Winter Storm Warning

I just checked Mt. Mitchell's weather station and saw that yesterday the high was 18 and the low this morning was 14, with a -9 factoring in the windchill. Tough conditions! We had our first frost this morning. Winter is soon upon us. As I have been holding charge conferences day-in-day-out, I can tell you that there are marvelous ministries, but there is also a systemic anxiety in the air. The economic fallout has caused sincere people of faith to wonder about their future. My thinking is that we're in a time like the Great Depression and WWII that produced the "Builder" generation and what Tom Brokaw called "The Greatest Generation." As I ponder this coming All Saints Day, I think about my father who quit school in the 8th grade to help his family survive. He was 13 at the time the Stock Market crashed. He subsequently joined the CCC's (Civilian Conservation Corps), married my Mom, survived the War years and became a successful businessman and a superb Christian.

Churches were filled as people's extrinsic idols disappeared. Maybe we're on the cusp of another such time, and a time of great revival. I recently was given a October 2008 prayer by Max Lucado, "You Have Our Attention, Lord" that puts all of this in perspective:

"Our friends lost their house

The co-worker lost her job

The couple next door lost their retirement

It seems that everyone is losing their footing

This scares us. This bailout with billions.

These rumblings of depression.

These headlines: ominous, thunderous -

"Going broke!" "Going Down!" "Going Under!" "What Next?"

What is next?

We're listening. And we're admitting: You were right.

You told us this would happen.

You shot straight about loving stuff and worshipping money.

Greed will break your heart, you warned.

Money will love you and leave you.

Don't put your hope in riches that are so uncertain.

You were right. Money is a fickle lover and we just got dumped.

We were wrong to spend what we didn't have,

Wrong to neglect prayer and ignore the poor,

Wrong to think we ever earned a dime. We didn't. You gave it.

And now, tell us Father, are you taking it?

We're listening. And we're praying.

Could you make something good out of this mess?

Of course you can. You always have.

You led slaves out of slavery,

Built temples out of ruins,

Turned stormy waves into a glassy pond and water into sweet wine.

This disorder awaits your order. So do we."

Amen.

A Womb with a View

Well, I turned 53 yesterday, October 23. One of my 2 brothers (the one in the photo) called me as is our custom with each other and sang "Happy Birthday." The same song was shared gleefully at my 2 charge conferences last night. My other brother called earlier in the week and sent a card. He is in a nursing home and has a tough time. My brothers are special to me. I love them and I know that they love me. We're 8 years apart in age. I guess Mother and Daddy didn't get a lot of consistent alone-time since Grandmother and Papa's room was across the hall. I was 2 when my oldest brother left home for USC. I have no recollection of him ever living at home.

Nevertheless, with both parents deceased, I think about my brothers today and thank them for their love and care. They got to name me. They gave me the name William as my first name after my mother's father, and my middle name Timothy came from the name of the bear in the "Dick and Jane" books. No joke! I guess they got naming rights from my parents so they wouldn't kill me or because Mother and Daddy were just too worn out to do it themselves. Mother was 40 and Daddy 41 when I was born.

According to her, Daddy, and my brothers, she thought I was an ovarian cyst or early menopause for about 8 months. I guess I didn't kick a lot. When my Dad was attempting to explain the "facts of life" to me as a early teenager he asked me a peculiar question: "Do you know that you're a M.A.C.?" I replied, "Sure, I know that I'm a Mc-Clendon." He responded, "No, I mean a M-A-C, Middle Age Carelessness. Do you understand what I mean?" Reluctantly I replied, "Sure." That was his sex-talk for me. I guess he figured if I knew what he meant about my birth, the rest would be okay.

My brothers naming me and Daddy's attempt at sex-ed has often come to mind over the years and made me wonder, "Did they want me?" "Was it a happy surprise?" I think so because they sure did love me. Mother said I kept her young. I do know this in terms of self-awareness: I have too often tried to live in such a way by working hard, pushing frenetically to somehow prove to my parents, even in death, that I mattered and should have been born.

I want to give that push-push-pushing up. It's one of the reasons I love the mountains where I sit and ponder; I love pottery making because it's slow and reflective; and I need my cave-time on Saturdays to feed my soul more than I do the rest of the week. I guess we all battle our demons and tapes about self-worth. The best news is that I know my wife loves me, my children, and grandson are glad I'm here, and a lot of other folks along the way. Even better is that God knew me in my mother's womb even if she didn't.

Foundation

I heard an ad on the radio this past Sunday as I was traveling from one charge conference to another. It was for a company called "Ramjack" that stabilizes foundations for houses. The promotional byte that caught my ear was the line, "Many homes in the Columbia area have unstable foundations." That is true in physical and spiritual ways. With the instability in the economy, a rise in crime, the need for a homeless shelter, and the fact that it's a lot easier to get around the city on Sunday than any other day of the week is proof enough that we need a better foundation for all our lives.

I remember hearing the story, without recalling the source, that there were two guys who were living on an island. One decided to take the beachfront property to build his house. The other thought it would be safer to build his on the rocky cliff overlooking the beach. His thought was that sooner or later a storm was going to come. He wanted to be ready. Years went by and no storm. The guy whose house was on the rocky foundation high above the sand and surf peered through his binoculars on a daily basis at the guy down on the beach. At first he thought that the guy was going to wash away and appropriately so.

After time passed he looked through the binoculars with jealousy as he saw the guy enjoying the beach. He even shook his hand at God thinking, "Here I am doing what's wise and there hasn't been a storm in sight. I lugged all these trees and building materials up here for no good reason." Well, to make a long story short, the guy on the rocky cliff finally had enough and wanted the "good" life on the beach. He abandoned his house and moved to the beach and had a great time. Then the storm came and wiped his and the other fellow's houses away. The home on the cliff didn't suffer any damage. Too bad nobody was at home.

In the storms of life I am too quick to take the easy way out only to pay for it in the end. Sounds like our economy and so many other aspects of our culture. Marriage takes hard work, and so does being a parent, a pastor, or a dedicated lay person. As a District Superintendent it would be easy to stay in bed on Sunday mornings. After all, I've been in churches and with pastors and laity all week, BUT what about my foundation. Sands shift and foundations crumble without the proper underpinning. I need a ramjack every now and then; more specifically moment by moment. If I don't start the day with Jesus, I end the day washed up.

That's Interesting

It's tough to age - my left knee hurts from the weather change and moisture in the air, plus I used some muscles the other day in ways that aren't my usual routine. I played disc golf for the first time with one of the pastors in the district. I have a birthday coming up in a couple of weeks and that milestone always makes me think about my life and what matters, and what hurts.

I was reading the Book of James this morning for my quiet time and a verse jumped out at me. James 4:5 says "...the Spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely." That's an interesting thought and powerful. What it says to me is that God is so desirous of intimacy with us that it's like envy. Sounds almost sinful, but God covets (another borderline word) relationship with us. Wow!

I remember the rose-on-the-bloom days of being a new Christian when the thought behind every thought was about Jesus. It's not so much that I don't love Jesus that intensely anymore, but our relationship has deepened like my 32 years of marriage to Cindy. It's wonderful, solid, and we still have date nights and fun together. It's not infatuation. It's deeper than that. I hope that the way it is between Jesus and me.

However, I do find myself jaded by being a D.S. and seeing the ins-and-outs of church and clergy shortcomings. There are those times when I simply can't seem to get enough spiritual nourishment or inoculation to keep me from having more than a small degree of cynicism. I have been opening up the end of charge conferences as a town hall-style format that uncorks some of the most peculiar questions. There are important questions but some are downright wacky. I've had at least one clergy make a --- out of himself with racist comments and I tried to gently yet firmly suggest that he might be better off to stop talking.

I used to say to ding-dong questions that were nothing more than a passive-aggressive traps, "I have no opinion." In my gaining years my face or voice can't pull off that subterfuge. I do have an opinion. My new tactic to hear people without giving them approval or judgment is to say, "That's interesting." I have found it's important to not shake your head or move your eyebows when you do this or words will be put in your mouth after the meeting. Just look them straight in the eye, don't blink, don't head-bob, and don't show your teeth - "That's interesting."

Call it what you will but what I'm trying desperately to do is to defect in place, exhibit non-anxious presence, and let the people figure out their mess on their own. I need to know where I stand, especially where I stand in relation with this God who is envious of my relationships. I can and will talk about Jesus without hedging or wavering. That matters much more than interpreting the Discipline or pampering a recalcitrant church. As Matthew puts it, "See ye first the Kingdom of God and all these things will be added unto you," or in my case I hope it's some subtraction of the distractions.

Intrinsic Purpose

My pension account has dropped 17% or $70,000 this year. I'm paying for health insurance for one of my children, college tuition for another, and car insurance for all my children. I have some assets, but who wants to buy 2 tenths of an acre at Junaluska if you can't get a loan to build a house. We don't have a home. I've kept thinking that we would eventually get everybody out on their own and then afford to build something. Fat chance right now. I guess we can live at Cindy's mother's place if things go completely south. I'm frightened. Retirement is at least 12-15 years away, but how long will it take for the markets to rebound? I've already had one consultation with a pastor who was thinking that he wanted to retire this year, but doesn't want to now. What am I/we going to do? I think I/we better be doing things for intrinsic rather than extrinsic reward.

Many of you have read Rick Warren’s, The Purpose Driven Life, whether you agree with its overt Calvinism or not. One of its propositions is that we humans that are made in the image of our Creator should enjoy creating. However, many people hardly know what their niche is in life in general, much less what their calling is when it comes to vocation. We slide from job to job hopefully making enough to get by or better, and don’t work for the job but for the paycheck. College students graduate with a degree and if they weren’t fortunate enough to be in a co-op program their job chances are scary. Many end up doing anything, which very often has nothing to do with their college majors. We don’t give teenagers many opportunities to apprentice anymore. Mentoring or shadowing someone in their career is possible, but finding a job in that desired field can be very difficult. There are too many financial and legal liability hurdles that keep it from happening, so we end up hoping that our kids have some inkling, without any experience to back it up, what they want to do before they go to college, and that their subsequent degree will actually get them a job.

Thank God for technical schools, universities and lifelong learning opportunities that have a real job goals in mind. I’m not trying to squelch the grand gift that a liberal arts education provides, but I’ve seen too many young adults get degrees and have the ability to excel in “Trivial Pursuit,” yet wind up in a job that wasn’t at all related to their college course work. I’m for apprenticeships that help people fine-tune their options before they go to college or while they are there. I have a great friend, Ovyind Hellieson, who lives in Norway who continually applauds his country’s compulsory 2 years of government service that each young adult has to pursue after high school. He says that it helps young adults, including his own children, clarify their interests and goals. I like the public service idea: Peace Corps, Teacher Cadet programs or the like, to help bring maturity and offer a sense of apprenticeship.

My Dad was in C.C.C.’s in the 1930’s. The Civilian Conservation Corps was a way for lads without jobs to learn skills, discipline, and earn money to send home during the Great Depression. The C.C.C.’s gave my Dad dignity and skills at a time when he could have been lost to abject poverty. Plus the C.C.C.’s and the W.P.A. created some of the most wonderful projects that are still enjoyed today. They accomplished something and took pride in the result.

Many people today who are either youth without a job or adults down-sized out of a job because of the economy are facing another kind of depression because they work hard for years for a company or for a degree and have little to show for it. We have to do something about this! Listen to John Haughey’s words in his book, The Conspiracy of God: “In one of George Moore’s novels, he tells of Irish peasants in the Depression who were set to work building roads. For a time everything went wonderfully. The men were glad to have jobs, and sang songs as they worked. But after a while they discovered that the roads they were building led nowhere, expired in peat bogs or simply ended. As that truth gradually dawned upon them, they grew listless and stopped singing. In the words of the novelist: ‘The roads to nowhere are difficult to build. For a man to work well and to sing as he works, there must be an end in view.’” Our end-view is to work for God our Creator. I pray that what I'm doing matters to God and neighbor. That's reward enough.