Back to Normal. . .For Now

Finally I think I am on the way to normalcy (although I'm sure some of you will argue that point). Between work, freelance, motherhood, and church stuff I have been SWAMPED. Whew! I have missed you friends.

I was in NYC last week and it was friggin' cold. This will sound really lame, but in my free time I went on a search for some tinted moisturizer with spf. It's summer: a girl's got to have some coverage! My hotel was just a few blocks from Bloomies so I went there first. As I walked up the stairs I saw the sea of make-up counters before me. I didn't have a clue where to start. Before I even had to make a decision I had been wooed. Our eyes met and I knew he was the one. He would be the one doing my make-up. I had hoped that we would be best friends, but now I think he was just using me. He lured me to his chair and began cleaning my face. Then he took out the very product that I was looking for and told me how beautiful I would look wearing it. He took such time and acted with such perfection. His use of the different brushes was exciting and exhilarating. With a little bit of this here and a little bit of that there he was transforming the old Jenny into something new and fresh and "soft" (I don't really know what that meant, but I wanted to be it). Then the moment came: he handed me the mirror. I would swear that angels sang and soft lights glowed around me. I looked beautiful. No wait. . .I looked &#$@ good!

And just like that it was over. I was only buying three of 20 things he said I desperately needed. His tone changed like I was his ex-boyfriend. He was uninterested and abrasive. I had broken his heart. He gave me the silent treatment as I made my purchase and left. I wanted to be best friends, but I had clearly crossed a line in not taking his advice and buying the $300 worth of product. I felt so used and abused. He said I was pretty--that my skin was flawless. He said I didn't even really need to wear all of the things he put on my face, though I was more pretty with them. He said I glowed. Now I know that was all a line to get me to buy stuff. I was deceived.

Back at home I've been wearing my tinted moisturizer with spf a few days and I don't even like it anymore. It turns my nose red and makes my face look oddly shiny. Somehow in the lights of Bloomies it really did "glow". I'm sure I could ship it back but what's the use.

I think tonight I'm going to read Psalm 139 until I fall asleep. Surely that's not just God's salespitch to hook us. God loves me and thinks I'm pretty, even without the perfect lighting at a makeup counter in a New York department store. I don't need Mr. Make-up in my life. He would probably just make me more self-conscious than I already am.

It was good to be with the church today--the people who really do love me shiny, red nose and all.

Randoms Thoughts

Before I write anything else, let me just say that Gavin was the one following me around on Thursday. . .not the other way around!

Ok, now that that's out of the way--on to more random thoughts.

Emergent was like being back in seminary. It was fun to talk theology and ecclesiology non-stop--oh, and don't forget hermeneutics. Sometimes when I'm with "normal" friends I start talking about that stuff and they're like, "Jenny, you sound like a complete dork." I love to hang out with people who love the church. My soundtrack for my short time at the convention is Derek Webb's song, "The Church". I LOVE that song. It says, "I haven't come for only you, but for my people to pursue. And you cannot care for me with no regard for her. If you love me you will love the church."

I only made it to the Scripture learning community and it was awesome!! Brian McLaren started by talking about how in love he was with the Bible and how not a day goes by that he doesn't read God's Word. He said a lot of other brilliant things, but that's the one thing that convicted me the most. I read something everyday, but not always the Bible. I read Anne Lammott, Dan Miller, Kathleen Norris, John Wesley, Reuben Job, Brian McLaren, a lot of blogs--but the Bible is nearly never my first choice. I'm really convicted about that because I don't find my place in the story if I don't love it and long for it daily.

I was so glad that Jonathon and Co. identified the "emo" look. Before I got there I was worried that I was going to look really out of place. My perception of who I thought I would see was young, hip-looking, goatee-having, messenger bag carrying, Vans-wearing, trendy people, of whom I am definitely not a part. And, while not everyone looked like that, it was definitely the dominate look. Funny, really. How I wish I could be hip.

So, not the profundity of Lynnette's or Jonathon's posts, but I was only there for a day. I'm hoping everyone else's thoughts and wonderings will spill over enough so that it's like I was there. I'm fried from such a crazy week and tomorrow I'm off to NYC for a conference that will have me fried and toasted. I'll blog if I can. If not, that's all until next weekend.

Focus

I feel like I could write about 15 different things right now. I'm am really taken aback by the whole "lack of female leadership in emergent" dialogue. I could go on about the whole good-ole-white-boy-with-goatee problem that abounds, but I think Lynette has articulated it better than I could, especially since she is actually in the movement and I'm in Tullahoma (definitely NOT an emerging area).

I could also write about a comment Jonathon made in his blog about what he likes about Jim Wallis. He said that he appreciated that Wallis knew who he was--evangelical. It got me thinking if I really know who I am. . .I mean if someone were talking about me to someone else and wanted to describe me in a few words, what would she say about me? Progressive evangelical? Liberal? Conservative? I have friends that when I hang around with them I feel like a total conservative. On the other hand, here in Tullahoma I feel like people must think Mark and I are flaming liberals. So I'm thinking. . .what would people say? (And then I'm also thinking is that thought even worth my time?)

The heaviest weight on my right now is finishing my CIC module. I was so excited to get to write something for fun since I edit and write all day long for work. However, the extra work is really starting to weigh heavily. I guess I'm feeling the same way that some of my writers feel when they are about to turn in an assignment and are worrying about the deadline.

Finally, my passion--the thing I want to think about constantly until it comes to fruition is this church plant idea that Mark and I have been talking about for the last week or so. We were dreaming of the greatest church we could be a part of and we got to talking about having a downtown church that wasn't known for the tallest steeple and the richest people, but for being the church for homeless people, travelers, young people, old people, rich people, poor people, multi-ethic, varying socio-economic situations. It would also just be a place where people loved being the church, loved each other, and hungered for time together in worship. We dreamed that we'd sing ancient hymns and talk before and after the singing about the beauty in the words so people could hang all for however many verses there were. We dreamed of the church writing new music to sing together--born out of the organic nature of the community. We dreamed that we'd have communion every week to feed our souls and then lunch together to feed our bodies. I know this is happening in places and we just don't know about them. I'm thinking though, that we don't know about them because they're not happening around here. I hope I'm wrong and naive about this.

At first we talked about how connecting to the whole emerging thing would be great, but then we remembered that methodism started as ministry with the poor and imprisoned. At the Healthy Churches event in Houston a British Methodist leader gave a message called "Remember the Foundry." He said that the worst thing to happen to the methodist movement was the "mahoganization of the church". That is, when the church became more about fancy buildings and pomp and circumstance than living out the gospel. I continue to be challenged by that. So, while the emerging thing is great and challenging for the church, I'm thinking that maybe United Methodists just need to go back to being who we were. We need to remember the foundry--where the spirit of true methodism began and the gospel was truly lived out.

I'm pretty sure I could keep on writing tidbits, but that's neither interesting nor fruitful. Excuse the randomness. I'm off to watch Life Aquatic. I hope it's good. Good night, friends.

Blue Mountain

So for the past week I've been at my brother and sister-in-law's log home on Blue Mountain in Pennsylvania. As I write this I'm sitting on their deck looking at the budding trees and blooming flowers. . .oh yea, and I'm also dodging pesky bees that are about to scare me right inside. I like to think I'm much tougher about it than I am, but I'm not at all. I'm a wimp about bees and wasps.

Anyhoo, my brother goes to a new Wesleyan church plant. The pastor used to be a UM guy. He graduated from Asbury and did the whole itineracy thing for a while. He felt like God was calling him to plant a church, but his conference didn't give him as much freedom as he needed to do what he thought God was calling him to do so he left the UMC. I don't know why I mention that except that he is a really good pastor and very into the emerging church. It's a shame there wasn't room enough for his ministry in the UMC. That was a few years ago, so maybe things would be different today.

Thursday was the National Day of Prayer and the church was in the middle of a sermon series on prayer. That night they had a service that started with praise and worship music with an awesome band and then multi-sensory stations spread around the church--including a family friendly one where kids painted tiles and they built a mosaic wall of prayer. It was really, really cool. I've done prayer stations before, but this was the most seamless and meaningful for me. In one room we ate bread and drank water as we prayed for the world--that through us Christ would be bread and water for a hungry and thirsty world. That is still sticking with me.

"Pastor Dan's" (that's what they call him) last sermon in the prayer series talked about the power of blessing other people with our prayers. That's also sticking with me. He said that when someone tells us his or her story and we don't know how we can help or know that we can't do anything about the problem, that our first instinct should be to want to pray for them. I know a lot of people that I love very much and would really like to solve their problems. Pastor Dan said that I can't solve their problems, but I can point them to hope, peace, and reconciliation through prayer. I'm going to start doing that.

So, it's beautiful here and I love being with family. They have a new baby (Jordan Abigale--she's beautiful), so it's been crazy around here with a newborn and a toddler. One of them is always crying and waking up the other. I'm pretty sure they're about to kick Gracie and me out of the state.

More when I return to the southland in the springtime.