I Would Never Wear That (and other lies I've told)...

I recently purchased a pair of skinny jeans. Now, they're not über-skinny, it's-difficult-to-sit-down jeans, but they are cut pretty narrowly in the calves and have fairly small openings at the ankle. Two years ago they definitely fell into my "I would never wear that" category. Yet, phrases I utter that begin with "I would never" tend to come back to haunt me...

I've struggled this year with discerning what is appropriate pastor-wear and what isn't. Though I'm not in full-time ministry yet, I've served as a pastoral intern, a college chaplain, and a hospital chaplain, and each has had its own unspoken dress code. The college position was by far the easiest - jeans, fleeces, sweatshirts, pretty much whatever. When I was preaching I'd usually go for some khakis or a casual skirt, but nothing over the top. When the college ministry students would see me dressed up to teach (I taught on the same campus where I interned as a chaplain, and for that I'll often wear collared shirts, suits, or pressed dress pants), they would often do a double take.

At the hospital I learned that suits communicate power and stand-offishness, while softer things like sweaters made me more approachable. Have you ever hugged someone in a suit? I would always hug my dad when he came home from work in a suit, but it was always nicer to hug him fifteen minutes later when he was in a t-shirt and jeans. I found this summer that people really hesitate to cry on your shoulder if you're in a suit, even if you're standing by the hospital bed of their dying loved one, and even if the suit is a fairly cheap off-the-rack model from TJ Maxx.

There's a great blog called "Beauty Tips for Ministers" that's been helpful in this regard (thanks, Marie!). The author writes about what is appropriate for certain scenarios (from a freezing-cold internment -- you're going to need snow boots but they'd better be professional, to a roasting hot day at the beach -- cover-ups are your friend, but it's okay to swim with everyone else!) without running toward masculinization. Because this is tempting. Most of the pastors I've seen and worked with have been men, and for them it's awfully easy. They basically have three options: Suit, khakis and a top, or jeans and a top. As long as they steer clear from sandals and bermuda shorts, they always look good.

But what about us women in ministry? How much makeup is too much? How little makes it look like we're trying too hard to be "in the world but not of it"? What is appropriate to wear when we're off work? Do I have to give up my two-piece bathing suit days forever when I'm ordained, even if I'm vacationing in Florida? Are knee-high boots ridiculously distracting or polished and professional? What trends can I follow and which ones should I ignore?

Of course I want to be professional and modest, but I also don't want to be frumpy and boring, or to ignore any sense of style. My CPE supervisors were really helpful in this regard. They both hit a beautiful balance between being professional, being themselves, and staying feminine, and they gave us two basic rules: 1) No jeans. 2) Experiment and see what works. It was wonderful to be given the opportunity to try new things, while knowing that my fellow chaplains would help to guide me if I was wearing something out of line. Some of my fellow chaplains experimented with gusto; others seemed to already understand what worked best for them. I learned a great deal through trial and error (i.e. don't wear scarves, they can end up dangling over bad, infectious places...), but I'm still experimenting, and probably will be for awhile. I tend to be ultra conservative when it comes to things that may not be appropriate (leaving most of my dangling earrings stuck at home), which is definitely the right side to err on, but I also don't want to miss out on dressing like "me" for the next decades of my life. And I really don't want to dress older than I am... Plenty of time to dress like I'm 40 when I am. Any helpful tips, those of you serving in ministry? Any disaster stories I can learn from?

Anyway, back to things I will "never" do. Here are the things I have done in the past three years that I said I would "never" do:

1. Buy (and wear) skinny jeans.

2. Buy (and wear) knee-high boots.

3. Date/marry Daryl (this caused no end of amusement to my family when he and I first started dating... "But didn't you say...?")

4. Go to seminary to become a pastor.

5. Actually enjoy reading literary theory.

6. Actually enjoy eating the following: salmon, guacamole, Mexican food, and broccoli

7. Give up the following: bread, pastries, and any other gluten-filled foods

8. Enjoy working in a hosptial.

Some of these are signs of growth, others seem to be signs that God has a good sense of irony... This list also makes me quite afraid of what will happen on my current "I will never..." list:

1. Move back to New Jersey

2. Have more than two children

3. Wear leggings as pants (unless I'm running a marathon...)

Yikes.

What's on your list?

Thursday Recipes - Chocolate Chip Meringues

My very favoritest cookies from Trader Joe's are their chocolate chip meringues. Light, airy, chocolatey... Mmmm... I can eat half a dozen without batting an eye. So you can imagine my dismay when I went to buy some for myself (and some for my fellow meringue-lover and Daryl's Nashville host Ted) recently and the friendly TJ's employee (they always are friendly, even in Jersey. Not sure how they find that many polite employees, but I'm all for it...) told me that not only were they sold out but the product had been DISCONTINUED. WHAT?!?! They still sell the vanilla kind (which = waaaay too vanilla-y), but I've never liked those.

Then I remembered - my mom used to make these cookies when I was younger! She called them "Bake While You Sleep" cookies because you actually put them in a preheated oven and then just turn the oven off and let them sit for at least four hours or even overnight - perfect for putting in the oven on Christmas Eve and eating on Christmas day.

This recipe is from AllRecipes.com and it's naturally gluten-free. I've modified it a bit to fit with my mom's recipe, and I'll be baking these sometime this weekend, if all goes as planned. Mmmmm... See TJ's? I can make it just fine without you... Until I need those white cheddar cheese puffs. Or your amazing fruit leather. Or that tasty mango lemonade... Yeah. I'll be back soon.

A few tips on making meringues, as they can be temperamental... 1) Make sure the egg whites are completely yolk free. Even a tiny sliver of yolk can make them impossible to whip. 2) Eggs at room temperature will whip more easily. 3) Don't even try to do this by hand... Use a stand mixer or a hand mixer, or else invite three or four friends with REALLY strong arms over to whip it for you. It will take a long, long, loooong time. 4) Make sure all utensils, bowls, etc. you use are extra, extra clean. If there's any oil from your hands or leftover grease from another baking project, they won't whip.

Don't be scared! They really aren't that hard, and the rewards are well worth the effort.

Chocolate Chip Meringues

Ingredients

• 3 egg whites
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 pinch salt
• 1 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips
• Optional: a touch of food coloring (this is great for holidays - pink for Valentine's Day, green for Christmas, etc.), shredded coconut, nuts, replace chocolate chips with butterscotch ones, peppermint extract for mint flavor, the possibilities are pretty vast...

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F (150 degrees C). Grease baking sheets or line them with parchment paper.
2. In a medium bowl, whip egg whites to soft peaks. Gradually add the sugar and vanilla while whipping to stiff peaks. Fold in chocolate chips. Drop by spoonfuls onto the prepared cookie sheets.
3. Place cookies in oven and turn oven off. Leave cookies undisturbed for 4 hours (or overnight). Wake up to yummy cookies!

Ten on Tuesday (Thanks, Megan!)

Yes, I know it's Wednesday. But it's 4:21am on Wednesday, so I'm calling it Tuesday. Sometimes when one is on-call at the hospital, one does not sleep so well and must spend portions of the early morning hours updating one's blog. And watching "About Schmidt" at the hospital's on-call apartment. And speaking of oneself in the abstract.

My friend Megan (hi!) sometimes does a Ten on Tuesday list. Since I've been a bit dry in the well of ideas lately (an intensive short-term course plus a husband far away can do that to a person), I thought I'd borrow this one from her. So...

1. What accomplishment are you most proud of? 
I used to say running the Chicago marathon in 2002 was my proudest accomplishment. I kinda still can't believe I ran that far (especially since I haven't run over three miles in a stretch in the seven+ years since). It was cool to see that I could push my body that hard and it would actually do what I trained it to do. I'd like to do another one at some point, but I think a half-marathon may be all I have in me from now on, particularly because running gets really boring after about five miles.

Now, though, I'm proudest of pursuing a life of ministry. It's still a scary thing to me for many reasons, from a life of fairly low income, to the ways that it is possible to burn out or just plain get burned in ministry, to my own occasional battles with self-doubt (who am I to serve God's people in the church?), so I'm proud that I've kept going on the path to ministry, even when it's been tough. Even when it means that sometimes I'm awake all night long with a hospital pager. Even when it means spending this year apart from Daryl. Even when it means a more uncertain future.

2. How much did you weigh when you were born?
Around eight pounds, I think. Maybe just under.

3. What is your favorite perfume?
I've never worn perfume. I'm not really sure why. I usually use lotion or body spray from Bath & Body Works and they just discontinued my favorite (Juniper Breeze), so I'm going to have to find a substitute pretty soon. I think I'd like perfume. I definitely like the idea of it - it sounds professional and sophisticated and grown-up-ish. Maybe I'll have to find a good scent sometime soon.

4. How many siblings do you have?
Two younger sisters. And they rock. And they both live in Minnesota, which is just too darned far away from where I live. One is a college senior, studying art and making brilliant and beautiful things. The other is a waitress, wife, and mommy to the cutest 1 1/2 year old girl ever. They're incredible sisters and I love hanging out with them more than almost anything in the world.

As a side note, it's continually astonishing to me how many of my friends in graduate programs are firstborn children. Wheaton was packed full of first-borns. It's a wonder we don't all boss each other around to the point of violence...

I also have a brother-in-law. When I was five or six I was fixated on having an older brother. It's what I wanted most in the world. Needless to say, that was a tall order for my parents, who kept trying to tell me that it was pretty impossible at that point to get me an older sibling. Well - now I finally got one. And he rocks. And when Daryl and I visit, he always punches Daryl in the leg and makes him fall over. And it cracks me up every time.

5. How many children would you like to have? (Or how many do you have?)
Probably two. I used to tell people that Daryl and I want two kids because we don't want to be outnumbered, but then a friend of mine who has one kid told me that when you have one baby, you're already outnumbered. Good point. Still, at some point down the road we'll start with one, add another one, and then see how things are going.

6. What’s the best class you took in college?
I took so many incredible classes in college I can't name just one... All of the writing courses I took with David Wright and Kent Gramm changed my life. Jeff Thompson's Creativity Practicum (which really does defy description) was an experience unto itself. I loved Em Griffen's Communication Theory, which was really hard, but always began with a short reading from Anne Lamott's Traveling Mercies. Also, he wrote the Comm. Theory book that most programs are still using today. And the book rocks. Dave Reifsnyder (who incidentally used to be a roadie for my Uncle Del's college band) taught Intro to Theater and Performance of Literature, both of which I loved.

And all of my tutorials in Oxford, which now seem kind of like a mysterious and wonderful dream (especially the writing course I took with the poet Kieron Winn. We met at his flat - which seems sketchy to me now, but was fairly commonplace in Oxford - and he used to throw books at his cat and serve me tea in flowered porcelain teacups). I can't believe I used to walk the streets of Oxford and drink tea and go to classes there. What a good time.

7. What was your favorite game to play when you were a child?
I grew up in the land of Capture the Flag. Loved it. I was never very good at it, but I loved it. As far as board games, I loved Candyland. Loved it.

8. What character on Friends are you most like?
I want to be Rachel, but I'm more Phoebe, especially in my more flustered moments. I like to think that as I get older I have more Rachel moments. In my nerdy moments I'm totally Ross.

Ross is my favorite. Luckily, Daryl is quite a bit Ross. He's part Ross, part Josh Lyman from the West Wing, and part George Clooney from Ocean's 11 (minus the felony part). Yeah, I'm just totally in love with the guy.

9. Are you a phone person? (ie: Do you like talking on the phone?)
I HATE being on the phone. I really hate it. I think my long-distance friendships suffer because I am so bad on the phone... My friend Sarah (hi!) and I really get each other this way. Often we'll call each other, get voicemail, and then just send an email instead. I think we're both happier that way.

I'm learning to be better on the phone. It helps that I'm forced to talk on the phone with Daryl and my family so far away... And whenever Inga calls me from Iraq it feels like an incredible privilege and not a chore to talk on the phone. I'm also always a little bit amazed to hear someone loud and clear who is not only halfway across the world but living in a war zone.

But so much is lost over the phone... I'd always rather talk in person.

10. What was the best vacation you ever took?
I'm with Megan on this one - can you ever beat a honeymoon? The honeymoon rocked. Daryl and I went to Cabo San Lucas (in January! and it was WARM!) where we walked on the beach, snorkeled, slept in until 11am every single day, and ordered loads of room service. It was blissful. Cabo was beautiful and the weather was amazing, but mostly I was just thrilled to spend so much uninterrupted time with the man I love.

Other than that, I loved all my travels from Oxford while I studied there (Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Wales, London, Penzance). I will always be in love with all things Britain. Trains and tea and rainy weather and cultural politeness and biscuits and umbrellas and raincoats and hardback novels. I will always be miffed at why tea tastes so much better over there, even when I buy the same brand here... Their water must be magical.

I loved the trips my parents took me on (and sometimes still take me on!). My favorite two were Canada (Banff, Jasper, hiking, camping) and Germany and Austria (skiing, pastries, museums, driving on the Autobahn). The best moment of the Canada trip was when we checked into our campsite. We went to the Ranger's station to pay, and he suggested we go to the Visitor's Center to get information about the hiking trails in the area. We took his advice, and noticed that there was a free documentary playing at the center about the wildlife in the area. How educational! We sat down to watch the film. About five minutes in it became clear that it was not an educational documentary so much as a "When Animals Attack" film about grizzles. And we were going to go camping. In grizzly territory. Caroline (who was about twelve years old at the time) spent the entire trip jumping six feet straight into the air every time anyone within half a mile stepped on a twig. It was hilarious. It was also the gnat infestation of the century up there. My father also left the poles necessary for setting up our camper back in Wisconsin... And we had one small tent for five people. Oddly enough, I think the vacations where things go wrong often make the best memories. It was quite a memorable time.

Thursday Recipes - Rosemary Chicken

Today's recipe is a GF recipe that my friend Cam made for Daryl and I when we were last in Chicago. You know you have good friends when you send out emails chronicling your necessary-but-pain-in-the-neck dietary requirements ("no wheat or gluten, and beware, gluten is found in odd places like soy sauce, salad dressing, and the ever mysterious 'natural flavors,' and if all this is too much of a pain we'll just pay for GF pizza for everyone...") and they respond with, "No problem! We'll make chicken."

I haven't cooked this yet myself (I'm still working up the courage to stick my arm in a raw chicken and pull out the giblets... Yeesh...) but I can attest firsthand that it is amazingly delicious. And naturally GF, so it doesn't need any special additives AND normal non-GF-free folks will happily eat it. In fact, it's so delicious that I am planning on soon putting my arm in a chicken. Yes - it's THAT good.

Cam and Leah served this with potatoes and veggies, but it would be good with just about anything -- rice, pasta, salad, or bread (if you can eat that kind of thing). I've left in all of the extraneous directions from Cam's email because they seem pretty important (thanks for letting me plagiarize you, friend).

Happy giblet fishing.


Rosemary Chicken (naturally GF)

1 frying chicken, 4 - 4 ½ lbs (they usually say "Whole Fryer" on the label).
Rinse with cold water, remove giblets from cavity

In chicken cavity, place:
     1 onion, quartered
     1 stalk celery, with leaves (optional)
     2 sprigs rosemary
     1 or 2 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped

Slip a finger under the skin along the breast on each side and slide a sprig of rosemary under the skin, one on each side
Coat skin with 1 T olive oil (maybe a little more - rub in with your hand)
Sprinkle with 1 T (plus a little more) Kosher salt
Place uncovered in preheated oven at 450 degrees for 15 minutes.
Reduce heat to 350, cook 1 hour 45 minutes.

Notes:
It is worth it to buy kosher salt for this recipe
It’s important that the oven is preheated to the full 450 before you put the bird in – that’s what makes the skin crunchy

I('ve) See(n) Dead People

I did a hospital chaplaincy internship this summer. Called CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education), this internship is required for many of us who are entering ministry. I dragged my feet quite a bit on the way in (I really don’t like hospitals at all, but as my supervisor soon helpfully pointed out, no one likes hospitals), but it turned out to be a truly incredible experience.  In fact, I enjoyed it so much that I go back to volunteer as the night on-call chaplain when the chaplain’s office is short someone to cover that shift.



Of course, with HIPAA and just plain ol’ pastoral confidentiality, I can’t share any specific details. But I can say that I worked in an ICU and saw a lot of healing, recovery, and joy, as well as a LOT of death, grief, and sadness.

In a modern world where our lives are amazingly sanitized, death often seems very far away. It can even seem downright mysterious. When I got my first on-call page at 3am, my first thought as I groggily sprinted to the Emergency Room was that I might be about to see my first dead body, apart from funerals. What was it going to be like? Would I freak out? Would it just seem normal? Would I say something so accidentally insensitive that I would be kindly asked to leave the program and never become a pastor?!?! I took a deep, deep breath and said a very earnest prayer. “Jesus, help me do this. And help me not to pass out. Or say anything really stupid.” And, praise be, he did.

Anne Lamott, in Traveling Mercies, says that her two most-often used prayers are “Help me, help me, help me” and “Thank you, thank you, thank you.” Nothing made me understand this like CPE. When that pager goes off and there are only minutes to get to the room of a patient, and that patient may be in any state, from death to near-death to just bored and in need of a conversation (this happened much more often than I expected), those prayers fell like my hurried footsteps. “Help me, help me, help me, Jesus.”

Since CPE I’ve found myself thinking more and more about grief, mourning, and death. Not in a morbid or overly-fascinated way. I’m in no hurry to approach it myself, mind you. But CPE has a way of reminding a person how very tenuous life is. It seems like for every person who comes to the hospital with just a broken arm, another person comes in with end-stage cancer or an aneurysm, and never leaves again. Sometimes people come in for something small and find out it's something major. I also didn't really know how ugly and awful the physical reality of death can be. Sure, some people die peacefully in their sleep, but this is something I have yet to see for myself. In the hospital, despite doctors' and nurses' best efforts, death is often messy and unscripted and horrible. It happens at three in the morning or before a loved one arrives or hours after it was predicted, when a family is all but crazed with anticipatory grief.

After my internship this summer, I’ve found myself wanting to cling more closely to Daryl (difficult, as he is hundreds of miles away), to protect him (and the rest of my family and friends) from any possibility of a car accident or a fire or a heart attack.

But I can’t protect my loved ones from these things. No one can. So I’m left to face the scary reality of death and the (perhaps) scarier reality that we am not in control of when death approaches us or the ones we love. This has driven me to greater prayer, but also to greater contemplation of what I believe death to be.

A fellow student in my Theology of Scripture course today said, “You know, death isn’t the worst thing. We treat it like it’s the worst thing, but it isn’t.” So true.

A professor of mine said recently that he has trouble teaching courses on the apostle Paul because Paul is like a pastor to him. Daryl once told me that he didn’t know if he could write his master’s thesis on Bonhoeffer because Bonhoeffer is his pastor. As the winds and waves of seminary have gotten rougher, I’ve realized that I need to return to reading some of my pastors. And perhaps there is no one more familiar and comforting to me than C. S. Lewis.

Two nights ago I finished The Silver Chair. While this used to be my least favorite of the Narnia books (what can I say, I loved horses as a young girl, and they rarely appear in this book…), as I’ve gotten older it’s become one of my favorites. It speaks so beautifully to the utter slog that the Christian life can seem at times. Mired in modernity and confusion, Aslan’s voice can seem very far away, yet we must still follow him.

Anyway, I bring this up because of one of the ending scenes in the book. The book ends with the death of King Caspian. Caspian is one of the longest-running characters in the Narnia series. He appears first in book two (Prince Caspian), sails the world throughout book three (The Voyage of the Dawn Treader), and then appears again in The Silver Chair (I know modern reprintings have changed the order of the series, but I am a die-hard believer in their original order – starting with The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and ending with The Last Battle). By the time King Caspian is a frail, elderly man, we’ve known him over the span of three books, and grown quite attached to him. He sails home from his final journey to bless his only son, Prince Rillian, and then he dies.

Soon thereafter, the two children of the story—Jill and Eustace—are brought by Aslan to a great mountain. There is a stream on the mountain, and the dead king lies in it with the waters flowing over him. Aslan, Jill, and Eustace stand over him and mourn. The exchange that follows goes like this:

“Son of Adam,” said Aslan, “go into that thicket and pluck the thorn that you will find there and bring it to me.”

Eustace obeyed. The thorn was a foot long and sharp as a rapier.

“Drive it into my paw, Son of Adam,” said Aslan, holding up his right fore-paw and spread out the great pad toward Eustace.

“Must I?” said Eustace.

“Yes,” said Aslan.

Then Eustace set his teeth and drove the thorn into the Lion’s pad. And there came out a great drop of blood, redder than all the redness that you have ever seen or imagined. And it splashed into the stream over the dead body of the King. At the same moment the doleful music stopped. And the dead King began to be changed. His white beard turned to gray, and from gray to yellow, and got shorter and vanished altogether; and his sunken cheeks grew round and fresh, and the wrinkles were smoothed, and his eyes opened, and his eyes and lips both laughed, and suddenly he leaped up and stood before them—a very young man or a boy. Jill couldn’t say which, because of people having no particular ages in Aslan’s country…And he rushed to Aslan and flung his arms as far as they would go around the huge neck; and he gave Aslan the strong kisses of a King, and Aslan gave him the wild kisses of a Lion.

At last Caspian turned to the others. He gave a great laugh of astonished joy.

“Why! Eustace!” he said. “Eustace! So you did reach the end of the world after all…”

Eustace made a step toward him with both hands held out, but then drew back with a startled expression.

“Look here! I say,” he stammered. “It’s all very well. But aren’t you--? I mean didn’t you--?”

“Oh, don’t be such an ass,” said Caspian.

“But,” said Eustace, looking at Aslan. “Hasn’t he—er—died?”

“Yes,” said the Lion in a very quiet voice almost (Jill thought) as if he were laughing. “He has died. Most people have, you now. Even I have. There are very few who haven’t.”

I love Lewis’s reminder that Christ has gone before us, and for this reason, death is simply the pathway to life. Hard to remember, in light of all the suffering around us, but profound nonetheless.

Dr. Davis taught about funerals in this week’s Presbyterian Worship course. He asserted the importance of having some prayers prepared to help us in funeral services. This was a prayer he used as an example, and the prayer I’ll leave you with today:

God,
You have designed this world and know all things good for us.
Give us such faith that, by day and by night, in all times and in all places,
we may without fear entrust those who are dear to us to your never-failing love,
in this life and in the life to come; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.

A Little Pick Me Up...

Hello friends,

I've been neglecting this blog lately for two reasons:

1. It's our short-term at Princeton, where students take an intensive three-week course. For various reasons I'm taking one three-credit course and another one-credit course, so my short-term is even more intensive than most.

2. After I dropped Daryl off at the airport for our second semester of geographical separation, quite a lot of wind went out of my sails. It was rough the first time, but it isn't any easier this time. I miss him, and I'm about ready to be done with this whole 1,000 miles apart thing...

I'll do my best to keep up with posting. If you miss my little updates, leave a comment telling me so, and I'll try to get back on the ol' blogging wagon more regularly.

So, since I am often in need of cheer these days, here's a bit of cheer for you.

First, American Idol's now-famous "Pants on the Ground" singer: here on YouTube.

Secondly, Wisconsin and Minnesota's much-beloved quarterback Brett Favre's take, after annihilating the Cowboys on Sunday: here.

Despite myself, I'm starting to become quite a football fan (at least late in the season, when things are more interesting). This definitely helped. :)

Worship

I’m currently taking a Presbyterian Worship course taught by Dave Davis, the pastor of Nassau Presbyterian Church. In the first class, he brought up the question (as all good intro courses will) of the subject itself. What is worship?

To help answer this question, he showed this video: Click here.

Watch the whole thing, if you can. It’s just five minutes long. It actually gave me chills by the end. Apparently it’s from a documentary project about music, community, and peace.

Its connections to worship are many. The one I love the best (that actually wasn’t even mentioned in class) is the idea of our worship as joining a song that is already going on. When the first man begins playing and singing, he is alone. But slowly more and more people join the song that he started. In our worship, whether it is private or corporate, we do not begin the song. It is already playing all over the world. Men, women, and children, the whole earth, the angels of heaven, are already singing, and we simply add our voice of praise to theirs. We are not alone in our worship not only because God hears and responds, but because the universe is dedicated to the worship of God.

Dr. Davis made the point that this video helps illustrate worship because we all need one another for worship. We need others to “stand by us” and bolster us in our worship of God, for we are weak and changeable people. “There are some weeks you’ll drag yourself to worship and not even be able to sing,” he said, “but the person next to you will sing for you.”

This reminds me of some wisdom my college roommate Kelsey offered to me back when I was in undergrad. I was only twenty, and I was sitting in our room crying about some boy or other. She found me there, on my bed, and came to sit down next to me.

“What’s going on?” she asked. 

“Oh, nothing,” I said. “God and I have some things to work out.”

“Would you tell me about it?” she asked, kindly. “You don’t have to handle it all by yourself. Sometimes we all need a prayer that is stronger than our own.”

This is one of the great beauties of the Christian life. Yes, we are each individually called to follow the Lord. Yes, our obedience and response to Christ’s call is a personal decision and responsibility. Yet, we simply cannot go it alone. We aren’t designed to. We aren’t built to. And, mercifully, we aren’t required to. The Christian life is by nature a life lived in community. We serve a communal God—three persons within Godself. We serve a God who reaches out to us to be in relationship with us even as we are in relationship with one another. And often, each of us needs a prayer that is stronger or different than our own.

I’m excited about this course on worship, despite being a touch cranky that I am required to take it (I’ve already passed my Worship Ordination Exam, making this course a tad bit redundant). Still, I’m learning that my Presbytery does indeed have my good and the good of the church in mind, and I’m trying to have an open mind and heart during this short course. And, really, if I am going into the pastorate, reinforcing the theology of Presbyterian Worship one more time before I head in for my final review is quite a good idea indeed.

Dr. Davis also said something that made me think twice about those Sundays where I sleep in. I go to a church 45 minutes away, which is quite a drive on a wintry Sunday morning when Daryl is far away in Nashville. Listening to a sermon on the radio is tempting. Sleeping in until 2pm is very tempting. But, as Dr. Davis rightly noted (this is my paraphrase): True worship requires the understanding that worship is not about us. It’s about God and God’s people. Some weeks, the person next to you will not have the strength to pray. If you’re not there, you’re missed not necessarily because your presence was missed, but because you were needed that day. Worship is the work of the people of God.

Home for the Holidays

Hello, friends,

Forgive the lengthy hiatus - I intended to update more while I was on winter break, but alas, I spent the majority of my time eating, sleeping, and playing the Settlers of Catan. So no updates, but I have returned to New Jersey a very rested Courtney.

Here are some photos from the trip home (with accompanying explanations):

It was Christmas. Santa came to our house, in the form of a small, 1 1/2 year old girl who had a serious fascination with cats.

 

Christmas Eve I sang in alto for our church service with my dad singing tenor and Caroline playing her viola. This was our whole crew, including Eric, our worship leader and pianist, who broke his hip only a few weeks earlier playing broomball. He played the whole service and all of the rehearsals - that's dedication!

Christmas morning! Matching pajamas are a family Christmas tradition. Cait and I each got a sewing basket from mom and dad to help us as we continue to learn how to sew.

 

Jared, Cait, and Aleah outside playing. Aleah LOVES the snow, even though she can't even put her arms down when she's all bundled up...

 

Christmas night we always drive up to the Simeones for an amazing dinner and games. We look forward to this all year long. This is me, Daryl, and Danny (who is so crazy grown up now I can hardly believe he used to spend hours building cardboard spaceships with my youngest sister, Caroline...) awaiting the feast.  The sign on the back wall reads "Sit Long. Talk Much. Laugh Often." That about summed up our wonderful night here.

 

The whole crew (minus my dad, who was taking the photo), including classic Simeone salad.

 

We also had an ugly sweater competition.  Ugly Sweater parties seem to be rising in popularity, as this was my second one of the season. Luckily Mom and Caroline had some to spare for Daryl and me. Aren't we a classy bunch? My mom's sweater won. It's hard to see in this photo, but it shows an entire mantle with stockings hanging from it. And it has shoulder pads. Rockin'.

 

The cutest little niece ever.

 

Yellow Birch Lake in winter. Didn't I grow up in a crazy-beautiful place?

 

Caroline is a budding photographer, and she took some photos of Daryl and I for our anniversary. We didn't have many good pictures of us since the wedding (three years ago! eep!), so this was a huge blessing. She's really talented!

 

 

 

That's all for now! More photos to follow when I get them. We also had a few great meals with Grandma and Grandpa, and my aunt, uncle, and cousins came up to visit from Chicago. All in all it was a really wonderful, fun, restful holiday.

What about you? How was your Christmas?