NO BUSY BEES

Recently, I attended a poetry retreat. The featured poet was the Palestinian-American poet, Naomi Shihab Nye (poet, songwriter and teacher).

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naomi_Shihab_Nye)

During her presentation, she said she has begun to ‘eliminate useless words’ from her life. And she started with the word, ‘busy.’ She explained that we use ‘busy’ as an answer to how we are feeling or why we cannot do things. “Busy’ has become some kind of weird excuse and even a description of American life. But, that the truth is that ‘busy’ is a consequence of the choices we make to say, “yes” to too many things or to fail to say, “no” to enough things. And that the truth is, we do not have to experience ourselves as “busy.”

Her comments made me pause and think of how often I describe myself as busy or how often I accept it when people tell me they are too busy. And that she is right. “Busy” is not a state of being and it is not necessary.

We really can look at our calendars and choose how we will spend our time. We really can think about what’s important among all of the choices we have and then focus on those – difficult, but not impossible. I think we would all agree that spending time with our families is important and that we should make time to be with our families, but do we always do this?

And then, I think faith. We say this is important, but are we too busy to pray daily or to meditate and draw closer to God? Are we too busy to study scripture or to do some reading that causes us to reflect on the things of the Spirit? Are we too busy to make regular Sunday worship a habit?

Or what about church? Much of current literature describes church as a series of optional activities that must compete with a host of others for attention in our ‘busy’ lives. Naomi Nye’s statement makes me wonder. Is this really so? Or might we make ‘church’ the priority that gives meaning and hope to our lives? Or are we “just too busy”?

I’ve decided to take her advice and eliminate “busy” from my vocabulary as one of a number of “useless words”. I am already finding that this is making me more intentional about the choices I make about events to attend, people to spend time with, work projects to tackle, visits or calls to make. What might happen in your life if you do the same? (Especially as the “Busy” holiday season approaches) Are there other words in your life that you need to eliminate?

TURNING THE CHURCH INSIDE OUT

As I have travelled around Boyertown and tell people I work at good Shepherd Church, I usually get a puzzled look. When I tell them where it is (just a couple of blocks away), they say, “Oh, the one with the clock tower.” I usually respond, “Yes, and we have lots of wonderful people who are doing remarkable ministry there. We’d love for you to come and see what goes on – under the clock tower!”

That’s the truth – Good Shepherd Church is sooo much more than a clock tower and I get a chance to see this every single week! But, it doesn’t seem like our neighbors see us that way. I have begun to wonder….what if we turned the church inside out, so that our neighbors would actually get to know us and so that we could actually make a difference in Boyertown?

On June 21st, we witnessed a powerful transformation of a church, as the people of Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, SC gathered on Sunday morning to turn their building from a crime scene into a sanctuary – one that was filled with hurting, loving, faith-filled people. I think the memorials will continue for a while, but in the end, this church will be known as a place of forgiveness and grace and not as a crime scene or as just a beautiful steeple on the skyline. The people of Mother Emmanuel turned themselves inside out, so that the world would know their love.

Our Penn Southeast Conference has an ambitious mission document for 2020, and one item in particular captures my heart:

Turning our churches inside out: to focus on community transformation as much as church growth. We want to see 5 cities or towns being positively affected by the presence of a UCC church as measured by the quality of life standards of those communities.

What if we committed ourselves to becoming one of those churches? What if we worked to find lots of ways we could strengthen this community? What if by next summer (when we hope to have the work on our clock tower completed and when Boyertown celebrates its’ 150^th Birthday) we had begun turning ourselves inside out with bold new ministries that would make a positive difference here?

The 2020 Vision Plan says, “We would need 2‐4 people trained to help determine pain points in community and interpret MissionInsite data and other information. These people would also need to learn how to better connect church with resources within their own communities.”

If you are interested in helping turn Good Shepherd inside out – there’s a bulletin board set up for you to share your ideas, commit to being trained and commit to serving on an Inside Out Task Team (which would begin work this fall). OR you can give me a call! As we work to restore our clock tower, perhaps we can turn things inside out, too!

Blessings – Laura Lee

THE WORK OF ALL THE PEOPLE

lit·ur·gy - (lĭt′ər-jē) - We use the word Liturgy to talk about the words that make up our worship services. But, in the original Greek (from which it comes), it means the work of the people.

This is why we have so many lay people leading our worship – as liturgists, ushers, acolytes, pastors, preachers and Elders who help with communion, baptisms, commissioning and new member rituals. It’s why we care deeply about the content of our worship.

At Good Shepherd, our worship is a clear indication of one of our greatest strengths. Our worship shows how different we are, and yet how connected we are. For most of the year, we have two services: one that is based on a traditional Reformed Church liturgy and another, which is still traditional in many ways, while more contemporary and intergenerational music and prayers, etc.

In the summer, this ALL comes together – the people, the worship and the liturgy! It’s a true expression of who we are – and of whose we are.

So this summer, you will see a lot of blending. In conversation with the Consistory, we decided that Matt & Pastor Kim and I will work to include traditional elements (the Apostle’s Creed, the traditional doxology, etc.) and some more modern elements (responsive readings, a different ‘gloria’, etc.) to express some of the many ways that we approach God.

This means that all of you will not ‘like’ every part of the service, but then worship is really not about what we like, it’s about how we gather to connect to each other and to God. So hopefully, in every service there will be some opportunity for every person to experience the holy. Just remember, if you don’t particularly like a hymn – someone else does. If you don’t like Passing the Peace, there is someone there who longs to connect to others in this ancient ritual…….Just like sermons – some speak to you and some don’t, but all of them proclaim the Good News of the Gospel!

So join us for summer worship – as often as you can – the work of the people may just change your life!

Blessings – Laura Lee

SIGNS OF SPRING

Last Saturday was pretty cold and windy, but everyone on my block was out getting their yards ready for summer. Lots of pruning and raking and digging going on. And, under all of the dead stuff you can see the shoots coming up from bulbs that were planted long ago…..And pretty soon, people will be planting annual flowers and vegetables. New Life! The Easter Season is here…..

Spring is arriving at Good Shepherd. We are getting ready for some of the things we’ve always done – like the Senior Shepherd’s potluck lunch or planning for Confirmation Sunday. The Softball team has had their first practice and pretty soon we’ll have Music Sunday and be moving to our one-service 9:30 a.m. summer worship schedule.

There are signs of new life here, too.  Starting in April, we will be offering a Communion Service at Chestnut Knoll each month. Coke Spence & Vickie Acree are starting a Prayer Shawl Ministry to provide prayer shawls for those who need a comforting reminder of Good Shepherd and the people who love them. We are working with the folks at St. John’s Lutheran Church to offer a great Vacation Bible School Program together this summer. And, our youth are working with our Deacons to do some fundraising. There is a local child who needs to have frequent wheelchair-accessible transportation to CHOP each month. They are currently working to raise the money for a specially-adapted van. Our youth are planning some fundraising activities and our Deacons will match every dollar that the youth raise with $2.00 to contribute to the van fund. And, those are only a few things.

As our Search Committee begins creating a church profile, the Transition team is continuing work with 4 Task Teams – Worship, Pastoral Care, Ministries with Children & Youth and Missions. They will spend the summer looking at what we are doing, finding out what people want to do, gathering resources and making recommendations to the Consistory. This is exciting new work that will hopefully lead to even more possibilities!

There is much about which we can all be excited - new ideas and new possibilities. There are also the foundations of our common life and ministry that go on and on – reminding us of who we are and whose we are. And, we can be grateful for the new and the old.

Wishing all a blessed spring – Laura Lee 

Run Silent, Run Deep

I saw a lot of old movies with my Mom and remember many of them. One was an old Clark Gabel movie – “Run Silent, Run Deep”. It was a movie about a World War II submarine mission and it was suspenseful in a quiet, intense way. Every now and then, I would be so anxious as a destroyer was passing over them that I would notice I was holding my breath!

On March 15^th, we commissioned our Pastoral Search Committee and gave them some gifts: a little stone to remind then that Jesus is the ‘rock’ and sure foundation of their work; a thumb drive to help them navigate all of the work on dropbox; and a little red candle to remind them to pray for each other and for the church. We also lit a big red candle (which will be lit every time we worship) to remind the whole congregation to pray for our search committee and for our common future.

So, the work has begun! And much of the beginning work will be building our church profile. Some of it will be happening ‘on the surface’: you’ll be asked to fill out surveys, provide information, thoughts, ideas and suggestions. But, much of the work will be happening ‘in the deep’. The committee will have to craft the parts of the profile and really work together to best describe Good Shepherd Church and to discern the gifts and skills we need in our new leadership. And eventually, they will go even deeper as they start receiving and reviewing profiles from candidates.

They will keep letting you know they are working, but it will seem at times to be very slow and very silent. You may even find yourselves anxious enough to be holding your breath. But, the truth is God’s time is not ours. Your committee will be diligent in the work before them and the right things will happen when they need to happen. So, sit back and enjoy the ride – all will be well!

Blessings – Laura Lee

The Tree People

This is an adaptation of a parable by The Rev. Dr. Peter Schmeichen in his book, “Christ the Reconciler.”

Once there were some people who lived up in a huge tree. Over the years, they had built an amazing tree house. There was plenty of fruit to eat on the branches and there were plenty of branches for climbing and exercise. Plus, they had an extraordinary view! Sometimes people would come to visit them in their tree house. There came a time, however, when the young people wanted to leave. Some wanted to set up tree houses of their own in a different place and others wanted to explore life on the ground. The Tree people were anxious and they devised ways to bring people to their tree house:

They held festivals where they gave away the fruit from their tree. This worked for short periods of time, but at other times, it was very lonely. So they tried to make their friends and children feel guilty for not visiting them in the tree. This only caused people to stay away. Hen they thought they would threaten people: they would throw branches down on people if they did not come to their tree. But this was not successful, since people just walked in wider circles around the tree. Life became more and more frustrating, as they could not meet their needs nor could they spend much time with other people. So their life came to a close. They tried every manner of strategy to meet their needs, except for one: it never occurred to them to come down from the tree.

And, Dr. Schmeichen comments: “If the church is to be renewed, it must undergo reform by means of the gospel. It has tried all manner of strategies dealing with program and organizational analysis, church growth and fundraising. No matter how badly these efforts fail, it is reluctant to turn to its priceless treasure. For the gospel is, after all, no simple remedy that can be controlled by individual interests or ecclesial agenda. It is the power of God for salvation, an encounter with the living God who will change things, as promised, only according to a divine will quite contrary to ours.”

What does it take for us to experience ‘gospel reformation’? What does it take to get us to come down from the tree? Dr, Schmeichen wrote this is 1996 and as parables should, this one always makes me ponder. What does it make you think about?

Blessings – Laura Lee

FEELING CRABBY?

This Christmas, I was so elated to have my daughter and new son-in-law here for a whole week and yet, by the end of the week, I was feeling a bit like Crabby Appleton. Some of you may remember Crabby from the old cartoon series, “Tom Terrific.” He was crabby about EVERYTHING!

As my week wore on, I was annoyed that my daughter was using MY bathrobe and that someone else’s device was in MY phone charger and that MY early dinner routine was disrupted and MY choice for a movie was overruled. Get the drift?

I have been living alone for so long that I’ve become attached to my own rituals and routines and choices – AND to my ability to do pretty much what I want to do, when I want to do it. In fact, I’ve become so set in my ways that I become a bit crabby when something or someone intrudes. And, this rigidity and crabbiness almost kept me from fully appreciating the wonderful time with my family.

I thought of this last Sunday when our Conference Minister, Bill Worley was with us. He pointed out something quite obvious; something I’ve read in lots of church articles and reports: We are so attached to sitting in OUR same seat every week that newcomers arrive and think we really don’t like each other or that we aren’t a real community of loving Christians. In fact, we are soooo attached to sitting far away from each other that we’d rather stay where we are than move closer together. We’d rather stay where we are than grow. And, when someone suggests that we move a little bit, we become crabby.

My own time with my kids reminded me that my inflexibility and my crabbiness can get in the way of having a good time, of learning from them, of deepening our relationship. Wouldn’t that be sad if I let that happen? Isn’t it sad that we let that happen in the church? (Not just with where we sit in worship, but in all kinds of ways that separate us.)

Maybe it’s time for us to sit in a different place, talk with some folks we don’t know or don’t see very often, sit close enough to show we care…. Who knows what might happen of we don’t get set in our ways?

Blessings, Laura Lee