Let's Talk About Lent

I did not grow up paying all that much attention to Lent.  As a young person I perceived "giving up" something for Lent to be a very 'Catholic' notion and not something protestants really did.  Plus, giving up chocolate is just ludicrous! I think that even more now that as a pastor there are days when chocolate is a MUST to jump the hurdles as I sprint to Easter, as is caffeine. 

But, I do not really think that it is the giving up of something that is important.  Lent is not diet to help you shed the pounds you have not lost since you declared to do so New Years Day so by all means, if you like soda or chocolate, have some! If you are going to deprive yourself during Lent, at least know why and have some meaning behind it.  To sacrifice, I think is symbolic of Christ's sacrifice for us on the cross.  That, to me, is way bigger than vowing not to eat M&Ms for a month.  A sacrifice in that case should be something that draws you into  greater relationship with the Lord.  Only you can decide what that looks like.  Maybe it is giving up that extra hour of sleep because you have been missing time in devotion or prayer.  Maybe it is removing one element of your life to add something greater to it.

I do find it fascinating that there are so many debates swirling around "not being allowed to say Merry Christmas on our public streets" or "not being allowed to pray in schools" and yet....many devoted Christians brush Lent under the rug, ignoring the days between Ash Wednesday and Easter mostly because we do not want to give up anything!  Especially our precious time, to go to a Bible Study or a community worship service, or simply to strengthen our faith at home.

  But let me be clear, giving up things  for Lent is not 'doing works' for salvation.  Lenten practices are not necessary for your salvation, only faith in the life, death, and resurrection that Easter celebrates is needed.

Lent can help attune our bodies, minds, souls, to that very moment of rejoicing that Christ Is Risen! It is a time of personal introspection.  Who are you, whose are you? What is your relationship with the triune God?  It is a time of communal worship.  We gather together in sanctuaries, fellowship halls, and homes to communally confess our sins to one another and be assured of the forgiveness we are granted in Christ. It can be a time to recall how great the sacrifice of life was for Christ and lament for the pain he and those who loved him endured.  We can lament the pain that we too as part of the greater humanity also endure as we strive to follow Christ's call to us.  It can be a time of study, a time to devote ourselves to learning more about our faith and perhaps the faith of others.

These are the reasons why, in recent years, Lent has become an important practice to me, not just because I am a pastor and I "have to do it," but that I want to experience this time, to honor Christ's sacrifice and find myself all the more joyful when we stand before the empty tomb. 

Holding On To Earthly Things

I think by now that most of you know I have had a very difficult week.  On Sunday someone very special to me, my mentor, and family friend Aimee Wallis Buchanan passed away due to complications stemming from the flu and ultimately pneumonia.  Aimee was just 44 years old and left behind a devoted husband and two teenage children who I have known all of their lives.  I tell you this because today I am speaking from a very honest and heartfelt place.  I must be honest with you in telling you that writing about Jesus’ transfiguration was the last thing in the world I wanted to do this week.  I contacted some of my minister friends and I said to them, “I am heartbroken and I don’t know how to write about God’s presence and Jesus’ shimmering white robe when I am sad and angry with God regarding his bigger plans that I don’t understand. Why did God take my friend from this world, a woman who was serving God’s kingdom with her whole life? ”  But Aimee taught me to use my words for healing.  Aimee told me when I was very young that God is big enough to take our anger, our wailing and gnashing of teeth.  It is okay to cry and ask God tough questions when you don’t understand what God is doing. 

So it is very hard for me to talk about the glorious mystery of God today, because, I myself, am not thinking it so glorious.  Rev. Rick Morley made the point in his blog post this week that we as humans want to know everything, and right now, if you please.  What did we do before we had Google at our fingertips?  How did we ever stay in touch before the days of texting and Facebook.  He writes, “As humans we've always had a hunger and thirst for knowledge—well ever since Eden that is. And, as technology has advanced through the millennia, we want more and more knowledge within our grasp at all times.”[1]

Morley goes on to say, “For faithful Christians, that’s no different with our relationship to God. We want to know things about God. We want to know how to relate to God. We want to know how this story, or this proverb, or this anecdote applies to our life. Tangibly. Really.”  But we all know that God cannot be explained by a series of readily available facts and statistics.  God is a mystery and Morley relates our relationship with God to that of sitting in a cloud, as clouds are so prevalent in the scripture passages today.  “It’s like entering a thick cloud, where everything is obscured. Distorted. Colorless. Disorientated. But, there, in the midst of the cloud is the Presence of God who has come to be with you.”[2]

We all need to learn how to sit in the cloud.  Even pastors, regardless of how many books we have read, how many sermons we have written, are anxious about being wrapped in the fog as it descends.  We need to learn how to be comfortable about knowing about something, without full understanding the big picture, the Something, with a capital “S”.

More than I ever have before; I think I can relate to Peter’s response to his time on the mountain with Jesus.  The gospel of Luke tells us that Jesus had taken Peter, John, and James with him, up the mountain, to pray.  The story describes them as being ‘weighed down with sleep.’ But because they stayed awake, they were able to see Moses and Elijah appear and have a conversation with Jesus about his departure.  Peter wants to cling to that moment on the mountain; he wants to make the mystery that surrounded them in that cloud tangible and enduring.  He is simply trying to make sense of this situation as best he can.  

I, too, long to hold on to earthly things, to cling to this earthly life! More than anything else I want my friend; I want to see my friend’s dancing eyes and radiant smile once more.  I want her to breathe the fresh mountain air, to listen to music and play with her beloved pet.  More than anything, I want her to grow old; hand in hand with her husband and see her two children graduate from high school and college.  To grow tall and get married and have families of their own.  I want that.  I can see and hear and touch that kind of life.  I cannot see or feel heaven.  I cannot wrap my mind around the resurrection, even though I believe with all my heart that it is true!  So, much like Peter, who was so contented in his earthly life with Jesus that he fell sleepy, I too have often looked at my earthly relationships with bleary eyes, taking for granted this realm. I have not been content to sit in the cloud, not willing to hear the voice of God saying, “This is my son, my chosen, listen to him!”  “This is my plan Loren, mine not yours, sit with me.”

Rev. Morley writes; “Moses came down from the clouded mountain with his face radiant—changed. Because it’s in the cloud that we’re changed. Peter, James, and John are changed on that mountain—forever. And, not because they learned lots of fun-filled facts. In reality, they probably descended with more questions than answers. But, like Moses, they met the Living God. And, that’s what changes us. That’s what alters the course of our lives. And, as Christians, that’s what we’re all about: being in God’s Presence.”[3]

Today, I think our challenge is to figure out how it is that we meet the living God.  His presence is everywhere, in creation, in worship, in the people we encounter.  The truth of the matter is that I encountered the Holy Spirit in Aimee Wallis Buchanan.  In her ministry and the way she lived her life, she showed God to me.  She may not have stood before me in dazzling white but her smile truly shined and her hugs warmed the heart.  My friend, the Rev. Jeremy Cannada reminded me that the glory that we see manifested in Jesus in this mountaintop moment is the glory that is promised to every person of faith.  He said to me that “the resurrection is God's love given for us, and Christ transfigured is Aimee's faith.”  

We are not promised that being witness to the Resurrection will be easy, we are not assured that because we have faith our lives will be without pain, or that service to the Lord keeps us from illness or heartbreak.  But we are promised eternal life, and we see a glimpse of that this week in Jesus.  In the days to come, I will try to remember this, and I hope that you will too.  Let us cling to this promise, mysterious as it is.  Amen.

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[1] Rev. Rick Morley, www.rickmorley.com, internet accessed 1/31/13

[2] Rev. Rick Morley

[3] Rev. Rick Morley

She Changed The World

Today I will do something Aimee Wallis Buchanan taught me to do, to use my words for healing instead of hatred.  Today through my tears and my grief I will remember a woman who embodied to me the Holy Spirit with her entire being.  

Throughout the day I have been amazed at the number of people who, through various social media outlets, have shared their love of Aimee and the entire Buchanan Family.  As my friend Katie Stetson expressed so simply and perfectly, "she changed the world."  This is no doubt true, as I speak from my own experience in saying that Aimee's presence in my life shifted my entire worldview in a matter of just a few encounters. 

The one word I keep coming back to when I think of my mentor, my friend, Aimee:  VIBRANT!  There are a lot of other adjectives bound up in that word such as witty, passionate, joyful, radiant.  I picture her eyes dancing with anticipation as she prepared to share... well anything... a story, a joke, a sermon, a witty zinger which she used to throw at us teenagers in youth group every now and then. When Aimee walked into a room I think it expanded, to encompass her spirit.  She would literally set the tone and temperature of the space she was in, always warm and inviting.  Her deep laughter would echo down corridors and hallways and settle in your soul.  Her heart was as big as her beloved state of Texas and I never doubted the sincerity with which she shared her love with me and with everyone she knew.  For fifteen years of my life she has rejoiced at all of my triumphs, listened and given counsel in all of my fears. 

 I can remember many times watching her walk determinedly in one direction, clearly on a mission, only to turn on a dime and walk with just as much vigor in the opposite direction, for a purpose just as important.  She was always busy living, busy parenting, busy creating, busy ministering. I suppose that it might be from Aimee that I learned that faith is about living.  Church is a verb, not a noun, your faith leads you to active verbs... being, doing, caring, loving, listening, welcoming. 

Aimee and Bill opened my eyes and my heart to my God given gifts at a very young age.  I say both Bill and Aimee because the two are always coupled in my mind, like Bob and Jo (Carson) or Peanut Butter and Jelly.  Knowing that Aimee studied English and loved creative writing and theater only made me look up to her more. The first time I saw her walk out on stage at Montreat and do a keynote I think my life shifted. I think, on some level, I knew I wanted to do that. I wanted to use creative expressions in worship.  I wanted to have an impact on someone else's life the way she and Bill and countless others in my new church family were having on me.   Aimee and Bill both showed me that my love of creative writing could be channeled into expressing my love for God.  They encouraged me to write skits and poems and prayers for worship.  

One of my brightest memories of Aimee is ten or twelve of us teens, gathered around her in the sanctuary at Bedford Pres, Elli no doubt toddling about somewhere in the background.  Before we got ready to practice any youth Sunday or Christmas Eve she would make us do these vocal exercises.  We would have to say things like "red leather, yellow leather" and "rubber baby buggy bumpers" over and over, faster and faster until we all exploded into a fit of laughter.  She also did this thing where we had to stretch our faces and make our eyes as wide as possible "big face" and then pinch our eyes and lips together, "little face".  "Big Face!"..."AHHHHH"  "Little Face"...."mewmewmewmew".  I have no doubt that she has used the techniques with hundreds of worship teams at conferences, youth groups, and Many Voices. 

The truth is that Aimee recognized that God was at work in my life, calling me to some form of ministry long before I ever did.  And she wasn't afraid to tell me that, even though the thought terrified me.  But from that point on, the first time she showed that confidence in me, the first time she encouraged me in that way, I was in awe of her.  So much of her ministry has been an inspiration to me.  She had this deep dedication and drive in her work.  I could tell that she really loved what she did, much more than a job, a vocation.  It made me grow into a woman knowing two things: One: I could do and be anything I wanted to be in this world, including a minister.  Two: Whatever I did in life, I needed to love it, I would need to utilize my gifts, otherwise I would never be happy. When I told them I felt called to ministry, it was like telling them I like french fries.  They already knew.  They had helped raise me in the faith, they knew me, they knew God was at work in me.   When nothing else in this crazy world makes sense today, I know this: that she was happy and blessed.   

Aimee's compassion is something that I strive to match (I am nowhere close).  When I think of Micah 6:8 Aimee comes to mind as a shinning example of what it means to "do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God."   Aside from my own mother, Aimee has been the single most influential woman in my life, mostly in the example she set for me of how she lived.  I am amazed by her work with Asheville Youth Mission, and of course Bill's too.  That they, as partners in all things, took this leap of faith to start a ministry from the ground up, one that was deeply important to them, being hands on in the community...it was brave, it was inspiring. It was, as I think Bill would say, "a God thang."   She taught me about compassion.  She taught me about justice. She taught me about hope. 

So today, as I am submersed in sadness; I try to think about the way she lived, rather than the fact that she is gone.  I continue to wait for the pastoral voice in my head to turn on and remind me of all the things I've been taught, all of the things I know to say to others in their time of grief.  I remember Aimee's voice telling me, "It is okay to ask God tough questions, it is okay to wail against God because you are angry or you are sad." But mostly I try to fill the hole in my heart, like this blank page, with thoughts of someone amazing, someone I am honored to know and love.