Having said all of that...

While I joyfully embrace the promise of this new year, I find myself equally - perhaps even more - excited about the familiar.

For the first time in seven years, I will not be spending any time this fall unpacking boxes or getting acquainted with new roommates. I returned from vacation on Friday to the same messy closet and sweet roommates I have known for almost a year now. I hurried into church this morning - late as usual - and was immediately greeted by a hug from Jonah, as he proudly proclaimed "I knew you'd come back!" By the time I left church, I had most of my week planned with the usual routine - Monday Girls, choir practice, God Chicks. When I walk into the office tomorrow morning, I will be greeted by my own files (however disorganized), familiar faces framed on my desk, and the friendly family of dustbunnies that has congregated under the conference table.

Much is changing in my small circle of Birmingham friends. Angela is pregnant. Zach and Ellen are engaged. Mayme, Lisa, and Melissa have moved away, and Nate will eventually be on his way too. In spite of all this, I find myself enjoying the unfamiliar feeling of stability. This is the start of my third year in Birmingham. I feel blessed to be able to continue some of the work and many of the relationships that began with GreaterWorks in the fall of 2004. I get a little teary-eyed as I watch the kids at church and see how they have grown and changed - mostly for the better - since we first walked into their Sunday morning youth group. I am overcome with thanksgiving as I am warmly welcomed back into the church congregation that has become my surrogate family.

I have been given so much here, so I know that much is expected of me. Comfort and familiarity can so easily breed the complacency I desperately wish to avoid but so quickly fall into. Stability can start to look a lot like an ugly rut, and I do not want to get stuck. My challenge will be to not just embrace and celebrate that which is new, but to approach my familiar routine and relationships with enthusiastic diligence, to be intentional in my investment of time and energy, to be a humble and thankful steward of all that has been given to me - materially, financially, relationally.

Paul admonished the Corinthians to give generously:
But as you excel in everything -- in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in all earnestness, and in our love for you -- see that you excel in this act of grace also. I say this not as a command, but to prove by the earnestness of others that your love also is genuine. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich. And in this matter I give my judgment: this benefits you, who a year ago started not only to do this work but also to desire to do it. So now finish doing it as well, so that your readiness in desiring it may be matched by your completing it out of what you have. 2 Corinthians 8:7-11

Lord, if only I could live my life as one big act of grace. As I set out to continue the work that started a year or two ago, I pray that you will give me diligence - whether my desire is strong or weak. Help me to do the work of YouthWorks, of relationships, and of obediently following you with generosity and enthusiasm. Keep me moving forward so I will not get stuck, and when I find myself necessarily standing in place, help me to blossom there.

Happy New Year

I've been out of school for more than two years now, but I have yet to know a life that doesn't revolve around a school-year calendar. Thus, though there are no menacingly sharp #2 pencils, clean stacks of college-ruled looseleaf, or trendy Lisa Frank folders (are those still trendy?) with which to celebrate, I still find myself ringing in the new year at the beginning of fall rather than the middle of winter.

As I think about starting this new year with a few new folks in our office, new plans and visions for the year ahead, and maybe even some new office supplies (hey, a girl can dream), I praise God for his grace in giving us new opportunities.

But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:
The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
Lamentations 3:21-22

He put a new song in my mouth,
a song of praise to our God.
Psalm 40:3

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.
The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
2 Corinthians 5:17

What a generous God, to give us a new day, a new year. What a gracious God, to allow us to become new, to reveal to us more of himself. I hope that I will be a good steward of this newness - that I will praise him with a new song, that I will let go of that which needs to pass away, that I will live each day as a new creation, and that I will recognize and celebrate the love and mercy that is new every morning.

The new year begins at 9:00 tomorrow morning. Dick Clark has sent his regrets that he will not be able to attend the celebration, and I don't think our sleepy procession into the office will be broadcast on network TV, but I still look forward to rejoicing in the potential that a new year brings. 10...9...8....

She says it better than I could and Book Report #2

In the midst of my thoughts on marriage, I was reading a book about chastity - which in turn was a book on singleness, marriage, sin, grace, and Christian community. As I neared the end of the book, I had one of those "how did you get inside my head?" moments with the author, Lauren Winner. She somehow grabbed a hold of a few of the threads that had been flying around in my head, pulled them together, and braided them into a tight cord in a few articulate paragraphs. I feel compelled to share an excerpt here, because Winner wrote it so much better than I could at this point in time.

In the Christian grammar, marriage is not only for the married couple. Insofar as marriage tells the Christian community a particular story, marriage is also for the community. Marriage presupposes fidelity, and married people are a sign to the church of God's own radical fidelity toward all of us. He loves us, and is faithful to us, when we cheat on Him. He loves us, and is faithful to us, when we insist our love has died on the vine. Marriages are made in part to remind us of God's relentless fidelity.

And marriage tells the church about the communion and community that is possible between and among people who have been made new creatures in Christ. It hints at the eschatological union between Christ and the church. As ethicist Julie Hanlon Rubio has put it, "Marriage consists not simply or even primarily of a personal relationship. Rather, it crystallizes the love of the larger church community. The couple is not just two-in-one, but two together within the whole, with specific responsibility for the whole... They must persevere in love, because the community needs to see God's love actualized among God's people" (Real Sex, pg. 144).

"Marriage is also for the community." Yes! Marriage is for the community, because it gives this 24-year-old single girl a glimpse of God's relentless love and faithfulness that I might not be able to see on my own. Marriage is for the community, because a married couple who has committed their life to the Lord can serve him better as a team than either could as individuals (which is why God called them to be married). Marriage is for the community, because a diligently married couple shows us a human (and therefore still incomplete) picture of God's relationship with us.

And with that, my thoughts are - for now - a bit more complete, my mind a bit less restless. For that I am thankful. I am also thankful for intelligent writers and good books, especially those that speak to the questions rolling around in my mind, and even more so those that speak to questions that hadn't even started rolling around yet. Lauren Winner's books have done that for me. I've read two this summer (that may actually be all she's got right now): Girl Meets God and Real Sex: the Naked Truth about Chastity. Girl is Winner's memoir of her journey from being an Orthodox Jew to becoming a Christian in general and Episcopalian in particular. Her Jewish roots help to illuminate some aspects of Christianity for her - and did the same for me as I read - and I appreciated her take on Episcopal traditions. Real Sex is a valuable work both because Winner talks frankly about the discipline of chastity and the role of sex and relationships in the lives of Christians, and because it is a book that is about so much more than sex. It is mainly directed towards young-ish singles, but I think it is worth reading for anyone, at any point. She'll make you laugh a little, and she'll make you think a lot. Let me know if you read anything of hers - I'd love to hear what you think!

Thoughts on marriage

Marriage has been on my mind quite a bit lately.

I just had lunch with my friends Brian and Ashley, who have been engaged for less than a week. Ash still can't stop looking at her ring, and both of them are glowing, their heads spinning with plans for a wedding and a new life.

Last weekend, I visited my friends Shannon and Luke. They have been married for almost two months. I had the privilege of being a part of their wedding, and was awed by what I saw that day. Watching two people you care about commit their lives to each other is typically impressive enough, but there was something that made their day - and their vows - even deeper. Shannon's mom had been battling cancer for several months - by the time Shannon and Luke were engaged, they no longer hoped for a cure, but for enough time for her to see their wedding day. She did, and I have not seen a mother-of-the-bride more radiant than Mrs. Bugh was that day. Shannon's dad, the senior pastor of their church, gave a beautiful homily. I wrote the following in my journal the day after the wedding:

To see Luke and Shannon exchange vows last night in light of what her parents have been through lately was powerful... they've seen what "in sickness and in health" looks like, and they await impending joy and almost certain sorrow. Mr. Bugh's words carried much weight: marriage is not about happiness, it's about holiness. What a great journey of faith they are embarking on.

It hasn't been an easy journey so far. Shannon's mom passed away last Friday night.

I also spent time with my grandparents last weekend. Fred and Charlotte Walter have been married for 28 years, the second marriage for both of them after death parted them from their first loves. Now, as grandpa has passed 90 and grandma 80, marriage calls them to faithfully care for one another, to be patient with forgetfulness and a slower pace, to provide companionship and love in these days that could be lonely. I watch them, feeling humbled by their love for one another and comforted by the security of their enduring bond.

Engagement announcements and wedding invitations are flying left and right. Sometimes marriage seems so commonplace that I forget the weight of it. A sparkling diamond catches my eye, I watch him put his arm around her, and it's easy to forget that marriage is not all fun and games and butterflies. News of yet another divorce, whether in Hollywood or closer to home, threatens to make me forget that marriage is intended for the long haul.

Through it all, Mr. Bugh's words ring in my ears, louder than any wedding bells: marriage is about holiness, not happiness. Author Lauren Winner describes marriage as a "school of sanctification."

My own marriage is still a distant point on the horizon. Until I arrive there, I will continue to be burdened for those who already have. To agonize over finding the perfect engagement or wedding card that somehow conveys how important I think marriage is (I have yet to find such a card). To cheer for those who take the risk of saying "YES", and to pray that they will have the strength to keep saying "yes" each and every day. To grieve for those whose feeble yeses are overwhelmed by nos, and to pray that God might bring redemption and reconciliation for them.

These thoughts are incomplete. Since I was a little girl, there's been a constant conversation going on in my mind about marriage - yes, the institution of marriage, I was never just dreaming about what my dress would look like or where we'd go on the honeymoon. So, I have no doubt that this conversation will continue. I enjoy the fact that those of you who occasionally peek in on my thoughts here in blogworld find yourselves at many different places on the relationship/marriage spectrum, and I would welcome your involvement in that ongoing conversation.

Now what?

To my YouthWorks friends,

At long last, we've reached the finish line (and in Birmingham, there was actually a finish line - it was really quite impressive). The YouthWorks 2006K is complete. How does one recover from such a race?

At the end of last summer, I sat down to really think about the answer to this question - it was one I had not answered well in summers prior. Exhausted from the race and unsure of how to get my life back to a normal pace, my bed often claimed the victory, with the couch and remote control coming in a close second. My journal and my Bible collected dust, and my phone sat idle as I wondered how to start a conversation that would allow me to really talk about my summer. Those were dry times, empty times, but not for lack of water -- only because I chose not to drink.

After running such a race, our bodies, minds, and souls desperately need a chance to drink, to breathe, to slow down. There are some simple - and some not-so-simple - ways to make this happen. The following may or may not closely resemble a to-do list, but I won't apologize for that. These things have certainly helped me, and I hope some of you may find them helpful as well.

SLEEP. By all means, sleep. You've done a number on your body with the hours you've kept this summer, and you've earned some quality time studying the backs of your eyelids.

DO NOTHING for a while. Give yourself permission. Trust me, it'll be okay.

PINCH YOURSELF. Yes friends, it may seem distant and surreal, but you did, in fact, spend your summer in a completely random place, hanging out with even more random people, doing things that might make some question your sanity (let's face it -- if people don't look at you funny when you tell them you slept on an air mattress on a school or church floor all summer, I might question their sanity). It may sound like bad reality TV, but it was reality. In fact, you probably came face-to-face with reality more often this summer than most people do in their "normal" lives. The past ten weeks were not a crazy dream, nor a nightmare, but simply another piece of your journey, appointed and anointed by our very gracious God.

PICK UP THE PHONE. Call someone who will get it -- someone from your staff or your area or around YouthWorks who will certainly understand how you're feeling. We've all just finished running a long hard race. Once you've done that, call someone who doesn't get it. Part of cooling down after a race is stretching. Stretch yourself here -- take the risk to share a bit of your summer with someone who may not understand or appreciate what you've experienced. You never know how a story you share might plant a thought or a question in someone's heart. This is an awesome opportunity to honor what the Lord has done this summer.

PRACTICE WHAT YOU PREACHED. Remember how we all admonished junior and senior highers to do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with God? How we encouraged them to serve with willing hearts and to be like Jesus? Those words don't just apply to them, nor do they lose value or importance when we're not in "mission trip mode." This might be another one of those stretching exercises for you.

PRACTICE WHAT YOU PRAYED FOR. You prayed for your participants, that their experience wouldn't end on Friday morning, that their YouthWorks week wouldn't be about emotion but about real life-change, that they would take lessons home with them and put them into action. This was your honest hope and desire for them -- how is this happening in your own life?

Most importantly, no matter what you do or how relaxed you may be, let there be NO SPIRITUAL VACATION. What did Jesus do when He had a break from the crowds? He spent time alone with his Father. Satan would love to get a hold of you right now -- to make you neglect the disciplines of prayer and Bible reading you established this summer, to lull you into complacency and make you forget how God changed you and how real and alive and close he was this summer.

Know that God is as real and alive and present today as he was on any Thursday night this summer. He is just waiting for you to seek him out. As you do, ask him for what you need right now: help in processing this summer, guidance in preparing for what's next, wisdom for how to live today -- indeed, that's all you really need. Ask him for your daily bread, and come hungry.

Walk it off… that means you must keep moving forward. Stretch out, take a deep breath and a nice long drink, and when all is silent, listen for that still, small voice that will always be your best coach and your biggest fan.

Mr. Edwards, meet Ms. Betty

On Monday morning, I kicked off my sleeping bag and rolled off my air mattress at around 8:15 (ah, the blissful life of an Area Director, sleeping through another morning of Marshmallow Mateys). In a rare move - that I wish would become more frequent - I headed straight for my Bible and devotion book. I turned to the next meditation and found words that I wanted to shout from the rooftops:

Time is precious. We are fragile. Life is short. Eternity is long. Shall we not then enter on every venture with a vigilance like that of the young Jonathan Edwards when he wrote his fifth resolution: "Resolved, Never to lose one moment of time, but to improve it in the most profitable way I possibly can;" which is really a subpoint of his sixth resolution: "Resolved, To live with all my might, while I do live"... Yes, this can become compulsive and unhealthy. But for those of us who need to hear it as an antidote to squandering the preciousness of irretrievable time, let us hear it...

Surely God means for our minutes on earth to count for something significant. Paul said, "In the day of Christ I will have reason to glory because I did not run in vain nor toil in vain" (Philippians 2:6). In the same way, I have good hope from the Lord that my "labor is not in vain in the Lord" (1 Corinthians 15:58). And I commend this promise to you. No minute need be lived in vain. Eternity will render it significant if lived in faith for the glory of God. In the end we rest in this: "My times are in your hand" (Psalm 31:15).
- John Piper, Taste & See, #79

How fitting, I thought, for the first day of our last YouthWorks week this summer. Time is indeed precious. I resolved to live this last week with all my might.

On Tuesday, I visited one of our new ministry sites in Atlanta - Cafe 458, a soup kitchen that looks and acts like a restaurant. They have a clothing closet there, and I took a peek inside. There I met Ms. Betty, a sweet 70-year-old who grew up working in the cotton fields of central Georgia. She works in the clothing closet every day for four hours, helping people pick out the clothes they need, rejoicing in every generous donation she receives. She told me that she found the job through the AARP, but that even if they had to stop paying her, she'd still come as a volunteer - she just wants to be doing something.

Throughout our conversation, Ms. Betty praised the youth who were volunteering at Cafe 458, talking about how nice it is to see young people working so hard and so willing to help. I found myself wanting to turn that praise around to her; it is exciting to see an older woman who is so willing to give of her time and energy, to serve so selflessly. She is truly improving the time she has, living with all her might.

As the day progressed, I realized how easy it would be to live with all my might this week. In the waning days of the summer, there is much to be cherished. It is easy to run hard now because the finish line is in site. I wonder if my resolution will still be strong after this race ends.

Will I live with all my might while I am on vacation next week?
Will I live with all my might in the dreary winter days when summer seems so far away?
Will I live with all my might when I am seventy years old?

Lord, my times are in your hands. Help me to greet each new day you give me with a resolve to handle each moment with care, to run with strength and perseverance, to live with all my might.