I don’t remember much, if anything, about being three years old. The furthest I can usually reach back is the year after that, when I suddenly had to share my parents’ attention with a big-lunged baby brother. I’m certain that who I am and what I know is built on experiences from those earliest years, but I’m also sure I could audit a few classes from a less-jaded version of myself. That is why I’m taking notes as I watch my son grow up. Here’s what my newly-minted threenager is teaching me:

Resilience. I have watched L outrun his own feet, causing him to leave several layers of skin on the concrete. Sometimes he cries, sometimes he doesn’t, but it’s never long before he has popped back up and started playing full-tilt again. He doesn’t understand shame, so he has no need to make his scrapes seem more dire than they are or to blame them on someone else. That frees him up to keep going.

Boundaries. I’ve seen other kids shove L when we’ve been in public play areas. He usually looks that child in the eye, points his finger, and says, “No hit!” in a firm voice. He knows he doesn’t deserve to be pushed around. (Let’s hope he always remembers that others don’t either…)

Feeling the feels. When something is really bothering L, he will break down in sobs and wail, “I’m so sad!” He gets it out, lets his dad and me comfort him, and moves on. He doesn’t stuff it down deep until it explodes at another time.

Love of self. This child loves the mirror. He tries out different expressions. He admires how he looks in a tie. He doesn’t brush off compliments; he beams at them. No body image issues here.

Un-self-consciousness. L loves planes, trains, and helicopters. He also loves Fancy Nancy, accessories, and the color pink. He doesn’t limit himself to a category, and (at least so far) he doesn’t try to impose labels on others either.

Persistence. L got a 24-piece puzzle (a real one!) for his birthday. It took a few days to complete. We left it out so he could work on it a bit at a time. He turned the pieces this way and that, trying to match the colors, lines, and notches. When he would find a fit, he’d take a moment to celebrate: “Great job. I did it!”

Forgiveness. No matter how often I mess up as a parent, he loves me. He gives me biiiiig huuuuugs. And he tells me it’s time to play again. He gets that our relationship is larger than one incident.

Yes, a lot of the great qualities that I admire in my son come from the fact that he is in the early stages of understanding how to relate to the world, which is itself still small in his eyes. He’s still very ego-centered. But I can’t help but think that he has much to teach me about myself – and that he is giving me pointers on how to help him as his challenges get larger – if I will only pay attention.

“I was so busy I forgot to eat lunch.”

“I want to take better care of myself, but I feel guilty when I do.”

“I don’t know anyone outside my church, and I don’t know where to look for friends who won’t censor themselves because I’m a minister.”

Can you relate to any of these statements? Many ministers seek coaching because they realize their work pace is unsustainable and their support networks need beefing up. It’s no wonder that self-care is a common theme in clergy coaching. Ministers are under pressure (from themselves as well as from others) to be available to church members constantly . . . while also preparing for programs or sermons, envisioning fresh ways to attract and engage newcomers, and representing the congregation to the community. Health, family, and personal time often take a backseat.

Coaching provides a safe space for the person being coached to vent frustrations about unrealistic expectations. From there we explore which roles really do belong to the coachee and which ones can be delegated. We talk through strategies for performing the claimed roles more efficiently and effectively, and I encourage the coachee to identify whom they will contact and when about the pieces to be delegated. We delve into what self-care itself looks like for the person being coached based on her personality type, family situation, and interests. I ask the coachee to name how she will hold herself accountable to her new plan. And then we celebrate (!) when she takes her days off, schedules coffee with a friend, or says no to a task she doesn’t need to own. If guilt at taking time for self-care persists, I challenge the coachee to point out how her health and well-being benefit others – her church, her family, her friends.

I’ve found that people (including me!) are more consistent about self-care when they are affirmed in their need for it, create a strategy for attending to it, have a place to share their joy that they are prioritizing it, and can reflect on how it contributes to their wholeness as pastors and people. If you could benefit from conversation around self-care, I’d love to talk with you.

My coaching clients are very brave. Almost all of them are young clergy women. They have responded to God’s call to serve in a youth-dismissing, increasingly-disparaged, male-dominated profession. Like I said, BRAVE. And they are doing amazing ministry. I am constantly in awe.

Still, I know from my own experience that it can be tough to remain confident when you are often asked, “Are you sure you’re old enough to be a pastor?” To stand tall when the people in your care take shots at you because they are anxious about personal matters or angry at God or unhappy with the church. To keep going when you see your male friends from seminary keep climbing into bigger and bigger pulpits when those same churches won’t even grant you an interview.

My clients are changing the culture of professional ministry with their faith, gifts, and persistence. I can see the shift happening. As it does, I offer these thoughts on how to stoke one’s courage as needed. (Printable PDF available here.) Please share!

It always mystifies people that I once played basketball, since my height has not changed since roughly the third grade. (Even then, I was in the front row for class photos.) Part of the fun for me was being part of a team. We worked out together. We pushed each other. We were united in our goal of having the higher number on the scoreboard when the final buzzer sounded.

Contrast that experience with group work in class. That was often the pinnacle of “ugh” for me during my middle and high school years. Inevitably, some group members put in more time and effort than others. One person was passionate about busting the bell curve, while another was happy simply for a passable project to be turned in.

There’s a difference between being an allied force with a goal and being a collection of individuals with an assignment. In Overcoming the Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Field Guide for Leaders, Managers, and Facilitators, Patrick Lencioni outlines the process of becoming an honest-to-goodness team.

• Build trust. Without creating a safe space for vulnerability, conversation will be surface level.

• Be willing to engage in conflict. When there is trust, participants are willing to put all possibilities on the table.

• Commit. When it’s clear that every option has been explored, a team can make hard decisions with confidence.

• Hold each other accountable. When teams have agreed on a course, the members are invested in making sure everyone does his/her part.

• Pay attention to results. When team members keep one another on track, they are generally able to focus on and meet the objectives they have set.

A significant piece of ministry involves working with committees, boards, and/or task groups. In your work, how many of these groups fulfill the five functions of a team? How might attention to these functions not just make the groups you work with more functional, but also affect a culture change in your faith community? What would it take for your leaders to embrace these functions?

The most tempting button on Facebook – for me, anyway – isn’t the trusty thumbs-up, a sign of celebration and solidarity. In this election cycle, in this climate of increasingly divisive and belittling rhetoric, my less-dominant hand often has to restrain my clicking hand from lunging for the “unfollow” option.

While the majority of my Facebook friends share my political and theological leanings, I know and care about a lot of people – highly intelligent, deeply compassionate people – who think differently than I do. It would be easy enough to boot their impassioned statuses and their links to opinion pieces out of my newsfeed. I wouldn’t be going so far as to unfriend them, after all. They’d never know they hadn’t made the cut, so I wouldn’t be hurting their feelings. I could then go about my day with fewer inclinations to comfort-eat…and without the occasional pause to listen for apocalyptic hoof beats.

But the unwillingness to consider others’ points of view is how we devolved into divisiveness and belittlement, isn’t it?

It’s the age-old myth of scarcity at work, in this case with regards to airtime. If I don’t shout the loudest, I won’t get the chance to share my side. I can’t afford to use my debate platform to ask clarifying questions. I’ve got to spend it all on advocacy.

Truth be told, those on the opposite end of the spectrum are unlikely to change my approach to the issues with their Facebook activity. It would be arrogant of me to think I would have any more success persuading them. But I believe I have a responsibility to try to understand why others feel the way they do, to note how policy intersects with the lived reality of another human being. Because when I get the history, the reasoning, the pastoral care pieces behind the position – and when I share my own hopes and fears – I can still be in relationship with someone who comes at complicated matters from a different angle. (The exception here is when the way someone speaks sends me into a mental health spiral. Then self-care does need to kick in, so that I can tend to the parts of my soul that allow me to be in community with those who aren’t abusive.) Relationship leaves the door open for collaboration, or at least for compromise, in view of the common good. Even if we can’t work together, we still retain the ability to see one another as children of God.

If I can’t do something so simple as read a status update that challenges me, then I really should be listening for hoof beats…and it will be my need to be right hastening them.

Have you ever felt like your time was being sucked into some sort of chronological Bermuda Triangle? Where did all the hours go? Most of us live at such a breakneck pace that it’s hard to remember all the things we did today, much less last week or last month.

Or have you wondered why you always seem to react a particular way to a certain person or in a certain kind of situation? Where did that anxiety come from? At times it seems to tackle us from behind.

Or have you been feeling exhausted or restless, with no apparent reason? Why am I feeling this way? It’s hard to focus on the people in front of us and the tasks at hand when all we want to do is sleep or go somewhere – anywhere – else.

Enter the usefulness of tracking and reflecting. When we take a few moments each day to make notes on our activities or our state of mind, we can begin to notice patterns that help us understand ourselves better and point to potential changes.

Here are a few examples:

Where did all the time go? Use your calendar to keep detailed notes on how you spend your days, even marking how you use short bursts of time for things like email, Facebook, or hallway conversations. After a few weeks, sit down with your calendar and look for the time leaks. (You might even consider color-coding the different categories of time use to help with this reflection piece, especially if you’re a visual person.) What changes could you make to plug up these leaks?

Where did that anxiety come from? Keep a journal handy. When someone or something prompts you to act in a way you don’t like, write down what happened, who was involved, and what your mindset was going into the situation. Think through what you could do differently next time to come away with a different result. After you’ve made a few entries in your journal, consider whether there’s a pattern in your triggers and what that might mean for how you prepare for appointments and/or when you schedule them.

Why do I feel so exhausted/restless? Sometimes these feelings are the stirrings of discernment. Sometimes they are due to temporarily overwhelming life circumstances. And sometimes they are simply related to personality type. Look back over your calendar over the last few weeks. Are you an introvert who has been covered up with pastoral care visits and meetings? Are you an extrovert who has been chained to her desk lately by the demands of study and planning? Where might you play to your personality type to strike more of a balance in your day?

Patterns can be adjusted, but only when we’re aware of them! If self-reflection isn’t giving you the answers you seek, ask for the observations of a person you trust.

I cried at church on Sunday. It wasn’t the first time, though I’m not a particularly teary person. But I wasn’t reaching for the Kleenex because a parishioner shared a heavy burden or because I was having to say goodbye to a congregation I love or because conflict had flared up on the busiest morning of the week. I cried because I was a grateful mama.

My two-year-old spends his Sunday mornings moving between the nursery and the adjoining one-room Sunday School for the older children. He’s really into vehicles right now, and his first order of business when he gets to church each week is to pull out the three school buses in the baby room. One of the buses is designed to light up and make sounds, though its batteries probably died long before my husband was appointed to pastor this congregation in June. On Sunday morning a fourth grade boy told his parents he needed to take batteries to church so that L could play with a fully-functional bus. I was still in the children’s area when this sweet soul walked in with a Ziploc bag full of different sizes of batteries and headed straight for the nursery to get that bus ready to roll.

It wasn’t just the gesture but also the forethought that made me a little weepy. And yet, I shouldn’t have been surprised. I have seen this child go out of his way to welcome my preschooler. He’s not the only one reaching out, either. There’s a teenage girl who has taken it upon herself to look after L on Sunday mornings. Other kids engage L in games, sing with him, and read to him – without much (or any) prompting from the adults.

These children and youth have been deeply formed in their caring behaviors by the congregation as a whole. The adults check in with and help one another without reminders to do so. They can disagree and still love and minister alongside each other. They tell my son to stop running in the sanctuary with his sucker (thank you!) and follow that gentle instruction up with big hugs. Their prayer lives are deep and broad in scope.

This abundant care that is nurtured by the intimacy of a small congregation overflows into the community. The church works with the local elementary school to help families in need. It takes VBS to a nearby apartment complex. It actively invites neighbors to participate in on-campus fellowship experiences like trunk-or-treat and content events such as special speakers. It brings crocheted blankets to people who are hurting or homeless.

I have loved all of the faith communities I have been part of as a minister and spouse. But this place is definitely the place for us now. As a mama, I would not trade the congregation’s investment in my son’s spiritual and emotional development and the modeling of being responsible for and to other people – not for uber-modern facilities, not for a regular rotation of high-visibility events with bounce houses and snow cone trucks, not for age-divided or super-techie formation experiences.

So take heart, small churches. There’s no need to compare yourself to the big guys. Yes, they have much to offer. But so do you, and there’s no standard metric that can gauge the impact of heart.

You’re sitting in your annual review. Most of the feedback you’re getting is positive. Not just positive, actually, but really encouraging. There are just a few minor areas for improvement: “I wish you’d handled your conversation with X a bit differently.” “We’ve received some complaints about an example you used in a recent sermon.” “There was a slight dip in numbers late in the year.” And all the steam you picked up from hearing about what’s going well dissipates into the strata. Why, when there are so many more items in the plus column?

Part of the reason is that feedback is, well, backward-focused. And there aren’t any mulligans for moves we’ve already made, so we’re left endlessly replaying situations we cannot change. But in Entering Wonderland: A Toolkit for Pastors New to a Church, author Robert Harris introduces the concept of feedforward. Instead of putting the past under the microscope, Harris suggests that questions intended to evoke improvement start with the present moment and look ahead.

• Instead of (or as a follow-up to) “I wish you’d handled your conversation with X a bit differently,” a feedforward question could be, “How do you want to relate to X in the future?”

• Instead of (or as a follow-up to) “We’ve received some complaints about an example you used in a recent sermon,” a feedforward question could be, “How do you determine what stories best support your messages? How do you decide when an anecdote might be hard to hear but needs to be included?”

• Instead of (or as a follow-up to) “There was a slight dip in numbers late in the year,” a feedforward question could be, “What changes can we make in communication, content, support, and timing to help our ministries be as robust as possible?”

This kind of reflection acknowledges that there is room to grow, but it channels that awareness toward action steps. We claim our capacity for positive change instead of being held captive by second-guessing.

Feedforwarding doesn’t automatically happen. It is a different way of thinking, both about ourselves and for the people who join us in ministry. How, then, might you introduce and model the concept in your context?

Over the course of fourteen years in ministry, I’ve saved a few particularly meaningful cards and emails from parishioners. These notes name specific ways that my care made a difference in the life of the writer or in his/her church as a whole. I am grateful for the time these folks took to sit down and put their experiences into words. Whenever I feel inadequate in my vocation, I can re-read their thoughts from years ago and be emboldened to do good ministry now.

One of the biggest predictors of pastoral satisfaction is feeling like your ministry matters. According to Cynthia Woolever and Deborah Bruce, this factor is significantly more important than both compensation and the number of hours spent at work. However, some congregations and constituents are better than others at expressing (or even owning) their appreciation for your preaching, teaching, pastoral care, or administration. So if you don’t hear “thank you” enough, it’s not necessarily because you’re doing an underwhelming job.

It does mean, though, that you might want to strengthen your internal sense of your vocational worth. Here are a few ways you might go about that:

Take time at the end of each day to reflect on glimmers of God-ness you experienced. Where is somewhere unexpected that God popped up? How did God work through you or through someone in your care? Look for the smallest of sightings.

Take time at the end of each week to think about what you accomplished, even if there is no tangible work product. (In ministry, there rarely is!)

Follow-up with people who tell you a simple but heartfelt “thanks.” Ask what you did or said that made an impact. This helps you to know what you did well and trains that person to give you specifics.

Give yourself grace and space to learn if you took a misstep. Sometimes we gain the most useful insight for ministry that matters from those hard lessons – times we unintentionally affected people we care about in negative ways.

You are doing ministry that matters. Even if you serve congregations of somewhat reserved people – engineers, farmers, introverts – who rarely tell you what you’re doing right. Even if you have a few very vocal complainers who make you dread coming to the office. Even if the pastor-parish fit is not precise and you’re looking for a better match. Find ways to remind yourself of that so that you can persist in the work to which you have been called.

Your time and money are very valuable. When you come to a coaching call, I want you to get the most out of both! It’s up to me to prepare to coach you, and here are some things you can do on your end to make best use of our hour together:

Before our coaching calls begin:

Take advantage of the free introductory call. This is not a coaching call (though I might ask a few coaching questions to give you a feel for my approach), but it is a time for us to get to know each other, talk about the process, and build trust. I will ask about your overall goals for coaching and about your personality so that I can tailor my questions accordingly.

Utilize assessments. If you haven’t really thought through how you learn best, consider making use of a free assessment such as Mindframes. (It’s easy to complete in less than 10 minutes.) If you’ve never taken a test like the Myers-Briggs or employed a framework like the Enneagram, look them up online. We’ll be able to focus on action steps more quickly when we both understand where you’re coming from.

Before each call:

Follow through on actions designed on the last call. Once you have put your plans into place, we can tweak them to make them even more effective.

Minimize distractions. Close out tabs on your computer. (Or better yet, turn it off completely if we’re talking by phone.) Set your phone to silent. Put a note on your door that you’re not to be interrupted. This is your time. You’ve earned it.

Give yourself time to settle in. Make sure you give yourself a buffer before you coaching call. Take a deep breath. Refresh your coffee. Find a comfortable place to sit. Load up Zoom a few minutes early in case it needs to update. If you come into the session on two wheels, you’ll spend precious time at the beginning of the call focusing yourself.

Think through what you want to talk about. Consider challenges and opportunities you’re facing. Identify your desired outcomes for the coaching call. (This prep sheet can help.)

During the call:

Lean on your learning style to stay focused. It’s hard for anyone to stay fully engaged during an hour-long conversation. If you’re a visual person, find a focal point in the room or draw whatever our conversation brings to mind. If you learn by writing, take notes. If you’re a mover, stretch occasionally.

Ask me to rephrase. If a question doesn’t click with you, tell me to ask it a different way. Sometimes a new angle on the same question shakes loose some ideas.

Be willing to try new things. I might suggest we imagine or experiment. This might be a bit out of your comfort zone, but stretching provides the groundwork for positive change.

Tell me what worked and what didn’t. Especially if you are a new client, I will ask you at the end of the call what I should do more or less of during our next session. Even if I don’t ask, I am always open to feedback. I want to do whatever will best help you meet your goals.

After the call:

Reflect on your takeaways. Think about new awareness you gained or action plans you put together. (This reflection form can help.)

Act right away. To move your learning into long-term memory, you must act on it quickly. Take at least one small step within 72 hours. With every effort you will move closer to the results you’re looking for – or at least to awareness that will make change possible.

Build in accountability. Ask a friend or colleague to ask you how your action steps are progressing.

When coach and coachee both bring their best to a session, amazing things can happen.

It’s tough to get traction for forward movement when there’s no trust in people or process. Instead of focusing on what’s ahead, you’re busy looking over your shoulder to make sure there’s no one with a knife within stabbing distance.

So, unless a compromised relationship is abusive – in which case wariness if not complete separation is called for – it’s generally worth the effort to try to rebuild trust. Here are some thoughts on how to go about it:

If your trust has been broken:

Listen to yourself. Your limbic system has kicked in for a reason. Maybe the situation is harmless and a word or deed triggered some old trauma. Or maybe the red flags are waving to protect you from present danger.

Be kind to yourself. You do not deserve to have your trust violated.

Take a deep breath. It sounds so simple, but a deep, cleansing breath can interrupt a limbic loop. (Limbic loops keep us locked in survival mode, keeping us from learning more about our situation or finding a creative solution.)

Ask for perspective. Talk with people whose counsel you value. Ask them to help you understand the situation more broadly and discern how to move forward.

Be honest. When you’re feeling more brave – or can fake it! – tell the trust violator about the impact of her/his choices. The response will let you know what the immediate possibilities are for saving the relationship.

If you have broken someone else’s trust:

Own up to the breach. Acknowledge – first to yourself and then to others – that you have messed up, and ask for forgiveness. Otherwise the process of rebuilding trust stops before it starts.

Exchange stories. Share a bit about the reasons behind what you said or did, not to make excuses, but to pave the way for understanding. Invite the person whose trust you compromised to tell about how your words or actions have affected him/her.

Change the rules. Decide together what needs to change in your relationship for there to be trust again.

Overcommunicate. Make extra effort to be transparent. Nothing undermines rebuilding trust like guessing games.

Give space. The person(s) who feel violated may not be ready to jump back in to relationship. Pressure will only slow down the process.

Ask for feedback. Check in with the other person about how you’re doing and how s/he is feeling. What course corrections still need to be made?

Be worthy of trust. Enough said.

(Note that I did not include prayer in the steps above because conversation with God – whatever that looks like for you – should be woven throughout the process.)

Rebuilding trust, at its root, requires vulnerability on both sides. The violator must be willing to admit fault and make changes, and the violatee must be willing to try again in a relationship that has brought pain. There is no cheap grace. Be brave, be patient, and be assured that the Holy Spirit will go with you.

You share a closely-guarded piece of your heart with a friend, only to have her discuss and dissect it with others.

Your significant other tells you he has to stay at work late for a meeting, but someone tips you off that he was somewhere else…with someone else.

Your governing body holds a secret meeting, after which you are blindsided by the “request” for your resignation.

Trust. It is what crust is to pizza. Rails to your bed. Axles to your car. It is not only the thing on which relationships rest, it’s what holds them together. I can disagree with you, I can even dislike you. But if I trust you, I can stay engaged with you. And if you prove yourself consistently worthy of my trust, I can overlook a multitude of mistakes.

Trust is not just the bedrock of individual relationships. It’s the glue in the pastor-parish partnership and the connective tissue in congregational life as a whole. Trust between ministers and members allows them to say hard but necessary things to one another. Trust in processes keeps the church functioning. Trust in the pastor, in God, and in one another paves the way for a congregation to name a vision and pursue it, even when the plan hits a pothole. When there’s no trust, none of these things happens, and the energy churches could be spending on mission is wasted on secrecy, gossip, and agendas.

As important as trust is, it can be annihilated by a single word or the commission or omission of one action. But re-building trust is possible. In next week’s post, I’ll suggest some ways to go about it.

Scenario one: Your congregation has discerned the need to reach out to an underserved population in the community. Several church members have put forth ideas about what this outreach might look like. Some suggestions are re-hashes of previous enterprises. Other recommendations would take the church in innovative directions.

The congregation’s governing body puts a discussion of the issue on the agenda for its next gathering. At the meeting, proponents advocate for their proposals while those with different ideas point out why others’ plans won’t work. The recommendations are put to a vote, but everyone is so exhausted from the debate that there isn’t much excitement about getting started on the winning initiative.

Scenario two: The discernment of the need at hand is the same as above. When the governing body convenes to consider the various proposals, however, the leader suggests that everyone in the room work together to improve all the ideas put forth. After each recommendation is made as strong as possible, then the people in the room will discuss how to decide which one God is calling the congregation to implement.

I don’t know about you, but I would much prefer the decision-making climate described in scenario two. Yes, there will be some real dogs put into the idea hopper. But asking every person to improve every idea accomplishes a few things:

• It creates an environment in which everyone is on the same team.

• It deepens and broadens initial ideas instead of watering them down to the lowest common denominator.

• It ensures the end result has buy-in from each person in the room.

• It reminds us that our leadership is not about our desires but about the future to which God is drawing us.

Improving every idea runs contrary to the ways our culture (political and church) has taught us to make decisions. It will probably take some groundwork to prepare leaders to consider this approach. But wouldn’t it be worth it to get excited about meetings, knowing that the gathered body will be doing creative, Spirit-infused work instead of looking for all the possible holes in a plan with great potential?

Just before New Year’s Day I published a one month calendar of prayer prompts. The thought on the timing was that many folks commit (or recommit) to growing spiritually with the turning of the calendar. But May is also a transition point for many – warmer weather, the end of the school year, the end of the program year in churches – which can lead to changes in spiritual disciplines. I am thus posting the calendar again. I hope you find it useful, and I welcome you to share it. (Here is the print-friendly PDF version.)

'Twas the week before Christmas, when all through the congregation
this minister was rushing to fulfill her vocation.
The greenery was rung 'round the sanctuary with care, 
in hopes that regulars and visitors soon would be there.

The figures were placed just so in the nativity,
waiting to add Jesus with Mary's natal activities.
The choir director in a tizzy, and I having sermon writer's block, 
were praying our health would hold out
'till we'd sung "Silent Night" with our flock.

When from the copy room there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from my desk chair to see what was the matter.
Away to the Xerox I flew like a flash,
dismantled the paper tray and pulled out the trash.

The machine had eaten all the Christmas Eve bulletins
and left me with confetti to distribute to everyone.
Little did I know that this was only the first mess
that would cause me no end of holiday stress:

The glow sticks I had purchased to hand out to kids
had been backordered because so many churches put in bids.
My nursery workers were bailing, wanting to be in the pews,
meaning parents would have to juggle their hymnals and babies
until the service was through.

Grieving members needed extra care as they recalled Christmas memories,
and suddenly I was unsure where to focus my flagging energy.
A water main broke and half our parking lot was a geyser,
and I wondered if I could just hide under my bed covers, no one the wiser.

Strong Mary! Doting Joseph! Smelly shepherds and sheep!
Sweet-singing angels
and gift-bearing wise men coming to watch the baby sleep!
To Bethlehem proper, to that small, crowded stall,
now come quickly!
Come quickly! Come quickly, all!

Time speeded up as the 24th drew nearer, 
and when was I supposed to shop for my family? That was no clearer. 
So to Amazon I went several nights, grateful for Prime, 
and shopped till my clock warned me it was nearly daytime. 

And then Christmas Eve came. It was showtime. 
I said a prayer that the worshippers would experience something sublime. 
As I climbed into the pulpit, white stole  'round my neck, 
I glanced toward the AV booth and gave a nod to the tech. 

Suddenly, I saw the faces. People smiling, expecting a Savior, 
glad to be snuggled together, on their best behavior. 
They were dressed in red and green, a few even in bells. 
They looked toward the creche, where God in flesh now dwelled. 

The music - how it filled me! The harmonization, how inspiring! 
The readings reminded me that I should be among those admiring. 
Communion brought us together with both future and past,  
Silence drew me into God's promise to be with us to the last. 

I then remembered that whatever did or didn't go right, 
the darkness would be pierced by Christ's growing light. 
Illumined by candles, the sanctuary filled with hope, 
and my heart beating gratefully, I scurried back up from the end of my rope.
 
God's love had been born anew, not just for me, but for all: 
good guys and bad guys, the worried and ill; 
the lonely, the wanting, the broken, and the raging, 
the hopeless, the imprisoned, the young, and the aging.

We all filed out when worship was done, 
Some to full, busy houses and some to a table of one. 
I headed home to pour a big glass of wine 
and to collapse on the couch, a hard-earned rest finally mine.

But as I drifted off to sleep, too tired even to remove my shoes, 
I gave thanks not only for the holiday's good news, 
but also for the privilege of witnessing to God's world being made aright. 
Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night. 

As a southerner and a lady (pronounced uh-LAY-dee), I have always received the telepathic cultural message that “no” is not a proper response to questions or requests – at least not without a lot of explanation or qualification. Of course, not saying “no” is at best a setup for my own resentment and passive-aggressiveness. At worst, it puts me in danger of violations big and small at the hands of others.

I recently had lunch with a couple of friends to discuss my interest in search committee training. In the midst of talking about all that can go awry in the pastor-parish relationship – both before and after a call is extended – we segued into a conversation about a church’s expectations for a minister’s family. One of my colleagues recalled a mentor who, when being asked if his wife and children would be at church that evening, simply replied no. He did not feel the need to justify their absence. “Because “no,'” the mentor said, “is a complete sentence.”

I was taken aback by the truth – and the power – of that statement. I don’t have to deliver a monologue in response to an inappropriate question. I don’t have to agree to an inappropriate request. In one sense that seems obvious, but in another sense it is revolutionary.

Certainly there are times when explanation is warranted. Our noes can be opportunities for teaching. Our noes may be misconstrued and cause problems in relationship if no context is given. Our noes to supervisors pretty much always need fleshing out. But sometimes (often?) our “no” sets a boundary that we have every right to set. An accompanying explanation would permit our hearers to expect that under different conditions, that boundary would be permeable.

Now, I think it is true that middle-aged white men feel much freer to say no and leave it at that than women of any demographic. But if I am hesitant to say it for myself, perhaps I can think of it as advocacy on behalf of someone else. I want to protect my family. I want to push against the message that women should smile and go along with anything. And if I say a simple no enough times for others, then maybe one day I’ll also be better at doing it for myself. I’ll be able to summon my inner Julia Sugarbaker at a moment’s notice.

Some questions to consider, then, are:

What requests do we need to say a flat “no” to?

Where do we find the courage to say “no” without justifying our boundary?

What are your expectations…

…about work? What is and isn’t your job? When is your job “done” for the day? How do colleagues work together?

…about relationships? How do you communicate? How do you argue? Where do you compromise?

…about finances? What’s your budget? How do you mesh your spending/tracking style with a significant other, aging parent, or child?

…about ways you spend your time? What time is yours? What blocks of your schedule belong to someone else?

…about the direction of communities you’re part of? What’s the vision? How do you participate in shaping and carrying it out?

We all carry around expectations, whether we put words to them or not. And as Brené Brown points out, there’s a strong correlation between expectations and disappointment: “Disappointment is unmet expectations, and the more significant the expectations, the more significant the disappointment.” (Rising Strong, p. 139).

We’ve all been steamrolled by disappointment. The afternoon we set aside to binge-watch Netflix gets taken over by a lengthy honey-do list. The job we thought we wanted turns out to be a terrible fit. The Normal Rockwellian Thanksgiving dinner we imagined becomes a hot mess of overcooked turkey and battles between relatives with different political ideologies. The church we love loses steam, and the church friends we love slowly drift away to other congregations or to no congregation at all.

There’s no way to avoid all disappointment, but Brown prescribes a couple of steps to take away its power:

Put all your expectations on the table. Don’t expect your spouse, your kid, or your supervisee to read your mind. That’s a recipe for sunken-heart syndrome and broken relationships. It’s also helpful to raise our expectations to consciousness so we’re not caught off guard by our own strong reactions to tough situations.

Acknowledge which expectations are based on factors beyond your control. You might still have the expectation, but it might be easier to deal with the frustration if you realize you couldn’t have changed the outcome.

These are good exercises for congregations because we carry so many expectations about our community of faith. How do my expectations line up with my fellow church members’? And, more importantly, how do our human hopes fit in with God’s hopes for us?

Everyone deals with anxiety, some of us more than others. Two typical responses are:

• Overfunctioning – Keeping busy doing something – anything! – to keep our feelings from catching up with us. Not only will we refuse to delegate, we will rip to-dos from the hands of others. (This is my default.)

• Underfunctioning – Allowing emotion to immobilize us. It embodies the attitude, “I can’t fix things, so why try?”

A bit of one or the other might serve us well in the short term. In times of crisis, there’s often a need to TCB (take care of business). Or we may need to stop in our tracks before we do or say something irreversible out of anxiety. But in the long run, neither over- nor underfunctioning serves us well. It’s basic physics – an object in motion will stay in motion, and an object at rest will stay at rest.

It’s not just individuals that are prone to inertia. Communities can over- and underfunction as a collective. A congregation that is so afraid of shrinking numbers that it never takes time to evaluate its many ministries will press on until it has run off anyone interested in innovation. A church that is so depressed that it can’t dream or discern or do will slowly die off (spiritually and numerically).

There is no way to avoid the hard work of connecting the dots:

• What am I (are we) feeling? What won’t I let myself (we let ourselves) feel, and why?

• How did I (we) get here?

• What can I (we) control?

• Given what I (we) can control, what is the first step in moving forward?

Rising strong from tough situations requires us to combine the best aspects of under- and overfunctioning. We must feel, and we must do.

[Disclaimer: this is not really a Rising Strong post, but it goes along with the idea of helping each other live wholeheartedly.]

There is a very important skill that most of us could stand to fine-tune. Anyone can offer criticism, but constructive criticism is a wholly different animal. And we all need to hear this kind of helpful feedback since it’s tough to step outside ourselves and understand how our words and actions affect others.

Whether you want to share your thoughts on the preacher’s sermon, your teenage daughter’s outfit, or the school board’s re-zoning plan, here are some questions to ask yourself before giving voice to your perspective:

Is this a real issue or a personal preference? Real issues need airtime. Personal preferences usually don’t.

Is the issue really the issue? Am I really upset about something else? If so, what?

What is my intent/goal? What do I – honestly – hope to accomplish by speaking up?

What is my relationship with the criticism recipient? Am I the right person to bring this matter up, or would it be more effective coming from someone else who feels the same way?

How best can the recipient hear my message? How can I keep the conversation going instead of putting the hearer on defense?

What am I willing to do to help the recipient make change or to support the recipient in change? If the issue is important enough to raise, it is important enough to invest in the follow through.

May we all be willing to refine our criticism-offering abilities, and may we have the courage to use them. Compassionate honesty breeds connection.



Compassion is the heart of the gospel. When Jesus gives us our charging orders to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and visit the prisoner, he is explicitly telling us to note the suffering of others and – rather than turning away from or pitying them – to be as kind to them as if they were Jesus himself. He is implicitly reminding us that we have all known suffering of some sort, that we have all longed to be connected and to be understood.

It’s not easy to see pain in others’ faces, though. Not only do we have to do something once we note the pain, we have to admit that those who suffer are just as deserving (as much as any of us “deserve” grace) of connection and understanding and help as we are. It’s more comfortable to tell ourselves the story that the sufferer made poor choices to get to where they are. That obviously we made much more responsible decisions to be in the position to choose our targets of compassion.

BUT. What if instead we went about our lives believing that people are doing the best they can, that some folks are trapped in systems not of their making? What if we loved these folks as they are? What if we remembered our low points and connected with those in need out of our shared humanity?

This is the framework that Brené Brown suggests we operate out of. It is not a call to doormat-dom, however. It is not wearing ourselves down to the nub. It is a balancing act. It is knowing and honoring our limits so that we can do the hard work of looking pain in the eye and extending compassion.

What would it look like if we believed the people who exasperate or frighten us are doing the best they can? The person who calls the church every month for help with the utility bill. The congregational antagonist. The ministry leader whose life is spiraling out of control. What inner work would we need to do first to be able to extend this generous interpretation? And what difference would it make in our individual and collective lives if we could look at others – all others – through these Christ-colored glasses?