Liminality

Two years ago I went on a forestry tour. I hated it. It was cold, damp, and painfully forgettable – until the end. The forester came out of his professorial role and said, “The reason why forests show longevity is because they produce that which is needed to survive. The dying leaves sustain the trees.” He didn’t say it, but it’s as if I heard him say, “Death is a natural a part of the cycle that springs forth life. If your church wants to thrive, it must hold in harmony life, death, and birth. Without this cycle, the ecosystem dies.” Within my church community, we’ve experienced a lot of death. Each funeral changed us, forever. In light of these deaths (and the good word from the forester), we prepare a Blue Christmas Service each year to focus on the fallen trees of our church community, to name and grieve our pain together. In the midst of the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, we’re pausing to honor the lives of the people who won’t be joining us for Christmas dinn...

Be strong and bold . . . for it is God who goes ahead of you.  – Moses to Joshua in Deuteronomy 31:6 I love Moses’ phrase, “God is gone ahead of you.” Rob Bell talks about it in his latest book,  What we Talk about When we Talk about God . Bell (and Moses) is arguing that God is simultaneously in the present and in the future pulling us into a better tomorrow. The Greeks had a word for this:  telos . It means God is dragging, enticing, and luring us into the Great Unknown. Ministers must be people who believe God has gone ahead of us. That’s the deep, sacred work of vocational ministry. We listen and discern, hope and hold on, pray and believe that God is in what we’re doing, and we can be not afraid or dismayed for God is gone ahead of us. I’m a NEEDTOBREATHE fan. In their song  Keep Your Eyes Open,  the chorus says, “If you never leave home, if you never let go, you’ll never make it to the Great Unknown . . . so keep your eyes ope...

By Bill Owen For most of my life, the title “pastor” defined me. Bro. Bill. That was me. Church came easy for me. Time and space, expectations and rewards were clear. Doing church was the rhythm of my life. I pastored the same community for 32 years. My wife and I raised our three boys to love church. I loved church. I wouldn’t trade those memories or that particular group of people for anything. Now my title’s “coach.” I’ve retired from pastoral ministry and am embracing a new calling as a coach and consultant. There’s uncertainty about the new territory, but there’s familiarity too. Here are three things I recognize. I still have a place to stand. In Pastor, A Reader for Ordained Ministry , Will Willimon describes the pastor as a "representative person." She or he walks the road between heaven and humanity, representing God to humanity, humanity to God, and serving each in the other’s name. When I think about the many hats I wore as pastor, it’s overwhelm...

August 2014 is a bad month. People are angry. Humans are dying. Cultures are dividing. These are the talking points we have to discuss: Depression is a disease. Ukraine is in turmoil. ISIS just beheaded an American journalist. Refugee children are detained at the U.S. border. Airlines stopped their Liberian flights. Ferguson, MO feels more like 1960s Birmingham. Thousands of Palestinians have limited food and water. Police aren’t soldiers. Entire planes go missing. Gay Christians still aren’t accepted. Suicide is all too common. Race is still a divide. Lately I’ve stood in the pulpit thinking about who we are and what we’re doing, and I hear God saying, I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the offerings of well-being of your fatted animals I will not look upon. Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of you...

“I hurried to the gate, made my way on to the plane, stowed my luggage, and sat down next to Mother Teresa! I smiled and made eye contact. She politely said, ‘So, who are you? And what do you do in this world that matters?’” The keynote speaker who told this amazing story continued. “I wanted to answer that I’m somebody who does things that really matter, and I do those things well. But I wasn't convinced my goals, successes, and education were at the depth of Mother Teresa’s questions.” On the surface, these questions are easy to me. I’m a pastor who has three degrees in higher theological education. I teach on the seminary level as well as work full time in admissions. I’m the husband of a talented and skilled mental health professional who spends her days being a change agent for the homeless community, and I’m a father to the best baby in the world. But I’m also more than that. I’m someone who fears failing. I’m someone who hates letting other people down, and...

When it comes to changing diapers, I wish my wife and I weren’t egalitarian, but we are. Our marriage is an equal partnership. We listen for God’s guidance together and apart. We communicate our needs and express our desires openly. We sacrifice for one another and support each other’s careers. We divvy up roles based on skill-sets and availability. We both do laundry, make beds, cook, take out trash, clean the litter box, fold clothes, mow the lawn, put our child to bed, water the flowers, get the mail, pay bills, work full time jobs in ministry, and pray before meals. This is our way of life. We’re partners. We don’t live this way because my leadership style is so benevolent that as the “man of the house” I allow my wife’s desires to be heard. I’m not the boss. My wife doesn’t wear the pants in the family. It’s preposterous for us to think God’s dissatisfied with this way of life. We’re partners. Not everyone agrees. Recently an article emerged in the blogosphere from rock...

According to stereotypes I’ve heard, seminary culture used to be something like this: Future ministers pack up their lives, move cities, rent a small apartment on campus and find a corner in the library in order to learn how to parse Greek participles. They emerge after three hard-fought years of exegetical papers, book reviews and theological discussions in order to take a full-time church position offered through denominational affiliations. Students even tried out their calling by doing a “seminary pastorate.” They’d drive 100 miles either direction and pastor a small, quaint church in the country. Seminaries didn’t have classes on Mondays so the students could enjoy Sunday evening worship with their church community. Sadly, this culture is dead. Students now come to seminary in one of three ways: Young professionals with ministry experience and nonprofit interest . These students grew up in church but don’t want to pastor or work in a congregational setting. They stu...

No one has risen to fame and garnered more respect, attention, hatred, followership and love than Pope Francis (with the possible exception of Lady Gaga).  He’s been on the cover of Time Magazine and Rolling Stone. He’s re-authoring the public’s opinion of Christianity – and doing it with flare.  He’s usurping traditional, Christian stereotypes and challenging outdated practices. We’ve seen him make front page news by doing the following: 1.    Ride in a Ford Focus because it’s pompous to ride in a limo 2.  Walk among the masses even when his life is in danger because he wants to be accessible 3.    Touch and bless people who get disenfranchised by society because no one is outside the realm of God’s mercy 4.   Randomly call people who write him letters because he’s afraid they are suicidal 5.   Sneak out of the Vatican, wear a fake mustache and hang out with the homeless because that’s what Jesus would...

For the past two weeks, my wife and I have been on maternity leave. To help pass the time, we signed up for a free, one-month subscription to Netflix and started watching (of all things) Battlestar Galactica. If you were a follower back in 2004, you know why we love it. If you’ve never heard of it, don’t start watching it unless you have nothing pressing in your life – it’s addicting. The show is set in outer space. Humans are displaced after a world war attack by human-created robots known as Cylons.  The show is full of rich, biblical parallels, questions surrounding one’s theological anthropology and scenes dedicated to explaining God’s relationship to creation.  And I can’t help but see the connections from this show to our faith. The brightest and most obvious to me is God’s relationship to our understanding of both time and space. In the show, time is of the essence. As Cylons attempt to eradicate the human race, key leaders are forced to use “faster than ligh...