I got a lot of productive work done today, scholarship essays and other legwork, but I also carved out an hour to go to my happy place, my painting table.
I painted and got my hands sticky with gel medium. I’m working on about 5 mixed media canvases at once, alternating as my heart whispers to me. I would love to create art that inspires others, and I would love to inspire others to create art.
If we are the sons and daughters of a Creative God, and we are made in His image, it only makes sense to me that we can draw closer to Him as we explore our creativity. How do you do this?
It is the time of year when we consider resurrection. At senior high Bible study tonight we discussed the story of Lazarus. Read Luke 11:1-44.
Found in John chapter 11, A quick summary of Lazarus is story is that Jesus and Lazarus were friends. Jesus is away but gets word that his friend Lazarus is very ill and needs Jesus’s healing. Before Jesus can get to Lazarus, Lazarus dies and is entombed. Once Jesus arrives, he finds that his friends are wailing and weeping & Jesus wept too. He opens the tomb (much to the objection of Mary and Martha and the others) and tells Lazarus to come out. Alive, a resurrected Lazarus comes out of the tomb.
The raising of Lazarus from the dead is a story that comes right before the leaders coming and turning against Jesus. Through this story of Jesus with his friends we can sense God’s humanity and his empathy for others.
Questions:
What do you think about resurrection?
Do you think the next thing you’ll hear after death is Jesus calling you?
Which person in the story do you relate to best? Why?
An unexpected bonus tonight was that we talked about how to read and study the Bible. We still lack a clever acronym, but we came up with this process:
After reading a passage, ask:
What does the passage Say?
What does the passage say about God?
What does the passage say about Us?
What does the passage say about the Relationship between God and Us?
What else stands out?
I also shared that Google can be a great starting point as long as you’re careful.
My husband Dennis recently told me a story about an interview he saw in the late 1980’s with Howie Mandel. Way before the days of a shaved head, “Deal or No Deal” and AGT, Howie got his start to fame as a comedian, and then played a serious role as a doctor on the 80’s show St. Elsewhere. The interviewer asked Howie what it was like to change from comedian to serious actor. Howie shared that he didn’t see it as a big change, when he woke up, he was always “just Howie.” Sometimes Howie did comedy, sometimes Howie played a doctor, but he was always “Howie.” I like how this way of thinking frees us up from being our job title. We are not really meant to be a particular job title, we are always just ourselves doing certain tasks.
Since becoming an adult, I’ve been “Erin the college student,” “Erin the salesperson” and “Erin the Youth Director.” What I learned is that the trouble with identifying yourself as a particular job title is that you can lose that title. Who are you then? How do you answer the “what do you do?” cocktail party question?
When I was little, there were a lot of things I wanted to be when I grew up – a mom, teacher, author, artist, veterinarian. As a high school student, I even said I wanted to be a business woman and maybe volunteer with the youth group (I have a senior memory book to prove this, by the way!) What I didn’t realize then was that the process of growing up takes a lifetime, providing opportunity to be more than one thing in a lifetime. I am still growing up.
I’ve punted on veterinarian, but, in a beautiful turn of events, I have managed to become all of those things I dreamed of becoming. I am even getting to dabble in the “impractical” roles…the ones where even the people you love most respond with “good luck with that” when you say you want to be that role. Depending on the day or hour, I am taking in the role of mom, teacher, author, speaker, coach, artist, business professional, entrepreneur and youth minister. Yesterday, I wore my painting clothes pictured above, today I was primarily a writer. Throughout all of this adventure, I am “just Erin” doing different things. I am having an amazing time living beyond a specific job title, even if it makes explaining what I do extraordinarily complicated.
What do I do? I’ll get back to you when I grow up.
Blessings,
Erin
Questions:
What are you called to be?
What would you attempt if you knew you could not fail?
“Live a Whole Hearted Life”
I have spent too much of the last few years of my life being a bit broken inside. Not necessarily unhappy, but not completely myself either. It’s hard to put in words, but it’s as if I’ve been missing some fullness, some of my more spirited self.
I don’t know that I even realized I was a bit broken until I reached a point of healing and wholeness. My sense of self has returned – I am back. It has sometimes been a rough journey, but I am joyous and thankful to God that I am beautifully whole again.
My prayer and hope for you is that you can find your own place of healing and wholeness. I pray that you can live with your whole heart, that you can choose to soar as your very best self. With God’s help, live your whole hearted life.
Be still, and know that I am God!
I am exalted among the nations,
I am exalted in the earth.
Psalm 46:10
Tonight I gave SBUMCSHBS the gift of quiet time with God. We have been studying time, Sabbath and connecting with God a lot this year. We began the hour by centering ourselves, getting the noise out of our heads and putting aside our phones:
Students, journals and pens in hand, quietly rotated through five prayer stations. Each station had a description, Scripture, reflection questions, an activity and a prayer.
They lit a candle and asked for God’s light in the areas of life that needed guidance:
They wrote on a stone as they remembered what God has delivered us from and what He has given us:
They enjoyed grapes and bread as they remembered God’s blessings from the earth:
With water, they were cleansed and made whole and renewed:
And, perhaps most importantly, they
simply rested in quiet meditation:
What a joy to share the gift of quiet time with God!
Shalom,
Erin
How do you observe Sabbath time?
What can you do today to quiet yourselves and just be in God’s presence?
At the Academy, we spend hours in silence. When you shut off the noise, you can actually listen. It is such a gift.
My day in pictures:
In limited ways, I still access the rest of the world, read emails and the like. I have been limiting this to maybe 5 minutes a day. While here I received an email from a colleague in youth ministry asking for my advice about a difficult situation. I have been in her situation so I could empathize. What a gift I have been given by having days set aside to pray about it and wait for God’s answer.
As a lifelong United Methodist, I love a good acronym. I present to you SBUMCSHBS, pronounced s-bum’-ick-sh-bis. Teaching Wednesday night Senior High Bible Study is one of my favorite parts of my week.
Bonus: It’s also my weekly Texas Youth Academy reunion with Jake.
Tonight we talked about how God communicates with people. We came up with these ways: through Jesus, through other people, the Bible, nature, letters, prayer, burning bushes, music, situations, feelings in our gut and voices in our heads. And the occasional donkey.
How have you experienced God’s communication?
Where have you heard or sensed God?
“The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood.”
-Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
I love that we live in a diverse community and that my children have friends of a wide variety of backgrounds and ethnicities. We have so much to learn from each other. Diversity is a beautiful thing, including gender.
Today I had more than one conversation about becoming a woman in ministry. My friend Jake sent me this article about the backlash to a UMC ordained elder who happens to be female: this article: http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/4617205/. Then, when I was at a birthday party today, a male pastor from another denomination was a little surprised when I mentioned that I was on the track to ordination at my church. My thoughts were later rounded out by listening to a Sheryl Sandberg TED talk (http://www.ted.com/talks/sheryl_sandberg_why_we_have_too_few_women_leaders.html)
It’s fascinating (frightening, disappointing, shocking? I’m not sure on the right word) to consider that women religious leaders face so much more than a glass ceiling even today. I wonder in how many professions that it not only is challenging for female leadership, but even has people claim it’s biblically wrong for woman to lead. By pursuing ordination as a deacon, the ministers of service, love and justice, I may be stepping into a fight that’s bigger than I can now comprehend.
I wonder if MLK, Jr. would mind if I amended his quote to read “The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and sisterhood.” It’s worth fighting for justice – something I especially realize when I consider my daughter’s future.
Where have you learned to value diversity? When have you had to stand against injustice?
The Perkins School of Youth Ministry 2014 has come to a close. Had an amazing week of teaching youth ministry Foundations along with 3 inspiring colleagues – crazy to realize that our teaching team had over 140 years of combined youth ministry experience!
Loved my week of teaching, learning, reconnecting and growing. It was both rejuvenating to be around “my people” and a little exhausting to not have my sleep and quiet time. Today began with quiet time and journaling at home. Caught my breath. Now I am ready for what’s next.
If you look closely in the above picture, you’ll see a prayer labyrinth ornament. This was a thank you gift for teaching at PSYM. My faith journey has included a lot of special moments marked by prayer labyrinths in some way – at Grace, Trinity, National Youth Workers Convention, First Arlington, Texas Youth Academy and now PSYM to name a few. I wonder if God is trying to tell me something through this symbolic gift?
Have you journeyed through a prayer labyrinth? What did you learn from the experience?
This is an article I wrote for The YouthWorker Movement, thought I’d put it here on my personal blog, too:
Are we failing the students in our youth ministry by teaching them to be too polite to God?
I recently visited a different mainline church’s youth group program. During the lesson time, the youth pastor asked the opening question, “What are different ways we can pray?” The room contained a wide range of students from goofy 6th grade boys to mature 12th grade girls, so the maturity of answers varied a little, but the gist was: Prayers in church, silent prayer, singing praises, spending time in nature, prayer with movement, liturgical dance, writing down your prayer, reading the Bible, saying grace at dinner…and so on.
While listening, it occurred to me, all of the prayers we tend to teach and model to youth are very polite, reserved even. And maybe even a little fake.
When I’m honest, there are times in life when I don’t feel polite at all. When tragedy strikes and it’s on the news – innocent children murdered while at school, civilian hostages being shot and killed in a Kenyan shopping mall – the emotions I feel are shock, horror, sadness, grief, anger. When I lost my job, I felt wounded, betrayed, stunned, hurt. I’ve silently grieved the loss of unborn children lost through miscarriage. These emotions boiling inside of me are neither polite nor reserved.
Learning to cope with strong, often changing emotions is one of the biggest challenges a teen can face. If I reflect on my adolescent years, emotions I felt then were similar to the ones I feel now, more intense even. I clearly recall specific times of anger, pain, grief, doubt, disbelief, betrayal, abandonment and more ugliness. As a teen, I did not know much beyond my own personal experience and emotions. What is different for me now is I have a faith mature enough to recognize that, no matter the circumstance, God is still good and God is still in control. Teens don’t all know that yet. Is there a way to help them deal with pain and anger and other strong emotions by teaching it is okay to feel these emotions, even to pray toward God with them?
What if we taught that it was okay to be real, to even yell at God?
Here is how I introduced the concept recently: In this clip from the classic movie, The Apostle (1997) you can see an entirely different model of prayer, one I know that my United Methodist senior highers had never seen before. In case you haven’t seen the movie (it’s really good), what you need to know is the main character, Sonny, is a preacher that is a complicated, imperfect character. He just lost the church he started and his marriage is falling apart.
I showed this movie clip to my senior high Bible study last week, followed by questions on how they have seen people pray. Well, no one had even imagined yelling at God before. In church we tend to focus on the pretty parts of the Bible, but if you take a close look, there is a lot in Scripture about struggle, anger, pain, grief, jealousy and more. We followed the clip with a Bible lesson on the wide range of emotions found in the book of Psalms, having the youth read to themselves. Youth reflected on their week, read Psalms from the list in the lesson that spoke to them, prayed and then wrote their own psalm prayer. (Here is the complete handout I used: How to Use the Bible to Improve Your Prayer Life, adapted from to “Holy Things for Youth Ministry“ by Brian Hardesty-Crouch.)
Maybe United Methodists in general are never going to feel comfortable with actually yelling at God, especially in front of others, but maybe we should. What I learned through this Bible study is that there are deep emotions going on in the youths’ lives, even on an ordinary Wednesday school night. We fail our students if we don’t teach them that it is okay to be honest with God. Sometimes honesty is a painful thing, yes? By giving a method to pray about their emotions, by giving permission to be honest and to deal with hard things head on, healing and growth begin. By teaching how the Bible can give practical help in times of struggle, students learn to turn to God’s Word for guidance. The youth and I also learned that they are creative and can make parts of the Bible their own story. My prayer for you is that you can model honesty with God, even when the truth hurts.
Blessings,
Erin
Questions:
What other creative ways have you or your church taught about prayer? About dealing with emotion?
Is there someone you know whose life would be changed if they knew it was okay to yell at God, to release their anger and hurt?
Mission and Art 