Finding True North #11: Teaching, Worship, Names, and Kenya

Today I spent a lot of my time bugging Brenda. If things continue as they are, it looks like I'll be splitting my time between Brenda's office and Nancy's (where I actually have a desk and a church computer). That's fine by me, because they're both awesome.

Brenda and I were working on two things: planning worship for Lockerbie Central on Sunday (yes, this Sunday) and brainstorming for a worship design class we're hoping to teach. We're planning to lead a discussion about "Approaching the Bible" this Sunday evening at Lockerbie as part of the worship service, and I immediately put dibs on the Old Testament. Since my Facebook poll yesterday about sermon titles was at least amusing, I posted another question today: "If you could say one thing to a group of people about the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible, what would it be?" I think my favorite responses were, "It's hard out there for a...prophet" (Kate Flynn) and, "If it doesn't matter as much as the NT, then we sure are killing a whole lot of trees for no reason" (Sarah McGiverin). Nice. Anyway, I'll share more about that once we hammer out our plans for Sunday.

I've also been working on the bulletin and my sermon for Pentecost. I am *quite* excited about it. The choir has an anthem recalling Ascension Day and one focused on Pentecost, and the organ prelude and postlude are liturgically appropriate, as usual. And, of course, I picked good hymns. :)

For lunch, Brenda, Brian and I went to Yats, a cajun creole restaurant that is apparently a college favorite. This happens to be one of four eateries that Chad, last year's Duke intern, recommended I go to while I'm here. Check. The food was great, though I sure do need a nap right now. Also, one of the guys working there knew Brenda from Earth House, so we got free lunch. Awesome.

Something else I did today was to start a document on my computer called "My NUMC Directory." I adapted this idea from Laura Steed, who told us yesterday that when she first went to Kenya, she would write down names of and take notes about people she met to help herself remember them later. I procured a church directory and wrote down the names of people I've met directly so far, adding biographical info and memorable bits of stories to help me remember where I met them and who they are. I'm hoping I can keep up with this and that it will help me with name retention.

Kevin was out of the office most of the day because last night his father fell and was taken to the hospital. From what I've learned, his father has been ill for a long time—as in, over a decade. Prayers for Kevin and his family are encouraged.

The last thing on my schedule today was a board meeting for the Global Interfaith Partnership. It was at 4:30, so a little before 4:00 I decided to give myself a bit of a break to go read. I'm currently reading a novel by C. J. Sansom called Heartstone as well as Bryan Stone's Evangelism After Christendom. I need to finish the latter so I can write a paper for my evangelism directed study, and I need to finish the former because I'm not allowed to start Nikos Kazantzakis' The Last Temptation of Christ (which my friend Ben lent me) until then.

Anyway, I was just a spectator at this meeting, but it was interesting. Global Interfaith Partnership cooperates with various congregations and faith-based organizations in Indiana, and many more in Kenya. The Partnership supports the Umoja Project in Chulaimbo, Kenya, where the other interns are heading tomorrow. The group is working on getting an interfaith pilgrimage planned for clergy from here to travel to Kenya. They are also working on girls' issues and handed out the results of wide-ranging interviews conducted on a recent trip to Chulaimbo, which revealed the ways in which young women are particularly disadvantaged in that cultural and economic location. Ellen Daniels-Howell, the executive director (who is a member at North), said that professional women especially had a lot of ideas of how to help improve the situation of girls there. Also present at the meeting was Winnie Amollo, a former Umoja scholar who worked for the project for a year after graduating. Suzanne Anthony, a member at North (whose sister is in my class at Duke), just spent 4 weeks in Chulaimbo and reflected on the depth of relationships and competency of the staff that she witness while she was there. The GIP is really focused on empowering local leadership to make positive change for the community.

Tomorrow promises to be busy. I'd like to go to Bread 'n' Bowl, the thrice-weekly soup kitchen hosted at North—that's at 11:00 a.m. The Farmer's Market starts tomorrow at 4:00 p.m. Then there's some Board of Directors meeting I'm going to at 5:30 (I don't actually know what they direct) and then I *might* attend choir practice at 6:30. There are only 3 choir rehearsals left before they switch to summer choir, a more relaxed format that includes just a 10:15 a.m. Sunday morning rehearsal to sing at 11:00. I'd really like to be able to see Mark and Martin at work before that changes over.

As the summer cranks up, don't worry, I probably won't continue to post daily. But everything's just so new and exciting! :) Blessings.

Christians and the Old Testament (a quote from Dietrich Bonhoeffer)

"My thoughts and feelings seem to be getting more and more like those of the Old Testament. It is only when one knows the unutterability of the name of God that one can utter the name of Jesus Christ; it is only when one loves life and this earth so much that without them everything seems to be over that one may believe in the resurrection; it is only when one submits to God's law that one may speak of grace. It is not Christian to want to take our thoughts and feelings too directly from the New Testament." – Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Finding True North #10: First Day at the Office

I woke up this morning at 7:00 a.m., 30 minutes before my alarm, which wasn't a big deal because I'd gone to bed at 10:00 p.m. the night before. I don't remember the last time I got 9 hours of sleep in a night.

That's beside the point. I'm just really proud of myself for getting some sleep.

My first day at the office started at 9:00 a.m. with morning prayers in the chapel at NUMC. This is a daily thing that the pastoral staff does and which is open to anyone who wants to come. They rotate weekly who leads prayers, and today Brenda led. She read this week's lectionary passage from Acts and then invited us into a period of silence, after which we went through the prayer request cards people had filled out on Sunday. We also took joys and concerns from within the group present and prayed together, closing with a hymn. I'm pretty stoked to be starting my days like this. (Theoretically, that's how my days start at Duke, but those days start at 6:30 a.m., so, yeah.)

I totally overdressed, by the way. I wore an awesome new dress from Anthropologie with a pair of heels that is super cute, but the right shoe squeaks when I walk. I've had them for years, and every time I put them on, I think, "This time it won't squeak." It always squeaks. I need to get rid of them. Anyway, I overshot the office dress code, but I figured it was better to over-dress than to under-dress. Plus, did I mention my new dress is awesome? Because it is.

After prayers, I spent some time talking to Brenda about plans for worship at Lockerbie Central UMC, where I'll spend some time this summer in addition to being at North. They're planning to experiment with a new worship format where they start with a time of prayer and worship, then move into a time of conversation that is structured but not a sermon. I may get to help lead one or two of these sessions, and I'm interested to see how it goes.

By the way, when I walked into Brenda's office, the first things I saw were the guitar and the huge Bose speaker tower. Amazing.

After that, I spent some time in Nancy Fykes' office. Nancy is Kevin's assistant, and her office is where my desk is. She took me on a full tour of the building, got me set up with a computer login, email, calendar and such, plus gave me keys to the building and my registration info for Annual Conference, which is next week. Nancy is on the ball.

For lunch, Kevin took myself and the three Kenya interns (plus Laura Steed, who just graduated from Duke Divinity and is going back to Kenya for 18 months, having spent last summer there) to Patachou (I'm trying to do a better job of logging my restaurant escapades here—I had the Caesar Salad Wrap and their Highlander Grog coffee, per Kevin's recommendation). Not only was lunch delicious, it was fun to hear the other interns (Lindsey Long, Lydia Malone and Camille Glover) talk about their hopes for the summer. I especially liked Lydia's answer to the question about expectations, because she said quite simply that she wanted to learn to love God more. And when they asked me about my hopes for North, I was able to tell them quite honestly that I'm not jealous of the Kenya interns (because I was worried I would be); I already felt really at home at North on Sunday and am so excited about being here for the summer. Sure, I'd love to go to Kenya someday, and I know my beautiful colleagues will meet God there; but my call right now is to meet God in Indianapolis, and I couldn't be happier to be here.

After lunch was my first staff meeting, and it was genuinely fun. We did some get-to-know-you games for the sake of us interns and talked about various upcoming events at the church. The Farmer's Market, which is held in the church parking lot, starts this Thursday, and June 13-15 is Party in the Park, a community outreach festival they started last year (I think). There's plenty else going on, those were just two neat examples. I also got to talk to Brenda and Mark (the music minister) about worship; I'm figuring out Pentecost, and the Sunday after (June 19) I'll be singing a solo in church. They're putting a lot of trust in me, having never heard my voice.

For the remainder of the day, I worked on my calendar and the bulletin for Pentecost. I had to come up with a sermon title, and an off-the-cuff post on Facebook solicited these ideas (titles for a sermon of unknown topic):

• "Insert Sermon Title Here" (Anna Jensen)
• "Reading Between the Lines" (inside joke with Kathy Smallridge dating back to high school)
• "Reading Between the Lions" (Matt Rawle's early Christianity update to the previous suggestion)
• "Hey Paul! Is That a Thorn in Your Side or Are You Just Happy to See Me?" (Ron Beaton, a fellow 2012 M.Div.)

...and others. Just thought those were amusing. Anyway, I'm bad at coming up with sermon titles, in part because I worry I'll get a great idea on Friday night and have to change my approach, but my sermon is called "The Ultimate Birthday Gift." I told you I'm bad at sermon titles.

Anyway, I came home for a bit after work before going back out to a dinner with the Green Samaritans, an adult group from the church. Kevin had invited me along but had to leave as soon as he got there because his father was just admitted to the hospital (prayers, please). So I ended up having a delightful evening listening to hilarious stories about kayaking mishaps and learning about what plants you can and can't grow in Indianapolis. These people were so friendly, as everyone at the church has been so far, and it was wonderful to get a chance to sit down and talk to folks. They even made up nametags to wear for my sake, which I appreciated. (Note to self: get your hands on a church directory ASAP.) Perhaps the best part was Doris...who will get her own post. For now, I'll just tell you that I've been noticing beautiful textile and multimedia banners and pieces of art around the church, and I had been told the woman who makes them is 93 and has been doing that for North for decades. I got to meet her and learn about her work tonight, and seriously, it merits its own post, but I need to get my hands on some pictures first.

Apparently sunset was at 9:06 p.m. tonight; it was at 8:31 p.m. in Charlotte. Sunrise is closer together though. I hadn't thought about daylight being different here until I talked to my mom around 9:30 and we still had some light. But I digress. My first day at the office was wonderful. Tomorrow will probably involve more work on worship for North and Lockerbie Central; I will also probably attend a meeting of the board of directors of the Global Interfaith Partnership in the afternoon. And I can probably delay my bike ride until after all of that, since apparently it stay light out past 9:00 here. Good night!

The Isenheim Altarpiece

The Isenheim Altarpiece is a 16th-century work of liturgical art painted by Matthias Grünewald. The work is larger than the image I'm posting, but this is the section that interests me most. Karl Barth kept a print of this painting in his office, and he was particularly drawn to John the Baptist's hand. Being so Christocentric in his theology, Barth wanted to embody that finger that points to Christ. My dad gave me a small print like this, and I've placed it in the window above my desk area for the summer. I hope it will be a reminder of the importance of pointing beyond myself to Christ.

Finding True North #9: The Monon

When I was 12, I wrecked my bike. It was my fault, and I unsuccessfully lied about how it happened (I am notoriously bad at lying), so my parents told me that if I wanted to replace my bike, I'd have to pay for it myself. At 12, I didn't exactly have the money for a new bike, so I just went without one until the summer before my senior year of college. I went to Back Alley Bikes in Chapel Hill and brought home a Schwinn that had been fixed up and was a slightly unpleasant dark pink color. Her name is PB&J, which stands for Pepto Bismol and Joy. I quickly fell in love with the American Tobacco Trail, a rails-to-trails project in Durham.

Needless to say, I was thrilled to learn that Indianapolis has several such trails, the main one being the Monon. I decided to explore it today, and I ended up biking for an hour and 45 minutes. I went a little further than I intended/realized and ended up in Carmel, a suburb just north of Indy. The trail provided a pretty interesting cross-section of the city (which, thankfully for my abysmal sense of direction, is a grid).

I started in the middle of this first map, by Broad Ripple near the Indianapolis Art Center. This trail entrance is really near the house where I'm staying—it only took a few minutes to get to the trail. I crossed the White River and Williams Creek as well as the Indiana School for the Blind. I ogled the loft apartments springing up along the Monon as I went.

Of course, where the map ends is not where I stopped. Here's another map to show where I kept going into Carmel. You see how the first map ends at 96th Street? That's where this one picks up. And can you make out the uppermost horizontal line on this second map? That's 146th Street, where I finally turned around. Whew. Oh and Carmel has this massive new community center (Monon Community Center) right on the trail, complete with a performing arts center, civic center and water park (which just opened this past Saturday). Wow.

Probably the best thing about the ride was the middle aged couple I met when I stopped to drink some water and study a trail map during my first leg of the ride. They asked for me to take their picture, then we started chatting. Their names are Barb and Ken ("Barbie and Ken," they joked) and they're from the south side of town. I had been basically ordered to go north on the Monon, and I had no intention of obeying that directive forever, so I saw this as an easy opportunity to ask about the south half of the Indy Monon. Barb and Ken assured me it was safe, plus there is apparently a really beautiful trail that breaks off from it further down. I'm interested to learn more about what parts of the city are considered "good" or "bad"—apparently NUMC is on the cusp of both. Barb's brief assessment was that the south side of town is more laid back and less economically advantaged. Anyway, they learned I was in seminary and welcomed me to the city, and Barb said she would pray for me. Amazing. This place gets better every day.

When I started out this morning, I was feeling ambitious and thought I could tackle the entire trail today. But I haven't exercised in a while, and as the morning went on, it got hotter and more crowded (thanks, Memorial Day holiday). I can already tell that my legs are going to be really sore tomorrow. But the next time I bike, I'm going to take the Monon south and see what I can find.

Finding True North #8: My First Sunday

This morning, I went to church at North UMC for the first time. And by "went to church," I do mean that I put on my new alb, sat up front with the clergy, and read Scripture in service. Nothing like being thrown in head first.

I love this church. Worship was awesome. The choir (under the direction of Mark Gilgallon) sounded great, and the organist (Martin Ellis) is fantastic. The choir did an introit and two anthems—and people responded with "Amen"s both to the choir and to the organ. Someone told me after service that I seemed so relaxed reading Scripture, and I think it's because although North's worship is highly liturgical, the atmosphere is...well, relaxed. I didn't feel intimidated or nervous, even in such a big, pseudo-gothic space (I'll take pictures soon).

The pastoral team is great. Kevin Armstrong is the senior pastor; Brenda Freije is the new Associate Pastor of Discipleship and Formation; and Brian Williams is the Pastor of Mission and Outreach. Before services, I convened with the 3 of them in the sacristy...which they refer to as "the batcave." It is clear that this church fosters a sense of camaraderie within the pastoral team, and it was just plain fun to be with them. Everyone has been so hospitable to me already—Teri Crouse is another intern (she goes to Christian Theological Seminary here in Indy) and was so helpful in getting me ready for the service. I'm looking forward to working with them all as the summer progresses.

After both services, I stood in the lobby with the 3 Kenya interns (the Duke students who do field ed in Kenya spend time at North before and after their trip to Africa) to meet and greet. The church members are incredibly friendly and welcoming. Everyone I met seemed genuinely glad for me to be there. I already got recruited to play on the softball team, to go to the symphony, and to sing a solo in church. I was also struck by the diversity within the congregation; it is a predominantly white church, but I met a number of African and African-American members. Also, I need to check my facts on this, but I believe that North is a reconciling church, if not officially then at least functionally. Members had nametags, and on many of them I spotted stickers with the Reconciling Ministries Network logo. There is diversity evident in a lot of different ways, and I'll be interested to explore the dynamics of that within the church further.

I'm running out of brain power at the moment—after church, I went to lunch with the Kenya interns and one of their hosts, then I came back, finished reading a book, drafted my Pentecost sermon, and did various things until some of Barbara's neighbors came over for dinner, and they left a little after 9, so...I'm wiped. Tomorrow, I don't have to work, so I'm hoping to explore the Monon Trail, a rails-to-trails greenway that runs through the city (and on which I could theoretically bike to work if it's not too hot). On Tuesday, I'll get to attend my first staff meeting, and I can't wait.

What I'm Reading #24: The Evangelistic Love of God and Neighbor (Scott Jones)

The Evangelistic Love of God and Neighbor: A Theology of Witness and Discipleship, by Scott J. Jones

I admittedly read The Evangelistic Love of God and Neighbor (Abingdon Press 2003) pretty quickly; this is one of the texts for my evangelism directed study, and I need to get a few more books read and move toward writing my first paper. But I did enjoy it and commend it as a helpful exploration of love of God and neighbor as the governing standard for evangelism. This book is especially applicable for parish ministry, particularly in a United Methodist setting, as that is its audience.

Jones begins chapter one thus: "To evangelize non-Christian persons without loving them fully is not to evangelize them well. To love non-Christian persons without evangelizing them is not to love them well. Loving God well means loving one's non-Christian neighbor evangelistically and evangelizing one's non-Christian neighbor lovingly." Love is the source and rule of evangelism. This is not a general, sweeping, vague love but a concrete, contextualized, Biblical love. Jones stresses the importance of relationships, not simply as means to an end but as genuine meeting places where God's love is shared.

Jones wrestles throughout the book with varying definitions of evangelism. He notes the danger of seeing evangelism too narrowly, in the sense that its goal is conversion and its activity ends there. He works from a definition set forth by William Abraham and expands it thus: evangelism is "that set of loving, intentional activities governed by the goal of initiating persons into Christian discipleship in response to the reign of God." For Jones, evangelism and discipleship cannot be separate. He draws on the commission text found in Matthew's gospel: "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations" (Matthew 28:19).

Although I could have stood for a tighter structure in the book overall, I would recommend it for its accessibility and relevance. Particularly useful is the appendix, which includes a list of misconceptions about evangelism and 20 components of an evangelistic congregation.


Favorite Quotations

"The triune God is the primary agent in evangelism. Human agents play an important, but secondary role."

"[W]hatever privileged position we understand the church to hold in God's mission, it is highly presumptuous to suppose that God is not at work outside the church."

"It is not the aim of Christian evangelism to convert people. Rather, the aim of evangelism is to make disciples of Jesus Christ, and conversion is one part of that process."

"All Christians are called to bear witness in all places because Christ died for all persons."

"[L]ove is the chief criterion for the adequacy of evangelism."

"[T]o feed someone without inviting them to become a Christian is to fail to love them fully. Conversely, to invite someone into Christian discipleship without attending to their social, political, and physical needs is to fail to love them fully."