One Year!

I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.  -Philippians 1:6

It doesn’t seem like it’s been that long, does it? A year ago, I was getting ready to leave Indianapolis to move to a town where I had been only once before I visited during the September Presbytery Assembly. It was my second move within six months. I graduated from seminary, moved to Indianapolis in anticipation of a chaplaincy residency, finished the last steps of the ordination process and prepared for a service and reception at Sunnyside. Then followed the anxiety-filled days in August when my work authorization was delayed, and the chaplaincy residency fell through. In the midst of the uncertainty, I had been discerning a call to parish ministry, and a trust in God’s faithfulness and call on my life that went deeper than my immediate circumstances.

God was at work! As I began talking to different churches, Rev. Jennifer Burns Lewis asked me if I would be willing to talk to a church in our presbytery. When I visited, coming into Valparaiso on the night before the first in-person Presbytery Assembly since Covid reminded me of the South Bend that I had come to love so much, the quiet, north-west Indiana vibe that was so different from the bustle of the Northeast and Indianapolis. In the year that followed, there would be an ordination, a book club, many sermons and classes, many celebrations of Communion, and the whole cycle of the liturgical year. There would also be many relationships, much adjustment, many tears, much heartache and much laughter and joy and love. Through it all, there is the presence and grace of God, sometimes clearly seen, often in spite of whatever challenges might be present, but always calling me back to the center, back to focusing on Jesus as Lord and Lover, back to the sense of call that began at my baptism.

This is the way of ministry, and of discipleship. It is about being found again and again by a God who surprises us. It is also about embracing, being embraced and wrestling with the same God, in love and joy, but also in frustration and tears. It’s about being confronted with our own brokenness and that of others, again and again, and yet being called back to love, a love that can only exist, for others and ourselves, because of our rootedness in the Vine of which we are the branches.

At my ordination, Rev. Joel Moody compared ministry to the “splash zone” and Rev. Susan Arner charged me to listen, listen, listen, to the Spirit, to myself, and to others. These admonitions, coming from my pastors who have become my friends and mentors, have become the two primary images to which I keep returning. Pastor Joel’s image of the splash zone illustrates the ways in which ministry, and discipleship, is one of total commitment, of getting soaking wet, and getting our hands dirty. It can indeed be difficult, painful and lonely but it is also exhilarating, exciting and as I used to say as a teenager “awesome beyond reason!”

Pastor Susan’s charge, to listen, three times, to the Spirit, to myself and to others has stayed with me just as much. So much of ministry involves talking: preaching, teaching, providing counsel, encouragement or challenge. Our world is full of noise and chaos: natural disasters, violence and hate, political and ideological polarization…..as well as endless, sometimes mindless distractions and entertainment, numerous ways to numb ourselves and escape from the noise into more noise. The needs in our community, in the church as well as in our surrounding community, can be overwhelming. In the middle of it all, Pastor Susan’s charge continually calls me back to my center, Jesus Christ as my Lord and my Beloved, my call to ministry, rooted in my baptism and affirmed both externally and internally and my own intrinsic value and dignity, rooted in God’s love for me and Christ’s claim of me. Hearing that voice helps me to listen to myself and others as well, to hear what is deepest and most authentic in myself and in them.

This is the journey that both you and I are invited on! Through it all is the faith that none of us are done yet. In the in-between time, between Christ’s redemption and call of us and the final fulfillment of all things, we live with the tension of the ultimate truth about ourselves and our world, redeemed and made new in Jesus and the “not-yetness” of the final fulfillment. The splash zone is to be fully immersed in that tension. The call to listen is to stay attentive to God’s voice through that immersion. All of it is rooted in Christ, in knowing that the One who began a good work in us will bring it to completion! Thanks be to God!

Love and blessings,

Pastor Julia