Last night at dinner, The Quiet Husband and The Gregarious Son urged me to start looking beyond my home presbytery for a church. Think about where we might like to live in the future, they said. Go for it. Words like Oregon and North Carolina and Florida and New England came up. Michigan and Virginia. Pennsylvania. I felt energized and somewhat freed, and scrolled through every opening posted online by the PC(USA) after I got home.
This morning I woke up and thought, How ridiculous. What a prospective practical, emotional, familial, marital, and financial disaster we are contemplating. Not to mention that I have a life here: house, friends, spiritual direction, teaching. I can't possibly Start All Over.
Before going out, I flipped through the material I will be covering with the Methodist women's discussion group tonight. Go, says God to Abraham and Sarah. Go to a completely new place. Hmmm, I thought, in a most unserious kind of way.
I went out for my early morning walk and stopped, as I often do, halfway around, to sit on a bench overlooking Lower Lake and listen to Pray As You Go. Some music, a reading, some questions and time for prayer. I didn't like today's music at all, but I was too lazy to switch to yesterday's or tomorrow's. And so I made it to the reading, and there they were, the three of them again, with God telling Abraham and Sarah to get going. To a new place.
Which I am pretty sure is exactly what Sarah said. Many times, and the moving was the least of it.
Whew, there's some persitant pushing. You and your family will be in my prayers.
ReplyDeleteThis past shabbat's reading was about getting to the Promised Land, sending a few emissaries out to scout it out, and having them come back saying it wasn't good enough and that the Jewish people could never live there. Hmmm....
ReplyDeleteSo much to consider.
Verrry interesting, indeed. Prayers for discernment for you and your family.
ReplyDeleteI am thinking Ruth and Naomi
ReplyDeleteElijah in the cave on a mountainside
...Abraham and Sarah keep good company.
My experience has certainly been not to laugh too hard when God makes these wild suggestions...and so you most truly have my prayers for discernment!!
ReplyDeleteGood! God is hitting you on the head with a two by four. I've had that experience at times, too. I'm thinkin' maybe it would be a good thing to pay attention... :D Lisa :-]
ReplyDeleteenjoy the journey
ReplyDeleteIt's great your family is supportive of broadening the geographic bounds.
ReplyDeletePraying for your listening and hearing
ReplyDeleteOoooh... this sounds exciting and scary.
ReplyDelete