Innocence

Saturday mornings are grace, especially when surrounded by grandchildren. We're enjoying the morning after a sleep-over with several of our grandchildren who are wound tight and unwinding loudly. The noise level at times rivals a sonic boom, but I love being in the presence of childish naïveté. The exuberant shouts and unfettered motion are symptoms of what heals down deep--innocence. Could anything more clearly illustrate salvation? What saves us and keeps on saving us is the Father's insistence on and our acceptance of a return to holy innocence where sin no longer stifles intimacy. More than anything else, innocence is a way of relating to God that transforms the way we relate to everyone and everything else. Never intended as a historical marker, it is grace for the living of this moment with childlike wonder. 

Greenhouses and Prodigals

The greenhouse I started constructing as my wife's birthday present in June three years ago has morphed into a long term project of patience--hers. I did erect a 12' x 12' structure of treated lumber, but a yellow wood skeleton does not make for much of a gift. My sight shifted to our anniversary in the fall, but all she received was the addition of trusses for the roof. I decided to make it a grand Christmas present, but life kept interfering and the project became a birthday gift once again. Suffice it to say that two years of birthday celebrations, wedding anniversaries, and Christmases have come and gone, and I'm sitting tonight in what will hopefully be her Mother's Day offering this May. I no longer speak in certainties, but use the language of intention--I intend to complete it now by May. My wife patiently extends mercy, but I fear that cord is wearing thin. 

Reflecting on her forbearance, I can't help but imagine the Father waiting on me to keep my childhood promise and exhibit progress toward what I was intended. Why do I still resemble an unfinished greenhouse? Truth be known, the Father has invested lavishly in my success. Much of my life I thought "prodigal" meant "wayward" based on the action of the son in the familiar parable Jesus taught; however, prodigal is defined as "spending money or resources freely and recklessly; wastefully extravagant." With that nuance of the story line, the most glaring prodigal is not the son but the father, who throws a wastefully extravagant and lavish party for the younger son upon his return from the far country. This is where Timothy Keller gets his somewhat surprising title, The Prodigal God. The prodigal father standing at the end of the road and scanning the horizon is God who awaits our return and extravagantly shows his love for us by sacrificing everything for our sake. God's Son, “wasted” for sinners, while the Father patiently awaits our awakening. It's definitely time to bring closure to this limbo-bound greenhouse, and it's also time to move intentionally toward being the man that God invested in lavishly from before he fashioned me in my mother's womb.

Frame It With Actions

I have some things to say, but preferably not with words. They may not matter in the grand scheme of things, but they do matter to me on the smaller scale of life lived at this very moment. Mine are not pious proverbs of lofty ambition; these are the grit of decision in the daily grind, the fabric of what makes me me and not someone else. I ask only that my life speaks clearly of values adopted, truth accepted, direction charted, doctrines held sacrosanct. Orthodox or unorthodox, this is the stuff of my beliefs, but belief and behavior should always be compatible.  I have not closed the door of my mind; instead, I choose to frame it with actions that provide a stable place from which others may consider the authenticity and import of what I say. You need not agree with me on all points or at any point, but I pray that the force of a life well lived will convince you to at least listen for a moment. Perhaps for that one brief moment, you may consider the Truth that sculpts the truth I live.

Take the Long Look

I speak in favor of taking the long look at life. A fixed point is not adequate for understanding the line it is irrevocably and integrally a part of. Refuse to judge your life and your God in any given moment. You are not a stone; your life is a river flowing that consists of eddies and currents and backflows. To judge everything on the basis of this one thing is insane. And insanity is a hard thing to live with.

Sacred Space

Everyone holds certain places as sacred space.  I'm convinced that underlying much of Scripture is a theology of "place", and I see it at play in the most ordinary of moments and locations--a bush, a mountain, a well, a tent. In fact, associated meaning that connects to something or someone beyond the physical space transfigures ordinary into extraordinary. One such place is the dining room of our humble dwelling. By anyone's standards, ours would be considered somewhat commonplace. Granted, my wife has done a masterful job of arranging and decorating (she is a master of space management and visual effect), but the only thing out of the ordinary in our dining room is the handmade round wooden table that came from my wife's sister when we married. Our dining room is sacred for more important reasons. This room to the left of our front entrance is not often used, but when it is hosts a precious occasion-- the gathering of family. In addition to the table, we have six matching oak chairs, one of which is adorned with arms. That seat is considered Papa's chair (I'm Papa), and it has become a tradition with my grandchildren to see who can get to the chair before I do, and great smiles and glee accompany any coup d'état. On the surface it seems we do nothing more than share an occasional meal here, but what really transpires in this space is the mingling of lives and tightening of family ties.  We write a significant part of our family history here. Even when I sit alone, I can still imagine the familial conversations and relive the laughter.  Perhaps I call this place sacred because it embodies what I hold most dear--that we are created for relationship, and nothing in life is more akin to living in the image of God than the mutual investment we enjoy as family. I understand why Jesus portrayed heaven at one point as a dining room with family seated around the table, and evangelism as imploring those outside the family to take a seat among kith and kin. I may never have the nerve to dart toward the Father's armed chair, but no doubt I will endlessly relish the joy of being part of the forever family in God's dining room.

If the Curtain Fell

Let grace get a good look at you. The more honest you are with yourself about yourself, the more profoundly God is able to knead forgiveness into the essence of your life. Why is it that we tend toward playing Russian Roulette with authenticity? Only one moment in six am I entirely present as myself. The rest of the time I conjure a hologram of what I want others to think of me. What would happen if, instead, I allowed others to peak beneath the veneer? What would change if the curtain fell and I stood exposed, naked as to thoughts and feelings and hopes and hurts and insecurities and needs?  I imagine that many of my relationships would reboot with substance and depth and transformation. Perhaps I'm only as good as my next honest question and as real as my next sincere confession. Buechner speaks of this bottom-line understanding and presenting of ourselves: "There is no book to look up the answer in. There is only your own heart and whatever by God's grace it has picked up in the way of insight, honesty, courage, humility, and, maybe above everything else, compassion."(Whistling in the Dark)

Adam and Eve

At some point after they lost their place, Eve discovered that loving is both the hardest and the easiest thing you'll ever do. Probably a little later (guys always get it a little later), Adam realized that being loved is the greatest freedom as well as the most profound responsibility you'll ever own. In the cool of the day sometime after the fall, they understood love as they remembered what it was like to walk in intimacy with a God who loved them deeply. The longing they knew down deep in return awakened something within for each other. This might no longer be paradise, but it could be Heaven on earth.  What made it so was not the absence of sweat and tears, but the presence of each other. Great pain awaited them as it always does if we live long enough, but the hurt along the way could never overshadow what they gained from walking through it with someone who fully understood and shared the consequences of it. And in their oneness, they reflected not only one another but God himself. 

Feeling Like Epaphroditus

I wonder what it felt like to be Epaphroditus?  He was often near the action in the early church, but never the center of attention. Although he hung out with the rock stars of the Way, he never headlined a show or even opened one. Suffice it to say he had more in common with the roadies than those on stage. His name appears in only one book of the Bible (Philippians), unless he happens to be the individual that the apostle Paul addresses briefly with a shortened version of the name, Epaphras, in two other New Testament letters (Colossians & Philemon). At first glance, we may have high expectations of someone whose name means lovely; until further asking around reveals that it was quite the common name, derived from Aphrodite.  Hello, meet John Smith. It seems that our rather nondescript friend was a courier of sorts who multi-tasked as valet for St. Paul, but that tells what he did and says nothing about how he felt. Did Epaphroditus ever deal with a twinge of regret or even jealousy over never getting the chance to do something particularly memorable in the church other than deliver messages?  What was it like to be important enough to be mentioned by name in Scripture, but just barely mentioned? Actually, I think I know. I've reached the place in life where no matter what I do, I know of someone who does it better.  In fact, it would be delusional at this stage in life to think that I can best anyone at anything. No matter how hard I work, how well I preach or teach, how skilled I am at word smithing, how adept I am at coaching and facilitating, I'm always standing in the shadow of giants. The same was true of Epaphroditus, yet he has lasting merit because of his relation to Paul and others in the church at Philippi and beyond. In other words, my value will never be measured by performance. Instead, the import of my existence consists of the quality of my relationships. If my wife knows the joy of an adoring and supportive husband who helps her celebrate each moment as grace, I have great value. If my children and grandchildren look to me as an example of how to navigate the tragedy and ecstasy of living, I leave a legacy of exceptional worth. If my church finds in me a sacrificial shepherd willing to lay down his life for his sheep, I have an investment in eternity. In other words, relationship trumps accomplishment every time. Yes, I think I know something of how Epaphroditus felt.

Defining Church

I'd like to offer my own definition of church. Yesterday, I wrote that the words 'mega church' are contradictory, and I believe that strongly. Since it is always easier to oppose an idea than to advance one, I might let it lie and wait for another opportunity to shoot from the hip or blast away at some prominent practice with which I disagree, but what good does that do anyone? In time I would resemble more the wicked witches of east and west than Glenda, the good witch of the north. So, here goes my attempt to be positive and proactive as it relates to ecclesiastical debates of the day. I offer the following: A church is a prophetic community of faith. Perhaps you were waiting for something more dramatic, but, actually, I believe that statement is grounds for quite a stirring. Here's what I mean. "Prophetic" means transformational. A church is to be a change agent, positively transforming its community and the members of that community. If something were to happen to remove all vestiges of your church from one day to the next, who would notice? What difference would it make?  If the answer is none, yours was never really church. The second word in the definition is "community."  That means that church is built on a foundation of trust and we only trust those we know. In other words, strangers may attend an event together and even sit next to one another, but relationship is required to be church. And, finally, "faith." The church must live out, moment by moment, a radical relationship with Jesus Christ.  We are defined by him more than we are by each other or by place, or even by effect. Now, here's the kicker-- all three elements must be active to be church. A failure at any point negates the whole. Notice that this understanding places no importance to size and gives no weight to demographics. What it does is stress emphatically that a church is to be transformed from the inside out by an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ.

Reverse the Curse

The stark reality of aging seems unavoidable these days. I’m not certain it’s due so much to another birthday come and gone (the fifty fourth such event for me), as to nagging frustrations arising from increased physical limitation. Why can’t I bend over in the morning without doing warm up exercises to prepare for the warm up exercises? Why can’t I eat what I want whenever I want without then carrying it out in front for the world to see and causing Jenny Craig to recruit me for her next before and after? Why does morning arrive too soon but the night too late? Why these crevices in my face where smoothness once ruled the earth? And then, if things aren’t bad enough in the wake of my most recent birth “celebration”, I read still another reminder in Scripture:

“Anyone can see that the brightest and best die,
wiped out right along with the fools and dunces.
They leave all their prowess behind,
move into their new home, The Coffin,
The cemetery their permanent address.
And to think they named counties after themselves!

We aren’t immortal. We don’t last long.
Like our dogs, we age and weaken. And die.”
(Psalm 49:10-12, The Message)

Well, isn’t that special?! Thanks, Sons of Korah, for the pep talk! Talk about stating the obvious but tossing tact to the wind. But, honestly, it’s that kind of straight talk I need to hear to startle me out of spiritual lethargy and a holy hardening of the arteries. Get the paddles out—jump start me Lord! Shock me into a meaningful life of submission and service. Whereas my first thought once was of self-preservation, show me how to be used up for You and for the benefit of others. I’m not immortal. I repeat—I’m not immortal! Invest what’s left of my life so that something remains of me that matters when I lie down and join my dog. Make me a perpetual mentor, a teacher from the grave. Whatever changes are necessary, make them in me so that I will be for some a compass whose needle always points Godward: in private and public, the same; alone and in a crowd, no difference. A man of integrity and faith, of strength and grace; a “clutch man.” 

No doubt I will continue to deteriorate, to age and weaken and eventually die, but Lord, make old age an opportunity rather than a curse. Bring to life right now what will remain long after my body takes residence in its new home, The Coffin. Make mine a memory that speaks fluently the greatness of our God.

“By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was commended as a righteous man, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith he still speaks, even though he is dead.” (Hebrews 11:4, NIV)

Knowing and Being Known

I reside as part of a small community and I'm a member of an even smaller community of faith. I live here because my wife lived here before me, and over the past eight years I've grown not only accustomed to these surroundings, but to care for the people who are fixtures in these surroundings. Two such residents who mean a great deal to me are our landlords and neighbors from down the simple country lane I now call home.  This relationship led last year to my agreeing to preach at their small historic church that stands near the geographical gateway to the modest region. The white clapboard church building wears the label 'Methodist,' but consists of parishioners who are primarily not Methodists -- a denominational Heinz 57.  So, in an oddly unpredictable way, I fit - in this church, in this community, in this home. I have been thinking lately that were you granted the opportunity like the one given Karen Blixen by Denys Finch Hatton in "Out of Africa" as he flies her in an open cockpit biplane over her beloved Ngong Hills, you would peer down over the side and notice a quilt-like pattern spread out below you, a fitting image for a quilting people. Like the land, we are pieced together here, somewhat akin to gingham patches in an antique quilt.  This is a locale where the cemetery reveals as much about the community as anything living. In the overall scheme of things, not many have lived and died here over the past one hundred and sixty years. A relatively few familiar family names are etched in stone, scattered throughout Bosqueville cemetery like a circling of the wagons, a community's last stand against the onslaught of life and death. In the end, Bosqueville cannot be understood by GPS coordinates or surveyor's stakes; it is defined by its residents. The community persists along family lines, where neighbors know one another, attend each other's funerals, and applaud one another's children at school celebrations and athletic contests.  This is not a place for strangers. It is a place for friends, a place for family, and, above all else, it is a place for being known.  I share all of this because I believe God intends his churches to be just that-- places for knowing and being known.  We were created for him and to live in relationship with him and each other. We are to be a community in the fullest sense of the word. As Frederick Buechner writes: "There is plenty of work to be done here, God knows. To struggle each day to walk paths of righteousness is no pushover, and struggle we must because just as we are fed like sheep in green pastures, we must also feed his sheep, which are each other. Jesus, our shepherd, tells us that. We must help bear each other's burdens. We must pray for each other. We must nourish each other, weep with each other, rejoice with each other. In short, we must love each other. We must never forget that."

Discipleship

During the years I taught undergraduate ministry students, I encountered what I consider to be a common misunderstanding of an essential component of imitating Christ. Nothing is more basic to following Jesus Christ than obeying his demand for self-denial and cross carrying.  But What exactly did Jesus mean when he instructed his disciples to deny themselves? What, in truth, did Jesus have in mind when he established this seemingly counter-intuitve prerequisite for discpleship? Perhaps by default, the frequent interpretation communicated to young people in our churches is that self-denial equates to self-rejection. Somehow we confuse denying self with ignoring or at least avoiding self-understanding.  The difference is colossal, since knowing one's self is paramount to obeying Christ's command in Mark 8:34.  Daily denying of self invokes an ongoing process of self-discovery, for only by embracing the way God has fashioned me am I then ready to relinquish all that I am to Christ.  To pose this as a question, how can I offer to Christ what I'm unaware is mine to give? Such a scenario would be more akin to hypnosis rather than surrender. In other words, 'DNA' does not stand for "Do not ask." The more that I acknowledge my God-granted uniqueness, the better able I am to parlay that uniqueness into Christ-honoring service.

Tugboats and Christ

Jo and I stole away to Louisiana this weekend for a few days of genealogical research and rose rustling (taking cuttings from antique roses in order to try and transplant them in our own garden back in Bosqueville), and since we couldn't find a place to stay near Cottonport or Mansura, we're toughing it out in a hotel on the banks of the Mississippi River just across from Natchez, Mississippi. Sitting just now on the banks of what some call The Big Muddy or Ol' Man River, I feel an odd kinship with Mark Twain and half expect Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn to come rafting by. But instead of glimpsing rafts and paddle wheelers, I'm reliving a childhood pleasure watching a whitewashed tugboat chug up the Mississippi. We would often navigate our way to the nearby ship channel when I was a boy in Port Arthur, in order to watch the ships pass. It was cheap entertainment -- just the cost of driving ten miles to get there and back, and gasoline was cheap enough in those days. I loved every minute of those quasi-nautical outings and could sit mesmerized for hours, literally watching the world go by. The vessels I most enjoyed were the tugboats. I've always felt an odd affinity with those worker ants of the channel: Small. Compact. Useful. One might even say Necessary, particularly if you're a barge. These diminutive marine weight lifters are powerful, able to do more than one would expect, or that it even knows about itself. Tugboats have the character of an English bulldog -- Winston Churchill on the mighty Mississipp.  No river royalty for these crafts -- leave that for the paddle wheel steamers. No, tugs are more akin to river roadies. They do the hard work. There's nothing flashy about them, but they go about their aquatic assignments with a great amount of understated style. Tugboats exert immense force seemingly effortlessly. Attention inevitably shifts to the bulky but impotent vessel in front carrying precious cargo, but the crew and any well-initiated onlookers know where the credit belongs. It belongs to the pug nosed boat below and behind. Would I be stretching the analogy to say I hope to be a kind of human tugboat?  What I mean simply is that I want Christ to gain all the credit for anything good in my life, and am content to be a dependable vessel doing the Master's will until my course is finished and I hear him say, "Well done..."

Favorite Quotes on Worship

As we pull the shade on another Lord's day, I offer for meditation two of my favorite quotes on Worship:

"Worship is giving God the best that He has given you. Be careful what you do with the best you have. Whenever you get a blessing from God, give it back to Him as a love-gift. Take time to meditate before God and offer the blessing back to Him in a deliberate act of worship. If you hoard it for yourself, it will turn into spiritual dry rot, as the manna did when it was hoarded (see Exodus 16:20). God will never allow you to keep a spiritual blessing completely for yourself. It must be given back to Him so that He can make it a blessing to others."

(Oswald Chambers )

“Phrases like Worship Service or Service of Worship are tautologies. To worship God means to serve him. Basically there are two ways to do it. One way is to do things for him that he needs to have done - run errands for him, fight on his side, feed his lambs, and so on. The other way is to do things for him that you need to do – sing songs for him, create beautiful things for him, give things up for him, tell him what’s on your mind and in your heart, in general rejoice in him and make a fool of yourself for him the way lovers have always made fools of themselves for the one they love.  A Quaker Meeting, a Pontifical High Mass, the Family Service at First Presbyterian, a Holy Roller Happening – unless there is an element of joy and foolishness in the proceedings, the time would be better spent doing something useful.”

(Frederick Buechner)

Sculpting

This world is a great sculptor’s shop. We are the statues & there’s a rumor going around that some of us are someday going to come to life.__C.S. Lewis

God is Beautiful

At this tender stage of another Lenten season, I have a confession to make. I do not attend Roman Catholic mass, but I do make an occasional visit to Catholic churches, usually during the lunch hour, for the purpose of prayer and meditation.  Although I don't exactly stealth my way in with paranoid glances over either shoulder, this incognito custom goes against the religious grain of everything my mother instructed and practiced--stay away from anything Catholic as one would a staph infection.  She didn't come out and say 'They're of the devil," but her eyes betrayed the sentiment. In light of my upbringing, stopping by a Catholic Church to kneel and pray is as out of sync with my past as was the woman that stopped by our Ash Wednesday service in Bosqueville this week and declined to receive the imposition of ashes simply because she was "a Baptist." What draws me to these forbidden zones is not the confessional booth or any other particular Roman Catholic procedure.  I don't consider myself a Protestant--I'm not protesting anything--but I'm not Catholic either, simply a follower of Jesus Christ wanting to be fully his. So, that which beckons to me irrepressibly is the otherworldly artwork, transcendent glass windows containing a kaleidoscope of heavenly hues, candles and incense, statues that both inspire and humiliate, and peace, most of all the peace. For the few moments I allow myself to battle my childhood training and bask in the divine shadow of extravagant artistic expression tuned to whisper Christ's glory, I am transfigured. Utilitarian architecture has its place, I guess, but my soul always longs for more. I think this is what I edge closer to when the peace and filtered light wrap around me like a favorite blanket. And at that moment, maybe for just that moment, I lose sight of everything except that God is beautiful.

What Good are Ashes?

What good are ashes? Peculiar at best is the imposition of mealy black crosses on foreheads in the name of penitence. Taken at face value (pun intended), this may be one of the oddest expressions of Christianity extant, ranking up there with white smoke signaling another pontiff elected. Again I ask, what good are ashes in a world that condones war, winks at poverty, denies slavery, allows ignorance, and fosters fear?  It would seem that we have more important matters with which to occupy our churches.  But Lenten ashes have stood the test of time  because of their powerful visual contrast to our culture's obsession with more, more of everything, more of anything. Ashes remind that brokenness is the prerequisite to anything of spiritual value. I turn to Christ during Lent because I remember what it's like to be me. In brokenness I find healing and in grieving I am qualified to rejoice. Pablo Neruda, that magnificent poet of Chile in the twentieth century, wrote: "Let us uncork all our bottled up happiness." On Ash Wednesday we begin to remember where we put it. Happiness is hiding behind each splintered relationship, crouching just there in distended shadows of the towering twins regret and remorse. As we identify the origins of our pain and contemplate the consequences of our rebellion against the Grace-maker, forgiveness comes in waves. Small consolations followed by expanding relief and, ultimately, a crescendo of restoration. 

The Healing of Memories

Why contradict grace? Why reopen beleaguered wounds and delay the metamorphosis grace promises? What summons us to find sordid pleasure in self-inflicted lesions -- slumbering dragons awakened by self-pity. Enough is enough! The enemy has gained a purchase in too many lives. For every individual who foists pain on herself or himself over and over for a hurt done to them or done by them in the past, let the healing begin:

"More even than our bodies, she said, it was these hurtful memories that needed healing. For God, all time is one, and we were to invite Jesus into our past as into a house that has been locked up for years -- to open windows and doors for us so that life and light could enter at last, to sweep out the debris of decades, to drive back the shadows.  The healing of memories was like the forgiveness of sins, she said."   

(A pulsating truth that Buechner received first-hand from Agnes Sanford many years ago.)

A Survivor's Take on Abortion

Three separate influences this weekend set me to thinking about abortion. First, my gaze was riveted yesterday to a billboard on Franklin Avenue entreating every passerby to fast and pray (beginning Ash Wednesday) for the end to abortion. Next, Jo and I watched an interview with Bill Donahue of the Catholic League concerning the movie Philomena (which I've yet to see), and it's negative view of both adoption and the Catholic Church. Finally, I read this morning a quote by my favorite author, Frederick Buechner, on the subject, in which he  pushes us to be wider in our perspective. While I can appreciate anyone's honest struggle with abortion, I must confess a personal vested interest in every human outcome of the debate. I was born to an unwed mother in 1960 and would have had a damning designation on my birth certificate were it not for the tireless efforts of Edna Gladney on behalf of children like me some twenty years before. As bad as it would have been to have a prejudiced label on my birth certificate, the good news is that I had a birth certificate. The even better news is that my birth mother had the courage to enter the Sellers Baptist Home in New Orleans and gift me to Henry and Lois, a couple with hearts large enough to allow a child to flourish in the arms of great nourishing love.  I would never denigrate that poor young woman's angst over yielding her child, and, in fact, attempt consciously to live in such a way as to validate the outcome of her own soul debate. Two things get lost in the debate over choice versus life: the enduring turmoil of the mother-in-waiting and the enduring destiny of the child-in-waiting. Buechner helps at this point:

"And yet, and yet. Who knows what treasure life may hold for even such children as those, or what treasures even such children as those may grow up to become? To bear a child even under the best of circumstances, or to abort a child even under the worst — the risks are hair-raising either way and the results incalculable."- Originally published in Whistling in the Dark and later in Beyond Words

For those who uphold the individual's choice as superior to the unborn child, you will, no doubt, abhor my opposition to your position.  For those who vilify the individual in support of a moral dilemma, you must excuse my sensitivity to the turmoil of the woman.  The bottom-line is this: I write not on this critical issue as a physician or a scientist or a theologian or a liberal or a conservative; I speak as a survivor. 

Greater Value of Relationship

In Philippians 3:1-11 the apostle Paul gives an autobiographical account that leads to a remarkable declaration. He describes an impressive and impeccable religious pedigree, then marks it all null and void in light of the greater value of knowing Christ. His own study in contrasts leads us down the path to intimacy with Jesus Christ. Essentially, religion is revealed to be inferior to relationship.

Herding Cats in Pajamas

"I saw you outside herding cats in pajamas, so thought I'd stop by for a moment."  My neighbor's statement took me by surprise as did his uncharacteristic early morning stop on his way to teach at the local community college. I never know quite what to expect from my friend; he is, after all, a musician. As he spoke to me from inside his truck, I stood exposed in blue tartan plaid lounging pants, ETBU T-shirt, and Joseph A. Banks slippers (I single them out because I'm quite pleased with myself for having found them at a bargain basement price), while our Calico and Himalayan played figure eights around my ankles. When our brief conversation concluded and my neighbor headed off to his collegiate destination, my attention turned to two obnoxious cats, now circling at a frenetic clip. Having acquiesced to their morning demands, I had pause to reflect on my friend's curious phrase, "herding cats in pajamas," and the thought struck hard -- that's what I've been doing my entire adult life as a "minister." Vocational Christian ministry is much akin to herding cats, a frustrating divine assignment that leaves the minister entirely exposed and frequently embarrassed.  We are exposed because ministry demands transparency or else it is merely play acting.  In turn, transparency makes the minister vulnerable to regular criticism and occasional accolades, both of which are damaging to her/his servant spirit. And the payoff? Watching cats trapse in figure eights around your ankles while feeling helpless to stop the circus. So, what would motivate anyone to stoop to such ridiculous servitude?  What could possibly enamor enough to seduce one to herd cats day after day and year after year?  I can only answer with the phrase the Apostle Paul invoked when contemplating his own herd of cats, "Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart" (2 Co 4:1).  Ministry of any kind is grace. Thanks be to God for his indescribable mercy!