Singing Along the Journey

healing

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More

What I’ve Learned so Far…Learning is Fundamental

I am sitting here at my desk on a frigid bright morning, missing a class on Genesis 22 because of car fires and accidents on the highway that takes me out to the seminary.  My brain and my soul are still full from last night's discussion of the Holiness Code and its role in the land promises of the Pentateuch.  And, if I haven't lost you already in the face of this biblical techno-speak, I would point out to you what might not be obvious -- I GRADUATED IN MAY.  WHY AM I TAKING TWO BIBLICAL STUDIES CLASSES? Because, my friends, over the past months, I have understood some important…
Read More

Fog. Literal fog. Well, maybe…

It is Monday morning and as I walk to breakfast with my eyes firmly fixed on the dark-sky-slipping-toward-light ahead of me, I am thinking about fog.  I am, after all, in the Bay area and there is plenty of it.  I'm actively resisting pulling out my phone to try and capture what I see all around me, because I know it cannot be done.  What I see defies at least my current level of photographic talent -- the subtle puffs of white, still clinging to the hill tops and valleys as the sun, painting its tell-tale deep pink stripes across the still grey-black sky in its attempt to chase those…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over, Pt. 3: The Letting Go in the Moving On

I am sitting here in a warm, comfortable condo in Telluride, Colorado, watching the snow fall for the second day in a row.  Out my window, I can see birch trees and clean white powder, chair lifts drifting upwards to freshly groomed mountain ski trails, and the sun as it begins to peak through the snow flakes in this destination resort that claims 300 + days of sunshine each year.  In this week when the people of our nation turn their hearts and minds to the idea of thanksgiving, I am sitting here feeling the deepest of thanks as I embrace the beauty of nature all around me, a brief moment of…
Read More

The Storm is Passing Over Part 2…the Meaning of Recovery

I am sitting here at my favorite outdoor table on our last morning in Mexico, writing -- I know I won't be able to post this until days after we get back, definitely after Pentecost.  I've simply been too lazy to take my computer laptop out of its bag and tussle with the wireless network connection.  But I'm enjoying my last bits of tropical trade winds for a while, and the reality that today is the day of Pentecost, well, I just needed to sit and write for just a moment. Pentecost is such an important day in the life of our faith -- it signifies the day when humanity…
Read More

What I’ve Learned So Far….the Graduation Blog

The night we gathered as a graduating class to talk about the work of our Capstone projects and theses was a celebratory one.  Congratulations, hugs, tears...a chance to spend time with our faculty advisers (even though they were in the throws of the final grading needed to get us all to graduation).  And in the midst of that, a friend who had witnessed many times my opening introduction of "I'm not from a diocese, I'm a Baptist" whispered in my ear, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."   And the Episcopal church did welcome me.  It did not try to convert me, it did not try to change my theology.  Instead,…
Read More

The storm is passing over…

This morning my musical brain is full of the sounds of Charles Tindley's hymn (recast in its popular gospel arrangement), "The Storm is Passing Over" and this is not a random soundtrack for this day.  It is, in fact, a welcome, blessed message from my soul that I have been waiting a long time to hear, a message that as recently as yesterday seemed impossible. You see, yesterday was the one year anniversary of my seizure while travelling in Israel, the first recognizable symptom of the congenital heart valve defect that I had been living with for all these years.  It was the beginning of the long journey through doctors…
Read More

Today…

Today is my birthday.  We won't discuss how many of those there have been, but it is safe to say that this particular birthday should be special.  It is a birthday that very well might not have happened.  Or certainly might have happened in a very different way than finding me in the midst of my too-too-busy schedule running to that finish line known as graduation. I might not have been here to say:  I'm healthy (even if I can't really say that I'm happy) and moving and exercising and learning and loving and doing all the things that make up a life. And yet, I feel no desire, frankly…
Read More

The only thing we have to fear…

You know how that famous phrase offered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ends...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.  But after the last six months and more specifically, the last 6 weeks, of my life, I am no longer certain that I agree with our illustrious President. Fear, it turns out, is a natural, healthy human reaction, that when properly understood, can lead us to greater understanding and faith.  What we have to fear, most specifically, is our response to the fear we feel. I have been in recovery from a very serious heart operation these last weeks, an operation to repair a congenital defect that I…
Read More

Wherever two or more are gathered…

I read that quotation again this morning as I read Pastor Amy's amazing article about the importance of community in the new book Gathering Together:  Baptists at Work in Worship, but the truth is, I have been thinking about it for weeks and in particular these last few days.  Because right now I am in a unique position to testify to the power of  a community of worship. You see, on Sunday, as I attended what will be my last worship service for a while, people of my community gathered around me and sang songs and prayed over me and laid hands upon me and hugged me.  They cried with…
Read More

What I’m learning in seminary…and the story continues…

It is once again that time when my colleagues at Virginia Theological Seminary are writing their Ember letters to their supporters and most of all to their supporting Bishops in their home dioceses.  And once again, I thought that I would join in the fun with my very own Baptist version of the ritual...a blog post. The topic "What I'm Learning in Seminary" is simultaneously a broad one and a limited one, because the truth is that my learning in my seminary classes only succeeds when that act of learning and the information I take in works to transform my life, my relationship with my God, and my ability to…
Read More