It's Raining in Baltimore....

Life is full of bitter sweet moments and through all of those moments, especially in my life through all those moments music has had a defining place in what is going on. 

I tend to relate to music better than other ways to deal with whatever emotion I am feeling.  I also tend to gravitate toward a certain type of band, Counting Crows is one of my favorite bands.  They are not one of the more popular bands of the day but I love their sound and 98% of their lyrics. 

SO right now as I sit at 3 Bean for what will likely be one of the last times, I am listening to August and Everything After, great album.  The song in the video is on that album, and funny enough it's been raining in Baltimore a lot lately. 

If I had to be honest the last two years in the Newell house have been full of a lot of rain, a lot of storms.  In some ways we are still dealing with storm clean up, the battles with cancer, my tendency to internalizing and taking everything personally, walking away from the church that I was supposed to save, being angry at everyone involved in that process including myself, mostly at myself. 

The song talks about things that fall apart and about the need for a phone call, a raincoat some kind of connection with anyone and that's where I have been for a long time.  When we first left the church I was in a bad place, people reached out to me and I just sort of read their posts, words of encouragement all that and either ignored them or unfriended them.   I made excuses to not go to church, made sure I had to work as often as possible on the food truck, attempted to start writing again and in doing so posted a couple of angst filled rants.  Then something happened, well a couple of things happened. 

I have this amazing woman that I can say with complete honesty I don't deserve.  The amount of mess she has put up with in the last 23 years qualifies her for sainthood.  My best friend was having a birthday party, in Oklahoma and while we couldn't go she asked if I wanted to talk to him.  Now to be fair, he was one of the guys that reached out to me when everything fell apart and I just didn't respond.  Turns out the party was in Youngstown, also turns out we were going to be in Youngstown at the same time he was.  We couldn't go to the party but that didn't really matter, Joyce asked if I wanted to see him and I said sure why not.  Keep in mind I hadn't spoken to my friend in 7 years.  Long story short after along walk in the snow with my dog we had reconnected and when we got back to the house he mentioned that his nephew had preached the Christmas Eve service at NCA. 

Which brings us to where we are now.  We found out that NCA needed a pastor, I submitted a resume and this past Sunday the church voted us in.  Long journey actually,  full of prayer, conversation, prayer, conversation, evaluation, phone calls, prayer, travel to Ohio more than once, sermons and questions and all of it.  God did some pretty amazing things to bring us to the place we are at now.
He brought us to a great church in Baltimore that reminded me about how much God cares, he opened the hearts of the people in Niles, He opened my heart to realize that HE wasn't done with me by a long shot and that there was a place for us. 

The thing is all of this excitement comes with a bit of sadness.  We have friends here in Baltimore, people who we have grown to love.  People who have stuck with us, people that have been there.  We will miss them.

I will miss them.  Perhaps one of the ones I will miss most of all, is Jim.  I can say with a hundred percent surety that without Jim I would not be heading back into ministry at all.  Without his encouragement, friendship, and prayers I would just be sitting in my room with the lights off listening to Bathsalts (really dark angsty song) over and over again.  He and I came to Locust Point at the same time.  He left before I did and then I left and we have maintained a friendship that transcends ministry and shared vocations. 

God has done some pretty amazing things in the last six months.  I can't wait for all that he is going to do in the coming weeks, months, and years.

So there it is.  It's raining in Baltimore, but there is a light on the other side and well I can't wait to see what's next.




 

Plot points and Plans

Years ago...and at this point I do mean years, I was in the Science Olympics in my school...Don't get too excited, lots of people were in the science Olympics one of the ways to get in was to make a hot box that was supposed to keep water hot for a certain amount of time, build a contraption that kept an egg from breaking and some other strange stuff.  I happened to build a hot box that did a fairly decent job and in doing so landed a spot on the team.  The good thing was that it was a day out of school, if i remember correctly the bus ride for that particular science Olympics led to my first high school Girl Friend, at least I think it did, anyway the point is that you couldn't just do one thing at the Science Olympics back in the day Mrs. Viars wanted to optimize bus space.  So in addition to my hot box project I had to choose another event to be in.  There were options to do a weather event and a few others an then there was the option to do a compass course. I'm sure there is a more scientific name to whatever that was, but that's the best I can do given the circumstances.  I chose the compass course and my buddy Jeff did the weather thing.  I then spent an entire Saturday with a the commander of my Royal Ranger outpost (think boy scouts but attached to the church I grew up in) following direction a set of directions he had plotted out for me to find.  North South East West.. North East, South East etc.  I successfully navigated the courses he set up for me to navigate, filling in the paper with what I needed to and all was good.  I went to the competition confident that I had learned all that I needed to learn to make it through the course.

A little thing about compass navigation, especially when it is in competition form...yeah we didn't do north south east and west... we were each handed a compass that was set in the middle of a clear plastic ruler for lack of a better word, with markings on it the compass I had was a small circle with a flip top lid...the compass we used looked like this...

BIG DIFFERENCE...Now to be fair to Commander Cliff (no I'm not making that up that was his name, dude was TALL to)  this is the kind of compass he trained me to use, however he trained me N, S, E, W.  He did not train me 360 degrees bla bla bla.   To say I was lost would be an understatement.  I will admit to hoping we would all get to start around the same time and I could sort of fudge my way through.  Nope.  Start times were staggered, and while we all ended up bunching up there was a problem in that I really had no idea what I was doing.  I had the tools I needed but I had no idea how to use them.

Which brings me to the real reason for this blog post.  I have been out of ministry for 8 months now.  Back when I left I will admit to being pretty angry and that anger had several places to stop.  God, the church, the conference, and of course myself, because lets face it I had failed.  I made some pretty hard and fast statements as well.  It's funny how when we are in a place of pain, feeling like we have failed ourselves, God, our family and the group of people we are supposed to be helping we lash out.  I would love to tell you that I will never lash out again.  I would love to say that suddenly everything is sunshine and roses but if I am honest that's not how it is.  If we are all willing to be honest we will admit that there are days that we get it and days that we don't.  What matters is what we do on the days in-between.  See the days that we get it and that everything is right in our world and it's all working, we lean into the good stuff, we tell everyone how blessed we are, our social media posts are sickening to the vast majority of our friends, and we can't wait to get to whatever place of worship that we go to, so that everyone can see how great life is.  The days when everything is bad when things fall apart when we are lost and don't know what's next, we get angry, we are no longer blessed God is not real, or not interested, we find the most depressing music we can, and everyone tends to know how bad life is and how much we hate it and how much we are not being treated the way we should be.  We avoid getting together with other people to worship because we don't really want to or see a need too.

Full disclosure I was there for a long time.  I would make excuses to skip church  and when I did go to church it was usually just because that's what the family wanted.  Eye contact was at a minimum, angry rants abounded.  It's a small blessing that I stopped blogging, because while writing is my way of processing and I love doing it, what would have come out of my fingers to the screen would have been ugly and hurtful and would not have been even close to the way Jesus would respond.  Slowly things started to change, we found a church that we fit into, and we began to get involved.  I went back to Facebook and started to actually look at what people posted while I was going through the dark time and found so many people that I thought were gone from my life reaching out and praying and saying to call them.

I have had, for a while now, a hard time holding onto the whole road map of life that God drew for me individually.  I believe that God is interested in me, I believe God cares, I believe God has a plan and a purpose for humanity and even for me.  I believe that plan is to be a pastor, however I also believe that there are entire aspects of that calling and the fulfillment of that calling that sit squarely in my lap.  I'm not much for signs and all that.  People will point to Gideon and the whole fleece thing as if it's a good thing. I tend to see that whole thing not as a guidebook to be sure of what God wants and more of a this is not the way it should be done.   God did what he had to do for Gideon because Gideon didn't want to listen didn't want to step up didn't want to do the task that was before him, he set out impossible tasks not to test God but to get out of his job, the job that God had decided Gideon was supposed to do.  It makes me laugh was I read the entire account of Gideon, mainly because part of me thinks that God engages in similar behavior with the whole whittling down of Gideon's army.  I know that we have this great picture of Gideon having a come to Yahweh moment but I really don't think he was cool with losing vast chunks of his army, especially when it was that whole pick them on the way they drink thing.   God wanted to be sure there was no mistaking who was doing the saving sure, but Gideon still had to do his part, he still had to be the leader, he still had to follow the path that God laid out.

Looking back on the last eight months and even further back at the last five years I can see the shape of a path emerging, and while there are places that a road sign popped up to help steer the journey there are huge chunks of the journey that are me making choices after talking to my family and friends and yes God.  

As we stand on the edge of something new, I am beginning to see the pattern of how God has to deal with me to get me where I am supposed to be.  I plot the points but God makes the plan, and there are many times that I'm right back on that compass course with all the tools I need and not a clue how to chart the course, and then God steps in and hands me a revised plan with N S E and W instead of Degrees and Coordinates, smiles pats me on the head and says.  Now try it.   That's what is happening now and I can't wait to share the end results.

Aspiring artist exhibiting

Today we drove to DC for the 11 year olds art gig.   Let's be clear, she has always wanted to make money with her art, this year she has stared to do so.   The contacts made through Artists Compound have been great for her dreams.   She has been able to sell these hat's that she makes, and today saw he first commission.   She was also put in the promotional material.

So why this post so quickly after the one yesterday?  Simple.   Pride.  She wants to make money with he art and she is.   She's makin connections, exhibiting on a small scale, doing what she wants to do. 

Realizing all of this just affirms what I often forget.  No matter how bad it gets,  no matter what's going on in life that brings worry, I am really blessed with an amazing talented family. 

They really make life worth it, they prove grace is real to me every day,  weather it's a text from my J,  a shared webtoon with Amberly, a smile and wry comment from Zoey,  or a quick hug and kiss  I have more than most.

Anyway I wanted to let you in on a slice of life and promise more to come.

The Process

7 months ago I left the church that I was pastoring.  The circumstances were not fun.  It was not something I was planning on doing.  I came to Baltimore with this idea that I could sweep into this little church and that people would want to grow and that the neighborhood would realize that they needed something more in their life.  That we would reach out in tangible ways to the community and city and in doing so the church would grow.

I bought into this idea that if you could bring in enough change people would check in and and then stay.  I came in with a detailed plan, and we began implementing it.  Sure there were things that went off the rails.  A name change at the start that should have been pushed back at least a year, a missreading of the people I was to pastor, a completely different system of church governance that I thought I understood and could slowly and incrementally change.  

I have gone run through the whole sad situation in my mind over and over again, trying to figure it out, trying to know what I could have done that would have made it better.  Joyce and I were going over it the other day and I asked this question, one that had been going through my head for months.

"What was I thinking?"  Her answer was swift and sure..."You thought you could be the Carey Nieuwhof of Baltimore."  I opened my mouth to answer her and closed it because she was exactly right.  If you know his story if you've spent any time talking to him, you know that he dealt with some seriously difficult times when he started in ministry.  He took three churches that were having issues merged them all sorts of things and they grew, they became more, it's a great story, a great example of what could be, and she was right.  

The problem with this whole true sad tale is not that it didn't work, I could never be Carey and he could never be Aaron. We were given similar circumstances but not the same ones.  We were trying to turn around churches in different places and in different times.  We had different teams, different structures so many different things and while the principles are timeless the implementation isn't.  

Each year I would attend Orange and each year he would ask me if I was still there, and each year I would say yes, because I was doggedly determined to make this little church in Baltimore into the next big thing.  We were going to grow exponentially we were going to become the premier Orange church in Baltimore.  We were going to be multi-staffed.  Reggie was going to ask for me to present at Orange because of this amazing ministry that was reaching the families of Baltimore.  We were going to have a killer Kids Ministry, a growing youth ministry.  All these things were going to happen because they were supposed to, because I was doing all this for God, because I was working hard and because its what God wanted.

Well we all know how that worked out.  I have said I failed, and in many respects I did.  I have blamed myself, God and others and there is blame to go around. I have cried, gotten angry, said words like never and always.  I have done so many things when it comes to the time I spent.  

Ultimately I had to make a very hard choice, keep fighting for this church, or fight to keep my family.  I chose the latter.  I was not a pleasant person in the last year and a half.  Lots of anger, lots of fatigue, lots of just not happy.  We did so many things, and tried so hard and it didn't work.  

Who's fault is it?  Why didn't it work?  What could have made things different?  To those questions I would answer does it matter at this point?  Any time a ministry dies it's bitter sweet.  Sometimes they die because they outlive their usefullness, sometimes they die because it becomes about the leader and not the commission, and sometimes they die because it's not sustainable, and sometimes everyone is just too tired.  Sure I have my theory, the other leaders in the church will have theirs.

But as I sit here seven months later, looking at God moving in our lives I have to say that the whole experience was a very good lesson.  A lesson in how to love people, a lesson in how to lead, a lesson in how to work with, a lesson in God's grace, and in God's capacity to pick us up and put us back together even while we are trying desperately to tell him to leave us alone.

Check back soon for more if you are so inclined.  I know God is doing something that I am excited to share.

The Jesus nobody wants...

Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so...little ones to him belong they are weak and he is strong...ish....because he also is meek and mild....in fact we all know that this is what Jesus looks like...I mean lets face it....He's white, has long hair a well groomed beard and blue eyes, something

that always made me wonder because growing up in the church tradition I grew up in guys having long hair was considered some kind of major sin that would inevitably lead to promiscuity, drug use, drinking, smoking, swearing, and very likely devil worship complete with regular human or at least feline sacrifices.  This Jesus is safe, this Jesus is fun to follow, a mash up of Barney, the Wiggles, Mr. Rogers and David Copperfield (the magician).  Christians like this Jesus because this Jesus is above it all, this Jesus never did any of the gross things that humans do.  He never had doubts, never questioned authority, never had a crush or fell in love.  This Jesus turned water into Grape Juice, floated a few centimeters above the ground, and
shed tears on a regular basis.  This Jesus was led quietly away without a sound or complaint....This is the Jesus so many grew up knowing, and believing in and the reason is simple, this Jesus is manageable.  This is the gentleman Jesus that I wrote about the other day and people like this Jesus because this Jesus will never surprise them, never call them to care about more than what their church says to care about, never ask them to stand up for people no one else will stand up for.  This Jesus would be welcome in our churches because this Jesus wouldn't rock the boat. He would "find his ministry" and spend his days checking kids in, or taking offering, or parking cars, or singing on a praise team or in the choir, nodding, smiling, affirming what comes from the pulpit.  People like this Jesus.

Recently, due to life I've done a lot of re-evaluating of my faith.  There were always things that didn't sit well with me growing up.  Things that didn't make sense that caused me to push against the edges which is a good thing when we push against the edges of our faith authenticity develops but I've said that before, it's nothing new.

While we love that Jesus in the picture we are afraid of this Jesus, and the reason is actually pretty simple, this Jesus is not happy, he's not meek and mild, he isn't offering you and I our best life now.
On the contrary this Jesus is angry, this Jesus had doubts, this Jesus wondered if "the plan was worth it.  This Jesus is the one that did one of the most irrational things that a person can do, and in doing it should offer all of us a type of hope that the other Jesus, the meek and mild floats above the clouds Jesus could never give.

Mark 11:12-14 (NLT)
¹²  The next morning as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry.
¹³  He noticed a fig tree in full leaf a little way off, so he went over to see if he could find any figs. But there were only leaves because it was too early in the season for fruit.
¹⁴  Then Jesus said to the tree, “May no one ever eat your fruit again!” And the disciples heard him say it.¹³  He noticed a fig tree in full leaf a little way off, so he went over to see if he could find any figs. But there were only leaves because it was too early in the season for fruit.
¹⁴  Then Jesus said to the tree, “May no one ever eat your fruit again!” And the disciples heard him say it.

I love this scripture because it shows  Jesus really did get it, he really did live among us, he really did walk the earth, have feelings, got angry and lost his cool, but more than anything it showed he could be irrational and respond in a completely emotional way.  IT WAS TOO EARLY FOR FRUIT. Jesus knew this, and yet he was hungry, and tired, and frustrated and so he reacted he just said no fruit for you, never again.  I can see him walking away the disciples shaking their head thinking what did you expect it's not time yet.  Keep reading the story and you find that they saw the fig tree a few days later is didn't just have no fruit, it was dead.  In his frustration, in his anger, Jesus destroyed a tree that wasn't supposed to have fruit on it yet.  

Jesus begged his dad to not make him have to die, I know we love the idea that Jesus said not my will but yours and it was just this resigned shuffle off to death, but the Jesus the cursed a tree for not having fruit, when it wasn't even time for it to have fruit wouldn't have done that. I believe there was a lot of struggle, a lot of angst, a lot of begging, with the ultimate surrender not because he had to but because he chose too.  I believe the Jesus that cursed the tree to death, that threw out the people buying and selling, that got angry at the mourners at Lazarus tomb, that stood and cried because his friend was dead, even though he knew what he was about to do, had crushes, got in a fight or two joked around with his cousin, skipped out on chores, came in late, argued with his parents from time to time, made good choices and sometimes made bad ones (that tree again.)  

This Jesus is not the Jesus we want, but it is the Jesus we need, correction it may not be the Jesus you need but it's the Jesus I need, because this is that Jesus that offers humanity the hope that the end result of a walk of faith, and lets face it, his time on earth as a HUMAN was a walk of faith, can lead somewhere besides church on a Sunday morning.

One of my favorite stories from the life of Christ happens just after the resurrection.   Jesus is about to forgive Peter and lay some pretty heavy instructions on him.  The disciples are fishing, Jesus tells them to put their net on the right side of the boat they get a huge haul of fish peter rushes to shore even after he had denied Jesus...but the part of the story I love is that Jesus is already cooking breakfast.  Jesus built a fire, brought some fish, and was cooking for the disciples, he knew they would be there, he knew they would be hungry, and so he was meeting their need, not only that he invited them to bring some of what they had to round out the meal.

John 21:10 (NLT)
¹⁰  “Bring some of the fish you’ve just caught,” Jesus said.

Jesus has always viewed faith not as a blind trust, but a full on partnership. A partnership with people just like him.  People who walk the earth, who get angry, who love, who hate, who hurt and who help.  People that doubt and fear, and make good decisions and sometimes are irrational.  People who can become more like He is now, because he took time to be like we are now.

How it is.

As I sit here the day after Christmas I have come to the conclusion that Christmas and all it's trappings are better when you're a kid.  The best memories I have of Christmas have kids in them, either I'm the kid or it's my own kids, okay that's not totally accurate, one of the coolest Christmases I remember is our second Christmas.  We didn't have a regular tree in or apartment, instead Joyce taped a tree to the one wall made of paper, ribbon and ornaments. Simple times before life began it's inevitable trudge towards whatever this thing is now.

I want to say thanks to everyone who has been reading posts, and reaching out.  I know it may not seem like it but I do appreciate the effort.  I just want to make sure people understand a few things I guess. 

I grew up with a certain set of beliefs about God, Church, and Christianity.  Most people do so that's not really news to anyone.  We all come at the God question from whatever angle we are taught to view it.  If you come from an evangelical upbringing you answer the question, many times through very narrow windows of understanding.  You come to the Bible with a certain set of preconceived ideas as to what it really means and you are right and everyone else is wrong but that's not really exclusive to evangelical Christians, or any religion for that matter, we all take a we're right and you're wrong approach to religion.  What gets me is how we all are so positive that we are right and everyone else is wrong, usually based on our feelings, not based on anything more.  People read their faiths chosen texts and cherry pick what they like.  The gather together with other people just like them, that think and read said text the same way, they become a church and begin to make rules of inclusion and exclusion, usually based on their own ideas of what God meant when the holy book they read was written. 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a pantheist, nor am I Unitarian.  I happen to believe that Christianity is the one that has it right, what I refuse to believe in any more is christianity (small c on purpose.)  I am so very tired of platitudes, of we're right and you're wrong simply because, for whatever reason, we don't like or agree with or understand you. I'm done with artificial sanctification, the kind that comes through a membership class,or getting baptized the right way, tired of christians in general, myself included itching for a fight about worship music, or service style, or eschatology, or LGBTQ issues, tired of the idea that scripture is to be viewed through the lens of personal conviction and current experience as opposed to through the lens of context, and historical accuracy.  Tired of evangelicals giving the president a pass as the one that will stay the hand of the apocalypse bound to start in America because I mean lets face it we are the center of the universe.  Tired of liberals claiming the moral high ground, or the real understanding of scripture knowing the real truth. 

Most of all though I'm tired of myself.  Tired of trying to straddle both of those worlds, not feeling like either is a complete fit for my faith in God.  I am not as far as I can tell an evangelical, or mainline, or liberal, I just am. I have said for years that I am a Christ Follower as opposed to a christian, but even that is a bit of a struggle at times.  It's hard to follow in the steps of the one that got it right because, well lets face it, he was God of course he got it right.  It's hard to accept that in this journey I am supposed to be on I'm not ever going to be like the one I am trying so desperately to be like, and worse yet, when I try and lead people to be like him they may or may not accept that I have it right.  If they do, then I run the risk of yet another group of intolerant people putting qualifiers on what it means to have a faith of consequence. 

I have asked that people not tell me what I already know, not tell me Jesus has me in the palm of his hand, or that God is preparing me for something.  I have asked not to be given the Jesus Loves Me answer, simply because I know those answers, have said them to  myself and others, and don't really need reminded of them, what is equally off-putting and makes me realize how far we have to go if we really do want to effect the world the way we were told to is the complete lack of respect for this request that I have seen evidenced...

Growing up one of the things that I was told on a regular basis was Jesus was a gentleman, that he would never force himself onto anyone, the idea that we were all given a free will to choose was drilled into us, but there was always a catch...Jesus was a gentleman as long as we realized that the way our church said was how Jesus worked, and we were given a free will to choose the Jesus that was the one our church or denomination liked to follow, the one that affirmed their understanding of Old Testament scripture etc.  That was the qualifier to Jesus being a Gentleman, he was as long as we understood that the only Jesus that mattered was the one taught by our church...our denomination and this Jesus may or may not have been the  Jesus that walked the earth with 12 guys and a few women over 2000 years or so ago give or take.  Why we think we can be the gatekeepers to a relationship with God is anathema to me but we all do it, and in doing so we turn away whosoevers by the bucket load.  Jesus consistently called religious leaders to task for making it impossible for people to know God and yet religious leaders today keep setting the bar higher and higher for what constitutes a true believer. 

Recently I have had people tell me that I'm not like any pastor they have ever seen, they have said I can talk to you, if you were my pastor or if you had been my pastor I think I would have stayed in church, with that in mind I posit this question....if you are in the Baltimore area...would you and yours be interested in being a part of Baltimore's un-Church.  The place that people who want to explore their faith, do what the Bible talks about.  Hanging out together, having all things in common, taking care of people who can't take care of themselves, doing good, talking not so much about the God we serve and the rules to get to him, but the struggle to become more like the one that God sent to show us how to live and move and have our being in him?

I am posting this to two different Facebook accounts...opening the Pastor Aaron Facebook back up, it's been rather dormant for the past 10 weeks but I think it may be time to explore what it looks like to do something that looks different and hopefully fresh, that reaches to all the rest of the Un's...

Struggle

...Funny how those three little dots can have so much meaning.  For me they evidence my thoughts on life, God, Church, fill in the blanks.

It's been a little over 8 weeks, I have been told I need to get over it, that I choose where I am, that depression is not of God.. that "the enemy" is attacking...bla bla bla, dot. dot. dot.

For the record. I used to say the same things, I used to think that God was intimately involved in the daily life of the people he created, the people that follow him, that when we read he orders our steps, it actually means there's a plan and path that is set out for us and all we have to do is "read the map" the map being the Bible.

More and more I am leaning more toward a deist view of God.  God exists, don't get me wrong, but I am increasingly coming to the conclusion, at least for me personally we are set down into this world and then he kinda walks away...things like the Big Bang theory shouldn't be seen as a lack of belief in God, rather as God creating through word, deed, volition, and then watching to see what happens. Feelings of being called may come from God or they may come from the fact that we are created in the image of God and as such find our worth in doing something beyond our own human capacity for survival and the pursuit of happiness.   The degree to which we "tap into" the image we were created in then determines the vocation we choose.

I am fully aware that the above paragraph is going to further alienate me from the people I grew up with.  I understand that for many of them as it was for me, this need to have God involved in an intimate level with their activities of daily living is life and breath and faith to them.  If at any moment they begin to doubt, to question, to wonder, they look for and find a space, usually their church or small group, or family members that will offer the encouragement that lets them quickly slip back into the Jesus Loves me this I know type of faith that is so much easier to live in, but for me at least has become hollow and meaningless.  We choose the call, we choose the work, we choose the fight, or we don't.  God watches, God sends the butterfly to flap it's wings at times, but ultimately it falls to us to do what it takes to fulfill the calling we FEEL is placed on our lives.

Which brings me to where I am now..

There's a much better song that fits where I am but sometimes we realize that it's better to edit...

As it stands now I have been gone from the Church for two and a half months, it has not gotten better, I have not gotten better.  People talk about being dead inside, and while there have been times in my life where I have understood this feeling to some extent, I am not sure I have ever lived in it as much as or as acutely as I am at this point. I am so angry at the people involved but no where near as angry as I am at myself. We gave a lot, and before you say but Jesus gave more please don't this is not news to me.

We are hurting, I am hurting, we are not going to see family because the leadership of both the church and conference decided that they didn't need to help though a very trying time financially.  Yes I am working but Joyce had to take 8 weeks off for surgery.  Oh well deal with it, seems to be the take away. I have never hated anyone in my life, yet that is where I find myself, hating others, hating myself, angry at God beyond imagining, and still so many people want to tell me that God cares, that God sees, that God knows that God is ordering our path and steps, to which I reply...then God can stop doing so.  God can go spend time with someone else for a while.

If anything this has not served as a push me to my knees time as much as it has to a push me away because of all the times I have fallen to my knees the Heavens have rung hollow.  People will point out when Joyce was ill...I would point out there was no reason for it, people will say but she survived cancer, to which I say she never should have had to deal with Cancer.  I know that's silly, I know all the answers but for me I yes I can't do it any more.  I can't listen to God cares platitudes, I can' hear you the evangelical right wing christian friend from my past tell me again that I must have done something or that the trying of my faith works patience, or that God has something on the other side that is huge and important and wait to see what he does.

I don't want God to do anything else...

Merry Christmas.