Sweet Child of Mine

The Holy Spirit rocks my world sometimes. 

What I enjoy about my Lutheran tradition is we put some structure into place and then open the door so the Holy Spirit can mess it all up. 

Here are three of the many Holy Spirit moments from Sunday's celebration of graduations, baptism, confirmation, third grade Bibles, and faith formation leaders (it was a whole lot of celebrating and I'm sure there was some whining about how long church was):

1. Simul Justus et Peccator (simultaneously forgiven and sinning). 
There was a moment in worship I never thought I would experience. A young man played Guns N' Roses as special music. I'm pretty sure Axl Rose never expected his music to be in church and I could feel the moment when those of a certain demographic in the congregation all realized what song was being offered up.

I almost started laughing and then worrying about my job, but it was so amazingly beautiful and holy I didn't do either. 

I love the young man who played the special music dearly. He's brilliant and an amazing artist and has probably been scolded by most of the adults in the congregation. We've had some challenges over the years.

There is no better paradox that captures the love of the Christian community than this particular young man playing Guns N' Roses Sweet Child O' Mine. It was perfect.

I don't know any of the lyrics besides all the "Os" and "sweet child of mine", but that is enough to make me smile. The profane and sacred, the sinning and forgiven all mixed into one bag in the church. Church isn't about putting your holy on, but showing up as a sweet child of God's, giggling as the waters of baptism are poured out, and offering a beautiful gift no one else could have offered.

2. The offering of the crosses

There is a point in the service when parents place into their 8th graders' hands a cross and say, "May the cross keep you strong through all suffering and sorrow." 

As they spoke those words, I saw in more than one parent's face the truth of those words. I witnessed the realization dawn that they can't protect their kids from all the heart breaks and hurts ahead of them. We place the cross into our kids' hands not thinking they will escape suffering, but hoping they won't be alone in it.

3. The postlude

It was a gift this year to hear special music from so many of the 8th graders, but the final song knocked the breath out of me. I'm not sure what it was, but it sounded like a river and a perfect sending for a day when we celebrated so many transitions. The bubbling and swells, the stillness and rapids seemed to capture the flow of our lives. We know we can't hold on to a moment in time; we can only ride the river of God's grace. 

I freaking love my job and this whole crew blessed me in many ways. They added a few gray hairs to my head, but also made my heart and life so much richer. 

Amen. Come Holy Spirit.

Speech

I love being a pastor, but it's been nearly twenty years and I still suck at knowing the right thing to say.

I replayed some of the conversations over the years where I have failed:

"Pastor, I caught my husband with a horse." 

"Eat more green grapes, Pastor, keeps you regular."

"Have you ever had contact with aliens, Pastor?"

I think I just stared at people in response. What does one say?

There's also the more normal stuff. I have no idea what to say to "nice sermon" let alone when folks are wrestling with trauma and death. 

Here's what I came up with today after replaying some flubs I made recently. 

I asked myself, "What would my speech therapy teacher say?"

I spent most of elementary school in speech therapy for not being able to say "s, r, or l." I don't remember anything about the classes other than my teacher loved Ireland and a girl named April laughed so hard snot hung from her nose to the table. 

Speech therapy did nothing for my impediment because I didn't realize I had one. I sounded normal and most of my friends in speech class sounded fine too. It's hard to work on a problem you can't hear.

I even got to do summer speech camp. I've blocked most of that from my mind other than the animal flash cards. I rocked it until we got to the damn squirrel. Do you know how hard "squirrel" is when you can't say "s, r, or l?" I'd see that squirrel coming and I'd get so worked up about saying it right that I'd just sit there exasperated and humiliated screaming "thgaw." 

So how speech therapy help saying the right thing?
1. I can give up on being right and try to be aware of what is wrong. What sounds normal and right to me may sound wrong to another so I need to pay attention to how I'm sounding to the other person. 

2. Don't get so anxious and worked up that I just sit there muttering intelligible sounds because the task of saying something meaningful is too daunting. I know when I'm hurting it is often enough to know I've been heard and everything else sounds like thgaw. 

3. Swear. I'm pretty sure everyone who's struggled with speech has learned to swear. Swearing and singing come from a different part of your brain than formal discourse. Sometimes I need to release that part of my brain and no one wants to hear me sing.

4. If I really mess up and say something I want the other person to forget, I just let snot drip down my face. Those gross memories obliterate everything else. Poor April is still remembered 40 years later as the girl with the hanging snot, but at least I can't remember anything about her speech impediment.

Anarchy

I'm thinking about anarchy. 

Some of it is the sunshine and heat; my brain melts in such conditions.

Some of it is our recent bishop election. Lutherans gather as geographical synods once a year and this year in Alaska we elected a bishop.

When we finished this year's election, someone asked me what I thought. I love our bishop. I think she is a faithful and steady servant so my immediate response was not to critique her or the process, but I did question the nature of hierarchy. I'm just not sure out current leadership structure will see us into the future.

Finally, some of my thoughts come from an article out of the Christian Science Monitor with the sub-heading, 

Spontaneous mass protests in the former Soviet state of Armenia have ended a deceitful power play by a longtime ruler to stay in office. In throwing off their fears, Armenians showed others in repressive countries how to ‘live in the truth.

I'm fascinated by spontaneous gatherings of people who show others how to "live in the truth." 

A leader in Armenia was later raised in the midst of the protests and I want to believe that will be helpful to good order, but I can't say history has many examples of new leadership that doesn't imitate the tyranny of the old leadership.

It also made me think of a story we learned when we visited the DDR museum in Leipzig last summer. A group of students in 1956 in communist East Germany sat in silence for six minutes at the beginning of class after the Soviets crushed the revolt in Budapest. It was a spontaneous act of solidarity with the protestors in Budapest . The principal yelled at them for their silence, the head of the education department yelled at them, and finally the Stasi interrogated the students to find out who the leader was. 

But there was no leader. They all just knew it was the right thing to do. And then they all escaped to the West together. Even when they were interviewed after the threat was over, there was no leadership they could point to.

What creates the sense of trust and fellowship in a group of people that frees them to risk their lives to live in truth?

 I don't know the answer to that question, but I think it's an important one and I'm pretty sure the answer is not hierarchies (it's probably also not anarchies). 

Leadership is important for good order, but I do think in the church (and probably our nation) leaders can repress the creation of spontaneous communities who have a sense of the truth and are willing to risk witnessing to it. Leaders tend to take charge and leave folks feeling impotent and disconnected.

Confirmation youth making stoles for ministry

I'm not sure what that means for pastors. I was taught pretty early on that I'm not in charge and it's not my church, and on my good days I see myself as a trainer, observer, and student of scripture. 

Sometimes, on my not so good days, when my ego butts in, I see myself as "right" and "in charge." 

That's probably the best place for my anarchical tendencies to start dismantling hierarchies and then I'll worry about the rest of the church and world.