when the light turns on

i spent many years at our last church teaching a sunday morning class to middle schoolers. up until the point that i did it was a dry, dreary, confirmation-type class. the kids hated it and the teachers resented the duty they felt having to be strapped with the obligation to cram these heads full of the information they needed to grow up. i committed to the class only when i got full reign of what i was able to teach and how i planned on doing it.

it became 4 years of real joy. i found a groove with those kids that we all loved. i treated them like they had brains and wanted to learn and they gave me a place to begin to verbalize big thoughts and deep theology in a way that we both could understand it and grow. i loved those kids and they loved me. many stayed in my class once middle school was done because they enjoyed it so much. it wasn't the most popular class, but the kids who came really wanted to learn and knew that i could teach them.

it's one of the only things i truly miss about our last church. i knew i left those kids prepared to own their own faith, ask difficult questions and be okay with answers that weren't all about their heads and not their hearts. i still keep in touch with many of them to this day.

upon the entrance of my very own pink into middle school this year i realized that she was the age of the girls that started in my class years ago. i knew there really wasn't the kind of class that would help she and her friends prepare to own their faith in a real way that would help them navigate through their teen years. liam and i volunteered to do the middle school youth group on wednesday nights and i volunteered to teach sundays for the month of november.

the learning curve for mid-high is L.O.N.G. those boys have the attention span of a common house fly and earning the right to be heard with these young hearts was going to be the biggest challenge that i would face. it took me a week to understand that small tables wasn't going to be the best way to keep their attention. week 2 i circled the chairs and brought out 'the paddle of power' (sarcasm necessary) - a ping pong paddle that you needed to hold if you wanted to share your story with the group.

i decided that i might only ever get these four weeks with them, so i needed to pick my topics well. what were the things over 42 years of life that i would die for? what were the things that i believed were the most important.

i realized that giving them tools to help them build their own spiritual lives with god was what i longed for each of them, especially pink, to know. the first week we talked about being still, silence, solitude and even did a short ignatian gospel reading together. it's the most interactive, talkative class and it's like herding cats sometimes, but i know that there were real, live tools that these kids were taking into the future with them.

the second week we talked about the daily examen. highs and lows and what we can learn about ourselves and following god through listening to our best and worst. it was so lovely to sit with those 8th grade boys, new this week, who had no interest in being in the class, begin to share their highs with the class, then they felt safe enough to share their lows, without me even asking, and they unfolded their lives and stories before me. it was a sacred honor.

last week wires got crossed and i was given "relief" (that i really didn't want) but had planned on talking about confession, and following it up this week with forgiveness. so today i talked with them about both. i pray each week for a word picture or story to help me begin each class with. they always come and are so beautiful and rich as they help the kids engage in the process before they've even realize why i am talking about these things. today i brought a garbage can and a recycling bin into the middle of the circle.

they sat there for a few minutes ignoring them until finally one curious girl finally asked "what are these doing here?" we spoke of the gift that god has given us to be able to clean up the messes we make with confession and forgiveness. the garbage can was used in so many different ways to talk about what happens when we ignore our messes, or what happens when someone gives us their garbage to carry by hurting us.

i saw lights turn on in eyes today. bright beautiful lights. in bright, beautiful eyes. what a gift to be able to help these young souls understand the gift that confession and forgiveness bring to their lives.

i had a father come up to me after the class. he's a former pastor who's been through his long, laundry list of abuse by the church, and tell me how much his two kids like having me for a teacher. it's nice to hear from him, but i could see it in their own eyes today. i have missed that light.

years ago i thought that i was given children to teach because others thought i wasn't skilled enough to teach adults. what i found out was that i loved it. those young minds are such a joy.

parental bootcamp

i am hating this stage of parenting my daughter. she just turned 11 last month and we have begun to navigate hormones, mood swings and puberty and i am not doing so well. more than anything i want to raise a strong, capable, kind daughter - i don't want to crush her or bend her to my will - but dang, this is really tough to navigate.

as we did the examen last night as a family i shared that my worst was having 20 years of experience talking with young girls and helping them through this stage of their lives and being unable to do so with the one that i love the most in the world. i know it's time for her to have other adults in her life. i know that is why i had success with so many other tweens and teens was because i wasn't their mother. i was just a lady in their church who taught their sunday school class or was married to their youth pastor, or just plain cared. i know i'm not supposed to be everything to her - but i would give quite a bit to be able to not be the brunt of all of her frustration, the one she can't seem to stand and the one who she scratches at when she just can't figure out what she's feeling.

and i don't know if it is true for other mothers of daughters, but she is a window into my own soul and a flashback into my own growing up years. i know she is not me and i more than anything want her to be her own person, but dang, she is so me in so many ways - far too many ways that i hate in myself. i keep thinking "oh, if you're going to pick a way to be like me, please don't pick that!"

i realized when my kids were in their "terrible 2's" (which for me started at about 30 months and went until they were about 3 1/2) that this was more about me and liam than it was about them. this was boot camp for parenting. we were learning how to parent our children.

i looked at liam the other day and went "duh! THIS is bootcamp for the teen years". that's why this is so hard. we are now learning how to parent teenagers. and i'm sure at about 16 there will be a "boot camp for parenting young adults" too (hopefully i can remember that one is coming instead of being stuck dead center in the middle of it feeling like i'm drowning)...

i am learning how to parent my daughter as a teenager - it's supposed to be hard. it's supposed to take effort and intention. i can almost hear my own mother say "hey, if you're going to take anything from me, don't take shutting down, don't take pushing away, don't take withdrawl and feeling like your own failures are insurmountable here" - because, dang it all, i am so much like her too.

she smoked to make me go away. when things were hard and we were all nails and teeth with each other she would light up a cigarette and it would push me away. i hated them and she knew it. it was her way of controlling the situation. i never understood it then - but i do now. and yesterday i realized that i am using the computer as my cigarettes. i turn my head and loose myself in the screen and say to her "you can't ignore me, i choose to ignore you" - god help me. this is something i want to give back to my mom and not carry with me into my mothering of pink.

on sunday my counselor spoke at church about his father who had just passed away. it was a beautiful eulogy as he unpacked the wonderful things his father has handed down to him. he also was wise in speaking of the things that he didn't want to carry forward into his own life, the places where he saw weaknesses. he used this verse to explain that once we identify what those things are we are then able to choose to live a different way:

"In those days people will no longer say,
'The fathers have eaten sour grapes,
and the children's teeth are set on edge.'

Jeremiah 31:29

i know this is an opportunity to choose life and a new way. i don't know what that is yet, but i know what it isn't. it isn't easy. it isn't comfortable. it isn't natural. maybe i do know one thing that it is. it is worth it.

youth ministry - the next 50 years - part two

you can read part one here

i have separated these because this second half was influenced by an article i read this morning in the new york times and i had developed the thoughts in part one over the past couple of days and didn't want them influenced by this. i almost tossed them out because this article, it raised so much emotion within me. i think it's important to note some of that here.

New York Times: Evangelicals Fear the Loss of Their Teenagers

as stated in part one i have personal experience in the evangelical mainstream and have seen first hand a lot of what is referenced in the article. much of it now makes me squirm. the very things highlighted as crucial by those interviewed here are the very things i find so damaging and i think might be the very cause of the exodus they seem unable to explain.

i know, who am i to argue with the powers that be? voices like josh mcdowell and ron luce - they are heavy hitters with huge platforms. but i fear that much of what they have built is the cause of a lot of those who truly want a personal relationship with god becoming frustrated and becoming the be-leavers. those who still hold faith, but can't participate in the formal incarnation most churches hold to.

i see that the same tactics that are being used to influence voters are being used to influence church-goers and youth. so much of this message is based in fear.

hear the verbs in these sentences:

"evangelical Christian leaders are warning one another that their teenagers are abandoning the faith in droves."

"Their alarm has been stoked by a highly suspect claim that if current trends continue, only 4 percent of teenagers will be “Bible-believing Christians” as adults."

"We’ve been working as hard as we know how to work — everyone in youth ministry is working hard — but we’re losing.” (Ron Luce)

"The board of the National Association of Evangelicals, an umbrella group representing 60 denominations and dozens of ministries, passed a resolution this year deploring “the epidemic of young people leaving the evangelical church.”

do you you hear the fear?

ron luce compares himself and his draw to paul mccartney in the article (yes i know editing can do strange things, but the fact is he mentioned paul mccartney. does it seem as lame as john lennon comparing himself to jesus?) he is competing with a world and an enemy he can never beat. he was never meant to beat.

the article goes on to talk of fighting the great beast of materialism and the worldly culture - like changing the t-shirts on america's youth will somehow change their destinies and futures.

when did we take the bait church? when did we loose our way? the battle is within - not without. the armor of god is for your very souls - not to wage war against the world.

the inner battle is where we belong. not fighting against pop-culture and the media. they are not our enemies. taking every thought captive - now there is our work. that is what we're supposed to be teaching our youth.

how have we become the people who scare the hell out of everyone instead of show the love of christ? we have so lost our way. fear not. fear not. fear not.

we still don't get it.

i remember being at the national youth workers convention about four years ago and a wonderful old black preacher man was there. he talked about the stump from isaiah 11 - the nation of isreal being hacked down to the root because what had been allowed to grow was so ugly and distorted it couldn't be recognized anymore. oh do we need to pay attention here. this looks NOTHING like jesus people.

50 years? i have no idea what the next 50 years will hold. my own children will be having babies by then - god i hope we're on a better track by then than we are now.

love not fear. please. love.

youth ministry - the next 50 years - part one

if you are here from the christianity today link the article about ron luce you are looking for is here - youth ministry - the next 50 years - part two

the president of youth specialties, mark oestreicher (marko) has kindly tagged me (after i suggested some female perspectives) to write on the future of youth ministry. christianity today just published a 'future of the church' in the next 50 years and wrote a short article about where church youth experts believe we're headed.

the article wasn't as satisfying in it's breadth as marko hoped so he has tagged a huge variety of voices to give their input. as the wife of a youth pastor and one who has a great love for tweens and teens and participated in youth ministry for the past 20 years, i have my own share of thoughts on this matter. i have purposefully not read any other perspectives except marko's post and the CT article yet, so i am able to bring my own insights to the table here.

standing apart from youth ministry for this past 12 months has given me a lot of perspective. things have crystallized for me that once were curiosities or wonders. questions and difficulties that were raised in me while ministering are now finding answers and clarity.

i observed that during our time in paid ministry over the last 10 years that many parents and church leaders, usually the ones with the bible training and a lot of the power in the church, really want their children programmed with all of the right information to get them through the next 10-15 years of their lives without loosing their faith or their way. it is motivated by well meaning, loving people - but i feel it is misguided at best.

information will never transform anyone.

the push to indoctrinate the youth of the church, while successful in the two to four years you have their attention, cannot create the permanent lasting change the parents and church leaders hope to maintain in their children's lives.

because much of this indoctrination they hope to instill in the youth is so lifeless they must dress it up in rock-star clothes and hype it up with great displays of emotion and crusade-like events, hoping that in and amongst all of the window-dressings the truth of god will be consumed like the crushed up pill in the spoonful of honey.

somehow we have lost our way. jesus didn't come to earth in 2006 for a reason. in my opinion he came at the least opportune time for relay of information and message. i would have thought that god had more brains than that. cnn, mtv, satellites, dvd's - all of these things could be used to convey the powerful message he wanted his church and the world to hear. but he didn't. and he didn't because it's not supposed to be translated that way.

it's organic, it's viral. it's supposed to be about relationships. it's supposed to be spread like the cold my son brings home at the beginning of every new school year.

human contact is where it's supposed to happen. the man, who started this whole thing, said before he died 'numbers dilute giftedness'. yac had his finger on the next 50 years 10 years before anybody was really paying attention. bigger is not better. stronger is not more powerful. power is not in the glitz, the glamour and the games.

i think the best thing that is ever going to happen to youth ministry (and the body of christ) is the bankrupting of these great, grand edifices and campuses that are popping up all over north america called 'church'. when the economy drops out and people cannot sustain the big show anymore we will have to be reduced back to the basics. we will have real need, and be forced to face community with our hands empty and have nothing to offer except a shoulder to cry on and the love of jesus.

indoctrination won't help that freshman in college get through their first philosophy class at university. all that was poured into them will go up in a puff of smoke. it will evaporate. it also won't get them out of bed on sunday morning after that big party in the dorm on saturday night. the church in their college town just doesn't feel like the one 'back home' so they don't go.

we have spent so much time teaching out children to fall in love with church that we've forgotten to teach them that god loves them and invites them into relationship no matter what - no matter where.

i played a lot of team sports in high school. i was even all-state and the captain of my volleyball team my senior year. it takes a lot to maintain a love for volleyball when you're 40 years old and have two little kids.

i watch those raised to run or swim, or even play golf or tennis with a lot of envy. i never built those muscles. they are still running, and swimming and playing tennis - they can pick up and do those things any time they want to. they are able to maintain their relationship with their sport alone.

i think teaching youth to fall in love with the team sport of youth group is just as dangerous. yes we are meant to be in community - we are meant to be members of things larger than ourselves - but if we can teach youth that their relationship with god is their's and their's alone they can take that with them wherever life leads them.

they don't need the hype of a convention, the altar call with all of the tears or the activity of the group to keep them connected.

because our spiritual journey is a personal relationship with god we are meant to walk much of it alone. giving teenagers tools for this kind of life will take them far further into the future than any indoctrination ever could.

spiritual disciplines more developed than 'read your bible and pray more' would give them the ability to weather the storms of life far into their adult years. simplicity, silence, solitude, contemplation, contentment - i know it wouldn't blow the doors off the church or increase the numbers at youth group but what would it look like if we truly gave the those hungry teens in our communities the ability to commune with god? where would it lead them? where would it lead the church?

i don't know what the next 50 years will hold for youth ministry or the church, but i do know that if this happened maybe the church might not look any different, but the world surely would.

p!nk - conversations with my 13 year old self

darren at alternative hymnal has a great post on a song i wasn't familiar with by p!nk called 'conversations with my 13 year old self' - i know that i and some other blogging women i've spoken to have a real struggle with embracing that child within - that scared little girl or teen we were.

i think by doing so we heal somehow. p!nk does that here so beautifully:

Conversations with my thirteen year old self
Conversations with my thirteen year old self

You’re angry
I know this
The world couldn’t care less
You’re lonely
I feel this
And you wish you were the best
No teachers
Or guidance
And you always walk alone
You’re crying
At night when
Nobody else is home

Come over here and let me hold your hand and hug you darling
I promise you that it won’t always feel this bad
There are so many things I want to say to you
You’re the girl I used to be
You little heartbroken thirteen year old me

You’re laughing
But you’re hiding
God I know that trick too well
You forget
That I’ve been you
And now I’m just the shell
I promise
I love you and
Everything will work out fine
Don’t try to
Grow up yet
Oh just give it some time

The pain you feel is real you’re not asleep but it’s a nightmare
But you can wake up anytime
Oh don’t lose your passion or the fighter that’s inside of you
You’re the girl I used to be
The pissed off complicated thirteen year old me

Conversations with my thirteen year old self
Conversations with my thirteen year old self

Until we meet again
Oh I wish you well oh
I wish you well
Little girl
Until we meet again
Oh
I wish you well
Little girl
I wish you well
Until we meet again
My little thirteen year old me

darren also has a brilliant idea for youth pastors or parents of teens to create media interviews of what they would tell their 13 year old self to show to the teens at their churches. i think this would be incredibly powerful - he says it brilliantly here:

The Alternative Hymnal » Pink - Conversations With My 13 Year Old Self

Blog Tour for Contemplative Youth Ministry

CONTEMPLATIVE YOUTH MINISTRY
Practicing the Presence of Jesus, Mark Yaconelli

oh to hold in my hand a book with the name yaconelli on the spine - it thrills my heart indeed! please everyone not associated with youth ministry - keep reading - this book is for ALL OF US! it's an incredible resource for all who long for the bridge to the contemplative life. it's heartfelt, honoring and a joy to read. mark has truly taken his time and this book has the taste of fine, aged wine. oh, and the forward by the high-priestess anne lamott is a wonderful surprise and insight into her church and their ministry to their youth (including her son).

first off I LOVE the book, it has been so validating to read as liam and i left a youth pastor position at a fairly large evangelical church within the past 12 months because of our deep desire to have a contemplative youth ministry and the church's desire for him to indoctrinate the youth colliding. i can't wait for him to have the opportunity to read it.

DISCLOSURE: this book was provided to me free of charge by zondervan as christian bookstores are few and far between on this edge of the ocean! i am not being paid or otherwise compensated for this review.

i had a wonderful opportunity to supply mark with questions - many others on the tour have taken the scholastic and vocational perspective on the book - my blog isn't really that kind of place, so my questions are a bit more personal:

First, let me say how much I appreciated the introductions to each chapter - the quotes - from such amazing contemplatives married with quotes from youth and youth workers - it was so honoring. Were these extraordinary people, mystics of some sort, or normal people who had spent time alone with God?

For seven years I worked with very average, normal, in some cases dying congregations, seeking to try and form them in contemplative awareness. The quotes in the book come from people from these churches. They are accountants, electrical linemen, receptionists, part-time and full time youth workers who innocently participated in my work and were introduced to contemplative prayer and practice. To be a mystic is to experience God. We are all mystics. These people were just given the time to notice it, to notice God, to notice the thin, frail, thread of eternity that runs through each and every moment.

My husband and I attempted to bring contemplative ministry to an evangelical church and found so much resistance. Your book was incredibly affirming for me to read because of this. Is there hope for helping that style of church to receive this type of ministry, or are they destined (doomed) to indoctrination only? We found the youth incredibly receptive, but the leadership of the church we were in was threatened and abrasive to our work. We made our great share of mistakes along the way, and I was wondering if you had any advice for youth workers who find themselves in our situation to navigate this in a better way than we did?

It's difficult to work in the church. There are so many egos and insecurities. So many ways that the church has absorbed the values and mores of the culture (sigh). I don't know what the specific "resistance" is that you experienced. Most churches are simply secular institutions with a religious veneer. There's a driveness to succeed, to produce results, to grow numbers, to be productive and efficient--just like any American profit-making institution. Unfortunately, this is all in contrast to the Spirit, message, and life of Jesus. Jesus, to be truthful, is unproductive (in the world's terms), inefficient and the "results" of his ministry are ambiguous (the disciples flee, misunderstand his identity and intentions, etc.).

"Success is not a name for God" Martin Buber once said, nor is it a name for Jesus. And yet most churches and pastors want to succeed. If not success, then what is it we're after? Faithfulness. Transparency to God. Obedience (which etymologically means "to listen"). Our job is to be faithful, Mother Teresa once said, not successful. We don't need churches speaking spiritual truth we need churches that know how to embody the spirit.

To embody the Spirit, we need to slow down. We need patience. We need to pray and wait and trust and listen and then respond. We need to stop running ahead of grace. How do you do this when you have a leadership "driven to succeed?" You speak the truth in love. You find others within the church who will slow down, pray and then move intentionally. Most of all you pray and listen for what God is really asking of you...and then you trust and respond.

As a follow up do you think you can pull a Stormie Omartian and follow up with "Contemplative Senior Pastoring" and "Contemplative Parenting"? You really could make a full career out of this one book title! On a more serious note - how do we get this book into the hands (and hearts) of those in church leadership?

Actually, I am thinking about writing a "contemplative parenting" book. Mostly based on my wife as the positive examples and my own parenting methods as the worst case scenarios. My wife is a natural contemplative...where as I struggle to be engaged and attentive. That's why contemplation is interesting to me...it's something I need. In terms of how to get it to the leadership...give them the book and ask them to read it. Or, for senior pastor types who might dis-regard it...give them Eugene Peterson's "The Contemplative Pastor" or Gerald May's "The Awakened Heart."

On page 74 you write "To stop and surrender is to repent" - it is a small thought that isn't fully developed, but it made me gasp when I read it - in our work-aholic, fast-paced world I can think of nothing that the church needs more than to repent of this kind of lifestyle - I loved the idea that taking time to be silent is a form of repentance - could you expand on that thought please?

More and more I'm convinced that the root of our brokenness, as North Americans, is our inability to be present to God and others. The reason we're unable to be present to others is because we're moving too fast, multi-tasking, moving from one activity to another without absorbing/feeling what we're doing. It's difficult to pay attention when there is great suffering and pain in the world. It's much easier to stay distracted and busy when slowing down often means feeling pain, or helplessness or acknowledging the ways in which we are hurting ourselves, our children or our world.

One month after the United States began the 2003 bombing and invasion of Iraq, a neighbor of mine began to post pictures of the civilian dead. She collected these images from European and Middle Eastern news services, then pinned them to the large sycamore tree that grew along the sidewalk in front of her house. Each photograph was covered by a white piece of paper. Above the images was a sign that read, If you are willing, look and see the suffering and death we're causing in Iraq. One day I took the time to look. The images were horrific. Most of them of mothers and fathers grieving over young children whose bodies had been torn apart from the bombing.

For the next two years my neighbor continued to post pictures on top of pictures until the sycamore became covered in sheets of white paper. I had many occasions over those two years to observe people walking along the busy sidewalk in front of my neighbor's house, not once did I see someone stop and look at these images. More frequently, what I observed was people turning their head to avoid the invitation to look and witness the pain and suffering.

The truth is that slowing down and being present to life is hard and painful. Who wants to slow down and notice a world that is increasingly becoming, what former President Jimmy Carter recently labeled a culture of death. Who wants to slow down and recognize the pain and violence that so many youth are forced to live with. Who wants to pray and become vulnerable to bleeding and brokenness within so many families? Who can really stand to look and see the devastation that is occurring in our natural world? Who wants to be aware of the ways in which our faith, our churches, our ministries seem so inadequate at inviting any real change or hope within people? It's difficult to be present. It's difficult to see and hear. It's also difficult to be vulnerable and aware. And yet, as Biblical scholar Walter Brueggeman reminds us, our central task in ministry is making people aware.

We trust the truth, we trust the stories of faith passed down from generation to generation and most of all we trust God. We trust God that our sins, our brokenness, our fears and mediocre attempts at loving are not the last word. We trust that God is on a mission of love and that love, like Jesus, always comes vulnerable, undefended in weakness and trust. Can we believe that our weakness and helplessness makes us more available to God's love and presence? How do we begin to repent? We slow down. We stop. We look. We listen. We feel.

Your father was/is one of my mentors, I know he would be/is so proud of you and your book. I had a parent, my mother, die early in her life and I wondered if it gives you comfort to know that your dad was able to experience the contemplative life before he died?

My spiritual life is deeply connected to my dad's. I kind of began where he was leaving off. He started reading Henri Nouwen in his mid forties, I read him in my early twenties. So much of my spiritual life was in dialogue with my dad. We were reading similar books and both of us felt excited that we were on to something new and life-giving.

I realized, a couple of years before he died, that much of my motivation in doing contemplative retreats was to provide a place and setting for my dad to experience the contemplative life. In many ways I got to go out and get the formation and training that my dad was looking for and I wanted to share it with him. My dad was a busy man. It was hard to get him to slow down...even harder to get him to do something for himself.

When I started leading Sabbath retreats (five day contemplative retreats for youth workers) I asked him to come and be the speaker....knowing that he would only come if there was work to do. Once he arrived I made him join a small group, see a spiritual director, do the prayer exercises, keep silence, and do everything else the participants were required to do. He did it and loved it and I think his best writing and speaking came out of these weeks of prayer and retreat. I cherish the times that he and I had together sharing our gifts side-by-side. It was nurturing to both of us.

While everyone else was jumping on the publishing bandwagon as soon as the 'ancient/future' scent entered the radar screen of the church I was always so amazed with your patience in writing this book. How did you maintain your time schedule and not bust out of it? Your book is so much better for it. Cut could you tell wanna-be writers like me what it was like for you along the patient process?

You're one of the few people to notice this. When I first started exploring the integration of Christian spirituality, spiritual direction, contemplative prayer and youth ministry I could tell immediately that the Christian marketing forces would want to exploit it (after all, I am the son of a publisher...). When I wrote an article on contemplative youth ministry in 1998 in the Christian Century I was contacted by six publishers and a big time publishing agent. Everyone wanted to do a book. Two different publishers offered me a book line and one publisher offered to hire ghost writers to write under my name.

My feeling, at the time, was that people needed to experience contemplative prayer...not read about it. So I refused to write anything. I then bullied and pleaded with my dad not to produce any books on the subject...he held out for three years. I also called friends at the upper room publishing and other publishing houses and asked them not to publish any books on the subject.

I wanted people to come to Sabbath and other contemplative retreats and experience it first. Of course this was unrealistic and soon books began to come out. Most of them are what I feared...they're written as journalistic books (sort of a tour of contemplative practices) or cut and paste together like any other educational curriculum. Contemplation is about the spirit and attitude or disposition by which we approach life. It's a certain awareness, openess, transparency.

People receive a book from the same place from which a person writes a book. If you have people writing about contemplative prayer...but not experiencing contemplative prayer then the book can be clever or informational...but never transformational. I wasn't ready to write a book from my heart eight years ago. It took ten years of struggling with prayer. Ten years of praying through doubt, grief, disillusionment, struggle, breakthroughs, etc....before I felt ready to write. I'm glad I waited....even though I often wanted to write much earlier.

And this was the question I always asked your dad - who are you reading? Who are the new contemplatives we need to know about?

I love Richard Rohr. He's a radical, Jesus-loving, truth telling itinerant Franciscan. I read all of his stuff.

Gerald May's "The Awakened Heart" is one of my touch stones.

I'm going through Elie Wiesel's works right now...trying to see how he brings together suffering and mysticism and Fredrick Buechner ("The Eyes of the Heart" and his collection of sermons).

And last, but not least - could I please have the recipe for the Famous Yaconelli Fried Spaghetti?

This is actually something I used to have for breakfast growing up and ate it almost every week in college. You chop up one onion a few cloves of garlic and fry it up with plenty of olive oil. Then you throw in spaghetti...already cooked and cooled in the refrigerator. You add lots of fresh black pepper and then top it with fresh Parmesan cheese (in college I used the canned stuff). Now days I also add broccoli or asparagus.

ah, the breakfast of champions! thank you mark! i so enjoyed reading your responses and look forward to what the future holds for you! you carry the yaconelli name so well!

here are the other previous & future stops on the grid-blog tour:

May 8 Jonny Baker
May 9 Gavin Richardson
May 10 Sarah Dylan Breuer she never posted a review
May 11 Jennifer Roach
May 12 Mark Oestreicher
May 15 Dixon Kinser
May 17 Jonathon Norman
May 19 Adam Cleaveland
May 22 Steve Case
May 24 Tim Van Meter
May 26 Lucas Land
May 29 Andy Jack
May 31 me
June 2 Darren Wright
June 5 Kester Brewin
June 7 Lilly Lewin
June 9 Mike King

all i know is that i am honored to be listed with such an amazing group of bloggers and have the opportunity to interact with mark as i blame he and his father for awakening my soul to the voice of god. you can read what i wrote about that here:

god i miss him

i remember

tears of joy

weepy day

i have been reading mark yaconelli's book 'contemplative youth ministry' for the past couple of weeks as i will be reviewing it on wednesday here on my blog as part of the grid-blog tour. i have been putting off writing mark as each time i sat down i was just overwhelmed with emotion. the fast approaching deadline forced my hand today and so i spent this morning in centering prayer and opened up to the emotions i had been holding back for far too long.

mark and his father mike were midwives of sorts to a very big spiritual awakening i had - i credit them for giving god permission to speak into my life (credit/blame - it's all the same!). they both taught me how to practice the presence of god - and remembering and honoring those emotions today has caused a lot of tears. if you've been reading my blog for a while you'll remember back in october i got a chance to thank mark at the nywc in pittsburgh and did the big ugly cry, right in front of him - trying to fight it the whole time. i was also dressed like a angel/fairy and he was the epitome of grace and kindness. he told me that my tears were a prayer, softening the hardened ground. well, today the ground is much softer as i have spent much time watering/praying.

it all seems so inefficient - i have THINGS TO DO - sitting in silence and tears just seems so indulgent, risky and like i'm tempting depression to take back it's ulgy hold on my life. how do we get to the place in our minds that doing the thing that will keep us from depression (being present to our emotions) is the exact opposite of what we tell ourselves - fight the emotions, keep a stiff upper lip, just keep swimming, just keep swimming... it's irony isn't lost on me here.

and so today i will enjoy the dirt under my psychological fingernails and plant some seeds in the tender soil of my soul and water them with my tears as i remember and am present to these life-changing memories and emotions.

blog tour for contemplative youth ministry

i have been asked to blog on mark yaconelli's new book "contemplative youth ministry" as part of a grid-blog this month. i am honored and excited. the book just arrived in the mail today and i can't wait to have some time to sink my brain and soul into it.

my official day isn't until may 31, but i wanted to make sure you were reading what everyone else had to say too. bob carlton at 'the corner' is the master of the grid-blog and this is what he had to say:

For the next month, Mark will be touring a group of blogs, sharing his story in ways that are unique to that blog and the community that reads it. I invite you to journey along with us, to offer your voice and experience integrating Christian spirituality and ministry.

May 8 Jonny Baker
May 9 Gavin Richardson
May 10 Sarah Dylan Breuer cannot find the link/post
May 11 Jennifer Roach
May 12 Mark Oestreicher
May 15 Dixon Kinser
May 17 Jonathon Norman
May 19 Adam Cleaveland
May 22 Steve Case
May 24 Tim Van Meter
May 26 Lucas Land
May 29 Andy Jack
May 31 me
June 2 Darren Wright
June 5 Kester Brewin
June 7 Lilly Lewin
June 9 Mike King

all i know is that i am honored to be listed with such an amazing group of bloggers and have the opportunity to interact with mark as i blame he and his father for awakening my soul to the voice of god. you can read what i wrote about that here:

god i miss him

i remember

tears of joy

big news from youth specialties

woo hoo!!!! BIG news from YS!

Congratulations Marko, Tic & Karla (& co!) Celebrating with you all today!

TGIF!

whew, this week has been a whirlwind. it started last weekend as we had a spiritual retreat planned for the youth at the church. we set up the auditorium with 12 stations where they could do everything from listening prayer to make prayer beads to give themselves henna tattoos with christian symbols. we also set up the prayer path labyrinth for them to experience.

we kept it up until today so my small group of women could attend instead of our normal study today. only 5 showed up and that kind of made me sad, but those who did really appreciated it, and i got to go through today myself. i needed that time of reflection after such a crazy week.

i've done this labyrinth about 8 times now and each time is different. there is one station where you stand in front of a full length mirror - looking at myself today i realized how far i've come. i remember the first time i ever did this years ago at the nywc in cincinatti that i couldn't even look at myself. today i was able to see myself for who i was. i truly haven't changed that much 'outside' but inside i am new, restored, and much more gentle to myself. i actually looked deep into my eyes and smiled. that could have never happened years ago.

afterward i was able to read the journal that we leave at the end of the path so people can write their feelings or thoughts on the process. it became somehow a thank you card to liam and i for taking the time to invest and expose our youth to this type of spiritual experience. i wept as i read of the depth of emotion and experience and god speaking into their lives. it made everything worth it, every little bit.

looking back i realize how much this would have meant in my own life if i had been 13 and exposed to this kind of christian experience - meeting god without someone telling me how to do it or what to think. this they will take with them everywhere they go - it's all portable and can be duplicated on whatever path god takes them.

yay! but i am glad to be on this side of it all!

i went and got the second set of bloodwork done today too, so hopefully i'll have a good idea of what's happening with my thyroid next week, and maybe even start on reclaiming that part of my life back. i'm really looking forward to it.

have a wonderful weekend ya'll!

trip the light fantastic

where to start? it was a really good week, exhausting, but really good. the youth (30 of ours - 5000 others!) were incredible and well behaved, so that made our job much easier. the worship was probably the most amazing that i've ever participated in before.

2 years ago at the last convention god met me there is such a big way, i'll have to blog about that at a different time, but i had a vision, and it's the only the second time i have ever had one and it left me with high expectations and lots of pressure for this week. i attended each time of worship with bated breath, almost challenging god to show up, and that kind of attitude usually backfires.

on wednesday i was getting discouraged and just hoping and praying for a big revelation or moving experience. you see i wasn't raised with any type of a showy god. things were all about the mind, all about the learning. it's only been in the past 5 years that i have even allowed god to 'show up' in my life. i hate to think of all of the times he did before that and i missed it because my mind was so closed.

anyway - that night we had an extended time of prayer and worship, great drama and art exercises and tangible worship tools. i was pretty thrilled by the fact that the 'head office' had stepped out of their comfort zone and allow god to work in a less constructed space.

i know it's not very emergent of me, but i love worship music. chris tomlin was our worship leader for the week and that night all pistons were firing. he played a lot of songs from his new cd, so experiencing them for the first time allowed me to hear them unlike the songs i've sung before. during one of them i had my eyes closed and as i stood there a picture of myself and god dancing came to my mind. i watched it for a couple of minutes, and then it really freaked me out. i was almost embarrassed. the voice in my head kept saying things like, 'how silly, god dancing with me'. 'who do i think i am??' 'i mean really now bobbie, god has much more important things to do than dance with you.'

it was from that moment that things fell flat for me. flat. the songs were just songs, the words were just words. i listened, even sang, but for the rest of the conference it just wasn't the same. i think i was really ashamed. that intimacy seemed just a bit too real for me. i almost thought i had concocted it just so that i would have a special moment to remember. almost.

i enjoyed the rest of the conference, but told myself that this year it was only supposed to be about me facilitating the experience for others. i was okay with that.

then i got home.

waiting for me saturday in my emergingsideways at gmail dot com mailbox was an email from a wonderful, virtual friend. we have never met, we have just bonded online because of our shared experiences. this is what her email to me on wednesday said:

"Bobbie - I was awake really early and in my conversation time with my Beloved I talked about you.

And He said that today He wanted to take you dancing!

I don't know if you know how to or not but just go ahead, abandon yourself to His music and dance your socks off. Oh maybe it is too hot for socks so go in your bare feet. Even better because then you feel the beat in the floor!!!"

i still weep when i re-read it. it was real. she had NO way of knowing that i needed a good dance with my beloved - and neither did i. i actually had kicked off my shoes on that wednesday night, and in the 'vision' i was barefoot. god wasn't more than a shadow, but i could feel him spin me and hold me. the intimacy of it all terrified me. it was so close that it made me ashamed, not sexual mind you, just intimate. like i imagine the daddy/daughter dance at the wedding would be. i never had that before, and this time it was so real that it took my breath away.

coming home to that email confirmed god's care for me in such a deep, intense way. i can hardly even begin to explain it, and my words hardly do it justice.

a woman from vancouver gets a message from god for me, takes the time to pass it on and i am unable to read it until the exact time i needed it. the lyrics to the song chris was singing were written two years ago, by a first time song writer. louie giglio held on to them thinking one day they would be a good fit for him. it's a beautiful song.

indescribable, uncontainable,
you put the stars in the sky and you know them by name.
you are amazing god!
all powerful, unchangeable,
awestruck we fall to our knees and we humbly proclaim
you are amazing god, you are amazing god.
indescribable, uncontainable,
you see the depths of my heart and you love me the same
you are amazing god!

there's no place like home, there's no place like home...

back from oz and it's good to be home! i have been reading blogs and have about 10 posts brewing in my brain - can't wait to tell you how god met me there! thanks for your well wishes and prayers!

internet cafes

hola from the convention! just a quick stop to say hey. don't have a lot of time, but just wanted to say we're having a great week and i'm getting a lot of time alone to journal. amazing how different it feels to have a pen in my hand again instead of a keyboard.

have a wonderful day!

signing out...

well, i am signing out, we leave for the church tomorrow at 4:30 a.m. - so even though i want to check my messages i am going to refrain. ttfn! if you think of me please pray that god meets me there! have a great week!

got grace? part one

tim's question drove me from my bed this morning at a very early hour. he asks "I'd love to hear more about what it means to 'get' grace". tim, i really honestly appreciate your questions, they spur me on, challenge me and inspire me, really. thank you! this is going to take some background to answer, so please bear with me.

my journey to get 'grace began' because after 12 years of begging god to answer the call in our lives he finally opened the door to this tiny little church in the middle of absolute nowhere. it had the word 'grace' in it's name.

we thought we had died and gone to heaven already to be finally allowed to serve god vocationally. honest, liam quit his very well paying job and we sold our first home that we only had been at for 2 years (oh yeah, i was 8 months pregnant with our second child) and we moved to a broken down farm rental on a dirt road in a place even farther from nowhere than that little church. and done with a song in our heart.

we were so naive, so green and so misled. this church was anything but grace. have you ever met a girl named joy who was anything but? that's what this place was like. not on the outside mind you, they smiled and patted us on the head for almost two years while we fell madly in love with their teenagers, and their teenagers fell madly in love with us.

what we didn't know is that they were crumbling spiritually, and they didn't know that we were crumbling emotionally. i was literally living on a dirt road with two small children and a husband who was working himself to death to keep food on our table and this tiny little church happy and none of it was working.

what i didn't realize is that i was postpartum. i could have been that lady who drowned her babies to put them in a 'better place'. god spared all of us, i never laid a hand on them, but i was spinning out of control in my addictions.

my husband would come through the door with a box of little debbie swiss rolls every night, and almost toss them to me like you'd feed a wild animal. i'd devour them and be medicated enough to be conversant with him until bedtime, but it usually ended up with us fighting or in sleeping in seperate rooms.

then came the day in july when the church decided we needed to have a youth yard sale. the basement of the church was filled with donations, and no one showed up to help. this was the day before our first time off in over a year. i had to 'help' with my two tiny toddlers on main street as the tourist zoomed past. it also happened to be over 100 degrees (in canada) and the most humid day i've ever felt.

i can hardly remember it, i truly could feel myself cracking under the pressure.

i retreated to the air-conditioned basement of the church to grab some more items to sell. my husband came in and saw me sitting down and made some comment to impress on me the fact that he really needed my help. and i lost it. it wasn't loud, but again, no one came to help, so i truly thought we were alone in the church. little did i know that our fight drew a silent witness.

all i can remember was the line 'i hate this f@#!ng church!'

that was all the 'power-player' elder needed.

instead of coming down and confronting me he chose to hire a lawyer. it got ugly. but only on their side.

they started to 'collect' a list against my husband, watching for any mis-steps or mistakes. the whole while we kept ministering, and i entered counselling and finally found a OA (overeaters anonymous). this recovery group was church to me. you see church there was 'oh you're the youth pastor's wife, you can run the nursery'. i would get us all ready and off to church to sit with my children in their cruddy little nursery for 2 1/2 hours, oh yeah, and babysit any of their kids they decided to dump on me too.

so that 1 1/2 hours at OA became my temple, my worship center, a place where i could finally meet 'god as i understood him'.

so many christians get hung up on that line in the AA big book. what they fail to realize is that we all (especially christians) have a version of god that we 'understand' to be true. this was the FIRST time god wasn't a masochist to me.

i remember jim, he was a veteran 12 step group member, with many other 12-step groups under his belt. if you met jim anywhere other than a group you'd have thought he was a tower snyper. he had that scary look in his eyes. except when he was talking about recovery. he became our guru. 6 over weight women and jim. i miss him more than i miss anyone in canada. somehow that unredeemed, ted bundy looking man was jesus to me.

the crazy thing about all of this is that we were getting healthier and happier than we had been in years. and that was when the s&*t hit the fan.

if the church had come to us and said 'man this isn't working out' we HONESTLY would have known god had other places for us. but that didn't happen. they decided it was necessary to crucify my husband. it was horrible, ugly and sinful. they punished him for having a wife that he couldn't control but never once told us it was because i had a nervous breakdown in the basement of the church. never once.

we sat in meetings and begged them to tell us what this was about. the answer we received as that 'if we told you you'd just explain it away'. no, really we'd have a clue, ask for forgiveness and not do it again. just tell us what's wrong. nope.

here's a list of 12 things you need to fix, you're on probation and we're watching you.

we were so programmed that elders spoke for god that it never entered our minds to walk away. we loved their kids, this was the call of god and somehow we had screwed that up.

we went to their counselor (who by the way gave us rave reviews and thought the church was nuts) and liam jumped through every hoop they gave. also we did this silently - no one in the church, other than our two best friends ever knew this was happening. we knew that we needed to do this without sin. after we were well on our way to finishing the list the senior pastor told liam 'if it was me i'd resign'.

resign? what is that going to look like at the high school (where liam had his other job)? people only resigned when there was sin - and we didn't sin here. we talked and talked and talked (it was the best thing that ever happened to our marriage btw, stinking hard, but it drew us closer to each other and god than we had ever been before.)

we decided that the only other route open to us was to split the church, and we knew that wasn't god's will. so we told them we'd resign if they let us tell 'our kids'. we did, and they were shell-shocked. it was horrible (because they wouldn't let us stay to work with them afterward (even for free). it really took it's toll on a lot of those kids (their kids - what were they thinking??). and we left. the senior pastor resigned two days later.

liam still had his position at the school so we took our time to find a good match and we interviewed churches more than they interviewed us. and we decided this was the time in our lives to experiment - to try different churches, and we did.

god began to be real to us again. we worshiped truly for the first times in a church (we had been attending the national youth workers convention for the previous 2 years, so we had begun to understand what real worship was like.) and god started to dismantle the box we kept him in, and the box of what church was supposed to look like for us. it was very freeing. it was the beginning of emerging for us, and we didn't ever realize it.

it was only after we moved that someone had enough courage to tell us about the f-word in the basement. i had totally forgotten about it. god used my conniption fit in the basement of that church to begin to free us from the tyranny of spiritual abuse and a small minded church structure that we would have never left if we hadn't been forced to.

the air out here smells so much better!

that is only part one, there is much more to tell, but it will have to wait as we have church this morning. thank you for reading!