GRACE AND GRATITUDE

I am grateful to Christ Jesus our Lord,
who has strengthened me,
because he judged me faithful
and appointed me to his service.

1 Timothy 1:12

I returned to blogging on a regular basis because the process of weaning myself from the practice of weekly sermon preparation and preaching is a struggle. Even though it has only been a month, I miss being in the pulpit.

(And I dearly miss the good people at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Youngstown, where I most recently served as Interim Rector. But I will write about that experience at a later date.)

The closest comparison to missing preaching that I can think of is that of recovering from an addiction. I don’t want to make light of a serious issue, but breaking with habits, whether healthy or harmful, is a challenge.

I’m a borderline diabetic. A little over ten years ago, my primary care doctor gave me two options, lose weight or begin an insulin regimen. I chose the weight loss.

I was referred to a nutritionist who bluntly said to me, “I could tell you to count calories, but I know you won’t do it. So my recommendation is to cut out carbs. No bread, no rice, no potatoes, no pizza, no pastries.”

I thought to myself, “I would sooner cut off my right arm.”

Yet when I seriously weighed (pun intended) my options, there was really no alternative. So I began my strict no-carb diet and in two months I had developed a new lifestyle. By the six-month mark I had lost fifty pounds! Not only that, but my glucose levels were also back within the safe range.

I recall vividly that during that period, we visited Germany. Every hotel where we stayed had a breakfast buffet that featured the country’s most delicious pastries, of which I tasted not a one! Talk about self-control!

Sadly, the pandemic of 2020 began to wear down my resolve. Sitting around the house with nothing to do slowly chipped away at my resistance. It started with a slice of pound cake with my morning coffee. It’s called pound cake for a reason.

Five years later, I have gained back half of the weight I lost, my blood sugar levels are back within the danger zone, and I’m on diabetes medication – which is quite expensive.

Once again, I now find myself at a crossroads.

I’m back to doing nothing. I wake up most mornings with a completely blank schedule. After finishing my prayers and some devotional reading, my day is wide open.

I’ve been dabbling with improving my photography. I’m actually reading a novel, rather than the Bible commentaries, biographies, and other non-fiction that takes up the bulk of the space on my bookshelves.

I’ve been going to a few more lunches than normal, catching up with friends whom I haven’t seen in a while.

A few days ago I took a trip to Pittsburgh to spend the day with a former colleague and friend whom I hadn’t seen in ages. We took in a ball game and a mini tour of the city. It was a wonderful day!

But these delightful moments are few and far between.

Over the past four Sundays I’ve been church hopping. Notice I didn’t say shopping. I know all the clergy at the churches I visit, and they understand that I’m not looking to become a regular worshipper there, but merely checking out how the other half lives.

The problem with pew sitting is that I’ve preached on most of these scripture readings in my quarter century of ministry, and I have to strongly resist the urge to imagine how I would have approached a particular sermon in light of the crazy times we’re living in these days.

So I listen.

I listen much more attentively than the average Sunday Lutheran/Episcopalian. I listen for some detail that I may have not paid attention to before, or some insight that I may have overlooked when I last studied the text.

Let me quickly add that I am not there to criticize the person in the pulpit. I know how hard they work to interpret God’s word and apply it to the people listening in order that it may bring grace, mercy, and blessing to those who hear it. It’s a tough task.

As I think back to those days, not so long ago, when I was in their shoes, I can recall that there were some Sundays when, as the metaphor goes, I swung and missed. Preaching is a little bit like baseball. The readings are liable to throw you a curve on occasion.

And as I alluded to earlier, preaching in these times has been challenging, to say the least. We find grace in the text, but precious little in the world. What the preacher proclaims as the word of God, some people in the pews interpret as political. One would think that I would welcome this time as the ideal moment to re-retire from ministry.

Many of my colleagues have strongly advised me to give myself more time away. I agree it is beneficial for me to do so. Other than the imposed idleness of the pandemic five years ago, I have not had this luxury of leisure. And I plan to enjoy it for the time being.

We serve a God of grace, who knows us better than we know ourselves. The more we understand grace, the more one becomes grateful.

As the apostle Paul points out in his letter to Timothy, with which I began this reflection, Christ has displayed the utmost patience with me, waiting years for me to make up my mind about responding to the call to ordained ministry. And now he has granted me this time of rest and refreshment.

For that we say, “to him be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.”