Things have been going better at the church since September. Attendance has slightly increased. The youth became active again. Those of us who met at the last women's meeting all had the same realization: Monday night bible study (for all) at the church wasn't working, we ought to start having bible study in people's homes. So I pulled out my calendar and church directory to ask whose house first and when we were going to start. We started last Monday; one of my lay speakers led the study since I couldn't go. Praise God for lay leadership!
This past Sunday we celebrated Christ the King Sunday (in accordance with the Revised Common Lectionary) and Thanksgiving, with a big meal after the service. The service was my longest one ever, two hours. When that was pointed out to me, I pointed out that they'd still be going with the previous pastor - the services he led averaged two and a half hours!
Part of why the service went long was because I began my sermon a little differently. I asked how it was with their soul and how their spiritual life was. I asked if they felt ready and excited to celebrate the kingship of Christ or if they felt a little down. Then I asked the congregation to take 5 minutes and break up in pairs and share with each other how it was with their soul, how they were really doing, with no lies or glossing over. I reminded them that we are a family (somos familia), that we are trustworthy (somos de confianza), and that we don't gossip about each other (no contamos chismes). Most folks paired up although there were a couple groups of three. I have no idea how long we shared with each other. There is no clock in the sanctuary and I don't wear a watch. I have no idea if all groups stayed on topic; I didn't check up on the groups. But after my group was mostly done, I called time and asked folks to move back to their seats. And then I asked if folks now felt more ready to celebrate Christ the King and Thanksgiving. The answer: YES!
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Too Many Halloween Hats
As the sole pastor and only employed person at Unidos por Cristo, I've gotten used to wearing different hats: pastor, preacher, pray-er, cleaner, driver, youth pastor, children's ministry consultant, minister of visitation, worship planner, administrative assistant, and more. However, usually each role happens one at a time. I'm either writing a sermon OR I'm visiting a family. I'm taking out the trash OR I'm wandering a corn maze with the youth. However, on Halloween Sunday, all these roles collided.
It was already a busy Sunday. The youth were selling food to raise funds to go to Pilgrimage. We had gone shopping the previous day to get supplies. I got to the church early. The youth got to the church early (the bigger surprise). Others helped the youth in the kitchen preparing the food so that the youth could help direct the service (read the Scriptures, lead prayers, etc.). Three volunteers never made it to the service they were so busy getting things ready for the meal after the service. My husband was grill-master. The youth sold all the food they made. It went well.
After people had started to leave after eating their hamburgers, fries, and cupcakes (the menu the youth chose), the praise band wanted me to practice with them for the two bilingual songs they'd be playing for the charge conference worship service. They felt comfortable with the songs, just hesitant about their English pronunciation. So we start. Then the leadership team chair comes in to ask a couple questions and I leave practice to put on my administrative hat. I return to practice. Then my husband comes in to tell me goodbye. He gets a quick kiss; my wife hat didn't stay on very long. I go back to singing with the praise band. Then one of the youth comes in to say goodbye but I need to talk to him so I go with him to my office to get the Pilgrimage permission form for him and explain next week's plans. Youth pastor hat. And then back to the temporary musician hat. Again.
The good news is that the charge conference worship service went very well this past Sunday afternoon. It was a cluster charge conference, meaning that it was Unidos por Cristo and about ten other churches for worship, then we split up for our separate business meetings. Since Unidos por Cristo is a mission church and not chartered, we didn't have to have a business meeting. So I don't know how those went but I know that worship was wonderful!
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Applause in Church
During high school and college, I developed some very strong ideas. For example, I still truly believe that most parents do the best they can raising their children. Sometimes their best isn't good enough for their child, but I believe most parents really do try.
Another strong idea was that applause has no place in church. Too often to me, applause ran the risk of applauding the musicians and not being actually directed at God. (In white churches, applause usually occurs after a particularly moving piece of music.) It was better, therefore, to abstain. And I have been possibly the only one in a congregation to not clap at such times, so strongly did I believe that it was better not to clap.
Now, I pastor a Hispanic church. It is a "typical" Hispanic church in that it falls into the category my mom calls "joyful noise" churches. Lots of clapping. During songs. After songs. Before songs. And when the music leader calls for an applause for God after a praise song, I clap, too. Perhaps it's because it's so explicitly stated, as this is clapping for God. Perhaps it's because I sit in the front row and my actions are very obvious to the rest of the congregation and I want to show my support for my music leader. Lately, though, I've found that I don't mind giving God a hand.
This past Sunday something quite unusual happened, unusual for any church. I preached from the lectionary and at the end of my sermon, repeated Jesus' question at the end of the Lukan passage, "When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?" (Luke 18:8). Then I said, if he will find faith in you, please stand and affirm that faith now with the Hispanic Creed (written by Justo Gonzalez; found in 'Mil Voces'). At the end, I repeated what God said in the Jeremiah text, "For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more" (Jer. 31:34) and I said that since we have this promise that God will forgive us our wickedness and remember our sins no more, let us now confess our sins. After the standard United Methodist prayer of confession, I asked them to pray for a few minutes in silence. And then I gave a slightly altered United Methodist pardon,
"Hear the good news: Christ died for us while we were yet sinners; that proves God's love toward us. In the name of Jesus Christ, we are forgiven! Glory to God! Amen."
The congregation burst into spontaneous applause. Wow.
Friday, October 15, 2010
Rest, Sabbath, Day Off, etc.
Friday is usually my day off from church. However, the church doesn't know that; I don't think I've ever told them. While I refrain from doing much church work on Fridays, when a church member calls, I answer. I want them to think that although I live two hours away, I'm still there for them when they call, even if I'm trying to take a day off. I say Friday's usually my day off because sometimes it's not. A pastor's schedule can be so erratic, that it can be hard to have a consistent day off. Things come up and have to happen on Fridays. Then, I try to switch to another day to rest, but not always successfully.
A mentor colleague recently shared with me something he'd read recently (I forget the book's name): we are made to work from rest, not rest from work. Humanity was made on the sixth day and on day seven, God rested and presumably all creation, too. We didn't start work til day eight. We rested before we worked. How different would it be if we really worked from rest? Refreshed from the weekend to begin work Monday (or Sunday for pastors) vs. tired from the week and ready for the weekend? Rested from a night's sleep vs. coming home from work ready to crash?
As a student and as a teacher, I took Sundays off from doing any kind of schoolwork. I tried not to even think about it (usually successfully). As a pastor, I'm having a lot more trouble.
Last Sunday was my first Sunday off, and it was great! Instead of sermon prep when I was in town, I visited five families! And instead of sermon writing when I was at home, I started packing to move in a few weeks. Then I spent a couple days at Duke's Convocation and Pastor's School and felt more refreshed spiritually and more exhausted physically. Now, I'm back to feeling stressed again and struggling with the self-discipline of taking a day off. If only I could figure out how to work from rest rather than rest from work... Maybe I need to find that book.
A mentor colleague recently shared with me something he'd read recently (I forget the book's name): we are made to work from rest, not rest from work. Humanity was made on the sixth day and on day seven, God rested and presumably all creation, too. We didn't start work til day eight. We rested before we worked. How different would it be if we really worked from rest? Refreshed from the weekend to begin work Monday (or Sunday for pastors) vs. tired from the week and ready for the weekend? Rested from a night's sleep vs. coming home from work ready to crash?
As a student and as a teacher, I took Sundays off from doing any kind of schoolwork. I tried not to even think about it (usually successfully). As a pastor, I'm having a lot more trouble.
Last Sunday was my first Sunday off, and it was great! Instead of sermon prep when I was in town, I visited five families! And instead of sermon writing when I was at home, I started packing to move in a few weeks. Then I spent a couple days at Duke's Convocation and Pastor's School and felt more refreshed spiritually and more exhausted physically. Now, I'm back to feeling stressed again and struggling with the self-discipline of taking a day off. If only I could figure out how to work from rest rather than rest from work... Maybe I need to find that book.
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Cross-Cultural Ministry
When I was preparing to serve in Nicaragua, I went through lots of training and tests that looked at how well I functioned in foreign settings and gave me advice in how to cope. On the adaptability test, I scored the highest in my group.
When I returned from Nicaragua, I attended a debriefing workshop. One exercise was to mash together yellow and blue play-doh to show how the country you served in had affected you. One color represented your home culture; the other color was the host culture. Mashed together, you could no longer completely separate them again. Most people's play-doh turned green, but not mine. Instead, believing that I was following the directions, I carefully mashed together my play-doh so that the yellow and blue were stuck together, but not mixed together. One side was yellow, the other side was blue, and only held up to the light could you see green. The workshop leader called me a chameleon, able to blend in wherever I am.
The fact that I am a European-American serving a Hispanic church makes this ministry technically cross-cultural. But I have spent enough time in Hispanic countries and studying Spanish cultures that the cross-cultural part isn't stressful to me.
Instead, what is the most cross-cultural, where I have the most trouble blending in, is the setting of this Hispanic church, which is rural.
I don't do rural. In any country. In rural places, I stand out. The smallest town I've ever lived in was Asheboro, NC in the early 1990s. In 2005, Asheboro reported 23,046 inhabitants. The city where I lived in Nicaragua in 2005 had 100,000 people. Unidos por Cristo is located in Grimesland, NC, whose 2009 population was 470.
Cross-cultural white American to Hispanic I can handle. But urban to rural is a whole other ball game.
When I returned from Nicaragua, I attended a debriefing workshop. One exercise was to mash together yellow and blue play-doh to show how the country you served in had affected you. One color represented your home culture; the other color was the host culture. Mashed together, you could no longer completely separate them again. Most people's play-doh turned green, but not mine. Instead, believing that I was following the directions, I carefully mashed together my play-doh so that the yellow and blue were stuck together, but not mixed together. One side was yellow, the other side was blue, and only held up to the light could you see green. The workshop leader called me a chameleon, able to blend in wherever I am.
The fact that I am a European-American serving a Hispanic church makes this ministry technically cross-cultural. But I have spent enough time in Hispanic countries and studying Spanish cultures that the cross-cultural part isn't stressful to me.
Instead, what is the most cross-cultural, where I have the most trouble blending in, is the setting of this Hispanic church, which is rural.
I don't do rural. In any country. In rural places, I stand out. The smallest town I've ever lived in was Asheboro, NC in the early 1990s. In 2005, Asheboro reported 23,046 inhabitants. The city where I lived in Nicaragua in 2005 had 100,000 people. Unidos por Cristo is located in Grimesland, NC, whose 2009 population was 470.
Cross-cultural white American to Hispanic I can handle. But urban to rural is a whole other ball game.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Hard Work
The hardest part of my ministry at Unidos por Cristo isn't the two-hour drive there. It's not the fact that it's cross-cultural or in a different language. It's certainly not planning bible study or the youth group's meetings. What I have to put the most work into are my sermons. Most pastors have all week to write them, finishing them Saturday night, maybe even rewriting on Sunday morning.
My Grandpa, a retired Methodist elder, recently told me the story of when my mom was young and was asked when her dad wrote his sermons. Her answer? Saturday night in front of the television watching hockey. In the 1960s (and probably at least into the 1980s), Grandpa hand-wrote and revised his sermons during the week and typed them on the typewriter Saturday night watching the Philadelphia Flyers play.
I don't have the luxury of a typewriter or of waiting until Saturday night. Because Spanish is my second language and I want to make the Word as plain as possible, I have editing help with my sermons. My accent may get in the way. I may talk too fast. The youth in the back row will laugh when I stumble over a word, which will inevitably happen. But I want the words I'm trying to say to be right. My deadline for sermon writing is Thursday lunch. By Thursday lunch, I email the week's sermon either to Rev. Luis Reinoso, another retired Methodist elder, or to Ms. Idia Piacenti, an administrative assistant at Duke Divinity School for the Thriving Rural Church Initiative and the Hispanic House of Studies. They review my grammar, my word choice, my verb conjugations, my word order, etc. and email the corrected version back to me by Saturday lunch. I then print it out and read it out loud at least once before putting it in my bag for Sunday morning.
For me, sermon writing is work. I have to make myself sit at the computer and type my notes (in Spanish). I read the commentaries and translate them and add them to my notes. Yes, I write my sermons in Spanish; it saves time and energy to just do it in one language. The Spanish spell-check helps a lot. But I have to make myself sit and write the sermon. Nothing else I do as a pastora requires so much self-discipline to get it done.
What I am most looking forward to about my Sunday off next week (Oct 10) is not writing a sermon!
My Grandpa, a retired Methodist elder, recently told me the story of when my mom was young and was asked when her dad wrote his sermons. Her answer? Saturday night in front of the television watching hockey. In the 1960s (and probably at least into the 1980s), Grandpa hand-wrote and revised his sermons during the week and typed them on the typewriter Saturday night watching the Philadelphia Flyers play.
I don't have the luxury of a typewriter or of waiting until Saturday night. Because Spanish is my second language and I want to make the Word as plain as possible, I have editing help with my sermons. My accent may get in the way. I may talk too fast. The youth in the back row will laugh when I stumble over a word, which will inevitably happen. But I want the words I'm trying to say to be right. My deadline for sermon writing is Thursday lunch. By Thursday lunch, I email the week's sermon either to Rev. Luis Reinoso, another retired Methodist elder, or to Ms. Idia Piacenti, an administrative assistant at Duke Divinity School for the Thriving Rural Church Initiative and the Hispanic House of Studies. They review my grammar, my word choice, my verb conjugations, my word order, etc. and email the corrected version back to me by Saturday lunch. I then print it out and read it out loud at least once before putting it in my bag for Sunday morning.
For me, sermon writing is work. I have to make myself sit at the computer and type my notes (in Spanish). I read the commentaries and translate them and add them to my notes. Yes, I write my sermons in Spanish; it saves time and energy to just do it in one language. The Spanish spell-check helps a lot. But I have to make myself sit and write the sermon. Nothing else I do as a pastora requires so much self-discipline to get it done.
What I am most looking forward to about my Sunday off next week (Oct 10) is not writing a sermon!
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Love Wins!
***If I disclose anything that I shouldn't be disclosing, please let me know and I'll revise or delete this post.***
Last Friday I was picked up from my apartment complex about 9:30 a.m. We drove to Charlotte, home of the closest Immigration Court for the state of NC. After stopping for a bite to eat, we arrived at the building around 12:15 p.m., just before the family from my church. The other pastor prayed before all of us except the Sra. went inside. According to the government, the Sra. has no status in this country; a really sad sentence. What does it mean to have no status, not even a low status? We waited in the hallway before the court opened at 1 p.m. The kids, all U.S. citizens, showed me their soccer pictures and assorted school certificates that they had brought. At 1 p.m., we went through the metal detector to the waiting room, along with two other families. The other families went into the courtroom before us, because their cases were shorter and simpler. One lady left the courtroom crying. I pulled out a little notebook I had brought in case I needed to take notes (what was I thinking?!) and played tic-tac-toe with one kid before turning over the notebook and pen to the kids to play games. The first phrase for the first hangman game was one work: 'hope.'
Then, we all trotted in to the courtroom and the judge was surprised by how many of us there were (4 adults, 5 kids, and 1 lawyer). After recognizing the kids, they were sent out to the waiting room with one adult. I got to sit and witness the whole thing. After hearing the respondent's testimony, the judge was leaning toward him staying because if he was deported, he would take the whole family with him and 1) one child has a serious heart condition needing regular follow-up; 2) another kid is a junior in high school and wants to go to college; and 3) the only work available to them in Mexico is fieldwork. But, the chief counsel said she'd reserve the right to appeal. So, the judge called in the oldest child who talked about how great his visit to Mexico was visiting his grandparents and that he wanted to go to college and not work in the fields. I couldn't believe the counsel almost asked him, "What do you have against fieldwork?" Fortunately, the kid didn't hear her and she didn't repeat herself. Then the other pastor testified to his relationship with the family and what a great father and church member the respondent is. The lawyer said that testimony sealed the deal. The judge proclaimed that "the deportation order is canceled" - such a phrase that doesn't adequately convey the emotions it causes - Yay! Gloria a Dios! He gets to stay! The kids get to stay! He gets to apply to be here legally. The lawyer doesn't think the counsel will appeal, but they do have 30 days to do so. We walked out about 4 p.m. a little stunned to tell the kids, "Good news!" The sra. cried when we told her outside in the parking lot. We celebrated at Pizza Hut. It was funny to arrive at Pizza Hut and three of us were on our cell phones.
I got my notebook and pen back with lots of games played and a prayer written by one kid in Spanish: (my translation)
Holy God, help me. Let my dad stay, please. I ask you from my heart. Please let him stay. From my heart. Amen.
Even though all I did was show up, the oldest kid told me, "Gracias, pastora."
Last Friday I was picked up from my apartment complex about 9:30 a.m. We drove to Charlotte, home of the closest Immigration Court for the state of NC. After stopping for a bite to eat, we arrived at the building around 12:15 p.m., just before the family from my church. The other pastor prayed before all of us except the Sra. went inside. According to the government, the Sra. has no status in this country; a really sad sentence. What does it mean to have no status, not even a low status? We waited in the hallway before the court opened at 1 p.m. The kids, all U.S. citizens, showed me their soccer pictures and assorted school certificates that they had brought. At 1 p.m., we went through the metal detector to the waiting room, along with two other families. The other families went into the courtroom before us, because their cases were shorter and simpler. One lady left the courtroom crying. I pulled out a little notebook I had brought in case I needed to take notes (what was I thinking?!) and played tic-tac-toe with one kid before turning over the notebook and pen to the kids to play games. The first phrase for the first hangman game was one work: 'hope.'
Then, we all trotted in to the courtroom and the judge was surprised by how many of us there were (4 adults, 5 kids, and 1 lawyer). After recognizing the kids, they were sent out to the waiting room with one adult. I got to sit and witness the whole thing. After hearing the respondent's testimony, the judge was leaning toward him staying because if he was deported, he would take the whole family with him and 1) one child has a serious heart condition needing regular follow-up; 2) another kid is a junior in high school and wants to go to college; and 3) the only work available to them in Mexico is fieldwork. But, the chief counsel said she'd reserve the right to appeal. So, the judge called in the oldest child who talked about how great his visit to Mexico was visiting his grandparents and that he wanted to go to college and not work in the fields. I couldn't believe the counsel almost asked him, "What do you have against fieldwork?" Fortunately, the kid didn't hear her and she didn't repeat herself. Then the other pastor testified to his relationship with the family and what a great father and church member the respondent is. The lawyer said that testimony sealed the deal. The judge proclaimed that "the deportation order is canceled" - such a phrase that doesn't adequately convey the emotions it causes - Yay! Gloria a Dios! He gets to stay! The kids get to stay! He gets to apply to be here legally. The lawyer doesn't think the counsel will appeal, but they do have 30 days to do so. We walked out about 4 p.m. a little stunned to tell the kids, "Good news!" The sra. cried when we told her outside in the parking lot. We celebrated at Pizza Hut. It was funny to arrive at Pizza Hut and three of us were on our cell phones.
I got my notebook and pen back with lots of games played and a prayer written by one kid in Spanish: (my translation)
Holy God, help me. Let my dad stay, please. I ask you from my heart. Please let him stay. From my heart. Amen.
Even though all I did was show up, the oldest kid told me, "Gracias, pastora."
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