Liminality

I’ve been pastoring traditional, Baptist churches for four years.  I’ve worked in them for six.  In these years I’ve heard the cries of God’s people.  I’ve listened to their stories.  And a lot of these stories are similar – even though the geography isn’t.  It’s as if the southern United States carries with it (in traditional, white, Baptist circles) a collective consciousness.  In other words, there appears to be a single, unifying thought in which everyone nods in agreement with.  And to be honest . . . I’m bothered by it.  This unifying thought is, “We think we’re dying, and we don’t have much more to offer God.” This is the saddest picture I could imagine for a church, but it’s not the first time God’s people felt this way.  Have you ever read Isaiah?  These fifth century Judeans return home from exile . . . back to their homeland . . . back to where they used to worship . . . but it’s to a city that’s utterly destroyed....

Six months ago I vowed to honor, to love, and to do life until death with my best friend.  Looking back, I can honestly say I didn’t know all the subcategories that go unmentioned when making these vows. These subcategories include juggling class loads together, crunching out research papers, embracing job changes, working seventy hour weeks, facilitating church functions, going shopping for the sake of spending time together, anticipating each other’s needs, coordinating wedding plans, taking mini vacations, laboring through Clinical Pastoral Education, traveling for work, preparing lesson plans, and saying goodbye to old friends.  More subcategories include battling illnesses, ulcers and the strep throats.  Fighting over who makes the bed, folds the laundry, or takes out the trash.  In reality, we’ve vowed to laugh over how much I don’t know about cooking (and maybe life in general).  We’ve vowed to play countless games of Sequence and Banana-grams. ...