Broken Pilgrim

Brewin' in the Wind II

I'm spending the day at Brewin' in the Wind II, a small coffee shop (formerly the Espresso Cafe) in Oceanside.

Listening to music that stirs my soul. Using The Divine Hours. Reading Scripture. Praying. Journaling. Solitude and Silence. And even a little blogging (finally!).

Coming in to this vacation, I've been torn up by some mistakes I've made in ministry, a person I've inadvertantly hurt … and I can't fix it until after this week. Actually, I really can't fix it at all.

And so my mind goes where it too often goes in such circumstances. Do I even belong in ministry? Do I bring anything truly worthwhile? The answer is … of course … no.

And then I come to THE PRAYER APPOINTED FOR THE WEEK from The Divine Hours. How appropriate that these words just "popped up" at this point in my journey.

Almighty and merciful God, it is only by your gift that your faithful people offer you true and laudable service: Grant that I may run without stumbling to obtain your heavenly promises; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

I don't "belong" in ministry … on my own merit or ability. Rather it is the gift of God above.

Thanks be to God.

Woke Up Early

Woke up early, real early, this morning without an alarm clock … that's just a sign of how stressed and obsessed I am. So I began to pray, journal and enter into my Lenten disciplines.

From the journal:

Oh, Lord. I am lost and at sea. I'm constantly being tossed around by all the little but big things going on.

• My relationship with You is stressed.
• My love for ministry is tenuous at best.
• My effectiveness in ministry has crashed.

Oh, Lord, deliver me, guide me, direct my steps.

And then I turned to the Morning Office in Eastertide and read/prayed THE CALL TO PRAYER:

I will call upon God, and the LORD will deliver me. God, who is enthroned of old, will hear me. (Psalm 55:17, 20 BCP)

No answers. But a simple experience of the undeniable presence of God for me here, now, today.

I Got Nothin'

But David Adam had a couple somethin's in today's reading from Forward to Freedom.

Very often we see a task that needs to be done and yet feel that somebody else should do it. We must take on responsibility for ourselves and for the vision that we have. When God calls us, God also prepares us and empowers us to do what God would have us do. (p. 42)

Today the church has almost all the resources it needs; what it lacks is the willpower to get up and act … God calls, man stalls. (p. 43)

"Join some great cause; you may not do much for it, but it will do a lot for you." (John Bright quoted on p. 44)

It's really easy to read this quotes and apply them to somebody else … which is rather ironic, don't you think?

Vocation and Call

(This is a somewhat longer post … if you're such a wuss that you just can't read it all, be sure to skip down towards the end to read and reflect on the quote from Scott Cairns … my thoughts are quite secondary in the grand scheme of things.)

One of the issues that I'm struggling with right now is what is my place? Really, it's a return to the question as to what is God's calling on my life. It's always good to revisit this question … and as good as it is, it's quite frequently painful as well.

So while this question is coming into sharper relief in recent days, it really goes back to the work God began to do in me during my sabbatical last summer. I experienced a significant climax/crisis point on this issue while at Regent in Vancouver, BC auditing a class on Celtic Christianity. Here's what I wrote at the time:

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JOURNAL ENTRY
Wednesday, July 13, 2005

God is good. God is SO good. I went to chapel today and it all pierced right to my soul, my heart. We began with two songs of praise. The first was a setting of Psalm 42 to the tune O Waly, Waly.

  As longs the hart for flowing streams,
  So longs my soul for You, O God
  My soul does thirst for the living God
  When shall I come to see Your face?

  My tears have fed me day and night,
  While some have said, “Where is your God?”
  But I recall as my soul pours dry
  The days of peace within Your house.

  Why do I mourn and toil within,
  When it is mine to hope in God?
  I shall again sing praise to Him,
  He is my help, He is my God.

The second was a translation from the Latin, 9th century, and set to the tune of Veni Emmanuel.

  Creative Spirit, come to us,
  Give vision to the minds You own,
  And fill the hearts which You have made
  With gifts whose grace is Yours alone.

    Praise to God, the Christ, the Word,
    And to the Spirit: all adored.

  For You are called the Comforter,
  The glorious gift of God Most High,
  The living water, fire and love,
  Outpouring of eternity.

  Make our imaginations blaze,
  And fill our hearts with flowing love,
  That we, who have no strength, may know
  The strong flight of the soaring dove.

Then Scott Cairns came and spoke and my soul welled up within me, my emotions raw and pierced. What he said is right at the heart of what God is challenging me with, God’s call to my soul. He had specific thoughts on vocation and prayer in which God’s echo resounded. Here are his thoughts:

Vocation is a gift from God where God makes Himself present to us. Prayer is a gift from God where God makes Himself present. The heart of ministry is not that we are giving to God or that we are serving others. The heart is God’s action towards us. The heart of prayer is not that we are giving our time to God or lifting up the needs of others, of the world to Him. The heart is that God gives Himself to us. [How different to approach my vocation and my prayer as my hunger and thirst for God Himself.]

Scott’s call was essentially to become prayer.

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I was so moved by Scott Cairn’s chapel talk that I later e-mailed him and asked if he would be willing to share his text with me. So here is an exact quote from that text:

I’m beginning to see that a vocation is not so much a chore as it is yet another in an array of countless blessings a loving God pours out upon his children. Granted, when we pursue our vocations, we are serving others, and we are serving our God, but I’m beginning to suspect that a vocation is also to be understood—maybe primarily understood—as yet another way that God ministers to us, another way that God reveals his love for us, another way he enables us to glimpse His abiding Presence. (Scott Cairns, Regent Chapel Talk)

This quote continues to be revolutionary for me. I'd NEVER heard this before, although it seems so obvious as I read it yet again this day.

And now as I ask questions about calling, I think the most important thing God wants me to do is to lean into the truth of Scott's teaching on vocation. How is God being present to me NOW, in the midst of living into the calling that I know and seeking the calling that is to be?

And fortunately through all of this journey, His ongoing filling presence is way more than I can ever "leak" out.

Technorati tags: Scott Cairns, Calling