Rogue Reverend

Holding a Freshly Made Baby

You know, there’s just something about holding a freshly made baby. The sweetness. That “new baby smell.” Rocking them. Patting their bottoms. Cooing to them. Singing (poorly) to them.

And then, of course, handing them back.

True Friendship

There was a woman in one of my congregations, several years ago, who complained about EVERYTHING. She didn’t like the music. She didn’t like the meetings. She didn’t like the sermons. She didn’t like the newsletters. Honestly, there was nothing that she didn’t complain about.

She was an elderly woman, her husband had died years before, and she had no children. There was no one, besides her church, that she was in contact with on a regular basis. She was lonely.

My biggest fear is that I’m going to end up just like her: lonely and complaining about everything.

I think what she was truly missing in her life was anyone to tell her the truth. I’m sure her husband had, at one point, served that purpose. But now, later in life, there was no one to point out the ugly truth to her. You know, true friends.

True friendship. What is it? Well, certainly, there’s the obvious things, having stuff in common, laughing together, liking the other person, and sharing experiences. A simple google search results in this definition: Friendship is a relationship in which the partners respond to one another with an individualized interest and concern and commit time to one another in the absence of constraints toward interaction that are external to the relationship itself. The more these two factors are in evidence, the stronger the friendship.

I find, in my own life, that the friends who I value the most are the ones who, well, to put it bluntly, call me on my crap. A true friend is one who will say, “You crossed a boundary with me. Make it right.” A true friend is someone who will say, “You’ve been very [insert bad characteristic here] lately. What’s really going on?” A true friend will say, “Did you mean to be such a jerk to me?”

The older I get, the longer I live alone, the harder it is for me to remember that my actions effect other people. I know! I know! I should understand this better! But living alone for so many years has made me act as if I’m the only person to bear the consequences of my actions. My friends, those true friends, remind me gently that my actions happen in community, and they affect the people around me.

I believe that my true friends make me a better person.

And I hope they stick around long enough to keep me from turning into that former parishioner.

Good Sex, with Diagrams

A couple of years ago, in Alabama (of course) a preacher preached a funeral. The funeral was probably a very normal service in Alabama. They probably sang a couple of hymns. They probably read some Scripture. Then the preacher probably got up to do the sermon, because every funeral in Alabama has to actually have a sermon. And most Alabama preachers are looking to get people saved at funerals.

The preacher stood to begin the sermon. He probably addressed all the people that loved the deceased, talked about how much they loved him, how he loved them, and started the sermon slowly.

But at some point in the sermon, the preacher looked out at the mourners and said, “This man was a drunkard and a fornicator. You are all drunkards and fornicators.”

Now, like I said, the preacher was probably just trying to save some souls. Apparently, the crowd jumped up, rushed to the altar, not in a frenzy to get saved, but in a frenzy to beat the preacher up. They punched him in the nose.

And then they followed him home and punched him some more.

Apparently, no one, even in Alabama, likes being called a fornicator.
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Sermon Research

Hey, all! I’m writing a sermon for Sunday entitled “Good Sex.” And I want to have Venn Diagrams. What are three things that you think add up to good sex? I’ll include them in the sermon, if they’re good!

Thanks!

Lia

Gathering Up Crumbs

Be careful with the crumbs.
Do not overlook them.

Be careful with the crumbs;
the little chances to love,

the tiny gestures, the morsels
that feed, the minims.

Take care of the crumbs;
a look, a laugh, a smile,

a teardrop, an open hand. Take care
of the crumbs. They are food also.

Do not let them fall.
Gather them. Cherish them.

~Gunilla Norris

in Becoming Bread