Holy Week with Toddlers

I am pastor and mother. Holy Week and all of its emotions and experiences are very much a part of my life and psyche this week.  All the while, I am mother of two thrill seeking and darling toddlers.

We play kitchen, or as my oldest says "chicken" with the fake food, and when I am asked to hold the grapes, my mind wanders off to a scene of the disciples and the Last Supper.  We play outside on the swing and the slide and I reflect on what betrayal does to relationships, in Jesus' time and my time.  We bathe them, and kiss their tiny feet as we dress them for bed, and scenes of Jesus and washing the road weary feet of his adult disciples seems so far removed from the experience of giggles and soft baby feet.

On Good Friday, their respective childcare was closed and both sweet hubby and I were home.  We did typical things: watched Frozen, play in the "chicken," negotiated cease fires (over toys) with children whose language skills are not complex enough yet, we ate lunch, and put them down for their afternoon naps.  Now, a moment to reflect on the cross that is not broken up by cries for "Mommy" and "Daddy," or diapers to change...
 

I keep thinking about how I won't always be able to shelter them from some of the horrible things that happen in this world. My beautiful children will indeed experience heartache, disappointments, and pain.  One day I will hold them while they cry over the latest injustice or act of violence.  And then in the next breath I feel guilty because I can shelter my babies knowing that there are children throughout the world that are subject to horrible things.

Today, I reckon with the cross.  And its messy and not always focused, but I am grateful that God's grace is big and wide and welcoming.  And I'm thankful that Jesus loved us all that much.  

To the Gravy-Makers!

5:00am is really early.

The husband and I had an understanding early on--no speaking before 8:00am beyond pointing and brow furrowing.  Then, we had children, and those rules no longer apply as they once did.  This morning the youngest decided 5:00am was a good time to wake up, request some milk, Momma's undivided attention, and an episode of Doc McStuffins.

About 6:00am, it was time for some breakfast.  We are cereal people.  Or yogurt and some fruit when we are making an effort toward good health, and on our quickest days-- poptarts or cheerios.  But this morning, I had time.  Plenty of time.  So I made biscuits, and got out the iron skillet to fry up some turkey sausage patties, and while I was there I decided I would make some gravy.

I can't make gravy without thinking of my Papaw and the time he decided to teach me how to make gravy.  He was an expert gravy maker, but on that day with his life-worn hands and finger tips having lost feeling a long time ago, he managed to add powdered sugar rather than flour, resulting in one of my all-time favorite memories of him.

At 6:30am as I remembered that moment with my Papaw,  I smiled in my barely lit kitchen with the sounds of my youngest now playing with the train table in the background.  Oh, how he would have delighted in his great granddaughters!  Then, I began to wonder who taught my Papaw how to make gravy.  My Great Grandfather or Great Step-Grandmother?  His mother died shortly after his birth.  Maybe my Great Great Grandmother Gray?  She was the one who cared for him in early childhood. 

That's a lot of generations of gravy makers.  

As I looked out the kitchen window, gazing more into the past, the sun began to light the earth bringing me back to the present. Back to the gravy that needed my attention.  I stirred and added a little more milk, realizing that my reflections weren't really about gravy at all.  Its not even about the sleepless nights and early mornings and general lack of sleep--I'm telling myself sleep is over-rated anyway.  It is about the little one who is almost past the baby stage preferring some cuddles and attention from her Momma rather than being alone in her crib on a cold winter morning. Its about the gift of slowing down, reflecting, loving, and remembering. 

When my kids get a little older, I'll tell them the story of my Papaw that is safely cradled in my heart among my most cherished memories.  In the meantime, I'll treasure the sound of her sweet voice in the middle of the night calling my name, I'll memorize the smell of her tiny head, the way her cheeks indent when I kiss them, and those precious little hands.

Hands that will one day make gravy, among so many other things. 

Allie's Turn: "The Dress"

If you read my very irregularly (and rarely) updated blog, you may remember the day that Grace wore "the dress."

This little green dress has been passed down and worn by most of the daughters and grand daughters and great grand daughters on my Mother's side of the family.  Part of the tradition is to add something to make it unique.  My Mom said that when I wore "the dress," she wove ribbons of bright colors through the holes.  When Grace wore it, I strung a pink ribbon in those same well worn loops.

Today was Allie's day to wear "the dress."  Such a special day to pass this tradition on to another wonderful daughter.  She's 6 months old.

In order to make it suit our Allie, I carefully pulled my Great Grandmother's pearls through the loops.  On her wrist is a small string of pearls, a gift from my parents.  On her head is the lace bow that she wore on the day of her baptism, and in the center of the flower is one pearl.   Pearls seemed like an elegant theme for our smiley girl.  From the moment I dressed her, it was as if she knew she was wearing something special.

As with most parents to be, we take the process of naming very seriously.  When we found out we were expecting a daughter, Allison became the front runner on our list of names. Suzanne came quickly as well and once we put them together, it felt and sounded...right. Allison Suzanne is named "Allison" for Sweet Hubby's best friend, Robert, whose middle name is Allison.  "Suzanne" is for my second sister (my first and oldest friend), whose middle name is Suzanne.  The Sue in Suzanne also covers several women from my family: Mamaw, Mom, and Great Aunt. We even call her "Allie Sue" from time to time in the spirit of these great women. Her name may honor many, but it is all her own. This girl is happy to be in the world, and our world is made much better because she is in it.  We love our girl so much!

Sunday: Remembering Papaw

"For all the saints who from their labors rest..."

This morning as I am preparing for our All Saints worship service at St. Paul, I am remembering a gift I received in 2007 in the midst of a great loss.  That was the year that my Papaw died and went to be with out Lord.  At the time, I was taking a preaching/creative writing course at Duke.  My assignment was to find a connection between Halloween and All Saints and explain it through story.  I wrote this sermon on the evening of October 30th, reflecting on my Papaw's illness and planning to go visit him the following weekend.  He died the morning of October 31.  Below is the sermon, which continues to be a gift for me. Cherish the saints in your life, friends, those who have gone on to be with God and those who are still among you. 

Papaw is like a garden grown vegetable. Sometimes he’s sweet, and he looks like he’s going to be real sweet; and sometimes he looks so sweet that he’s about to be rotten. He’s always worth the first bite. I sat in the yard under the tree with my sister and watched him poke around in the garden that he fought to maintain despite the road that that receded closer to its border like a balding middle aged man.  He hated that road, and always fussed if we got too close to it.  But he loved that garden.  My sister and I participated in our usual adventures of exploring the yard.  Sometimes I followed him around stepping on things that were meant to be eaten, asking “Papaw why is the sky blue?”, picking up bugs, asking “if I pull this critter’s antennas off will he die?”, making mud pies, asking “Papaw, do you love chocolate more than you love me?”, and poking my fingers into the soft skin of the tender tomatoes.  Mostly I got “mmhhmm,” and “what do you think, say-rah (that's how he said my name)?”  I treated my grandparents like organic toys to be prodded and poked, and they treated me to cocoa puffs, playing in the garden, strange mixtures of foods, and the wisdom of the old people.  It was like living a story, and I always tried to imagine the pasts that they painted of my extended family,  of Cook’s valley, Arkansas, and my Papaw’s mom, Sarah Byra Gray Moody, who died shortly after his birth.  Their world seemed different from my world, so much like that place between waking and dreaming, just barely painted across a mountain backdrop enough that I could see myself inside them, somewhere. 

My Papaw was a strong man with several masks—husband, Father, Papaw, business manager, brother, church elder—and each bore with them a mask to represent a memory that remained fully present in a past sense.  My masks include: student, daughter, preacher, oldest child, friend, girlfriend—some out of necessity and others out of natural progression.  If ever one mask is removed, there is another beneath it.  What will be left when I take them all off? I removed the Sunday school student mask one day to confess that I hadn’t read the whole bible.  That for all fourteen years I had been alive, I never once read it like I did my extensive collection of other books.  I have always been a reader.  He told me that he read the whole bible more times than he could remember, and that when I learned to love the scriptures more than I loved the book world I lived in that I wouldn’t be able to put it down.  He recited God’s Word back to me--which had become his words--and told me that he had been a Sunday School teacher for much longer than I was alive. 

I always think of Papaw in the autumn when the air smells like its on fire, and the wind carries with a hint of harvest, sweet mint, chewing tobacco, shaving cream, and sleeping autumn trees.  The birds get quiet and the silence of the night becomes overwhelming.  I’m captivated by smells that make me recall dreams, or even actual events in life that only seem like dreams swept up in the dew of the morning dawn.  Who do I see when I look at my Papaw?  Which mask that I place on his face is true?  Can a mask be true?

I remember my first time tasting honeycomb sitting at the cash register at the short stop.  It was like playing store, except that it was a real gas station/convenient store.  I loved running back through the freezer and sifting through the numerous projects Papaw had going on in the corner that was his “shop” for knives and sewing machines.  We played with his cane, the cane with a handle that smells like his hand—harvest, sweet mint, chewing tobacco, old time foam shaving cream, and sleeping autumn trees.  In my own organized courtroom, I accused him of making holes in his mouth with the chewing tobacco that bulged out his bottom lip.  I refused to allow him to make holes in his mouth that I saw in a video at school.  I tore the mask away, stole his deadly candy and emptied it on the ground.  I wore my stubborn mask, and I sat crying with the shame of being so forceful with my gentle Papaw.  I was already a failed lawyer.  He never stopped chewing, but on some level, I felt like I stripped him of one of the fairy tale masks that I used to cover his face.  Who told him that was his story? Why did he start?  Those were never questions I asked.

“Do what I say” he said, and my Mamaw whispered, “but  not always what he does,” as he instructed me to pour grease into the skillet to make gravy.  The gravy never did get thick enough, probably because he had calloused touch sensations due to years of hard work and diabetes.  As we sat down to eat, discouraged at our ability to make things “just right,” he asked me to pray. “God is great, God is good, let us thank him for our food, Amen.”  We tasted, and everything was sweet.  The meat was sweet, the gravy was… sweet, the potatoes were… sweet, the cornbread was way too sweet.  I was the first to giggle, and then we all laughed at Papaw’s mistake—powdered sugar instead of flour.  The amount was right, but the substance was all wrong and it made our feast taste like a cavity waiting to happen.  He took off the mask of Teacher, and became the student.  

I always think of Papaw in the autumn when the air smells like its on fire, and the wind carries with a hint of harvest, sweet mint, chewing tobacco, old time foam shaving cream, and sleeping autumn trees.  I remember when I told him I was going to seminary, and I knew that he didn’t support woman pastors.  He told me a story.  He told me the story of a capable woman who worked in the church because it was safe.  He forgot to take off the mask of church elder to show his face as grandfather to a scared granddaughter who was a confident adult by paper, but really a child looking for assurance at heart.  My story was his story, the story that he told me of a blessed redeemer that kept him going each day.  The story of a God whose message to the world was one of Gospel to those trapped by sin and death, a message of healing and deeply loving… and of resurrection.  He came to hear me preach one time—the word that he helped teach me to love—and I know he was proud, even if he would never be able to say so.

Last time I saw my Papaw he sat in his chair watching one of his favorite Westerns.  He muted the sound, but the action played on as though it was depicting the battle within his heart.  I knew he was scared, and I knew he would die, and for the first time I saw him as a man—another child in need of God’s grace—a fellow beggar at the door of mercy. I hugged him and kissed him as I left and said, “I love you rascal, try to behave yourself,” and he said, “I never behave.  I love you too, Say-rah.”  Driving away from their home—I looked into the space that was once the garden—now an overgrown bunch of weeds long past harvest time, its last harvest being several years back and I painfully choked out the words:  “Dear God, I trust you with my Papaw.”  

Sisters and Brothers, what masks do we wear?  How do we tell our stories?  How do we live out our stories?  When we see Jesus standing in the Jordan beckoning us home, will we recognize the songs of the saints?  Our visible communion is incomplete and small compared to the invisible cloud of witnesses that surround our tables.  God made us maskless and said we were good.  My Papaw was a man of true faith, a man that did not live like a Pharisee; he did not live that others might see his good works, but lived so that if others were looking they would see his good God. So that a fellow traveler in this crazy world might see Jesus’ painfully visible fingerprints of blessing on his life.  I will always think of him during the autumn-- when the air smells like its on fire, and the wind carries with a hint of harvest, sweet mint, chewing tobacco, old time shaving cream, and sleeping autumn trees.  Merciful God, give him the courage to hear the wooing of your Saints as they sing the Hallelujahs into the depths of all your creation.  Breathe into him eternity.  Amen.

October 30, 2007

Grace: 6 months

To my darling 6 month old...some things I want to remember.

You would rather play with your feet than hold your bottle, even though we know (and you know) that you are capable of holding your bottle.  I love this because it means you want to spend that time with someone who loves you.

You insist on sitting up all on your own in the bathtub.  We make sure you are just the flash of a hand away from help if needed, but you want to do it yourself.

You love the water.  Cold water, or warm water... no worries, bring it on!  When we went to the beach, you sat in the surf under an umbrella admiring the water and the sand as it swept around you.  We went to the Little Pigeon River over Labor Day and your Dad and I  squirmed as we walked in the cold mountain water, but you couldn't wait to submerge as much of your body as we would let you. And then you splashed with joy.

Your first game was with "monkey" when Jess came to visit and she played "kisses" with you.  It always made you smile, and even lunge in for your own kisses.  You still love playing this game.

You are always trying to make us laugh, and if we do, you will do whatever you were doing over and over again to get a giggle.  We return the favor because your laugh is the best sound in the world.

You peed on Poppy!  Poppy doesn't change diapers, but you made sure to include him in the fun anyway.  Love it.

When you are not ready to wake up and something is disturbing your sleep, you shake your head back and forth (eyes clothes) over and over again.  When you are ready to sleep, you turn on your side, lips pursed shut and those long eyelashes light on your sweet cheeks.

You love to smile.  You smile all of the time, and when you do you draw your nose up so that it has little creases in it.  You smile at strangers and get joy out of their response.  It is delightful.

You are the headband queen.  Thanks to Mimi, you have quite the collection and already the reputation to go with it.  We roll with it.

You are excited about Preschool when we walk into your classroom in the morning, and my day is made at 2:00 when I pick you up.  I walk into the room, usually you are busy picking things up and putting them in your mouth, and when I call your name, you jump and wave your hands and snort with excitement, smiling with your whole face, scrunching that little nose up.  Seriously, girl, it melts this Momma's heart every time.

We love you and cherish your little life, more than words can adequately convey.

Theology Thursday: My friend, the Millennial

Apparently, I am odd.  For many reasons, to be sure, but for one reason in particular.  
I am 30, a millennial (on the upper end, since my 12 year old baby sister is ALSO a millennial), and an ordained pastor in a mainline denomination. My close proximity to generation X might make my cultural context and vocational choice even more unusual.  
Also, I have a lot of odd friends--Hello, young adult clergy friends!

Often, as if my age gives me expert status, I am asked questions about an anxiety in the church over a missing generation in the pews: 
"where are the young people?" 
"why do they leave the church?"
"what can we do to get them to come back?"

I give my best Rachel Held Evans answer (she is right on target, go Rachel!)... but a part of me feels like a medical student diagnosing a real illness that I have only studied in books. 

This does not mean I have never doubted.  This does not mean I am especially holy.  This does not mean I have deep theological insight.  This does not mean that I have not experienced pain. This does not mean that I am ignorant or naive.

Now, I find myself a clergy-person on a denominational ship that is threatening to be pulled apart in the same young waters that led to its earliest adventures.  We are left with every meeting and every book to frantically scoop out water while we continue to sink.

What I really want to say to all the searching or annoyed or apathetic or hurting millennials out there is simple...
Don't give up. Please, come back. 

The church is not good at a lot of things, and unfortunately we are still trying to figure out the difference between an "issue" and a person whom God calls us to love and accept.  We are not always kind, and we don't love our neighbor, much less our enemy. 
Lord, have mercy.
We often try to neatly box up our faith and we have yet to figure out that being a disciple of Jesus does not mean we have to align with one political party over the other.   
Christ, have mercy.
We fight over silly stuff like parlor decorations and windows and flowers and preaching styles, and in doing so we ignore the really important conversations at the expense of those we should be serving.
Lord, have mercy.

And yet, like a well-meaning relative that usually says the wrong thing, or an over-grown house that used to be a well-used home, I love the church because I have known the capacity into which she is capable of beautifully being and living.   I hope that is true about me, too.  That God loves me even as I am so painfully broken.

Millennial friend...find a church near you, and give it a real try... a more than 2 clicks on a website sort of try.  You will find a community that will surprise you, make you angry, inspire you, defend you, walk with you, love you, and if you stick around long enough, there will be moments when the Kingdom of God is near enough to see.

Wildcard Wednesday: Naming

I'm a traditionalist, I can't help it.  Maybe its part of being the oldest and wanting everything to be fair, everyone to have the same experiences, and to cross the same milestones.  Maybe its just in my DNA. 

When Daniel (also a traditionalist) and I found out we were expecting, naming felt like such an important task.  Everyone has their own process and qualifications for doing this, but for us it was an opportunity to bestow a special blessing.  We made lists of names with special meanings or that represented special people.  We called our parents and learned of funny family names, like one of Daniel's relatives called "Allie," short for: Alabama Georgia.  Bless her southern heart.  

When we got news that our little bundle would be a girl, the list was cut in half and we spent weeks deliberating.  For some reason, this felt like the most important thing-- our girl needed a name!  Pregnancy hormones have a way of assigning urgency to pretty much all things, you know, like dusting baseboards or organizing rarely used cabinets. 

We finally settled on two names.  It went down something like this...

Sarah: "Ok, which of your names is the most important to you?"

Daniel: "Forced to choose: Grace, I really like Grace. Its in both of our families, my twin sister is Mary Grace, and one of your sisters is Haley Grace.  Its a beautiful name.  Grace was my Grandmother's name. What about you?"

Sarah: "I always wanted to name a daughter after my Great Grandmother, Margaret, but I don't really want to call her Margaret."

Daniel:  "Ok, what about Margaret Grace?  We can call her Grace."

Sarah: "Sounds good... Grace Margaret it is."

Daniel: "Or, Grace Margaret sounds good too."

My husband is a good sport, but if you know me at all, that goes without saying.  That sweet, patient, handsome, man of mine deserves a metal...or a ring (check).   :)

For a long time we kept her name a secret, whispering it to each other, and calling her by the secret name in our prayers.  Finally we decided to share with our family and closest friends just weeks before her arrival.  One night about a week before she was born, it dawned on me that her name was perfect, because she is Grace to us. For more reasons than I am willing to share, everything about this miracle of pregnancy felt like Grace. Literally. 

On the day of her birth we named her "Grace Margaret" in memory and honor of people whom we cherish, and as a blessing for the future that she might receive portions of their spirit as they trickle down our family tree.

As tradition would have it, in my family there is a special right of passage for baby girls.  Many years ago now, 60 or so, my Mamaw had someone make an Easter dress for my Aunt Donna.  Since then, all of the baby girls have all worn it.  We have all had our picture made in it, and this morning was my girl's special day.

She remains Grace in our lives.  Such a blessing.