It's Not Time to Worry Yet, Scout

I’ve been staying in Dunedin for the last ten days or so. The night before I left I packed in a mad rush. I did that thing where you open your wardrobe, pull out all your draws and throw into your suitcase anything you like the look of without any real thought as to what is useful, practical or necessary.

Last year I had spent a couple of months travelling around the UK and Europe. I had packed less clothes for those two months than I did for these two weeks. It’s all about preparation really. I had been more prepared for those two months. I had thought carefully about the places I was going and the adaptability of the different items I had packed, whether they would dry quickly, or could be layered to keep me warm, or rolled up and stuffed into my pack so I could have more room and weight for other things.

This time though, I didn’t think about any of those things. I didn’t really care either. This time I was much less concerned about function and far more concerned about fashion. You see, every now and then people tell me I look like a teenager. Every time this happens I think to myself, “Cate, you have got to stop wearing jeans and a t-shirt,” because every time I do people think that I am younger than I am, and somehow I think that’s a reflection of my maturity, and therefore my respectability. Perhaps that’s a bit of a jump, but that’s the thought process anyway.

So, I turn up in Dunedin with far more clothes than I probably need. At least I thought I did. Suitcase after suitcase went around the conveyer belt, the number of people standing around waiting got smaller and smaller, and my suitcase still didn’t arrive.

One of the ladies at the counter offered me a ‘Feminine Hygiene Overnight Pack’ while the other checked the system to see where my suitcase was.

I had had a connecting flight in Wellington. I hopped on the plane and my suitcase stayed behind. I had arrived in Dunedin at 8pm, the last flight from Wellington for the day.

I spent the night at a friend’s place, just me and my carry on – which was next to useless. Who needs a laptop, a couple of books, and some biscuits when you don’t have pyjamas?

In my Goodie Bag from the airline I had a plain white t-shirt, size XL. I have never loved a t-shirt so much in my life.

This wee incident reminds me of the time Jesus says;

“Why worry about clothing? Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They don’t work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith?”

So don’t worry about these things, saying, ‘What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear?’ These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs. Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.

So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.”  (Matthew 6: 28-34)

This little story was true for me as I was sleeping in my extra large t-shirt, wondering if my suitcase would arrive the next day and I’d have clean clothes to wear.

This was true for me when I arrived at the Knox Centre for Ministry and Leadership and was worrying about being an Intern, and maybe even being a Minister one day.

I was worrying about a day other than today. Today has its own trials and triumphs.

Atticus Finch, a character from the novel ‘To Kill A Mocking Bird’, was right when he said to his daughter, “it’s not time to worry yet, Scout”.  

I don’t know if you are worried, but if you are, you don’t need to be anymore; your heavenly Father knows all your needs, and he will give you everything you need.

It’s almost as if Jesus was saying to me, “believe me when I say that I care about you. I care about you because I love you. And I love you because I love you. You don’t have to earn it. You don’t have to prove that you are worthy or respectable. You just have to respond.”

In a sense, I worrying about what I would ‘wear’ – figuratively.  It was about the kind of person I am now, and the kind of person I want to become as I am continue along this process of formation. It was about the kinds of things I was wearing from my current wardrobe full of characteristics and personality traits – the good, the bad and the ugly – and the kinds of things I need to wear as I continue to seek to be Christ-like. The words Colossians 3 encourage me, saying:

 ^“So, chosen by God for this new life of love, dress in the wardrobe God picked out for you: compassion, kindness, humility, quiet strength, discipline. Be even-tempered, content with second place, quick to forgive an offense. Forgive as quickly and completely as the Master forgave you. And regardless of what else you put on, wear love. It's your basic, all-purpose garment. Never be without it.” (The Message)

Perhaps love is like a plain white t-shirt; a basic all purpose garment.

So, let us throw open our wardrobe doors, let us clear out our closets, and;

When our caring tears apart at the seams, may we be clothed with Christ’s compassion
When our kindness is stained, may we be clothed with Christ’s kindness.
When our humility wears out, may we be clothed with Christ’s humility.
When our gentleness gets grubby, may we be clothed with Christ’s gentleness.
When our patience wears thin, may we be clothed with Christ’s patience.
When our strength can’t be found, may we be clothed with Christ’s strength.
When our love gets left behind at the last place we were at, may we be clothed with Christ’s love.

At St Paul’s we sing this song with our kids. The lyrics go like this:

Look at the birds of the air,
and the flowers of the field.
The God who cares for them,
he cares for us.

It’s not time to worry yet, Scout.

You are clothed in Christ.

It's a Matter of Life and Death

The Sunday before last was my final day as the Children and Families Pastor at St Paul’s Katikati. On Tuesday I began my internship there – I’ll be a Ministry Intern, a student for ministry.

I wanted to write something beautifully eloquent to mark the completion of this chapter of my life. Perhaps, a eulogy of sorts, as I reflected on and rejoiced in this life that once was, and will never be again.

Gosh, that sounds awfully depressing! It sounds like a part of me is dying. It sounds like I am wanting to write the final chapter of a tragedy after the heroine has died and all hope is gone.

The truth is; I want to let this part of my life die. I have been shaped by the things that I have seen and experienced over the last three-and-a-bit years, and these things have contributed to who I am and who I am becoming. I want to value and appreciate this time for what it was, and I want to put it to rest. Otherwise, I’ll keep trying to live this old life, I’ll keep trying to resuscitate something that was never meant to live forever, I’ll keep trying to write a storyline that stops connecting with the main theme because it’s just going on and on and drifts further and further away on some ridiculous tangent.

So if we imagine that life is like a story, and like any good story, with chapters and characters, conflicts and climax, each part of the story contributes to the overall narrative flow. This latest chapter of my life – one which has been full of beauty and mystery – may have come to an end, but it is not the end of the story.

The more I live, the more I understand that death is a part of life. The more I live, the more I understand that death brings things to an end. The more I live, the more I understand that death isn’t ‘The End’. Death is never the final chapter, but it is a necessary chapter.

The Gospels tell us the story of Jesus’ life, death, resurrection, and ascension. His death leads to life.

It’s the same for us too. At the end of our days, when we close our eyes and take that final breath, we will enter into death, and we will experience new life in Christ. His death leads to life.

So, if it’s the same for us, what if it’s not just the same for us at the end of our days, but every day? What if we didn’t think of death as this big, formidable enemy whom we avoid at all costs, or give our lunch money to so he won’t beat us up today? What if death is something we experience daily, as we stop trying to sustain life on our own terms, by our own exertion (which doesn’t really lead to any kind of life at all), and finally allow ourselves to be found in the life of Christ? What if we put to death our pride and our desire for control, and surrender ourselves to the One who is the Way, the Truth and the Life? What if we embrace death, and live?

That wouldn’t be tragedy. That would be triumph. Not because we thought it would make a good twist and decided to write that into our own stories, but because it’s a part of God’s story, and we are too. Our stories are found in his story. Our lives are found in his life.

To be continued…

Coming Home

I spent New Years up in Dargaville at my mates wedding. Dargaville is his girls home town and I hadn't been there since I was sixteen, and even then we were only passing through.

I think that marriage is a beautiful thing, where you journey through life with one person in a way unlike you share life with any other. As a person who knows nothing whatsoever of what it means to be married, I imagine that this beautiful thing isn't always an easy thing, because, as many of us know, life isn't always an easy thing. There are struggles and trials that are made all the more bearable because we have experienced joy and hope, and that we feel all the more deeply because we have loved and have been loved.

As I reflected on this I wrote a wee poem for Wayne and his bride. It's neither particularly beautiful nor eloquent, but it speaks of an enduring love, which is a beautiful thing.

It goes like this:

We are one, you and I,
We are united together.
We are loved, you and I,
Whatever the weather.
You and me feels like home
Because you are someone I love.

When it is time to build a home and settle down,
To till the soil, put our roots deep into the ground,
I'll be ready to come home
To someone I love.

When I've been working away all night and all day,
Overwhelmed with exhaustion, with no words to say,
I'll be coming home
To someone I love.

When there's trouble and tragedy,
When life feels like the stormy sea,
When all around there's uncertainty,
I'll be coming home
To someone I love.

When I wake early with those morning eyes,
When the house is a mess and the baby cries,
When you say, "we'll be fine," and I won't believe your lies
I'll be at home
With someone I love.

When we fight,
When we can't quite get things right,
When I speak words that hurt,
And when you won't stop digging for yourself that hole in the dirt,
I need you to keep coming home
Because you are someone I love.

When my body is frail and it's time for death,
When I close my eyes, take that final breath,
I'll be coming home
To the One who is Love

Home is Wherever You Are

The day before I left for London my friend Kirstin gave me some of her handmade cards decorated with koru designs and photos from her home town and surroundings in Otago/Southland. Kirstin, the resident artist at the Gordon’s out Tuapiro way and at St Paul’s in town, spent much of 2010 in South Africa and India – a seasoned traveller to be sure. She said that these cards were a good way to say thank you to people you stayed with and shared life with along the way. I was grateful for her advice, and the cards that accompanied it.

Kirstin also said that wherever you stay, whether just for the night, or for a whole week, put out, or put up your mementoes from home, your pictures of the people and places you know. Kirstin didn’t know it, but what she said gave me permission to feel at home wherever I lay my head. It wasn’t about homesickness, it was about belonging. Those keepsakes that connected me with the homeland reminded me that I belonged somewhere, that I belonged with a community of people in a particular part of God’s world. In the same way, I belonged wherever I was, and with whoever I was with, at that particular moment it time. I will never be divorced from where I’ve come from, but at the same time, I will never be disconnected from where I am going.

I’ve been back home for months now, and flatting with a friend of mine in a little house up beach road with a paddock next door. Occasionally the cows come in. When they do I spend some time with them, sitting on the fence and eating my toast. Wayne, the flatmate, is getting married at the end of the month, and he’s moving up north to be with his girl. On Monday the movers came, packed up his stuff (except for the alcohol and the aerosols) and took it away.

I’m staying on for the next couple of weeks. 

I made myself scarce on Monday. When I returned home in the afternoon the house was empty and the cupboards were bare (a part from the aforementioned possessions, and my room, where I had stashed all my stuff).

Remembering the wisdom and experience of the homeless traveller, I set to work making this relatively empty house ‘home’ – even if it’s just for two and a half weeks. It’s not worth retrieving the couch and kitchen table I have stored at my folks place. So, I bought my nana’s old red rocking chair, a side table and a bookshelf out of my chock-a-block bedroom, and set them in a corner of the lounge as a little ‘living area’.

This exercise reminded me to the time when God told the Israelites, who were living in exile, to make a home for themselves, to plant gardens and settle down (Jeremiah 29:4-7). Although they would not be living in Israel in the time being, they would not cease to be Israelites. Although they belonged to the land of Israel, more importantly, they belonged to God, and therefore belonged to each other. They would always be at home together.

I am not living in exile, nor am I far from my homeland. The nature of my age and stage means that I am in a state of transition a lot of the time. For now, my living situations are only ever temporary – for a year, or maybe just a few months. I would like, more than almost anything, to build a home and settle down, to have some stability and security. But, at the same time, I have itchy feet, eager to get going. Perhaps it is the nomadic life for me (for now). And so, wherever I am, wherever I lay my head, I will make a home for myself. I will settle down.  I will belong, because I belong, first and foremost, to the One who has called me here, and will call me on.

Guide me, oh thou great Jehovah. 

Story Telling

I am like a child and I ask you to read me my favourite storybook over and over again. Each time you tell me the tale it gets further and further entrenched into my being. I notice new things and I am drawn deeper and deeper into the drama of the narrative – I become a part of the story and the story becomes a part of me.

Don’t ever stop telling me that story. I want to hear it again and again. I need to hear it again and again.

Remind me of the One who created me and sustains me, the One who created us and sustains us. Tell me again of the One who made a space for us, of the One whose love will stop at nothing, of the One who is love. Remind me of the One who reconciles and restores, the One who redeems.

That’s the story I want to hear, that’s the story we need to hear. Tell it.

Ride it Like a Wave

'The Lords of Dogtown' is a movie about a bunch of surfers-come-skaters in Sante Monica, America in the early 1970's. The story is set during the time when the standards of skateboarding were taken to a whole new level. Skip, the coach and mentor of a group of teenagers, introduced his boys to a new variety of wheels for their boards that would change their world - they would be able to perform tricks that were never possible before. Skip took them out to a concrete drainage system and called out "ride it like a wave boys!" And they did.

You may have heard that grief is like a wave; it comes and it goes. Sometimes the full force of its raging power comes crashing down on you and you're left breathless as you struggle to the surface. Sometimes its swift and steady as the current carries you. And then at other times it's still and serene and you feel quite secure.

The change between these states can be quite unpredictable and I've been caught out more than once. It happened again while I was away.

I'd met my Aunty in Prague, she was heading over to the Czech Republic for a wedding of this guy she knows and I got to tag along. Three years ago her husband, my mothers big brother, passed away. It's been three years, and although I've come to accept the fact, I don't think I'll ever get used to Uncle Ron not being around. It's not right that he's not here and I found myself continuing to grieve his death. Perhaps the process is never completed. Ride it like a wave, Cate, ride it like a wave.

Jesus knows what it's like to lose someone; his friend Lazarus died. Jesus got word from Mary and Martha, Lazarus' sisters, that he was sick. When Jesus arrived Martha said to him, "where were you? If you'd been here Lazarus would still be alive."

I found myself saying something similar, "Jesus, where were you? If you'd been here Uncle Ron would still be alive."

Martha told Jesus she knew she'd see her brother again, at the resurrection, on the last day. He told her that he, himself, is the Resurrection.

He told me the same thing.

Grief sucks, it really does. I dont think it will ever stop hurting, but I think that I am getting better and better at riding the wave. I have become honest enough to ask Jesus where he was when it happened, and he keeps me humble enough to hear him say that he was right there with them, and that he was right there with me too, he's always with me, closer than my breath.

Jesus is the Resurrection and the Life, in him we live and move and have our being. Nothing changes that. Not even death changes that.

Imitation (sing it the way U2 sing 'Elevation')

My dad knows Dr Seuss' 'The Lorax' off by heart. He read it to us so many times as kids that it will be imbeded into his memory forever. When he is too old to remember the names of his own children, I bet he will still remember the names of the Brown Barbaloots, the Swammi Swans, the Hummingfish, and the Lorax.

My father has also recited this story to me so many times that when he begins, 'At the far end of town where the grickle-grass grows...' I am able to repeat the words along with him. I am yet to learn the entire story by rote, and I rely on him to help me along, giving me prompts and clues and suggestions for expression.

In Prague I attended a strings performance held in the old museum, which is closed for construction until 2015. It opens in the evening though, especially for these concerts.

The museum sits at the top of Wenceslas Square and is hundreds of years old. We entered the atrium and filed up the stairs to the main landing. From there four stair cases, two on each side, lead to the balcony above. I imagine that the rooms which run off from the balcony are full of history and mystery, and will be nothing but beautiful when the renovations are complete.

The musicians stood on the landing and we sat on the stairs. Sitting on the steps diagonally across from me was a blond haired boy in a blue shirt, about 12 years old. He too knew some of these songs off by heart. He played the air violin note for note, stroke for stoke. I valued his contribution and his enthusiasm. I suspect that the quality of his performance was thanks to his familiarity with the song and his opportunity to imitate the master musicans below.

Imitation isn't mere copy-catting. When I recite 'The Lorax' I am telling the same story as my father, but I tell it slightly differently, with my own particular emphases and personal style. When violin boy plays Mozart he is animatedly and energetically playing the song that was written all those years ago, and he plays with the passion his personality brings.

In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul said 'imitate me as I imitate Christ.'

As I reflect on this I give thanks for those mentors and role models who have significantly impacted my life. I have been blessed with people who are familiar with the story of how God entered human history and showed us what true and perfect love is. They know the story well, they tell the story well. They sing it. They play it. And I have seen something of Christ at work in and through them.

I've been shown how to love the story. I've been shown how to live the story. I've heard the beauty of the song and I've been given space to play along.

Together, let us continue to imitate Christ and share in the life of his story