I will admit that I feel a bit like Carrie Bradshaw this morning (Aside: Yes, I was one of those high school girls who watched an episode of Sex and the City here and there despite my mother's request not to do so. I honestly just loved Carrie and Big as jacked up as their relationship was. I was also drawn to the unbreakable bond between Carrie and her friends. I knew I wanted friendships with that kind of strength and resilience despite the various adversity they faced together.) as I sit in front of my computer with messy wavy hair left over from yesterday and a cup of coffee as I attempt to get enough control over the thoughts in my head to fling them onto the page.

This week has been a week, y'all. 

I don't necessarily mean that it's been bad. In fact, I think there was only one emotional breakdown and that had to do with the Sacraments. I'm learning that that's the norm for this season in my life. I'm really being challenged to wrestle with the significance of the Sacraments recognized by the United Methodist Church. It's almost a literal tugging on my mind and heart as I try to figure out why these are such difficult concepts for me to grasp as someone who hopes to be a pastor in the future. But then I get to Sacraments class on Wednesdays, and I'm reminded why. Learning in a communal setting where I feel free to ask questions is healing and helpful to my calling (and to my sanity).

I actually talked in both of my classes yesterday, and while this might seem like a, "Uh...so?" kind of happening at the surface, for me, it's a pretty big deal. For the first year and a half of my seminary career, I managed to get by speaking up little to none in my classes. I'm surrounded by people who are incredibly gifted in a number of ways, one of which being able to eloquently articulate concepts, theories, and reading comprehension/application (effortlessly, for some of them). I can do those things, too, for the most part. However, I often have to process those things aloud before I can helpfully contribute to a conversation. Yesterday, my professor for my Theodicy/the-problem-of-evil-in-the-world-if-we-have-an-all-powerful-as-well-as-all-loving-God class (who is a proponent for not making students talk in class because he never had to and still got his doctorate and became a well-established professor and author) could apparently tell the wheels were turning like crazy inside my head, so he asked me what I was thinking. I think I managed to articulately word vomit (yes, I actually think that's possible haha) my concerns and confusion with evil. I won't go into that discussion because I'm sure it would be a bore, but at the end of the day I spoke up about what I thought and the professor didn't look at me like I was nuts, so, for me, that's a step in the right direction!

There have also been many reminders of the evolution of life this week. A dear friend of ours has been undergoing a number of grueling medical procedures in the hopes that she will be chosen to have a double lung transplant due to having a critical condition called IPF. Two families I care about deeply have lost older members of their respective families. I have other friends who are having difficulty getting pregnant, yet another friend just had a precious baby this week. In a week where I'm deeply contemplating suffering, death, and what God's role is in those aspects of our earthly existence, I can't help but be overjoyed and thankful for the gift of new life (both literal and spiritual) with which God provides us. I find myself just going and looking at the pictures of that sweet baby when I get tangled up in thoughts about issues of loss and mortality, and it's nothing short of healing. New life....thank God for new life, and the eternal life we are promised in Christ. 

On another note, church last night was incredible. We have a family service called The Gathering on Wednesday nights, which I have gotten to help plan and lead as part of my Field Education requirement. The group that comes consists of mostly young families with kids who are usually 12 and under. We did stations worship last night so that the worship experience could be more interactive for the kids. We dimmed the lights and played music to set the mood, and let me tell you. Watching families worship in that way together is the most I've been moved in church in quite a long time. Witnessing parents really invest in their children's (as well as their own!) faith through a worship experience was nothing short of beautiful. I get teary-eyed now thinking about families going together to my Pastor to be anointed with oil and be prayed over together. Kneeling down to be on the level of their children as oil was placed on their heads as a sign of the Holy Spirit being with them, I was moved by these parents' dedication to the nurturing of their children's spiritual formation. It was such an uplifting, fulfilling, assuring experience, and I am so thankful to have been able to witness it. 

And finally, I'm thankful when things happen that let me know I made right decisions in my past. I won't say more than that, but I'm thankful for reassurance. Especially when it comes in the forms of new beginnings for people I once cared deeply about! Thankful for true love and the way it ebbs and flows, yet remains so strong and the greatest gift of all.

Thanks for letting me spill my thoughts and feelings all over the place. Please keep in prayer the families I mentioned who lost loved ones this past week, the mom and baby of the newborn I also mentioned earlier, as well as our dear friend going through the medical procedures for a double lung transplant this week. I so appreciate your prayers, and I hope you'll let me know if there's anything I can be praying with you about. Have a wonderful weekend, one and all! Carrie Bradshaw, signing out!

Those who know me well also know that my relationship with the Sacraments recognized by the United Methodist Church is a complicated one as of late. This issue of relationship is not due to hurt that has been inflicted upon me by the Church. At least, not intentional pain... 

The bottom-line is: I was never taught about the Sacraments.

Until recently, I wasn't encouraged to explore the Sacraments to understand their meaning and theological significance in light of how I understand my faith. 

Instead, Baptism and Communion were merely things we (my hometown congregation) followed along with in our hymnals as part of the rituals whenever it was necessary. Fortunately, after a couple of weeks being completely terrified that I would never know enough about the Sacraments to become a pastor in the UMC, I have had the opportunity to explore a number of different perspectives and resources that have helped me to better process what the Sacraments mean to my denomination and in the Christian tradition thanks to my Sacraments and Ordinances class this semester.

In the Methodist Church, we are fortunate to have several resources that assist us in learning about and celebrating the Sacraments through word and song. While I haven't spent much time with these resources beyond a surface level in the past, I've gotten the chance to learn more about Baptism over the past week by using resources including the The Book of Discipline of The United Methodist Church, the UM Hymnal, and the UM Book of Worship.

TBOD is a helpful book for UM's to obtain very succinct statements about what the denomination believes about various parts of our tradition, including the Sacraments. I actually found TBOD to be much more helpful than I originally thought was possible. For those of you not familiar with UM Polity, TBOD is known to be a very dry, rigid resource that is only helpful if one knows how to navigate it. However, I found that it gave one of the most clearly defined explanations of what the Sacraments are and their significance to faith out of the resources I have explored thus far.

It explains that Baptism is a gift from God of grace, which humans did nothing to receive (Eph. 2:8). However, it makes another important distinction that I think had previously been a missing piece of the puzzle for me. It emphasizes that Baptism is not just a mark that separates the baptized from the unbaptized. It's not about a mark that we receive because it's just something we're supposed to do as "good" Christians. The candidate (or the sponsors, if the candidate is not able to speak for him or herself) makes a commitment to living a life with Christ in Baptism. It serves a holy purpose: to initiate the candidate into Christ's Holy Church, which means recognizing that everyone is wanted, everyone is welcomed, everyone is loved, and everyone is a part of the body; we have all been washed in the Spirit in order to be part of what God is doing in the world (1 Cor. 12:13).

Believe it or not, hymns have a lot to teach us about Doctrine (church teachings) and also help us celebrate monumental celebrations such as Baptism within the life of the Church . You might be familiar with the concept that hymns have something to teach us; however, it wasn't until I took UM Doctrine last semester that I began to comprehend that hymns are of more use to folks than dully singing them on Sunday mornings. The hymn, "Open My Eyes, That I May See," (UMH, 454) is no exception.

This is one of the hymns listed as appropriate to accompany services in which baptisms are performed, and upon reading the lyrics, it is clear to see some scriptural parallels that would lend it to that categorization. Psalm 119:18 (NLT) specifically says, "Open my eyes to see the wonderful truths in your instructions." By becoming part of Christ's Holy Church through Baptism, believers (or their guardians if they cannot speak for themselves) commit to being active within the life of the Church. Such a commitment requires senses that we as humans do not possess on our own. In light of the new birth we experience in Baptism, we must allow our perspectives to be changed or enhanced by God so that we may be effective in joining God's mission to alleviate suffering in the world and bring people into the life of the Church.

Because unconditional love is at the crux of Christianity, it only makes sense that part of the commitment of Baptism would include the candidate agreeing to serve God with the Church as it seeks to extend its ministry to all people. The last verse of "Open My Eyes, That I May See" says, "Open my mouth, and let me bear gladly the warm truth everywhere; open my heart and let me prepare love with thy children thus to share." Baptism instructs us that our commitment is not solely to loving and serving God, but also loving and being in rightly related community with others so that we may all work together to understand the magnitude with which God loves all persons.

Beyond hymns, much can be learned about Baptism by reading through any of the four baptismal covenants in the UM Book of Worship. The language used within these covenants is of particular interest to me for a number of reasons, including but not limited to the fact that the language we use to conduct baptisms today has been used to conduct baptisms of Methodists (and other Christian denominations with language spoken at the exact time of Baptism) all over the world for many, many years. In this way, Methodists are connected to one another in doctrine as well as in spirit.

Within each of the baptismal covenants, there is a prayer in which the pastor presiding gives thanks over the water that will be used in the baptismal ritual. It's in this prayer that I get the sense that I'm not only connected to those in the UM tradition who have been baptized before me, but that I am connected to God and those who have loved God all the way back to the beginning of Creation. Within this prayer, the candidate and the congregation are reminded how instrumental water is in our religious history and tradition and what those stories tell us about the faithfulness of God. It concludes with the explanation that Jesus was nurtured in the water of a human womb, yet was anointed with God's Spirit and that Jesus then goes and invites his disciples to die and rise with him in baptism as a commitment to join his mission to make disciples of all people.

Now, I hear you over there. "That's a lot!" you say. And you're completely right! I'm still wrestling with these concepts as well, such as how to eloquently articulate the transition from the old covenant of the water that protected Noah, the Israelites and others to the new covenant of water and the Spirit with Jesus. But, as I understand it, baptism is a commitment to "dying" to one's old ways of living and "rising" in new life with Christ as the focal point for the ways one lives every part of his or her life. As I understand it....The water in Baptism washes our sins away (which is directly connected to the fact that Jesus died to take away the Sin of all humanity) and Jesus' Spirit anoints us in our commitment to live our lives serving God by loving God and loving others in seeking to end suffering in this world by leading those who are lost to a relationship with Christ. 

Baptism is not a onetime commitment. It's a commitment that is on-going, ever-evolving, always-learning, always-growing. We continually commit ourselves to trusting God to give us new beginnings we need to be one with Christ. We fall short...a lot. The gift of grace in the new beginning of Baptism is that we receive a lifetime of those new beginnings accompanied by the promise we will never have to go them alone (Matt. 28:20).

I encourage you, if you have interest in learning about the Sacraments celebrated in your tradition and the ways they give spiritual life to those who partake in them, not to wait around like I did for someone to teach me. Go out. Reach out. Ask for help. It's okay. And, really, it will benefit you so much. Even though I still have much to learn, I already feel much better off than I did before beginning this semester's journey with the Sacraments.

Is an "angry pastor" an oxymoron?

This is a question with which I wrestle on occasion. I tend not to be angry, and I may generally come across as a "nice person" to some people. But the truth is that I, as do other human beings (at least I hope I'm not alone!), get angry on occasion. 

And I never know what to do with those feelings.

Most of the time, I'm able to angrily ramble to my husband or to myself within the confines of our home, which enables me to process my thoughts. What I'm learning about extroverts is that we ain't so good at keeping thoughts and feelings cooped up in our brain. It's good for most of us to get it out, even if we think we'd be better off internalizing. 

The problem with such rambling, ranting, and venting presents itself in the realm of pastoral care, particularly when it pertains to someone I love being hurt--whether it be by another person, group of persons, and/or an establishment/organization. When I feel that those I love have been mistreated and made to feel worthless, that's when I begin to feel the heat rising from my gut, to my chest, to my face. Maybe you're familiar with those sorts of feelings yourself. 

Often, I'm able to stop the explosion of anger before it explodes all over the place, including onto the person who has come to me to sort through their pain with them. And other times, I don't. For me, it's hard to put my thoughts and feelings aside when I feel someone I love is being jeopardized. This feeling has since extended to people outside of my immediate group of loved ones, which causes anger and sadness to spill over into other issues such as oppression, social injustice, and lack of consideration for women's rights and overall value as human beings. That's all fine and great, but how can I truly help someone if I'm so caught up in my own emotions?

So, I guess the question fumbling through my mind today is, "What would God have me do with these emotions?"

I know God knows I'm human. I know God wouldn't want me to try to mask or pretend that the "mad" emotion is something like a switch that I can just turn off whenever I please. The issue here is whether or not there is room for anger in ministry.

Some would very quickly tell you, "Yes, of course there's room for anger! If no one's angry about all the horrible things happening in the world, nothing will ever change!" Still others would say that it's expected of pastors (particularly women, I would argue) that we should--to use the trendy pop-culture phrase--"Keep calm and carry on." Or maybe even, "Never let 'em see ya sweat!" (Thanks, but I'm a sweat-er. Literally. The parishioners are gonna see that side of me regardless.)

I often, when thinking about this dilemma, think of Jesus the "pacifist." What would HE have me do? (Parts of me doesn't really think Jesus was AS much of a pacifist as Christianity sometimes makes him out to be. When we consider all of the boundaries he crossed and out-of-the-box thinking to which he introduced his disciples and followers, I tend to think of him more as an activist. Someone who wants us to do what it takes to love people, even if it's something that means we're looked down upon (or punished) by an entire group of people. I think Jesus calls us to love. But I digress...)

As frustrated as I know some of us get with Paul due to the language he uses in his letters to address various audiences throughout the New Testament, I particularly like chapter four of Ephesians where Paul is instructing the Church about how to live and work together in their new-found faith in order to act as one in the body of Christ. In verse twenty six, he says, "Be angry, and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not give the devil an opportunity." The section in my bible where this instruction is found is appropriately (in my opinion) labeled, "Rules for New Life."

What I received from focusing on this particular passage is that anger is okay...in moderation...if it helps you be constructive for Christ. Sure, we're all going to have moments where we're so angry that we're going to have to explode in some way, because for some of us that's just how we "deal." What's important, I think, is not to stay confined mentally, emotionally, and spiritually in that explosion. There has to be movement from that place of explosion to an eventual place of peace. 

We cannot merely pray our feelings away, but I do believe in the power of prayer. Even praying about our anger (something I need to do more of) can be fruitful! I'm learning that I cannot go this road alone without asking for God's guidance and acknowledging God's presence in the midst of all situations, particularly the ones like this where I'm fully aware that I'm at a loss to my own human nature. I'm learning that I have to at least be in the process of dealing with my own emotions before I can help someone else sort through theirs.

And it is a process: figuring out how to handle emotions in light of who we're called to be as pastors, Christians, human beings. But I think our emotions--all of our emotions--are valid and should be felt. For me, feeling helps me really "get it" where issues of suffering are concerned. My feelings and my emotions help me connect to people, and I'm good with that.

However, it's extremely crucial that I don't let those emotions get the best of me, that I work to find the good in those with whom I'm angry, and remember that they, too, are children of God and are made in the likeness of God just as I like to think I am.

Anger can move us to positive action. I truly believe that. Please hold me accountable to the movement and grace of new life so that I may refrain from dwelling in the explosion.