On the Holy Practice of Listening

This past Sunday I took advantage of an early return from our vacation to Wisconsin to attend worship at St. Petri as just "a guy in the pews." Some of you probably knew this already, but it can be very difficult for a ministry professional to find a time and place where they can be in worship without being "on the job" and therefore able to just participate without feeling the need to tend to every last detail. It was a wonderful experience, particularly given that our preacher delivered an excellent sermon (well done, Anita!). I walked away feeling refreshed and rejuvenated, which is my hope every time I enter a house of worship, whether I'm preaching, leading, or sitting in the pews as simply one of the gathered faithful.

One reason the sermon was excellent is that Anita paid attention to the world and incorporated it into what she felt the text was saying to us. The massacre of 9 brothers and sisters in Christ in Charleston, South Carolina, was not something any responsible preacher of the gospel could ignore or downplay this week. For those of you who couldn't be there, Anita joined the proclamation of the psalmist, "The LORD is my rock and my salvation; whom shall I fear?" with Jesus' promises to always be with us to remind us that trust is developed over time and, particularly, in adverse circumstances where that trust is put to the test. Now is such a time for American Christians. Do we trust that God will help us see a way forward, together, to re-commit ourselves to overcoming the racism inherent in so many of our communities, or do we believe that if we are simply nice to each other we can go back to ignoring this problem that simply will not go away?

In a sense, I'm thankful we were on vacation in Wisconsin when the news of Charleston broke, because I was already actively trying to stay off technology and enjoy some recreational time with our family. It is, after all, impossible to check Facebook when you're shooting down a waterslide with your brother-in-law and nephew, or careening around a go-cart track with your niece screaming in delight and terror next to you. Even gathered around the campfire at night, we spent more time talking and less time clicking our news feeds.

However, I was online enough to know that there were many voices raised with many opinions about what Charleston means, and what we ought to do or not do about it. Some voices raised compelling arguments. Some voices were annoying. Some were so ready to confess sins of which they were obviously not guilty that I couldn't believe they didn't see that stridency often morphs into disingenuousness with very little effort. We pastors were told what to preach by people who didn't know us or the pulpits we occupy, and what we were told to preach was Law so strict and convicting most pew sitters would have shut their ears only seconds into the sermons we were ordered to give. All this made me incredibly grateful that I knew Anita would prepare an excellent sermon focused on our community here at St. Petri, which would address what we needed to hear without being captive to the many voices clamoring for words that would be foreign to our particular community.

Let me be absolutely clear: I am in no way saying that preachers shouldn't have addressed racism in their sermons on Sunday. What I am saying is this: before we speak, before we proclaim, before we prescribe, the first and holiest practice we must observe is listening. We are called to listen to the voices of anguish from Charleston, to be sure, but also listen to the bewildered voices of people who know something isn't right but also aren't sure exactly how to address the problem.

Something incredibly and painfully ironic happened as I "listened" online these last few days. I grew angry at the voices who insisted that I was a racist because my skin is white. I grew angry at the voices who insisted my church is racist, both here in our local congregation and as a denomination. I grew angry because I felt like I was on trial for crimes I hadn't committed just because my skin was the same as the young man who pulled the trigger, and it was in that anger that I saw the painful irony of my experience: that in being judged by my skin I was finally hearing the voices which have cried for freedom and justice for centuries because they have also been judged by the color of their skin.

No person of any skin color should be made to stand in for anyone other than themselves, for each of us has a particular story which no one else may claim as their own. Racism is a sin which will not be overcome by voices pronouncing guilt and judgment, though we will continue to need voices which can and should call out for justice and peace. First, we are called to the holy practice of listening to one another, and a specific kind of listening: listening to understand, to experience, and to affirm, without defensiveness or stridency or judgment. We are called to listen, brothers and sisters, to each individual as they tell their story, to listen for the voice of God present in all of us, and only in doing this do we have any hope of being healed of our own sins so that we might help others heal as well.

Can we listen? Will we listen? That remains to be seen. It is easy to prescribe what must be done, particularly from a distance. The hard work of listening locally, of thinking critically about our place, our work, our people, is a far more difficult and far more necessary thing. How can I listen here and now to the real people I meet every day, and how can we, together, work to judge everyone as Dr. King dreamed - not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character? This is the work to which we are called, and this is the way we can actively fight racism right here, right now.

Festival of Homiletics: Convicted

Like I said: the Moleskine got a workout

I was in Minneapolis last week for the 2014 Festival of Homiletics, which is fancy church-geek speak for "preaching."  Four full days of lectures on preaching and worship services featuring great preachers from a wide array of Protestant churches.  I heard from Walter Brueggeman, Anna Carter Florence, Barbara Brown Taylor, MaryAnn McKibben Dana, Lauren Winner, Otis Moss III, Karoline Lewis, John Bell, and Brian McLaren, and I regrettably had to miss lectures and sermons by M. Craig Barnes and Will Willimon (good news, though - for a small fee you can buy recordings!).  My hand was cramping from all the notes and my Moleskine filled up rapidly.

Healthy Pastor, Healthy Church

My denomination's provider of health insurance and retirement benefits has spent most of the past few years preparing to shift with the Affordable Care Act, and one of the resulting changes is a four-tiered health insurance plan rather than the single option previously provided to rostered leaders in the ELCA.  Among rostered leaders, this has produced some hand-wringing and consternation, and I hate to say there's good reason for it:  many fear that congregations, upon learning that more inexpensive options are available, will automatically dive to the cheapest plan to save money.  While being fiscally responsible is quite often commendable, in this instance I'd like to offer some thoughts about why paying less may cost congregations more in the long run.

Hey there, old friend.

Ten years ago, I wanted my campus pastor, Larry Meyer, to preach at my ordination service.  Unfortunately (for me), he had a prior commitment to his nephew to preach at his wedding.  At the time it was just a disappointment (again, for me - family trumps ministry every time and twice on Sundays).  Within a year and a half, though, Larry was gone.  Turns out that I never got to hear Larry preach again.

Until now.

This is the wedding message Larry gave at his nephew's wedding.  That nephew digitized the message and sent it to Larry's daughter Rachel, who is getting married this weekend (congrats, Rach!).  She shared it with the internet and gave me permission to share it here.  It's short - to the point - much like many of the others Larry gave (including the message Larry gave when he married my ex and me).  But tonight is the first time I've heard my old friend preach since at least 1999, possibly earlier.  And it's so fucking good to hear that voice again.  

Miss you, my friend.  Oh, how I wish we could share a beer & catch up.

Vision, Direction and Over-Correction

Last night, Beloved and I rode down to the library with our girls.  Our eldest is a very good rider these days - she scoots right along on her big girl bike.  Little sister, however, remains a work in progress.  Riding behind her last night was both comical and nerve-wracking.  She's not good enough to drop her training wheels yet, but she wants to ride fast enough to stay up with big sister; the resulting mess is a wobbly, heart-stopping mix of weaving all over the sidewalk, sudden stops, violent bursts and, in the end, bruised tailbones (and thankfully, thus far, no broken bones).

This child?  Not mine. Most emphatically not.

52 Straight Weeks. Oops.

So I checked in at the church building on Foursquare the other day and this happened:

52 straight weeks I've checked in at the church where I work.  That's not good.

Let Us Not Live In Fear

A few weeks ago, just after the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's 2013 Churchwide Assembly concluded its business, a colleague posted a link and I followed it.  It was about the recent election of a gay bishop and his taking part in a worship service with other pro-GLBT folks in our denomination.  Specifically, it was a liturgical critique; ironic, since most of the GLBT clergy I know are also liturgy geeks, but that's an unhelpful over-generalization and I digress.

Should've Known Better

Someone posted a link on the ELCA Clergy Facebook page earlier this week.  I followed the link.  Read the article.  Read the comments.  Then I posted a comment of my own.  Then this happened:

We Should All Be #ChurchNerds

I got up excited this morning.  Today was the first day of school for our girls:  Ainsley is a 1st grader and Alanna will start pre-Kindergarten tomorrow.  In addition to this momentous occasion, the third ballot for Presiding Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America was to be held in Pittsburgh at 7:00ish CDT, and thanks to the wonders of modern technology, I could follow via streaming video even though I'm halfway across the country.  So I sent this out:

Following #ELCACWA while making first day of school breakfast! #churchnerd (@ The Parsonage) http://t.co/pHslQSb3J5
— Scott Alan Johnson (@saj_nachfolge) August 14, 2013

Sermon for the 12th Sunday after Pentecost: "Where Your Treasure Is"

After Ten Years

Bishop Rolf Wangberg, me, Prof. Dennis Everson at my ordination
Salem Lutheran Church, Wakefield, NE.

Today is the tenth anniversary of my ordination.  I'm amazed to think it's been that long already, and at the same time I give thanks because after ten years ministry still feels like the thing I've always been meant to do.  Here are ten things I've learned in ten years as a pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America:

Friday Five: Church Libraries

From RevGalBlogPals:

Church libraries seem to be diminishing and even disappearing in some churches. Our church is full of scholarly books that no one looks at, and how should it change, be developed, or continue? As the de-facto chairperson of the library, I need ideas and suggestions about church libraries in this day and age. Please help!

The Small Moments That Change Everything

20 years ago, I was a college freshman working in the snack bar of one of the dorms at the University of Nebraska. I didn't have a job for the summer and was getting nervous. One night, my co-worker Brigette's boyfriend Mike wandered down to walk her home after we closed. He was wearing the staff shirt of the Lutheran camp I had attended as a kid. I told him I'd been a camper there and always thought maybe it would be fun to be a counselor. He handed me a business card for the camp and told me to call them, since they were still looking for male counselors. 

I hadn't been to church since arriving on campus. I didn't think a lot about faith. I was going to be a band director and maybe get a job playing in a symphony on the side. But thanks to a chance conversation with the boyfriend of an acquaintance, my entire life changed. (Said acquaintance is now a friend, and also an ELCA pastor, but at the time we weren't anything more than co-workers. Love ya, Brigette!)

So, I asked my colleagues:  what are the small changes that led you to where you are now?  Here are the answers from those folks who’ve responded.

Why I Don't Wash Feet In Church On Maundy Thursday

It's Maundy Thursday today.  The word "Maundy" is a bastardized version of the Latin mandatum, meaning "commandment."  Liturgically, we remember this day as the day Jesus gave his last meal and commandments to his disciples before his betrayal, crucifixion and resurrection.  We will gather in worship tonight to remember Jesus' last words to his disciples:  "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another." (John 13:34)

In some congregations, this service will be marked by foot washing.  It won't be in ours.  Here's why.

Sent to Nineveh

Today is a big day for ELCA seminarians.  It's the day regional assignments are released and students find out where they've been "drafted."  It's a day of high anxiety and fear.  Some students will find that fear alleviated by receiving the regional and synodical assignments they requested.  Some students will find that fear confirmed by being sent to a part of the country with which they have no experience and for which they feel ill-equipped.  A lucky few are able to go wherever they are needed and simply hope to find a good place to begin their ministry, but the overwhelming majority have a general place in mind where they hope they are called to serve, for whatever reasons may seem best to them.

A Week In The Life

Clint Schnekloth challenged some colleagues to post about a week in the life of a pastor. The past eight days seemed as good as any for such an endeavor.

SUNDAY, 6 January
9:30 am Worship, which means I'm up at 5:30 or so to get caffeinated, run over my sermon one last time and get to the office by 8:30 at the latest for details.  I practice briefly with the choir, meet with the lector & assisting minister to go over any last things, check in with the organist, do a sound check and try to remember to put on my alb and stole sometime before 9:28 so I can do it slowly and prayerfully and not "HOLYCOWIT'STIMEFORWORSHIPANDI'MNOTREADYWHYCAN'TITIEMY
CINCTUREHASANYONESEENMYIPADTELLTHEORGANISTTOPLAYFORAFEWMOREMINUTESKTHXBAI..."  We worship - it's a small crowd since the college students have gone home and the high holy days of Christmas have gone by.  But it's a good day nonetheless.  In the afternoon, I find time to read the Sunday paper while watching football, then I catch a 20 minute nap before working on the evening Confirmation lesson from 4 until the class actually begins at 6pm.  We do Confirmation jointly with the other ELCA congregation in our school district, meeting every 1st and 3rd Sunday of the month, alternating between the churches.  I'm leading this week because we're at the other church, so I put together the lesson plan, get the media display ready, etc.  We have class, and likely the high point is explaining what "eunuch" means.  It's certainly the moment at which I have the keenest attention of the group.  After class, I'm done for the day: home, a few hours of TV and reading, then sleep.  Sweet, sweet Sunday night sleep.

MONDAY, 7 January
Monday is usually my Sabbath day.  We get up, drop our kindergartener off at school and head to the gym with our preschooler, who stays with us on our day off.  I get in a good workout, and as a special treat there are several friends in the weightlifting class I attend.  We come home for lunch, then I break my Sabbath for a brief meeting with our Stewardship Chair (it's the only time she can meet before Wednesday's Council meeting).  I spend the rest of the afternoon reading, napping and puttering around the house. After supper my colleague & friend Jamie came over to watch the college football title blowout...er, game. So sad to end the best season of all with a butt-whipping, but man, that Alabama team was good!

TUESDAY, 8 January
Back at the office early in the morning - I check email and sort through some administrivia from the weekend.  At 10:30 I visit a parishioner, then lead a lunchtime Bible study before heading back to the office.  I spend a few hours finishing up various projects apropos to the time of year:  my annual report, looking over Council matters & other reports, reading mail that comes in, etc.  If I remember right I continued some more unpacking & organizing of my files - particularly stuff I don't use regularly but need to have from time to time.  After picking up our eldest from kindergarten and our youngest from preschool, we go to the gym together, then come home for the night.  As Tuesdays go, it's a light one, which is good because Wednesday is going to be a doozy.

WEDNESDAY, 9 January
At 7:00am, while I'm in the shower, I get a voicemail telling me a member of our church has died.  So we swing into funeral mode.  The family knew this was coming, so there's not a lot of pastoral care I need to do at the moment.  But there are details to put in place.  I know I'm going to be very busy the rest of the week, so I take my normal Wednesday morning sermon writing excursion to a local coffee house in the hopes I can get a very good start and not have to scramble after the funeral.  After lunch I'm at the office doing more administrivia.  At 3:00 I have an appointment with the family of the deceased and their funeral director, where we plan funeral details and remember the deceased with laughter and a few tears.  After that meeting I pick up our girls and go to a local plasma donation center (I use my plasma money for fun stuff like golf, music, etc.).  At 7:00pm I'm supposed to be in committee meetings for our monthly Council night, but at 5:30 we got a text from our babysitter telling us her car broke down and she won't make it.  I stay with our girls until the backup babysitter gets there, then head over to the church at 7:30 for Council.  The actual meeting begins at 8:00pm and runs for over two hours due to an overwhelming agenda, including annual meeting stuff, job reviews and constitutional review.  It's exhausting, but it's important work and for the most part everyone does it well.  Still, when I get back home sometime after 10:30, the best part of my night is the dram of Glenfiddich and cigar I give myself as a treat every month after Council is done.

THURSDAY, 10 January

The living room at The Sanctuary. Did most of
my reading in that red easy chair.

In the morning I was supposed to drive to Iowa Falls for our regularly scheduled Riverside Conference meeting, but due to the full schedule I had for the remainder of the week, I elected to stay home and catch up on a few things.  I read the newspaper, a spiritual discipline I follow daily to keep up on what's happening in God's world, then go to the office to finalize funeral plans and get them sent to the people who need them.  This takes longer than you might imagine, and by the time I'm done it's lunchtime.  Kristin and I eat lunch at the parsonage together, then we have our weekly staff meeting at 2:00pm.  At 3:00pm I pack my bags and head out to my 24 hour Prayer and Planning retreat.  I am trying something new - spending time "off the grid" at a nearby spiritual retreat center to get a better big-picture focus for the work I need to do.  In the afternoon I finish reading some journals and a book I'm using for a stewardship class coming up in a few weeks, then in the evening I start planning worship for Lent and Easter.  At 9:00 or so I call it a working night, break out Dead Beat, the next book in the Dresden Files series I'm reading by Jim Butcher, and read until I fall asleep.

FRIDAY, 11 January

The office at The Sanctuary.
That's my worship stuff spread out over the desk

In the morning I get up and realize the retreat center is out of coffee, so I have to drive into town and find a local coffeeshop.  After I get back home, I continue worship planning until 11:00 or so, then channel my inner Tolkien:  I fire up a good pipe and take an hour-long walk in the woods.  I can barely hear traffic noise from the highway, so it's a good, long, quiet walk (note to self:  the waterproof hiking boots you've been considering just moved from "wouldn't it be nice" to "gotta get some").  After my walk, I spend a few more hours planning worship & sermons, then clean up the retreat center before coming home around 5:00pm.  At 6:30pm I lead a short prayer service at the funeral visitation, then hurry home to see the girls for the first time since breakfast Thursday.  Friday night me & the missus spend some quality time watching TV together, then hit the sack.

SATURDAY, 12 January
Unfortunately, I see a lot more of Saturday than I planned.  Every once in a while my brain will NOT shut off at night, and tonight is one of those nights.  So I read in the easy chair in our bedroom until at least 3:00am or so, then fight for a few hours of sleep before the funeral.  I get to the church around 9:30, get everything ready to go with our sound guy, the funeral director and the family, then officiate the funeral at 10:30am.  We drive 15 miles to the cemetery for the committal, which is the coldest I've had in quite a while, particularly for Iowa.  The poor soldiers who came to play taps and present the flag to the widow are shivering even though they try to hide it - I admire their dedication to one of their own.  After the committal, it's back to the church for the funeral lunch, and after helping our volunteers a bit with the cleanup I check some emails in my office before heading home around 2:30 or so.  I didn't read the paper that morning, so when I get home I spend a couple of hours reading the Friday and Saturday newspapers while watching the playoffs and letting Kristin catch a nap.  In the evening we all make supper together, then play some games before the girls go to bed.  I'm not too far behind them.

SUNDAY, 13 January
And the week begins again.  Up at 5:30am to run through my sermon and cover last details for worship.  Today is the Baptism of Our Lord, so we need water in the font for a blessing prior to communion and a few other out of the ordinary things.  There are some emails related to a Council issue to read and write, and a quick conversation after worship about the same thing.  Decent attendance with at least three people who don't make it because it's flu season:  we don't shake hands for the passing of the peace.  I've got a bug myself: congested sinuses and a bit achy, so I hit the hand sanitizer often and don't shake hands after the service.  After posting my sermon on the blog, I'm done with "work" for the day - time to come home, read the paper while watching football and catch up on some rest after a very busy week.

This is what I do.  It's rarely boring, sometimes exhausting, but always rewarding.  I love being a pastor and can't imagine another calling giving me such a sense of joy and well-being. And I like to think that as I approach the 10th anniversary of my ordination (is that even possible?), I'm starting to figure out how to do it well, also. 

Minnesota Blogger Con-Fab Thingy (In Which I Forget Proper Documentation, But Consume 1X1023g Saturated Fat. YUM)

I'm a good blogger, I'm a bad blogger.  But you knew this already.

Wishing for Perfection

Before moving to Ames in 2008, we lived in Barrett, MN, a small town surrounding a lake much like the one in this picture. In fact, I took several sunrise photos that looked quite a bit like this in the four years I served Peace Lutheran Church in Barrett. Our house was just across the road from the lake, and when the conditions were right, you could get the most beautiful scenes when the sun came up across the lake.

I had a somewhat disheartening meeting today, one that reminded me that no matter how much we might wish for it, no Christian community is ever perfect. As I walked, sweating, over to the bus stop for my ride home, I thought of how nice it was last week when it was so cool, and how few days there have been this summer that weren't either rainy, steamy or (more often) both. Imperfect weather today, to do with an imperfect church (with an imperfect pastor, I might add).

Not every sunrise in Minnesota looked like this one. Most were ordinary, unremarkable, and passed without notice. Some were as beautiful as this one, some were even more spectacular. Some were, frankly, ugly - especially in March and April when the snow was finally melting and everything was grey and brown and mushy.

Gordon Atkinson, who blogs at Real Live Preacher, wrote a piece in which he reminded everyone that churches, at their heart, are "a silly bunch of dreamers and children, prone to mistakes, blunders and misjudgments." This doesn't excuse us from apologizing and trying to make amends when we blunder and misjudge, or when others make mistakes. It also doesn't allow us to go searching willy-nilly for "the perfect church," because that church only exists in fantasyland.

That town in which we lived and worked in Minnesota had its share of flaws. We had some genuine disappointments and struggles in four years there. We also had some really wonderful moments of grace, which were not of our creation but simply moments to see what wonders God can do in communities dedicated to living in faith with one another, with all our mistakes, blunders and misjudgments.

Perfection this side of heaven is a fairy tale. God chooses what is weak, foolish and imperfect to shame the strong, wise and seemingly perfect. We trust that God will supply the grace and faith necessary to live together as part of the body of Christ: forgiven, set free to enjoy grace when it comes, and dedicated to living together as one community, no matter how imperfectly we might do it.

Grace & peace,
Scott

Money Pit or Ministry Center?

When most people who serve professionally in the church (pastors, deacons & deaconesses, diaconal ministers, associates in ministry, etc) envision their careers, do they imagine being required to rebuild something like the sanctuary to my right? I doubt it. Of course, accidents happen, tornadoes and hurricanes and floods strike, and some of us get thrust into building programs we can't avoid because we can't walk away when disaster strikes. That kind of work is honorable and worthy of praise - but it's not what I'm talking about here.

Our campus ministry center is big, old, and in need of a lot of work. A whole lotta work. Like, a crap-ton of work. A good chunk of work got done under my predecessor, and what was done got done well. But that was just the necessary stuff, things to keep the building for falling in on itself. There's a lot to do - and I'm wondering: why, exactly, do we have to do it?

Our Synod Assembly was recently held at Lutheran Church of Hope, one of the largest churches in the ELCA. The place feels like an airport or a new middle school, complete with cafeteria space, a gymnasium, a coffee shop and two worship spaces that hold lots and lots and lots and lots of people. It's an incredible facility, well-built, well-managed, and obviously well-loved, given the number of people that worship there on any given weekend. Even though it's not really the place I'd call home spiritually, I'm glad they're there, and I think the ministry they do is, in many ways, very well done and an important witness to the good news of Jesus Christ. Now, I'm sure they've got lots of qualified people on their staff to handle maintenance there, to make sure stuff gets done the way it needs to get done, but as the pastor in a church with three paid staff, and me being the only one above 20 hours a week, I looked around that church in Des Moines and thought, "Man, I'm glad I'm not in charge here!"

When I first thought about ministry, buildings were the furthest thing from my mind. Bible study? Yeah. Preaching? Of course. Reading and thinking and teaching about God? Absolutely. Caring for the sick and building trusting relationships with the people I serve? No question. But caring for a building? Not even on my radar. Talk about ignorant.

There will be a lot of us in my position in the next 20-40 years: ministry leaders in places where the buildings are far larger than required for the worshiping community and in far more disrepair than is healthy. No, ministry is not all about the building, but we need to be asking ourselves some tough questions in the future:

• "Can we take care of this building, or are there others who could use it more effectively?"
• "Why do we pay so much for a building that is only properly used once a week?"
• "Do we make our building available for public, non-church events, or do we abdicate our building in favor of a more flexible, less labor-intensive way of gathering as a community?"

I'm not planning on going anywhere just yet, but the thought of being the pastor of a church with no facility to manage has some attraction to me. A coffee-shop office and worship in some public space once a week might be the way some of us will have to go - and it might even be more faithful to do so. Not everyone needs a place like Lutheran Church of Hope. Some do, and the "established" church building, with sanctuaries and Sunday School rooms and the like will probably never go away completely. But I think a lot of us are going to need to be creative about our facilities and our communities in the coming years, so that we don't make the mistake of chaining ourselves to money pits we can't manage properly. Every church, from Joel Osteen's big digs in San Antonio to the tiny little church I attended during seminary, is a ministry center - here's hoping we all find ourselves centered where we can actually do ministry.

Grace & peace,

Scott

"Turn the Car Around and Get the Hell Out of Town"*

The U.B. ended today. Now the hard march of post-U.B. reality begins, with all the emotional and financial repercussions we knew it would entail. I'm still trying to make sense of what happened, and trying to deal with the anger, betrayal and frustration for which I still don't have a productive outlet, but at least no one's dumping more shit on top of the pile anymore.

Praise be to God, a few more boxes moved and the leaving will be done. Time to shake off the dust and mourn what has been lost: friendships, trust, the ability to forgive. This mourning will be a long, lonely road but, as I noted before, at least Beloved and I will travel together, as we've done since the U.B. first started spreading its poison.

To those who've walked this journey with us, loved on us, supported us, prayed for us: thank you. Your continued prayers will be appreciated. As soon as we get our hearts and heads straight, I'll be back to blogging a bit more regularly, but for now we need to tend to ourselves.

The peace of the Triune God be with you all.

Scott

*A line from "What Was Wrong" by Storyhill