Glendale Baptist Church, Nashville, TN

Advent Sundays at Glendale

Wed, 13 Dec 2023 17:04:42 GMT

The Sundays in Advent have a few out-of-the-ordinary opportunities! Elementary aged kids are invited to join an inter-generational Sunday School event each Sunday in the Fellowship Hall. Lauren Plummer (and several others) will be leading sessions in collage creation. It will be relaxed and a chance to be involved with some new folks in chatting and creating together. Younger children (babies, preschoolers, and Kindergarteners) are welcomed to continue preschool Sunday School as usual upstairs with Lori and Thomas Williamson.

All ages (literally!) will gather in the sanctuary at 10:30 so that families can enjoy the first 10 minutes of worship together before the preschoolers go to Worship Care. There will be bells, music, the processional, a hymn, lighting the Advent candles, and the Time with Glendale Kids. Then the youngest Glendalers can move into the Worship Care time. There will be quiet activity stuff in the kids corner in the back of the sanctuary — but there should be plenty of movement and sights and sounds to entice the interest of all.

For more information, go here.

Search Committee Accepting Applications

Thu, 29 Sep 2022 16:15:23 GMT

In Special Called Business Meeting on Wednesday evening September 28, Glendale’s Leadership Council recommended 1) approval of a Minister of Music job description ( viewable here ) and 2) that the Music at Glendale Task Group shift their responsibilities and become a search committee. The recommendation was unanimously approved. The Minister of Music Search Committee will be accepting letters of application and resumes through Sunday, October 23. Please pass this information along to those you know who might be interested. Applicants can send material to gbc@glendalebaptist.org . Please remain mindful and prayerful as the Search Committee goes about their new work. Thanks to every single person who has planned, led, and staffed Glendale’s musical efforts since Easter!

A Prayer for Pride Sunday

Sun, 19 Sep 2021 21:46:08 GMT

A Prayer for Pride Sunday
by Lauren Plummer

September 19, 2021

Holy One,

Today we celebrate Pride — the gift of living into the fullness of who you have created us to be. Bless all who celebrate this weekend with joy in the knowledge that they belong.

We come with gratitude, Holy Mystery, for all the ways you are known to us and for all the ways you confound our comprehension. We give thanks to you, gender-bending God, who is both mother and father and still between and beyond all our categories of understanding. We celebrate the queerness of Spirit that beckons us out, to new horizons of hope and fuller communion with your being.

We give thanks, we give thanks for all the ways that Love finds us.

And as we celebrate, keep within in us the memory that Pride is also protest — a prophetic witness to the struggle of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, intersex, asexual, and every non-conforming ancestor who has gone before us. We remember today that joy and love dancing are courageous acts of sacred resistance: a testament to the goodness of your creation, a celebration of triumph over the forces of dehumanization and shame.

With gratitude, we call to mind the faces of all the holy trailblazers, in our own lives and in our larger story, who fought and suffered much, who modeled wisdom and compassion to show us how wide and inclusive Love’s welcome is. We hold these people in our hearts. Bless and keep also the saints among us now — those still using their gifts to speak out in myriad ways and showing us the the continuing revelation of beloved kin-dom.

This morning we remember especially those for whom living authentically has meant loss and grief. We remember those struggling to come out to themselves or their loved ones. We remember those who have been cast aside by family and friends, those abused and silenced, and all lives cut short by shame, stigma, and prejudice. Forgive us, O God, when we let fear shrink our hearts and we try to place limits on your boundless love. May we keep striving to make a world where all people know dignity and can enjoy a life of love and health and equal rights.

We pray that this remembering will strengthen our commitment to create sanctuary and deep welcome for those who have been marginalized. May our worship increase our awareness of grace — that we might give and receive it more freely with one another and all those we encounter. And may our worship reveal the work that is ours to do.

We offer this prayer with Jesus, our sibling & our friend. Amen.

Visio Divina and Running in the Rain

kelly.morelandjones@belmont.edu (Kelly Moreland Jones) — Thu, 24 Sep 2020 17:07:49 GMT

Glentern Kelly Moreland Jones was invited to write for Baptist Women in Ministry this week. Read her fearless blog about unlearning.

How Will We Gather? A letter from the Leadership Council and Church Staff

Mon, 04 May 2020 16:24:42 GMT

How Will We Gather? A letter from the Leadership Council and Church Staff

Dear Glendalers,

The Leadership Council and the church staff have begun to discuss the criteria that would need to be in place for us to believe that returning to the church building for meeting and worship is responsible and safe. As we have surveyed other congregations’ plans, we have found a wide spectrum of practices. As you’ve seen in the news, some churches have continued to meet unchecked. Many have followed their state or city’s stay-home orders.

Rev. Traci Blackmon, pastor of Christ the King UCC church in Missouri and a denominational leader in the UCC, has made a strong and definitive statement about the safety of returning to the church’s building facilities. We are familiar with Rev. Blackmon and her work particularly through her preaching at an Alliance of Baptists Annual Gathering several years ago.

Her statement delineates the difference in agendas of church/faith leaders and political leaders. Borrowing from her wisdom, we claim an agenda that grants equal value and dignity to every person—made in the image of the Sacred. Serving that agenda, we will make decisions for Glendale based on the following criteria: when the curve flattens, when the death rate declines, when everyone has protection and proper protocols, when access to testing/treatment is access for everyone.

While we would be delighted to set a date to gather in person and anticipate that joy, there are not enough solid data to let us know when we might return to the church house and how we would do that safely. Recognizing our collective need to know at least for the short term what to expect, the Leadership Council and church staff feel confident that we will continue to gather virtually at least through the month of May. This does not mean we will return to the sanctuary in June. As possibilities present for smaller groups to gather safely, we will evaluate and communicate with the congregation. We will make those decisions as we have information from people whose expertise can help us protect all who are in our care to the best of our ability.

As you have questions or observations, please be in touch. Our commitment to consensus building does not stop because we cannot sit in the same room and discern together the collective wisdom we hold. Your input helps the church leadership think more broadly and discern more carefully.

With Gratitude,

April Baker, Delvakio Brown, Eileen Campbell-Reed, Selena McCoy Carpenter, Alan Green, Summer Hyche, Alvin Jeffery, Amy Mears, Kelly Moreland Jones, Jon Neergaard, Lauren Plummer, Beth Ritter-Conn, Jake Schaub, Don Schlosser

A Lesson on Enjoyment

Wed, 22 Apr 2020 21:11:45 GMT

“Are you enjoying your new tires,” asked the tire guy at Sears. I had bought 4 new ones a month before and had brought them back in for the free balance-and-rotation thing. And then the ridiculous question. Was I enjoying my new tires? How on earth does someone enjoy a tire? Or even 4 of ‘em?

There are books that I enjoy over and over and over again. The Little House books when I was a kid; Prodigal Summer holds the favored position in adulthood. I enjoy baking a brown-sugar-pecan pound cake and I enjoy eating a slice. I enjoy inspecting my garden boxes and wildflower garden and cutting garden each day. I enjoy the feel of the cool water running down the kayak paddle onto my arms on a hot day. Tires? No. No, I was not enjoying my tires. Not even remotely.

Tires do their work down there on the 4 corners of the vehicle. Best-case scenario: I think about them when I’m getting ready for a road trip and go to the tire place for inspection and rotation. Worst-case scenario: the imagination sprints. They do their job, lord willing, and I rely on their appropriate functioning.

What a boon, then, to experience those things that are, in a fairly thankless setting, doing their job and being enjoyable! I speak, of course, about my co-workers. The Glendale church staff and the Glendale Leadership Council are diligently, creatively, energetically, inquisitively, adventurously doing their work in the 4 corners of the congregation with such grace. The Glenterns add laugher and spice and reality. Alan and April and Alvin and Beth and Delvakio and Don and Eileen and Jake and Jon and Kelly and Lauren and Selena and Summer are attending their service to the Sacred through their service to Glendale all the time. And they’re being pleasant while they do it.

They’re checking on you and they’re checking on me and they’re checking on each other and they’re checking on their neighbors. They’re learning new technologies and teaching them to me and some of you with such kindness. They’re asking what we can do better; they’re asking who we’re not seeing and how we can best make contact; they’re paying attention to finances and children and disinfecting the church kitchen and youth and the lectionary and microphones; they’re wondering how best we can thank Glendale for the privilege of sharing life here.

A global pandemic did not cause any of these things. They were already in place. The pandemic has, however, given time and opportunity to recognize and give thanks for life’s blessings. These people are at the very top of my long list of blessings. I am enjoying doing church with them and with you. Thanks be to God.

Pandemic's Positive Lasting Effects

Fri, 10 Apr 2020 17:31:32 GMT

Dear friends,

I received an email this week from a journalist asking me to contribute to an article about our current church-life situation. Here’s the invitation:

“I’m working on a story about how adaptations and innovations during this time might produce practices with lasting effect. What are you and your congregation doing now as a result of the pandemic that might continue as a good practice well after the crisis?”

Here is my response: Thanks for your email invitation. Here’s my thinking on:

Pandemic’s Positive Lasting Effects

~It’s possible that there will be long-term recovery of the hand-written gesture. People have been moved to write to one another—especially people that they perceive would be lonely or particularly isolated. Our kids’ Sunday School teachers mail care packages of material for the children to open in the usual Sunday School time when they’re together by zoom with the teachers. Everybody has been delighted with that experience.

~The congregation has a stronger understanding of the importance of affinity groups and other small groups. There is a fairly broad sense of concern for people who aren’t obviously or visibly connected to other church members.

~There exists a certain intimacy in worship by being up close and personal with worship leadership. Maybe it’s because the worshiper’s face is literally 12-18” from the person who is leading/preaching/praying/singing. It is the absolute opposite of the “theater-seating” kind of worship experience that seems to have engaged a significant part of the worshipping world of late. Every worshiper is face to face with almost every other worshiper (a few only connect through audio.) “Intimate” is the only word that comes to mind. I’m not sure how we that sense could be incorporated when we are back in the sanctuary. I have a hunch, though, that our sense of connectedness will be enhanced in the long term.

~Church members are experiencing an increase in active awareness of who might need care. There’s always been a generalized kind of benign attention. “Who could use a phone call or a card?” kind of thing. Now there are earnest volunteers to care for folks as though lives depend on it. Who needs our help? Groceries? Cards? Call? Pharmacy runs? WILL YOU LET US KNOW HOW WE CAN HELP? I’m hoping that sense of urgency continues.

~I’m feeling an enhanced connection because of being all up in each other’s faces for several hours a week. The isolation has contributed to more consistent attendance at events. Church members I would only see in passing on Sunday mornings I’m now face-to-face with for an hour and a half on Sundays, an hour and a half on Wednesdays, and a half hour on Fridays. The feeling that we know each other better is sure to live on past the cloistering.

~More people are using online giving platforms. It’s possible that this will continue. That will require us to do what people have been asking for (and we’ve been remiss in delaying): placing “I gave electronically” cards in the pew racks so that everybody who gives can respond to their encounter with the Holy by bringing something forward in worship. (We bring offerings forward rather than having them collected by passing plates. We formed this habit when we were connected for a couple of years with a congregation in NOLA’s 9th ward after Katrina. Worshiping with them taught us the importance of physically moving in worship as we embody our gratitude and response to the work of the Holy in our lives.)

~There is already an enhanced sense of the importance of remembering those who have moved away as being a significant part of what makes us who we are. As we’re gathering for worship or prayer or storytime or whatever, long-timers are introducing new Glendalers to people who used to be here but now live far away. Who would have thought that a pandemic would bring together people formed by their church life 15 years ago and our brand-new members?

~In a related thought, there is an enhanced understanding of the importance of this place, of our particular way of experiencing church, on people’s lives—especially on young ministers. We’ve been joined in worship, just in the last 2 weeks, by TEN Glenterns (the name by which we lovingly know our interns.) They’ve come in from Flagstaff and Detroit and Seattle and all over to, well, I suppose to do several things. To experience worship that they’re not having to lead, maybe. To get ideas for their own use as worship leaders. To re-connect with people who were critically important in their own formation as ministers. It has been a moving thing for us to see these young pastoral ministers in worship.

~Because we are zooming worship live—each worship leader from their own home—everybody “present” is sitting forward in anticipation of what’s going to blow this time. (Something usually blows.) It reminds me of the Annie Dillard quotation about worship:

"Why do people in church seem like cheerful, brainless tourists on a packaged tour of the Absolute? … Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it? The churches are children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, mixing up a batch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake someday and take offense, or the waking god may draw us to where we can never return.”

I saw an email reminder of a Holy Week service this morning that said, “Tenebrae Service: watch at 6:30 on Facebook.” I hope that Glendalers will retain the sense of expectation when we return to worship in the sanctuary. It’s not a spectator sport.

So these are some of my random thoughts. Hope they spur your own creativity as you write!

Peace, a good Holy Week, and wash your hands,

Amy

Troubling Truths About Tables

Thu, 09 Apr 2020 17:12:11 GMT

The Last Supper

2009

John August Swanson

During Holy Week we are reminded of the last supper Jesus shared with his friends. As you already know, the scene will change from community table fellowship to desperate garden prayers alone, betrayal, arrest, crucifixion, death, and, finally, resurrection. Not gonna lie… It all feels particularly heavy this year. I’m on the edge of my seat, leaning in to new life in every way possible. I hope you are too.

But first, I want to talk about tables. What might they signify?

They invite community . Don’t get me wrong, the idea of community sounds great to me. Right now it also scares me like no other thing on the planet. It is messy. It is complicated. It forces me to get out of my head. And, often, I rather like it there… The solace of being alone means no one can hurt you. But that also means no one can love you.

They get turned over . We typically read that Jesus story as a win, right? I don’t disagree with that interpretation. Jesus was legitimately angry and he wasted no time upsetting the prescribed order so that all could experience God’s love. But what about all the brokenness that was left when the tables flipped? Do you sweep it up and throw it away? Mend it and make it more beautiful as a kintsugi artisan might do? I hate destruction. But without it nothing new is born.

Some of them are headless . When I came across the above image of the Last Supper, that was my first observation. Nobody’s at the head of the table. Who is in charge of this group of diners? Who is keeping the conversation flowing? Making sure glasses are filled? For someone whose primary orientation in the world is to take charge in the absence of leadership, I am deeply concerned about that bunch. Also, I wonder if they are all in charge of loving each other and if that somehow magically works?

Some of them welcome everyone . That was my second observation to Swanson's rendering. The shift from exclusively cisgender males around the table to the inclusion of feminine and androgynous figures is a significant theological proclamation. Who does the Holy welcome to be nourished at the table? Everyone. That's troubling if the table you're setting doesn't do the same.

As we gather around our respective tables this holy week, we might consider remembering these life-giving gospel truths…

“Behold I am making all things new.” –God

“Taste and see that God is good.” –The Psalmist

“Let us love one another, because… God is love.” –John the Evangelist

“Love your neighbor as you love yourself.” -Jesus

“I give you Peace. Do not let your hearts be troubled. Do not be afraid.” -Christ

I’m holding each of you close and look forward to seeing you via Zoom on Holy Friday at 7pm and again on Easter morning at 10:30 for worship.

I love you.

Kelly

P.S. Scriptural references include, but may not be limited to, Matthew 21:12, Isaiah 43:19, Isaiah 65:17, Revelation 21:15, Psalm 34, 1 John 4:7-8, John 14:27.

Special thanks to Vanderbilt for Swanson’s art. More information is available at http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=56552

Bifocal Lessons

Fri, 03 Apr 2020 01:47:18 GMT

“bi·fo·cal /ˈbīˌfōk(ə)l/ adjective (usually of a pair of eyeglasses) having lenses each with two parts with different focal lengths, one for distant vision and one for near vision.”

Dear Friends,

It was inevitable, I suppose… this need to correct my failing vision. Last week I began adapting to life in new glasses. Some observations:

1. I look down a lot. What’s that about? Can I not trust my own feet to take me where I need to go? When I look at them with these new eyes they are distorted and the ground is weirdly shaped. My brain is somehow tricked into thinking there are hills while my feet feel straight, solid ground. I wonder why I’ve been in the habit of not trusting my feet to take me where I need to go. I wonder why I feel the need to look over them, to watch them. I wonder why I’m afraid to fall. Have I always watched my feet so carefully? If not, when did I start? Why don’t I look straight ahead, reaching for what is right in front of me?

2. I look through the wrong part to see what I need to see. “It’s a simple neck tilt.” That’s what the optician told me. “Look here to see into the distance, here for your computer, and here for books.” My body is still learning these tricks. My eyes can’t see everything from the same location. They must adjust. Making my eyes behave has been difficult. They are a part of me, after all. Which is to say, stubborn. I’m learning that if I want to see clearly the beautiful life unfolding in front of me, I have to change behaviors.

3. They don’t exactly fit. They arrived the day we were ordered to shelter at home, so I didn’t get a custom fit. No human to human interaction… we might kill each other. I get it. I’m not arguing about that. Just an observation that in the absence of human communication, vision is compromised . In the absence of one saying what is too tight or too loose and the other hearing those words and making adjustments accordingly, the places I’m supposed to look (see item 2 above) slide around all over the place. It makes it harder to see properly.

Here’s the long and the short of it... I just want to be able to make my way through this world .

And I don’t think I’m alone in that.

Artist Lauren Wright Pittman seems to understand. I love her 2018 work, pictured above, called Multitudes . When asked about the work she says the following, "I’ve been thinking a lot about the journey to finding and expressing voice. I wanted to image snapshots of this journey, and highlight the beauty of this unfolding— especially of those who have a more difficult struggle in finding space and freedom to lift their voice."

Do you see what I’m saying?

Love,

Kelly

P.S. Thank you to Vanderbilt for the use of Lauren Wright Pittman's art. http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=57092

On Earth as it is in Heaven

kelly.morelandjones@belmont.edu (Kelly Moreland Jones) — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 03:36:38 GMT

Dear Kelly,

What would happen if you did not save dying for the end of your life?

Love,

God

That is the lingering question of my seminary journey and the current lament of my Lenten life. For the record, I do not recommend going to seminary during middle age, particularly if life as you know it is pretty dang good. Especially if the definition of good involves words like ordered, controlled, prestige, or power. If you can foresee a global pandemic crushing your last year then you might *really* reconsider.

Here’s what I’m trying to say: God may take you on a journey that calls you to die to the “good” life you have known forever.

And then you’ll have a choice.

Die to the life you’ve known and live in the one God has prepared for you… The one God has prepared you for...

…Or…

Go back to the former “good” life, live a lie, and die later.

Some context… That question arose from a reading in my Pastoral Care class a couple years ago. The author suggested that we imagine the whole of our lives as a cyclical process of living, dying, and being resurrected to new life. The challenge was to imagine doing that before our physical deaths… to imagine burying whatever wasn’t life-giving and following Jesus into a new, resurrected existence.

Interesting, I thought. Also, impossible.

Fast forward two years and we arrive at the present pandemic stage of history. Like a lot of you, I’ve tried to calm my nerves by reading. Because I enjoy punishing myself, I picked up Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver followed by Glennon Doyle’s Untamed .

(If you are expecting juicy gossip in this next paragraph, then you’re gonna be really disappointed…)

Barbara renewed my appreciation for the interconnectedness of all living things – the Earth, insects, plants, animals, humans – and love in all its passionate, perfect forms. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a wonderful book. I loved every page of it. The problem was that I read it while being quarantined from the community I need most in this world.

(It may be important to recognize that I sucked in every ounce of air in the room after I wrote that last sentence…)

Then there’s Glennon’s book... I’m still processing that impact. Here’s the passage that is screaming loudly to me right now:

“(Kelly,) There are two orders of things: There is the seen order unfolding in front of us every day on our streets and in the news. In this visible order, violence reigns and children are shot in their schools and warmongers prosper and 1 percent of the world hoards half of all we have. We call this order of things reality. This is the way things are. It’s all we can see because it’s all we’ve ever seen. Yet something inside us rejects it. We know instinctively: This is not the intended order of things. This is not how things are meant to be. We know that there is a better, truer, wilder way.

That better way is the unseen order inside us. It is the vision we carry in our imagination about a truer, more beautiful world – one in which all children have enough to eat and we no longer kill each other and mothers do not have to cross deserts with their babies on their backs. This better idea is what Jews call shalom, Buddhists call nirvana, Christians call heaven, Muslims call salaam, and many agnostics call peace. It is not a place out there – not yet; it’s the hopeful swelling in here, pressing through our skin, insisting that it was all meant to be more beautiful than this. And it can be, if we refuse to wait to die and go to heaven and instead find heaven inside us and give birth to it here and now. If we work to make the vision of the unseen order swelling inside us visible in our lives, home, and nations, we will make reality more beautiful. On Earth as it is in heaven. In our material world as it is in our imagination.” (Untamed, 65)

My dying seems inextricably tied to the birth of a “better, truer, wilder way.” Yours might too.

Love,

Kelly

"Dazzling" And Other Things I Wish I Hadn't Said

kelly.morelandjones@belmont.edu (Kelly Moreland Jones) — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 20:55:56 GMT

"The Good Shepherd" by Julien Dupree (1851-1910)

Dear God,

This is not what I had in mind.

Remember a few weeks ago when I ended the Transfiguration Sunday sermon by quoting Jan Richardson’s poem, Dazzling ? When I said, “Dazzle us, O God! Even as our hearts beat wildly in our chests, that is our prayer. Transform us, O God.” Our current reality is *not* what I was talking about. You’ve misunderstood. It’s ok. It happens sometimes. Please give me a chance to set the record straight.

See, I really just wanted things to continue pretty much as they had been but with maybe more people in the pews and more folks hanging out during our meditation and bible study hour. A few more in the choir could also be cool, as long as they aren’t tone deaf. Lord, don’t send that plague, please... And I wanted to shake their hands. OK. That’s actually a lie. I wanted to hug their necks.

I wanted love to expand.

Also, I wanted to keep my arms around all the things that people expect me to be able to do. After all, I’ve got a reputation to uphold. People at work depend on me to provide support and direction. These minions I live with expect food. SO. MUCH. FOOD. You can’t imagine it, God. And they also want reassurance and time to play and to have fun. But that’s not all. Did you not get the memo that I’m also TRYING TO FINISH SEMINARY RIGHT NOW? This is really bad timing all around if you ask me… And not at all the way I think things should be unfolding. People are having to postpone weddings, others are grieving the deaths of family members with no one other than immediate family around them. We’ve lost our ability to be Your embodied Presence for one another.

Could you (please) find a different way to transform us?

A more experienced pastoral intern would have something better to offer right now. These are my initial thoughts to all this chaos, though…

Wait.

What’s that?

You’ve got to be joking. The lectionary calendar has us reflecting on the 23rd Psalm this week?!

I. Kid. You. Not. Did You plan that?

Remember the beautiful choral arrangement of that Psalm that Don recently taught us? The one written by Bobby McFerrin that he dedicated to his mother? Maybe I will rest in the truth of those words for a while…

The Lord is my Shepherd, I have all I need,

She makes me lie down in green meadows,

Beside the still waters, She will lead.

She restores my soul, She rights my wrongs,

She leads me in a path of good things,

And fills my heart with songs.

Even though I walk, through a dry and dreary land,

There is nothing that can shake me,

She has said, She won’t forsake me, I’m in Her hand.

She sets a table before me, in the presence of my foes,

She anoints my head with oil, And my cup overflows.

Surely, surely goodness and kindness will follow me,

All the days of my life,

And I will live in Her house, Forever, forever and ever.

Glory be to our Mother, and Daughter,

And to the Holy of Holies,

As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be

World, without end. Amen.

I'm... uh... well... a little bit... dazzled... at.. the... moment...

See you at the church house (via Zoom)!

Love,

Kelly

P.S. Thanks to Vanderbilt's online lectionary resources for the image of Dupree's painting above. For more information visit http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=54256 . For the full text of Jan's poem visit https://paintedprayerbook.com/2016/02/05/transfiguration-sunday-a-blessing-made-for-coming-down-the-mountain/ . Blessings, y'all.

Are We There Yet?

kelly.morelandjones@belmont.edu (Kelly Moreland Jones) — Wed, 11 Mar 2020 18:51:55 GMT

Our Lenten theme, “How Long?” names the dissonance of our current human experience: we’ve arrived and not yet. Which is almost as much fun as the experience I anticipate next week as we load the minivan for a quick beach trip. The guys will have their devices and I will pack most of the fridge in a cooler between them but you can bet your last dollar on the fact that they’ll both say those dreaded words more than once: “Are. We. There. Yet?” If history is any indicator, my response will be sweet at first but then it’ll probably change a bit to something that a seminary student ought not write on her church’s blog. Y’all are smart, creative people. You can imagine how that trajectory might unfold… But that’s not exactly what I’ve come here to ponder…

HOW LONG? That’s what I wanna know. My soul needs the joy of resurrection and restoration. I’m weary. Barely hanging on. For me, Sundays are a significant rest stop on the Lenten journey. I believe with all my heart the truth of Sunday’s anthem, “We trust, O God, we trust in time our grief shall mend. Transformed by love that shaped our dust, your love that knows no end.”

It was just two short weeks ago that we acknowledged our dust status on Ash Wednesday, the next week we got blown around by a tornado, and this week COVID-19 has officially been named a pandemic by the World Health Organization. It feels like my ashes are being reshaped. I’m grateful to be held in unending love through all this. Without that Sabbath reminder, I’m done for. Completely tapped out. Am I alone?

Is anybody else fighting the angst of needing to be in community with people you love while also being told to self-isolate at home?

Or the desire to continue in support of tornado efforts while also being told to limit social contact?

It feels like we are trying to do life together, virtually. Which is weird. And also the best option for the physical sustainability of the most vulnerable among us. So I’m gonna do it, even though it doesn’t come naturally to me. Jesus didn’t exact take the natural, easy path. I figure I will follow that lead.

Seeing your smiles and sharing your tears is a treasure that (selfishly) gives me hope and purpose. I want to see you at the church house. Whatever form that takes, I will be there.

Love,

Kelly

It Really Is Bad Out There

kelly.morelandjones@belmont.edu (Kelly Moreland Jones) — Thu, 05 Mar 2020 18:20:01 GMT

Were you there? On Sunday Amy encouraged us to hold each other up during the Lenten season because “it’s bad out there.” Sometimes I wonder if that sister’s got some kind of ESP abilities, but I digress… I suppose it’s really good advice all the time to hold each other up. I left our worship experience feeling a deep and abiding peace. That’ll happen to a soul when it is sure of its place in a safe community. And then the week unfolded...

Are you there? There’s the tornado we saw on radar, photos, videos... In destruction, disorder, chaos… In communities clamoring for resources... In Facebook posts warning of predatory buyers that are poised to further damage friends in north Nashville... Y’all… in death. That’s hard to write and also, true. I left the experience with renewed appreciation for ancient communities that would do anything to appease the gods so that things beyond their control like weather could somehow be managed. “God, take whatever you want in exchange for no more great clouds blowing away life as we know it. We can’t take another thing. No more things! Mercy, it’s bad out there!”

Can you be there? Are you holding people up or being held, or maybe both? Cleaning up, providing hospitality, sharing money, making meals, connecting people to resources, offering words of hope, or hugs? Other things that I haven’t even thought of yet?

Will you be there? I suspect that’s a gigantic yes. I will too. Life and death are swirling all the time. We won't survive without each other. See you at the church house.

Love,

Kelly

Lenten Leanings

Tue, 25 Feb 2020 22:31:17 GMT

True story: the only lent from my childhood was spelled l-i-n-t and lived in the dryer. It probably looked a lot like yours… Gray and fuzzy... Harder to grab when cleaned regularly, yet that is exactly what the dryer instructions tell you to do. I’ve always found it easier to wait for a nice large load of towels and then clean it out. There’s more to grab that way. I imagine that there is probably an object lesson in that but it hasn’t come to me yet so let’s talk Lent, the liturgical season.

The season of Lent begins with a reminder of our mortality on Ash Wednesday and ends forty days later as we transition to Holy Week and, ultimately, Easter. The rhythm screams to us: your time is short! What can you give up to help another realize their place as a beloved child of God? What can you start doing? How can you steward the next 40 days so that your faithfulness before God is deepened?

Not gonna lie… It’s work, y’all. But celebrating Easter without these considerations really is just colored eggs and bunnies. Which is fine, if that’s your jam. What if you could also live in the fullness of resurrection joy when that time comes, though? The preparation for that begins now. I’m gonna try my best to lean fully into the humility and devotion of the Lenten season. There. I said it. No turning back.

The following household morning and evening prayers may help us as we journey. They are used by permission from Feasting on the Word, Liturgies for Year A, Volume 1 :

Morning Prayer:

Loving God,

I awaken this morning and raise up my mortal body from sleep,

I know that one day you will raise me to everlasting life.

Thank you for such an inexpressible gift!

Thank you, too, for the gift of this day,

Of this life among family and friends,

My home and the beautiful earth.

Show me how I can serve you today by serving someone else.

Help me to see evidence of your grace all around.

Remove any obstacle that causes me to stumble in faithfulness

Or prevents me from receiving the joy and gladness you offer.

In Christ’s name, I pray. Amen.

Evening Prayer:

Long after Wednesday’s ashes are wiped away,

My perishable body is still perishable,

O God of my salvation.

I can feel it in these evening hours:

the tiredness in my limbs,

my eyes,

my mind.

Thank you for the activities that engaged me today,

and for the rest that comes

as the sun leaves my horizon for another shore.

As I prepare to sleep,

Quiet my thoughts and all my strivings.

Let me ponder the treasures of my heart,

Lifting up each one as a prayer for your safe keeping.

When I awake,

now and in the life to come,

I am still with you.

In Christ, Amen.

And just like that, my dryer buzzer has sounded. So before I forget, I’m headed to search my filter for all the little specks of lint and get rid of them so my dryer can do what it was made to do as easily and efficiently as it possibly can. I’ll probably even add a dryer sheet to the next load in the hope that it will improve the results. Lent.

Glendalers, it remains a blessing to walk with you. See you at the church house.

Love,

Kelly

The Way of Love

Mon, 24 Feb 2020 18:08:58 GMT

The Way of Love

In our Purpose Statement, we name that we’re followers of Jesus “on the Way of Love.” The idea of being on this particular path comes from teachings of the desert mothers and fathers of 1500+ years ago, who considered life in the monastery (or for us, life in the church), as a school—a shared life where we are learning to love. Learning to recognize love, learning to receive love, learning to give love, learning to live in Love, the church is a laboratory. We are going to Love School.

Modern-day prophet and Kentucky farmer Wendell Berry says it like this: I believe that the world was created and approved by love, that it subsists, coheres, and endures by love, and that insofar as it is redeemable, it can be redeemed only by love.” The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays of Wendell Berry (ed. Counterpoint, 2003) - ISBN: 9781582439242 So even when we have overslept and missed class, when we’ve got the flu at exam time, when we surf the web during an important class activity, there’s something irrefutable about our community’s encouragement. We get the notes from a classmate, we find a tutor, we go to the Love lab, we find a study partner until we get caught up on the material.

Wendell Berry echoes what Dorotheos of Gaza described to his desert community of long, long ago. If a group of people practicing the Jesus-following Way stands in a circle and God is the center, then every step closer to God brings the individuals closer to one another. Every step closer to one another brings them closer to God.

Unfortunately, in the school of recurrent-themes-of-human-behavior, not everyone gets the memo and even some of us who do receive it choose not to pay attention. Like clueless Joseph in the Hebrew Testament’s Genesis story, arrogantly telling his dreams to his siblings and parents, “how not to be on the road together” is sometimes more reflective of our situation.

Desert cisterns, wild animals, camel caravans bringing traders and goods from far-off lands: the story of Joseph, thrown into a cistern to be sold off by his brothers, highlights the conflictual nature of the wilderness. It is at once desolate and rich, stifling and causing despair while providing life and insight that can’t be found anywhere else. The desert is death and life. The wilderness is beauty and terror.

The Desert Mothers and Fathers, the Ammas and Abbas of the third and fourth century deserts of Egypt and Gaza and Syria and Turkey, were about learning to love. They were about learning how not to snipe at each other. They realized that at times each one of them might be in danger of a toss into the cistern by their siblings and they were determined to overcome the impulse to violence large and small. Their purpose was a journey toward how to be humble, how not to resent one another, and how to resist comparing themselves to one another. Brilliant and compassionate Roberta Bondi says, “The Desert Mothers and Fathers claimed no other virtue greater than that of not being scornful.” Roberta Bondi, To Love as God Loves

Learning to love God, to love yourself, and to love your neighbor is, above all, about learning how not to judge those with whom you share the world. “Don’t judge fornicators,” say the Ammas and Abbas, “because the one who said, ‘Don’t fornicate’ also said, ‘Don’t judge.’” And there, we have to fill in our own favorite objects of scorn. Don’t judge those who gossip. Don’t judge those who scorn you. Don’t judge those who aren’t as responsible as you. Don’t judge those whose values are different. Because the one who says, “Don’t gossip, don’t be scornful, don’t be irresponsible, don’t neglect these things we value,” also said, “Don’t judge.”

There is an awful lot of wisdom in the desert. Personally, I would rather avoid being dropped into a cistern, and I would prefer to learn desert wisdom while photographing wildflowers and birds and lizards and beautiful sunsets; while gazing in awe at mountain vistas and at tiny, hidden forms of life and beauty. Like Joseph, though, I’m obnoxious. I like to tell my dreams. I’m insensitive to the feelings of those in my community. I judge. It’s a good thing that I enjoy looking up from the cistern where my options are limited to activities like mapping the constellations.

And I appreciate more and more the voices in my community (voices that echo Joseph’s brother Judah) who say, “Let’s not harm her because she’s our sister—she’s family.” For us, being on the Way of Love brings lessons in personal prayer, common worship, everyday work, and service in the cause of following Jesus. The community is the laboratory in which we learn these life-saving, life-giving wilderness survival skills. My work is to be a better student.

~Amy Mears

Glendale Baptist Church, Nashville, TN

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