Author Archives: Lisa Lewton

Hey, Don’t You Live Up There?

One Wednesday night at St. John is an adventure story. Within three hours, there is an intensity to the volume of delightful, multi-generational conversation, mishaps, tears and giggles. I love how this gathering reflects life as it truly is: imperfect.

Luther described a theology of the cross as God meeting us not in the positive, perfect moments, but in the thick of life. Call a thing what it is, Luther instructed. And so, we call our lives what they are: hurried and haggard at times, each day our best effort and nothing more. Christ did not die for our sins because we have our lives together, but because we do not.

I love Wednesday nights because this is what we live out – a theology not based on rewards for how well we are living, but a theology that solidly trusts in God’s grace through Christ. This gift of grace is enough. You do not need to do more, try harder, or get better.

Where you live, with your weariness and wondering, is exactly where God meets you. In the adventure story of Wednesday nights, we live out our imperfect lives fully trusting in God’s perfect grace.

The number of stories manifested on a single Wednesday night could fill a book, that is, if you could be on all three floors and in every corner of the building at the same time. Since I cannot, I can only report this small chapter.

I sat behind a young, conversational kiddo at worship. I was doing my best to listen to Christina preach, but my worship neighbor has not yet perfected the art of whispering.

“Hey, what’s your name?” she wanted to know.

“Lisa,” I whispered quietly, dropping a hint.

She gave me a hard look and then threw a glance toward the front of the church where Christina was speaking.

“Hey, don’t you live up there?”

“What?” I whispered, trying to set an example and failing.

“Don’t you live? Up there? Why aren’t you up there?”

Oh, I realized! She thinks my home is the chancel. That I make my bed beside the altar and eat bread and wine for breakfast, lunch and dinner. That I had left my home up front to sit in the back of the church.

She accepted my whispered answer, that it wasn’t my turn to be “up there,” and the night went on. During Communion distribution, she had one more thing to say to me, as she paged through the heavy hymnal.

“I like this book,” she announced. “And this is my church.”

There she was in a community of people who astound me each week. Parents and grandparents who have decided that passing along the Christian faith is worth the work of getting a young family to church, which can be a great deal of work. Many of these parents wear their fatigue on their faces, their time at church a brief intermission from running between kids’ activities.

Because my worship neighbor’s family almost never misses worship, this little girl may not be proficient at whispering, but she is wise enough to know St. John is her church.

The adventure book would capture other moments: grandparents teaching grandkids how to hold their hands for Communion; single parents who visit with their kiddos over supper with no cell phone in sight; a cook who lets nothing get in the way of her dedication to the ministry of the Wednesday night meal; kids who woke up that morning and announced to their moms that they can’t wait to eat at church; ordinary people who extraordinarily teach, mentor, sing, wash tables, bring dessert…

We do none of this perfectly. Perfect is not the goal, not the requirement, indeed not even a helpful aspiration. Perfect is the love of God, who also does not live “up there,” but here, among us, now and always.

Photo by CHUTTERSNAP on Unsplash

Reflecting: You Are What You Value

Look in the rearview mirror to last week, a stretch of days that now count as history. What do you see?

How did you spend your resources: time, money and energy? Did the days rush by in a blur? Did you feel like a pinball being bounced around in a machine? Or was the pace of each day more like a slow walk through the park?

Take a moment here and look around your life. Look back and to the sides. What you see today may not be the same as what you saw last week or last year, like reading the same Scripture you read long ago (or not so long ago) and understanding it completely differently.

The good news of the Christian faith is the stubborn insistence in a new day despite all reason; amid the joys and sorrows, hopes and regrets. Somehow, a splash of light overcomes an ocean of darkness because we believe Christ has died and rose again.

With God’s promise that every day is made new and even you are made new, look at your life and notice how you are spending the resources God has given you. You are what you value, that is, how you spend time, money and energy is a way to describe you.

The days have a way of moving forward whether or not you are buckled in! If your life feels exhausting, try this:

  1. Set an alarm for 15 minutes.
  2. Sit down with a piece of paper and pen.
  3. Write a list of your values. Consider what matters most to you in this season of your life. Your list may be two or 12 items long. Why do these values matter enough to you to make your list?
  4. Look back at your week. Did you spend your resources in a way that reflects your values? Where did you nail it? What needs reconsidering? Notice both what went well and where you have room to grow.
  5. Carry around your list and revisit it whenever you have that “I’m-a-pinball” feeling.

You, beloved one, are no pinball. God did not create you to be bounced around.

“I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love.”

Ephesians 3:16-17

Whether you look in the rearview mirror or to the days ahead, your life matters deeply to the Lord who dwells in your heart and starts over with you each day.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

If Only the Disciples Were the Dwarves

It isn’t right to compare the 12 disciples with Snow White’s 7 dwarves, however, I do wish the disciples had been assigned descriptive names. Surely there was a Sleepy or a Clumsy among the 12. Was there a Grumpy or a Bashful? There had to be!

We only know there was a Peter, John, James, Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew, Matthew, another James, Simon (not Peter), Judas, and “the” Judas. (Acts 1:13). “The” Judas was replaced by Matthias.

We know Peter is called The Rock, John and his brother James were Power-Hungry, and Thomas has been called Doubter. Beyond these descriptors, the Gospels tell us very little about these followers.

The Gospel text for World Communion Sunday this weekend is the feeding of the 5,000 in Luke 9:10-17, which has me wondering whether there was a disciple who could be called Curious.

Uniquely, this story is told by each of the four Gospel writers. In Luke, the disciples make the assumption that those who gathered to hear Jesus should be in charge of their own lunches. They tell Jesus, “Send the crowd away, so that they may go into the surrounding villages and countryside, to lodge and get provisions, for we are in a deserted place.” (Luke 10:12)

I find this instruction mystifying! By now in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus has healed the sick, cleansed the outcast and calmed a stormy sea. And they have the audacity to tell Jesus what to do? I would name them all Ridiculous.

“You give them something to eat,” Jesus replied, if only the Gospel writer would have clued us in on his tone.

The disciples go on to explain they have only 2 fish and 5 loaves of bread, pointing to the thousands of hungry people.

If I were to watch this scene unfold in real time, I would begin to look for Curious. Was there one disciple, just one, who was suspicious that Jesus was up to something? Was there a single disciple who had a hunch that whatever they had was more than enough for Jesus to satisfy the crowd? Did one of them raise his brows and wonder what more this teacher could do?

Jesus already knew he would have enough to feed the crowd. Eventually, the disciples knew it, too, along with the crowd. The Curious disciple, if there was one, had a head start. It had already occurred to him that anything is possible.

With God, beginnings are disguised as endings and hope masquerades as despair. Power and might turn out to be foolish and the greatest of these is not money or status, but love. With enough curiosity, we recognize abundance in 2 fish and 5 loaves of bread.

I hope to be the Curious disciple as I follow Jesus around in this life. Would I have raised my brows when Jesus broke the loaves, itching to know what he might do next? Or would I have furrowed my brows with the certainty that his meager offering would never be enough?

Will you open your eyes to the wonder of God’s mysterious abundance in your life? Will you set aside your certainty that there is not enough of whatever you worry might run out? Raise your brows, Curious disciple, and watch the bread that is broken satisfy the crowd.

Photo by Yulia Khlebnikova on Unsplash

A Birthday is Big

Birthdays shmirthdays, some might say. But not me! I love the gift of a birthday. Adding another year to a person’s age is nothing short of a miracle.

Walking with people in their faith, I witness both the joys and the trickiness of adding another year. It might mean one more year without that beloved person whom you miss. Or one more year moving through the deep waters of depression. It might mean one more year unemployed or less physically able.

I remember hearing a mom explain to her little kids that each year we get older we move one year closer to death which is one year closer to heaven. I think it was meant to be encouraging, but yikes!

A birthday, however, is a way to keep us honest. This life on earth will end. None of us gets out alive. Each day is precious just as you are precious in God’s sight.

Today my husband adds one more year to his age. Who better to remind him of his mortality than his wife/pastor!

A birthday is an invitation for each of us to wonder.

How might the fragility of this life shape your decisions? Are you doing the work you feel called to do? Are you using God’s precious gift of time to connect with your beloved people? Are you hanging out with Jesus each day?

The best part of birthdays, of course, is not the mortality wondering but the cake. Or the pie. Or whatever it is that marks the occasion. It is a sweet gift to add that extra year.

Photo by Christopher Martyn on Unsplash

Pray to the Lord on its Behalf

At this moment (along with many other moments) one of my neighbor kiddos is swinging in her backyard. She spends hours swinging – up and down, again and again. And again.

It has to be peaceful for her, which is ironic because it is the squeakiest, most annoying-sounding swing in the entire universe! It’s enough to drive a neighbor into insanity. Don’t believe me? Play this soundtrack in your head: squeak, squeak, squeak, eighty-five thousand more times! Perhaps tonight I can sneak over with some WD-40, like a thief in the night to steal the squeak.

And yet, the squeaking swing and the person on it are part of my neighborhood and part of my community. They both belong, despite the irritating squeak. My neighbor loves to swing and I love my neighbor (so do you if you do what Jesus says) and so all manner of things shall be well.

Neighborhoods and communities include squeaky sounds and squeaky voices. Bring people together, whether there are two or two hundred or two million and it quickly becomes a challenge to be next-door neighbors who belong to the same community.

We might forget that we belong to the same community. We might stick with our own tribe of people, live life through a Facebook group, or imagine that the community and the world were better years ago.

Associating only with people who are like us, communicating heavily through a screen, or betting on nostalgia are guaranteed ways to hinder community-building.

The people of God who had been exiled to Babylon were not interested in their new community. (Jeremiah 29) When they preferred to stick with their own people and recall their days back at home in Jerusalem, God gave this instruction:

"But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare." (Jeremiah 29:7)

God breaks the news that this is their community, even with its squeaky swings and voices.

When we pray to the Lord on the community’s behalf and work toward the well-being of the community, we work toward our own well-being.

This can only mean that whenever we neglect to work toward the well-being of the community, we neglect our own well-being. When your neighborhood suffers, so do you. When the community is not well, nor are you, so connected are neighbors in a neighborhood even if we do not know/speak/or appear to care for one another.

Daily, the Spirit issues invitations for you to be a conductor of well-being in your neighborhood.

  • Meet a next-door neighbor you haven’t yet met. Chocolate chip cookies are an excellent ice breaker.
  • Go somewhere in your community you’ve avoided because it might feel uncomfortable. Talk to someone who isn’t like you to see your community from a different angle.
  • And that Facebook group – Lord help us all. What might you do to work toward community well-being in the toxic Facebook groups? I tend to avoid it, but fortunately not all of you do. Some of you with great courage speak truth into lies.

Pray to the Lord on its behalf, God instructed God’s people. May our prayers lead us to actions that bring healing, presence that brings peace, and squeaky, persisting sounds of mercy. Again. And again.

Photo by Kaleb Kendall on Unsplash

Another Word for Dysfunction

When families gather, each person plays his or her part. There is the wild and crazy one, the organized and orderly one, and the peacemaker in between. Throw in the matriarch and patriarch, the family member who keeps his or her distance, and the perpetually embittered and you may have a complete cast of characters for any family.

If you think your family is uniquely dysfunctional, open the curtain to see an audience of all the other uniquely dysfunctional families, which is to say, all families. At least God was consistent in creating families the same!

In the Christian faith, another word for dysfunction is brokenness. All families are broken because all humans are broken. We are, each of us, an assortment of broken pieces reset each day by the gluey grace of God. We are not perfect clay jars, but by God’s grace we are “afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair.” (2 Corinthians 4:8) Humans and their families are broken and beloved clay jars through and through.

Being part of a family is unavoidable. A family member can move away but cannot move on. The relationship system in which we grew up, even if not for an entire childhood, even if we never again see those family members, will forever shape who we are.

Look around your family. Who is among the cast of characters? What part do you play? What are your starring and supporting roles?

If you have harsh words for the cast, or if there are scenes you play in your mind on repeat that portray you as victim, perhaps you do this: take yourself to a thrift store, find an old jar, take it home, wrap it in a towel, and break it into a few pieces with a rubber mallet. You can leave the jar in pieces, but if you put it back together, you witness the daily work of the potter. We are afflicted but not crushed. Each piece has its place, like a character with its own part to play. Each piece is valuable, but not on its own.

Your broken family, your broken self, is never beyond repair for the potter and the potter’s gluey grace.

Photo by Content Pixie on Unsplash

This is Not Your First Day (Part Two)

Did you do your homework? Did you?

The reflection questions in the previous post turn your early-days-of-the-school-year attention away from your kiddo and onto you. Yes, you! Parents and guardians tend to focus heavily on our kids when something exciting is about to happen. We ask them:

  • How are you feeling? Are you nervous?
  • You’re a senior! What are you going to do next year?

We might forget that focusing on an anxious kiddo only increases the anxiety and pressure in your relationship. I am guilty as a mom of trying to be helpful only to become obnoxious. This is not something I intend to do, I just happen to be good at it!

It tends to lighten up your relationship with your child if you give your child a break and pose these questions to yourself.

  • Am I feeling anxious? How might I manage my own anxiety?
  • Life is changing for my kid. What am I going to do next year?

I suspect we direct questions to our kids and grandkids with the intention of helping them. Our questions are, as far as we can tell, indicators of how much we care. When actually, question-overload is like keeping the heat on high under a boiling pot of macaroni. It works just as well, even better, to turn the heat down.

In the Bible when life heated up, when the pressure was high, when people may have felt like an overcooked macaroni noodle, the writers offered images as encouragement. With words, they drew pictures of God:

  • God holds back the waters so they do not overwhelm you. (Isaiah 43:2)
  • God dries your tears and wraps you in joy. (Psalm 30:11)
  • You cling to God, and God holds you with one hand. (Psalm 63:8)
  • God is your forever lookout to help you when you need it. (Psalm 121:1)

To you encourage you, beloved parent or guardian, here is an image for you:

Accompanist

A parent or guardian who softly plays the chords for the child to make his or her own solo music. present in the background, the accompanist is practiced. This isn’t her or his first day on the piano. an accompanist is positioned to bring out a child’s unique and best.

I’ve not been an actual accompanist, but I know some brilliant ones. They have a remarkable way of knowing the soloist well enough to draw out his or her best sound. Once in a while, they might discreetly play an intro twice when the soloist misses the entrance. An accompanist is not a director, not the boss of the soloist, but more like a guide through the music.

Accompanists know they are not the soloists. This is not their first day. Instead, they offer steady and supportive roles to grow the confidence of the soloist.

Here is a blessing for the accompanists to send you on your way:

Accompanying is a privilege, may you sit in the Spirit’s presence as you play.

Keep your hands on the keyboard, may Christ be the director of this song.

Let the music carry, may the soloist shine with the light of Christ.

Photo by Wan San Yip on Unsplash

This is Not Your First Day (Part One)

Teachers and school staff do not need a calendar to recognize August. Even teachers who retired years ago feel the start of a school year roll in like a storm system. Similar to a change in the pressure system pronounced by the ache in your elbow, former teachers feel the arrival of August in their bones.

Both new and seasoned teachers are walking storybooks, living records of generations of families that have come and gone through their classrooms. Ask one to tell you a story of an anxious parent on “meet-the-teacher” night who organized her 1st grader’s desk, lining up the glue sticks in perfect order. Or the dad who could be mistaken for the anxious student if he wasn’t so tall, projecting his own first-day-jitters.

A parent carries more than the bag of school supplies on the eve of a kiddo’s first day. That parent also brings his or her own baggage: memories of her anxious need for perfection as a student; memories of his fear that he might look weak in front of the other boys. For some parents and guardians, walking into a school might be slightly terrifying. Certain memories, like a change in the pressure system, run deep and make uncomfortable return visits. We are what’s happened to us, perhaps.

This may surprise you, but your child’s first day may benefit from your reflections on your own first days of school. By looking back on your own life, you become a little clearer on your thoughts, feelings, and values, which helps you parent with extra grace for your child and for yourself.

Below are questions to get you reflecting. You might talk through one or two with a friend or partner or scribble a few notes in a journal. Part Two of this series will take those questions one step deeper. How might what you know about yourself both (always both) help and hinder the excitement of your child’s first day? I’ll share an image that has guided my own parenting.

For now, here is your homework:

  • What comes to mind when you recall your own first days of school?
  • Is there a word or phrase that captures how you felt as a student?
  • What did your parents or family expect from you in school? What happened if you fell short?
  • What did you expect of yourself?
  • What was your favorite activity at recess? (This may not be a helpful question – but it might be fun! Playgrounds have changed since you were there!)

As you reflect, pay attention to what happens inside of you. Notice the tender spots, the feelings that bubble up. And then take a breath that fills you with the peace of the Spirit, making all things new. Even you.

Behold, I am doing a new thing;
now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?
I will make a way in the wilderness
and rivers in the desert. (Isaiah 43:19)

Photo by Deleece Cook on Unsplash

Berry Season Forever Prayer

Dear Lord,

Please could it be berry season forever? Could all lands be lands of perpetual strawberry and blueberry harvest? I wouldn’t mind. I’d trade it for root vegetable season any day of the week! Potatoes and parsnips are no fun in yogurt parfaits.

This world is not as it should be. Berry season is temporary, much to my dismay.

On the list of complaints you will hear today, this is on the low end. Better that you tend to war refugees, among them thousands of Ukrainian children snatched up by the Russian army, an injustice that should get all our hearts racing. Could you, Lord, deal with corrupt governments, the production of opioids, and the disproportionate number of foster kids to foster parents? Your to-do list is long, I get it. My list is mostly laundry.

One human response to your long to-do list is fear, as though the world only recently became broken and the way through is to be afraid for the future, afraid of our neighbor, afraid of losing assets, afraid you’ve jumped ship and found another universe you like better.

Another response requires the long view, a look at your creation that takes the viewer back to the beginning. This response is more work, thus less desirable. We’re human, you made us, you get it. The long view reveals a season and a time for all things: a time for sweet berry harvests and another for hearty root vegetables; a season for peace but not for everyone, everywhere at the same time; a season for long days, another for long nights.

Like us, you long for the world to be as it should, to match your original dream. Out of love, you create scientists to contend with disease. You raise up an agency to fight for the safety of children and another to set up refugee camps. You call prophets and poets to speak truth. Again, your to-do list is lengthy and I see only in part, as Paul writes.

For today, I will enjoy the berry season. I will miss it when the days grow shorter. Then, the sun will set earlier and I will go to bed at a decent time and so will the rest of us, except for the teenagers. Lord, why did you make them so weird?

Thank you for berries, Lord, and all the ways you add sweetness to this life. Amen.

Photo by Will on Unsplash

Measurement Inspector

Today is a 17th birthday at our house – the season of passing through the last step toward independence. In other words, there is a chance my grocery bill may be bearable in the foreseeable future!

Even this far into the wilderness of parenting, it is impossible to remember the millions of moments now filed away as history. The scoop after scoop of sand in the sandbox, so many pushes on the swing, reading words, watching games, thousands of “goodnights” to end the day. And later, negotiating responsibilities, sitting fearfully in the passenger seat beside them, witnessing the changes impacted by friendships. And more changes amid the ever-changing teenager’s ever-changing interests and tastes.

The image of parenting that sticks with me today takes me back to the sandbox, sitting beside the kid and his plastic shovel as he loads sand into a plastic bucket. He will scoop and scoop, then carry the bucket across the sandbox and dump it out, then go back and repeat. If he scoops too much into his bucket, it will be too heavy to carry. Too light and he will get bored going back and forth the extra times.

Parenting, perhaps, has something to do with hanging around enough to encourage him to fill the bucket, but not too much. It is scooping responsibilities into his life just enough for him to carry, not so heavy to be crushing.

You can only know how much a kid can carry by challenging them and by getting to know them, which in itself is an endless job. Kids change and thus they require the constant effort of getting to know them. They deserve your willingness to do this, as they, too, continue to get to know their own selves.

The kids I love to visit with are the ones whose parents refuse to do the talking for them. These parents sit back and watch their kid practice conversation, stumbling at times, yet finding their way into their lives, into their own selves. These are tiny scoops of sand filling a manageable bucket.

And what an incredible, formidable gift to oversee the measurements of sand one year at a time.

Photo by Todd Gallant on Unsplash