Nothing Hard is Ever Easy

  Somehow I always delude myself that after Easter life will slow down.  It's the same delusion I have in May and December, "After Memorial Day (or Christmas) life will slow down."  But it never does.  This year we have inadvertently embarked on a variety of changes at the same time: changing emails, changing phone and internet providers, changing routers, changing technology in sanctuary, changing direction of music program, changing the use of our building facilities, changing programs for our worship visuals.  Changes are hard.  And as I am fond of saying, "Nothing hard is ever easy."
     Each of these changes have come with hours of unforeseen work, meetings, troubleshooting, phone calls, communication, etc.  None of which seminary ever prepared me for.  Finding the IP Address for the copy machine was a class I must have missed.  I continually struggle with the notion of balance, how do I balance all of these responsibilities, with responsibilities of family, with responsibility to myself.  How do I fulfill my obligations to work and family, while still finding some "me" time?  Nothing hard is ever easy.
     I'm afraid I have not been succesful at that balance in recent months.  I put "me" time aside for work and family thinking "It's only until Easter.  It's only until the summer.  It's only until that project is done."  Of course after that time comes, there's always something to take its place, always something else to do. 
     If I am ever going to achieve any kind of healthy balance in my life, I can't wait until "nothing else is going on."  I have to make time, now, and not apologize.  I have to find ways to restore my energy and keep that a priority.
     I did that on Monday for one hour.  I decided to take a walk in the gorgeous sunshine.  My son, Christian, wanted to go with me.  What a precious time we had together!  It was the first time we had a chance to just walk and talk.  Still four years old for a few more weeks, he shared with me what he was doing in school, the life cycle of a frog and a butterfly, words he was now reading, math work he was doing, the continents, planets, and months of year.  As we held hands, he held my heart, while he shared his life with me.  He wants to be a singer when he grows up, or a superhero.  He hasn't decided yet.  That one hour together renewed me like no other and I will cherish that walk for months and years to come.
     What can you do to renew yourself this week?  Have at least one event every week, if not two or three times a week, that you look forward to, that you enjoy, that re-energizes you.  Don't wait until there's nothing else to do, or it will never happen.  Just make the time.  It may be hard, but remember...nothing hard is ever easy.  

Under Renovation

As I type this, the sound of hammering is pounding in my ears.  The church started renovations this week.  What a mess!!  The existing internal structure of platforms and carpet were torn out.  Hammering, saws, and other pounding noise fills my days.  Dust and dirt and sawdust fill the air.  Fascinating items have been unearthed such as an old acorn that some critter brought in and left in the church walls as well as old newspaper pages shoved under the old platform dated February 25, 1929. 

Being under renovation is inconvenient to say the least.  The office is cold because the door to the sanctuary (which is not heated) is left open all the time.  People come in to ask me questions.  And it's not the ideal working environment with noise and dust everywhere.

 

Being under renovation is hard, messy work.  It takes skill, strength, patience, and persistence.  It takes a vision to see beyond the mess to what could be, what will soon be.  It takes a set of plans so those involved know the next step and the specifications needed to make that vision a reality.

And yet being under renovation means that something better is coming our way.  The sanctuary gets "worse" before it can be improved and more suitable for use.  It's exciting!  While all I see now is a complete mess, that mess indicates that something newer will be here soon, something we as a church have dreamed about for a long time.

And while our sanctuary is under physical renovation, maybe we as human beings are under renovation too.  Maybe God the Great Contractor wants to tear some things down, some attitudes, some behaviors, some thoughts out of our lives and replace them with more loving, accepting, sacrificial attitudes.  Maybe God is trying to renovate our hearts so that we can become more like Christ.  But in order to do that, it will be inconvenient.  It will be hard and messy.  But it means that we will be created into something better, something more like what we are called to be.

So what do you say?  Do you want to be someone who is under God's renovation?