This is a new adventure for all of us.

 

 

 

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Homemade Sorbet and Ice Cream Testing

To say that this is an odd summer would be an understatement.

Lots of working travel for me, Wylie working his first job and getting ready for college, Miles going to band camps,  Brother and Sister (the foster kids we did respite care for) and their siblings have been placed with a hopefully-forever family, … these are just a few of the reasons that this summer is odd.

But still it is summer, and despite the fact that I have not swam in a lake, or set off a sparkler, or blown up a pool, I am doing what I can to notice the small moments that offer themselves up to me like little feathers dropped at my feet.

 

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Like making homemade ice cream. One of my very favorite summer traditions.

Sunday night was Small Group, and this weeks theme for dinner was Summer Picnic, so I whipped up my Maw’s potato salad and a couple of frozen treats, deciding to test a couple of new recipes I had pinned.

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First off, I made my favorite flavor ice cream – Mint Chocolate Chip. Thanks to my sweet brother I have an ice cream maker (this one if you are curious) and I used this  Mint Chocolate Chip Recipe .

I only had to be make the following changes to the recipe:

I used mini-chocolate chips instead of shavings, and I added a bit more mint flavoring than recommended.

(mostly I make changes to recipes because I start cooking before I check my ingredient stocks… this drives Sweet Man insane, but it hasn’t killed him yet.)

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I would say that the recipe makes 4 healthy servings, or 6-8 small ones, and melts quickly once out of the freezer. But it was yummy – not too sweet or too minty.

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Miles has developed a digestive reaction to dairy, so for him I choose this Raspberry Rhubarb Sorbet Recipe.

Change I made to this recipe were:

I used Wildflower Honey.

I only had 1/2 cup of honey, so I added 1/2 cup of sugar, and 1/4 cup of water.

I added a small squirt of lime.

I didn’t chill before putting it in the ice cream maker, but that didn’t seem to be a problem.

Also, I used frozen Rhubarb and Raspberries. May try it again with fresh to see what the differences are.

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The sorbet made less than the ice cream, maybe 3 healthy servings or 5 small ones.

It was pretty tart, and the wildflower honey gave it a wild taste (imagine that!) but it was lovely all the same. Also, it melted quickly as well (which I think is the nature of homemade frozen treats.)

I would say, based on the fact that there was not a single drop left when we left Small Group that both recipes were a success. Hurrah!

I don’t know what other bits of summer I will be able to gather up between now and when we move Wylie to school, but we will have VBS in the next few weeks, and I suspect I will find my way to a lake at some point. And, I can always make ice cream.

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when you send a post that should be a draft….

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My apologies to anyone who just got a post from me that was very unfinished. Please delete and wait for the true one coming tomorrow morning….

The Vocation of a Summer Shrimp Boil

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This week I am the 79th General Convention of The Episcopal Church. This is my first convention and already – half-way in – it has been a wild and wonderful ride. One of the things that gets talked about a lot at convention are the inequalities between the ordained and unordained leaders of our church. About the worth of ones vocation. I have been thinking a lot about these things recently, in part because of my work for Baptized for Life.

“It seems to me that much of the proper work of the church and spirituality should be discerning and empowering people’s actual gifts. There doesn’t seem to be much discernment of gifts, even in seminaries, as to whether one really has a gift for Christian leadership, reconciling, healing, preaching, or counseling. (Most priests and pastors were ordained without ever having led a single person to love, to God, or to faith; and many do not seem to have a natural gift for this.) We seem to ordain people who want to be ordained! We can be educated or trained in offices and roles, but true spiritual gifts (charismata) are recognized, affirmed, and “called forth.” We do not create such people; we affirm and support what they are already doing on some level.” – Richard Rohr

For my tenth birthday I threw I sleepover. 20 girls came. 20 girls from different parts of my life – neighborhood, church, school, girl scouts… It was amazing.  My mother, who was 7 month’s pregnant with her fourth child, made us homemade popcorn at midnight and pancakes for breakfast. For entertainment we watched a movie on the VCR my dad had rented from the grocery store, and he gave “rides” in his old fashioned desk chair, by spinning each girl until she fell out of the chair.  There was also lots of hair braiding and giggling, games of M.A.S.H. played and ghost stories told. There was even some witnessing going on. As I remember it me and some of my church friends “led” one of my school friends to Christ.  Of course in retrospect who’s to say if we led or pushed, witnessed, or benevolently bullied. We were 10. And Baptist. And it was the 80’s.

When I was ten my favorite things were Martha Stewart’s book Entertaining, Amy Grant’s album Unguarded, Mary Lou Retton and all things church. I was also madly in-love with Randy (er Randall) Goodgame (whose sister broke her leg falling out of tree at that aforementioned birthday party). Thankfully I believe that my adoration went unnoticed by Randy (er Randall), and we left Florida and moved to Alaska before I could suffer the humiliation of being officially rejected by someone with perfectly feathered hair.

My love for Mr. Good Hair was not the only thing I left in Florida. I also left my love of gymnastics, probably in part because I could never get past round-offs in tumbling.

But my love for Martha Stewart, (now vintage) Amy Grant, Church Work and the Work of the Church remained.  In fact they remain still. Primarily the Church and the Martha parts.

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Two weeks ago I was away from home working on a new AMAZING project all about vocation and baptismal identity. During the week I set tables, and gathered flowers, and led prayers, and we all told stories about how we saw the Spirit of God moving among us and through us.

Saturday morning I returned from that trip and by Sunday evening I was at it again, setting tables and gathering flowers. Our family, along with our church Small Group, hosted a Shrimp Boil to welcome our new priest and his partner. We gathered around one long table covered in newsprint and flowers from the garden, ate amazing food prepared at home, prayed, laughed, and shared stories about faith, and asked questions of each other about where we feel Christ’ leading.

“Before you tell your life what you intend to do with it, listen for what it intends to do with you. Before you tell your life what truths and values you have decided to live up to, let your life tell you what truths you embody, what values you represent.”― Parker J. Palmer, Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation

I get a lot of questions about whether or not I am going to become a priest. People like to make helpful suggestions regarding my calling or vocation, which I understand. People see leadership qualities and they jump to the most visible option. Why? Because we have built a system – it can be argued intentionally or unintentionally –  that has done a lot of work to raise up, educate, and empower the priest and pastors, and much less to raise up, educate, and empower the laity.  (By comparison a similar thing happens to smart kids in school – we place them on tracks to become doctors and lawyers and engineers, as if those careers are the only ones worthy of intelligence or nurturing.)



But if you follow the the advice of Rohr and Palmer,  if you look back at that 10 year old girl throwing the birthday party, living for church life, reading Martha Stewart under her blanket with a flashlight, trying to explain the love of Jesus at her birthday party, I think you can  began to get a sense of what my life has always been telling me.

If you look at my books (especially A Homemade Year), if you look at the work I am doing for Baptized for Life, Forma, and Episcopal Relief & Development, at the work I am doing in my local parish and in my back yard, and if you look at the work I would do whether I got paid or not,  I think it is safe to say that my life is telling me what truths I embody, what values I represent.









If I look at what I am doing, what I have always been doing, what I will most likely always do, then my vocation lies solidly at the intersection where gathering, organizing, celebrating, storytelling, and translation converge.  If you look at where my great joy meets the worlds deep need, I think it is in my ability to help people see, identify, understand, and celebrate the outward visible signs of inward spiritual graces right where they are -at home, in church, in their neighborhoods, in the world –  in order that they may experience the deep joy of knowing and being known and loved by God and each other. 








The ways I do these things varies with the job with the event, with the mission, with my season of life.


Before I came to convention the way I lived out my vocation, my calling, my baptismal identity, was by hosting a Shrimp Boil for some of my faith community.

A few days ago it was by handing out eggs filled with Silly Putty for Forma and asking people “how were you formed?” here at #GC79.

Then on Saturday it was by helping coordinate and execute the Way of Love Revival for General Convention – using both my storytelling and event-organizing skills to help gather people together in order to share the Good News.

And then this morning, this Tweet exchange had me laughing:

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You see, my life has always been telling me what it is about.

The Way of Love Revival was just an extension of what I have always been doing.

The Shrimp Boil was just an extension of what I have always been doing.

The words I share are just an extension of what I have always been doing.

Whether or not I ever have a collar, my vocation will always be what I have always been doing.

It will always lie in the place where gathering, organizing, celebrating, storytelling, and translation converge – in order that people may experience the deep joy of knowing and being known and loved by God and each other. 

 

We all have callings, we all have vocations. Some come with collars, some come with titles, some are straightforward, and some are cobbled together out of the mess and the holy in our everyday lives. And some, if we are lucky (and not allergic to shelfish) come with Shrimp Boils and revivals.

Amen and amen.

*For shrimp boil instructions check out the St. Jame’s chapter in A Homemade Year: The Blessings of Cooking, Crafting, and Coming Together.*











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