Home

Yesterday morning I was sitting in a coffee shop, which is where I work from every Wednesday morning for ninety minutes or even two hours before heading to church.  I'm not a coffee drinker, but they have green tea, which I do drink.  I am, however, a coffee smeller, and I have no idea what coffees I am smelling when I'm there, but I can think of few things that smell better than the inside of a coffee shop.

I always take with me a book or two, some pieces of paper, and a pencil.  I do not take my laptop - on this one morning of the week, I am free from the burden of email and other social networks, free to read and meditate and perhaps develop some ideas for future sermons without the interruption of electronic communication. 

So, yesterday, as I sat there reading Putting Away Childish Things by Marcus Borg, rereading parts of An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor, and then composing a prayer for next Sunday's worship, it suddenly occurred to me to check the day's date.  When I did, I realized that it was on the same day two years earlier that I began my ministry at Bixby Knolls Christian Church.

Experience has taught me that the first year at a new church in a new city is mostly about learning how to get around:  how to get to the store, the bank, the post office; how to get around a new sea of faces, learning people's names, getting to know them; how to travel through the seasons and holidays.  The first time through the calendar, everything is new.  It's a time of discovering what traditions and rituals give shape to a congregation's liturgical year.

In the second year, things are more familiar, and "familiar," in this case, is nice in a comforting sort of way.  I don't remember when it was exactly, but at some point during the past year, when my family was driving home after a road trip of several days, I found myself looking forward to "getting back home" to where the scenery, routines, and faces are all familiar.

Suddenly I was startled to realize that, for the first time, "getting back home" meant Long Beach and Bixby Knolls.  What was once new, exciting, unfamiliar and even anxiety-inducing in its newsness had become a place of comfort and familiarity, a place where I belonged.  And now, as I write these words, I wonder if I ever reached this stage in my last place of ministry, the last place I called "home" ... which makes me realize all the more just how good it is to be here.

Looking Toward Atlantis

A photograph taken during a cub scout camping trip last weekend at Fiesta Island in Mission Bay, San Diego.  The island was covered by purple and yellow flowers - I'd never seen so many wildflowers!  This view is looking south; you can see Sea World's "Journey to Atlantis" ride in the background.

Walking Home

This spring, Monday nights are a night of walking for me and my two sons.  Since my wife has class on Monday nights (well, actually, she always has class, but her college courses are on Mondays), my sons and I walk home after the boy scout meeting.

Tristan, who's eight, does not look forward to this.  This week in particular, he let this be known.  Monday afternoon, he was whining and complaining.  "I hate Mondays!  I hate walking!" was his mantra.  However, he didn't have a choice.

The scout meeting ended around 8:00.  The weather was mild; we wore no jackets.  We started walking.  And talking.  The boys started discussing stuff that came up at school.  It's probably best if I not share everything that was discussed; however, Ethan mentioned how much it bothers him when people cuss, and I think he also mentioned a place he had heard of where people sell drugs to kids, although I can't remember if the place was real or from a book/movie.  I think we also talked about movies at some point; we usually do.

And then I had the opportunity to tell my sons how proud I am of the decisions and choices they make.  I took advantage of the opportunity, knowing that I don't seem to get that opportunity very often.

Before we knew it, we were home.  Tristan was surprised.  "We're home already?  It seems like we just started walking."  (In truth, we had walked one mile.)  And I knew then that, even though we could have found a ride home if I had wanted one, it was better that we had walked.

Take a walk this Earth Day...  it's good for the earth, and it's good for you.

Nature Walk

Earth Day is Thursday; be sure to take time to notice this beautiful world in which we live!

Photo taken April 10, 2010. La Jolla Valley, Pt. Mugu State Park.

Getting Intimate With Nature

A year or two ago, sitting on the beach, watching the children play in the waves, I picked up a couple of small rocks and tried to stack them on top of each other.  I didn't think much of it.  It was just something to do with my hands while watching the kids and the surf.

I looked at the rocks I had stacked - three rocks, each about one or two inches round - and wondered if I could stack more rocks on top of them, or if I could do it with bigger rocks.  I began experimenting with larger rocks and higher towers.  Eventually I ended up with a tower of some eighteen rocks which stood over four feet tall.  Looking at my tower, I had to laugh.  It looked so absurd!

However, other people I was with began building their own towers.  By the time we were done, we had a number of towers, which were admired by both humans and seagulls.

So I was not surprised last week when I arrived at the beach where my sister and her family were camping, and saw a rock tower.  I soon found myself once again building my own tower.  That night we camped on the beach, and the next day, several more towers were built.  Some towers were built for height.  Some were built for creativity.  And some were built, hoping that people would look at them and say, "How in the world are those rocks balancing like that?"

To me, it seemed like a fun, playful activity; no big deal, really.  But then a woman came walking down the beach at sunset, and began taking pictures of our towers.  I wondered what she saw in them.  It was just something we did for fun, really.  A part of me felt a little goofy stacking these rocks, like it was something children do, not grown adults.  I felt a little embarrassed at having other people look at something that I felt was so silly.  In fact, I feel a little embarrassed writing about it now.  The voices I hear in my mind keep saying:  "You did what?  Stacked rocks?  How ridiculous!"

I wondered what the woman taking pictures saw in our rock towers.  In her mind, were these oddities, or works of art?  Or, more importantly: were the creators of these towers oddballs, or artists?

I didn't ask her, so I don't know.  But after she left, I got out my own camera, and took a couple of pictures myself.

One thing I do know:  in stacking and balancing these rocks, I got to know these rocks in a way that I wouldn't have otherwise.  This "knowing" is similar to the way I "know" certain trees.  I began to notice the slight irregularities on the surface of the rocks, the dents and crevices that can make a rock good or not good for balancing.  Some rocks, it seemed, didn't want to balance at all, so I left them alone.  Others surprised me with their willingness to be a part of a tower, since at first glance they didn't look like they would balance at all.

I remember an activity that I learned once, to help children experience nature.  All the children are told to find a small rock, one that could easily fit in the palm of their hand, and then to come together and sit in a circle.  Next, they are told to study their rock carefully.  The leader then collects all the rocks, mixes them up, and begins passing them around the circle, one at a time.  The children are told that when they recognize "their" rock, they are to hold on to it.  When each child has his or her rock, the children are then told that they will play this game again, except that this time, they will play it with their eyes closed.  This time, they must recognize their rock by touch.

I remember being excited about such a simple activity that helps children (and adults) get to know their world on such an intimate level.... This week, I agreed to spend another week counseling children at camp, which I will do in July.  I have some ideas about helping the kids get to know the trees and rocks at camp ... and one day, there might even be some rock towers lining the stream.

Ebenezer

Time Among Trees

Hiking through the forests of Santa Anita Canyon, I passed through groves of different types of trees.  Most of the trees that grew in the moist soil of the shady canyon I didn't know well:  oaks, willows, dogwoods (I think those are dogwoods in the photo), and something that my friend David called a bay leaf tree.  I wondered if it had other names.  I'd heard of bay laurel trees.  Was that a different name for the same tree, or a different species or variety?  I didn't know.

Four miles into the hike, we came to Spruce Grove campground, and as I looked through the forest of oak trees, I saw some taller evergreens that I assumed were the namesake Spruce.  However, I do not know spruce trees very well, so I couldn't be sure.

A few days earlier, I had read a description of the trail that mentioned one area on a dry hill above the canyon, where jeffrey pines grew.  I was looking forward to seeing the jeffrey pines.  I know jeffrey pines.  I also know ponderosas, red firs, incense cedars, white firs, lodgepole pines, joshua trees, chinese elm, japanese zelkova, and fruitless mulberry.  I even remember when and where it was that I first got to know each of these trees.

I first met jeffrey pines at a campground near Green Valley Lake in the San Bernardino mountains, where my family went camping several times when I was young.  It was there that I first stuck my nose into the ridges of its bark and smelled its sweet sap.  It was there that I first noticed how the bark broke off into little jigsaw puzzle-shaped pieces.

I got to know Jeffrey pines a little better at Bethany Pines, a church camp I attended for three summers while I was in elementary school.  At Bethany Pines, I noticed how incredibly long the needles are on a Jeffrey pine -- about ten inches long -- and how they always grew in bundles of three.

I was looking forward to seeing jeffrey pines in Santa Anita Canyon because meeting a jeffrey pine is like meeting an old friend.

When I arrived on the ridge where the jeffrey pines were supposed to be, I looked for them, but all I saw were tall, dark trees with short needles.  They didn't have long needles in bundles of three.  They didn't have jagged, jigsaw puzzle bark.  They didn't have that sweet jeffrey pine smell.  In fact, they looked a lot like the spruce trees I had seen earlier.

They were very beautiful, but they weren't the trees I knew.

For a long time, I have recognized the fact that it is difficult for me to remember the names of people I meet.  However, my hike among the spruce trees made me think that it is probably more accurate to say that, as an introvert in a fast-paced world, it is hard for me to find the time to get to know people.  Once I take the time to know someone, I don't forget their name, in the same way that I can't forget the name of a tree that I've gotten to know. 

But that's the thing, isn't it?  Who among us has the time for such things?  In her book An Altar in the World, Barbara Brown Taylor writes:  "No one has time to lie on the deck watching stars, or to wonder how one's hand came to be, or to see the soul of a stranger walking by.  Small wonder we are short on reverence."  Barbara Brown Taylor then quotes the artist Georgia O'Keefe, who explained her success in painting flowers by saying, "In a way, nobody sees a flower, really, it is so small, we haven't time -- and to see takes time, like to have a friend takes time."

Near the end of the hike, I sat on a rock and ate a snack that I had brought along.  Suddenly, a tree on the hillside across the stream caught my eye.  It was a young evergreen that was unlike any other in the canyon, with shaggy red bark covering its long, slender trunk that wasn't much thicker than a light pole.

"Hey, I know that tree!" I said out loud.  However, I doubted, because the location didn't match.  Seeing this tree here, I felt like a child who runs into his kindergarten teacher at the grocery store.  "What are you doing here?"

I climbed down from my rock, crossed the stream, and scrambled about ten feet up the hill on the opposite side to get a closer look.  Sure enough, it was a redwood -- the only redwood in the forest.  "It is you!" I thought to myself.

I got to know redwoods at several church camps I worked at in northern California.  They can get much taller than this particular tree, of course.  I figured that someone must have planted this tree here, probably a resident of one of the historic cabins that line this canyon.

After greeting this redwood, I finished my hike, grateful for the opportunity to see at least one arboreal old friend, and thankful for the opportunities I've had to spend some time getting to know at least some of the trees I've met in the world.

A Beam of Sunlight

Photo taken near Sturtevant Falls in Santa Anita Canyon.  April 3, 2010.

To Save a Life

A few weeks ago, I came across an idea to use at youth group.  (I don't remember, but I probably found the idea, along with weblinks, at RethinkingYouthMinistry.com.) The idea is to get youth to give up sodas, energy drinks, and other beverages for two weeks, and drink only water.  The website H2OProject.org will even provide you with resources, such as bracelets, information cards, and videos to help with this.  Then, the money that would have otherwise been spent on those sugary drinks is instead collected and donated to an organization that digs water wells for people around the world who have no access to clean water.

It sounded like a cute little activity, until I learned more.  I learned that several million children die each year because they do not have access to clean drinking water -- that's one child every 15 seconds.  It costs several thousand dollars to dig a well, but since one well can provide water for a whole village, it really doesn't cost that much to provide water for one person (when you divide the cost out.)  In fact, according to the folks at the H2O Project, just one dollar will provide a child with water for one year, and just $10 will provide water for a lifetime. 

That's when it hit me:  sometimes, it is unbelievable easy to save a life.  I rattled this around in my head a few times:  "For just $1 or $10, I can save a life.  Our youth group, as small as it is, could save quite a few lives."  Even now, it sounds like hyperbole, a gross overstatement, as if there is some catch to it all.  When I told the youth group kids to come to youth group because we were going to "save lives," I wondered if they believed me.  I'm still finding it hard to believe myself when I say that. 

I wonder how often we realize that the mission of the church could be stated so succinctly:  our mission is to save lives.  And I wonder how often, as we gather for worship, board meetings, committee meetings, and various "cute little activities," that we realize that we are, in fact, saving lives through our ministry. 

I once was told that if it wasn't for the support that my family and my wife provided to a particular young person, that he would have killed himself.  It was his best friend who told us that.  The disclosure of that information nearly blew me away.  I hadn't done anything special.  The church I was part of at the time really didn't do anything special, except provide an opportunity for me and a few others to minister to youth in the community.  And yet that ministry of caring, I found out, had saved a life.  Incredible.

I also know that some older members of the congregation, especially those who live alone, would feel that life wouldn't be worth living if it weren't for the church's ministry.  In fact, in so many ways, our ministry is about providing life -- new life -- to people who would otherwise be spiritually dead, if not physically dead.  It is, as our church's identity statement says, about bringing "wholeness to a fragmented world."

This week, I and several of the youth in the church are wearing blue bracelets as reminders to not purchase any beverages, but to drink only water.  I don't expect them to give up their energy drinks completely (not that this would be a bad thing; some of them are seriously addicted!), but if they are made a little more aware of the issues of clean water, and are able to give up some of their drinks in order to save lives, well, it will be worth it.  As it turns out, after I planned this activity, National Geographic's April issue arrived in my mailbox; the entire issue is devoted to fresh water.  I also discovered that my church's Global Ministries sponsors well-digging projects in several areas of the world.  I can't wait to send them a check in a few weeks.

As I prepare for Easter, the celebration of new life, it's exciting to be reminded that in ministry -- in the midst of planning worship and attending meetings and coordinating use of rooms and making phone calls -- that lives are being saved.