Author Archives: jledmiston

Ouch.

This op-ed by Jessica Grose in yesterday’s New York Times rings true for many clergywomen – and many professional women in general. In referring to disgraced former billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried and his casual clothing style, Grose writes:

Every time I read the news and see Bankman-Fried’s unkempt visage, I’m filled with just a little bit more rage, because I know — women know — that investors would never entrust a young woman looking this sloppy with a single cent, much less billions …

Women of every age are treated differently from men, and by different, I’m not talking about general gender norms. I’m talking about how seriously we are considered in terms of our gifts and skills compared to men. What I am not saying: that women are always discounted. What I am saying: that women are often discounted. This happens at every age.

I remember the very first benediction I proclaimed on my first Sunday in my first church after ordination and in that breath between the Amen of the last verse of the last hymn and my first benedictory word, I heard one church member stage-whisper to another church member, “She can’t be a day over 16.” (I was 28.) Twenty years later I was identified by two young colleagues as a crone. I was 48. (For the record, they told me it was a compliment.)

In spite of what Lauren Pasquarella Daley says in Grose’s article, I believe that it’s not only possible for leaders of all genders to be both competent and likable, the most effective leaders actually are both. Excellent 21st Century leaders are emotionally intelligent, authentic, trustworthy, and capable. It frankly doesn’t matter if you are male, female, nonbinary, single or married, with or without children, or of whatever age.

And yet, I just yesterday talked with a young clergywoman who shared her experiences of being a young pastor who happens to have children and how hard it has been to be taken seriously as a competent professional minister. As a 60-something clergywoman, I have experienced – more than once – a male pastor explaining the sermon I had just preached to his congregation as if I hadn’t been clear.

Folks, it happens every day. And yet . . .

Those who discount anybody whom God calls to serve in whatever profession, in whatever kind of body are the ones missing out. God is up to something. I see it where I serve in Charlotte. I see it in our neighboring towns and in rural communities. I see it via friends in Chicago and D.C. and San Francisco. God is calling competent and likeable leaders who might be called babes or hags or something in between. Whatever. God is doing a new thing. God is using us all for more than an hour – or even a season.

Let’s stop judging each other based on age. We are the ones losing out when we confuse age (or gender) with effectiveness.

Image is from the July 2016 Conference of The Young Clergy Women Project, Boston University taken by Sarah Hooker and used with permission. Read more about the YCWP here.

You save humans and animals alike, O Lord. Psalm 36:6b

Did you see what happened in Scarborough, England on New Year’s Eve? A lost walrus (nicknamed Thor) was found resting in the Scarborough harbor and – after consulting with Marine Life Professionals – the town council decided to cancel their fireworks program for the sake of the walrus’ welfare.

A representative from the Scarborough Borough Council said on December 31st:

“We have taken the decision to cancel tonight’s New Year’s Eve fireworks display on the advice of British Divers Marine Life Rescue because of the arrival of the walrus ‘Thor’ in the harbour. There are concerns that the display could cause distress to the mammal.” Source.

Scarborough is a city of about 108,000 citizens. They had been planning the fireworks event for about six months. They had already purchased the fireworks out of the annual budget. And then they canceled to protect a walrus.

This is extraordinary. Most of us are concerned primarily with our own distress, our personal inconvenience, our individual discomfort.

Not only would most of us not miss out on a party for the sake of a walrus, many of us resented wearing face masks to protect our neighbors from covid.

What I believe about the atonement is that Jesus died to show the depths of God’s love for us. We who claim Jesus as our Savior are sometimes slow to make personal sacrifices beyond the easy ones. Most of us do not give to those in need in ways that involve authentic sacrifice on our parts. Most of us are annoyed by being personally inconvenienced even if what’s inconvenient to us is life-saving to someone else.

Whether we are talking about canceling fireworks for the sake of a confused animal or postponing a football game out of respect for a seriously hurt player, it’s often the right and good thing to do. Re: that football game.

Loving sacrifices include

• Stepping away from a leadership position we love for the sake of allowing fresh leadership,
• Surrendering the need to control a mission project we love for the sake of equipping new volunteers,
• Choosing to refrain from replacing our car this year in order to make a more generous donation to mission,
• Shifting our schedule in order to sit with a grieving neighbor,
• Going out of our way to turn someone else’s mess into an opportunity to relieve them even a little bit.

Jesus spoke words about the loving sacrifice of giving our lives for the sake of others. Sometimes all it takes to love someone sacrificially is to be willing to be inconvenienced for one night.

Resolutions might be short-lived, so I’m suggesting three spiritual practices that assume there’s grace when we mess up. What’s not new about 2023 is that political and theological divides continue and all of us are worse for it. And so, in the spirit of fresh starts, here are three spiritual practices I’m trying for the New Year and I hope you’ll join me.

1. Stop lumping people together as if everything is binary. There are more than two political perspectives (conservative and liberal.) There are more than two theological perspectives (conservative and liberal.) There are more than two ways to raise children (the right way and the wrong way), consume global news (my cable and your cable), and eat healthy (all the meat, no meat. ) It’s lazy to lump all ____ in a single lot as in: “Democrats care less about stranded passengers than they do about gaining more federal control over the airline industry.” WSJ op-ed 12-28-22 or “The Republicans chose to (back Trump) because they wanted power.” (NYT op-ed 12-3-22) I know. I know. You intellectually believe that it’s actually true that all Democrats are about federal control or all Republicans are about gaining power. I’m not sure it’s true for all Democrats or Republicans. Power is everybody’s god.
2. Stop saying “I absolutely hate ___” as in “I hate Nancy Pelosi” or “I hate Donald Trump” or “I hate evangelical Republicans” or “I hate godless Democrats.” I have friends and family members who routinely say these words in spite of their Christian identity. What God hates is performative faithfulness.
3. Stop writing people off. I get that it’s healthy to steer clear of anyone who has abused us or threatened us. Don’t get even. Get therapy. And yet if someone appears to be everything we disagree with, it doesn’t mean they are the embodiment of everything we disagree with.The beauty part of being in politically, socio-economically diverse church is that we are literally in a community of people with whom we would never be friends without that church connection.

So here’s the kicker: if you are part of a church that lumps people together, that spews hate towards certain humans, that writes people off . . . maybe you need a new church in 2023. Jesus was the living manifestation of a faith that sees people as individual children of God, that calls followers to pray for our enemies, that offers grace to the most unlikely candidates.

Let’s be more like Jesus in 2023.

Image from The St. John’s Bible illustrated by Donald Jackson (completed in 2011)

Many worship leaders (including this one) love lots of candles to create ambience. Lighting a candle to remember, honor, or pray for another is one of the most common spiritual practices throughout the religious world. And candles are only growing in popularity according to manufacturers. Raise your hand if you gave or received a candle for Christmas.

“Why is there a candle for everything?” asked Anna Kodé of The New York Times in December.

There is indeed a candle for almost every olfactory need: cheese, cinnamon rolls, fresh cut grass, bacon and Gwyneth Paltrow’s private parts. (It sold out quickly on her website which I don’t feel comfortable hyperlinking here.) There are candles promising balance, harmony, self-confidence and sex appeal.

Candles have been part of religious rites for thousands of years in almost every faith tradition. Before electricity, they were utilitarian. Now they are ‘meltable decor.” And in a world that needs to relax, candles offer opportunities for stopping and staring into the flame. They can also burn our houses down, so we need to stay mindfully relaxed.

You can order the Beeswax Magi and Baby Jesus shown here from Etsy although these candles seem like candidates for candles that you never actually light. The imagery of turbans on fire much less a flaming infant is not comforting. And yet someone decided that this particular mold might be inspiring through all Twelve Days of Christmas.

Creating sensory experiences is a common goal for those of us who lead spiritual communities. We are swiftly moving out of the season of handbells to hear, evergreens to smell, twinkling to see, cozy fabrics to touch, and favorite cookies to taste. These are the five senses that Aristotle taught us. But it’s clear that each of those senses are not lone experiences.

A candle feels warm, looks pretty, smells good, crackles ever so slightly, and might even put a specific taste in our mouths. Neuroscientists say that human beings actually have between 22 and 33 different senses including visceral senses (nociceptors) that signal possible disease in our internal organs or motor senses (proprioceptors) that help us move our feet without looking at them. Our senses all work together.

Quite a bit has been written about the importance of Relational Ministry in the 21st Century Church. How we treat each other makes a difference. Building community makes a difference.

And the physical atmosphere we create in church is also essential. How we make each other feel using all our senses is not just about superficial candlelight or soft music. The smells and sights and sounds and everything our other sensory experiences bring to mind give us moments of home and stories and the Holy.

Yes, there’s a candle for everything. Why do we have them in worship experiences? It’s an interesting conversation as we offer opportunities for authentic communion in 2023.

How are church candles connecting us to God and each other? And how are they not? Discuss.

Note: One of the saddest cultural shifts wrought by covid is the loss of blowing out the candles on a birthday cake. One of my brothers was a spitter and so some of us have been concerned for decades about this practice.

Once again the past year delivered in terms of lovely surprises. In our family, we celebrated three weddings and no family funerals. We survived the after effects of getting flu, COVID, and shingles shots all on the same day. (Note: We don’t recommend this.) We were blessed with people to love and work to do.

For all we might dread or fear in 2023, one thing is assured: there will also be glorious discoveries. New authors. New stories. New relationships. New insights. Here are my favorites from the past year:

1. What Pastors Can Learn from Santa Allen. The Christmas edition of This American Life from December 16, 2022 features a former corrections officer (i.e. someone well-acquainted with The Naughty List) who becomes a professional Santa. While there are many sweet moments when you’re a professional Santa, you must also be equipped to deal with the terrible parts: what do you say if a child asks for their parents to be home for Christmas (from prison, deployment, heaven)? There’s even a piece of wisdom about an “it” factor for pastors and counselors.
2. Alex Edelman. His stand up routine is the second story on the same This American Life episode listed above. You can listen here. He was voted Best Newcomer at the 2014 Edinburgh Festival Fringe Festival, but I’m often slow to pick up on the newest thing in pop culture.
3. Give Impact, founded by Liz Ward in Charlotte, N.C. Every city, town and village needs something like this. Give Impact is an advisory service that matches available land and buildings (like church property after a congregation closes) with other non-profits and for-profits who need land and buildings, bringing their own ideas, staffing, and financial resources to the table. Our Presbytery hired them to help us discern what to do with a valuable piece of property that we didn’t necessarily want to sell to developers. Our goal: to figure out how to use that property to address the needs of our community. Friends: unlikely partnerships are the future of professional ministry.
4. Imani Perry. Princeton University consistenly has one of the best African American Studies faculty in the world. I especially treasure Renaissance People like Dr. Perry who is not only an amazing writer; she is also affiliated with Princeton’s programs in Law and Public Affairs, Gender and Sexuality Studies and Jazz Studies. She wrote one of my favorite books of 2022 South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation which won this year’s National Book Award for Non-Fiction.
5. Leidy Klotz book Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less changed my life in 2022. He’s another Renaissance Person who ponders engineering, leadership, behavioral science, and design at the University of Virginia.
6. Cole Arthur Riley’s This Here Flesh is so beautiful I could weep. Do yourselves a favor and buy this treasured first book by the Teacher-in-Residence of Cornell University’s Christian House. Riley is a brilliant “household storyteller.”

May all of us be inspired by new stories in 2023 – especially our own. Happy New Year!

Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. The Gospel According to Matthew 6:10

Jesus had just then cured many people of diseases, plagues, and evil spirits, and had given sight to many who were blind. And he answered them, “Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them. The Gospel According to Luke 7:21-22

1. The blind received sight: William Yoo’s book What Kind of Christianity: A History of Slavery and Anti-Black Racism in the Presbyterian Church was published in August. The first step of turning from sin and towards God is seeing the truth about ourselves and Yoo’s book tells the truth of our history as Presbyterians. (The truth will set us free, but first it will make us miserable. That’s okay.) And for the second year, anti-racism training was required for all clergy and other leaders in our Presbytery.
2. The lame walked: One of our churches purchased new shoes in December for the children in their rural county. This was the 35th year of this project and they collected enough donations to buy 700 pairs of shoes this month.
3. The lepers were cleansed: Ten of our congregations have showers and/or laundry facilities available for homeless neighbors.
4. The deaf heard: Technology grants were provided throughout our Presbytery to improve sound systems and the quality of online worship services.
5. The dead were raised: One of our churches made the faithful decision to close in June and the Presbytery invited a team to work with Give Impact to discern how this property could best be used to address needs in the community in the name of Jesus Christ. The team includes members of neighboring congregations, a member of the closed congregation, and several neighbors who aren’t affiliated with any church – all of whom love the community and want to resurrect that corner of Charlotte, NC. (A final decision will be made in 2023 by our Presbytery.)
6. The dead were raised: One of our pastors received a double lung transplant in 2022 and the very fact that this surgery is possible is a testimony to resurrection on earth. We thank God for the donor’s family, for the miracle of successful transplant surgery, and for this pastor’s new life.
7. Good news was shared with the poor: From pastoral care to strangers to inspirational sermons, from sharing money, water, food, housing to inviting neighbors to share what they have, from connecting over coffee to holding each other in prayer there was Good News shared with those who’ve experience every kind of poverty in 2022.

The examples of resurrection are countless. The mistakes were numerous. The grace was immeasurable. Thanking God for the past year.

“I won.” Logan Roy in the final episode of Succession, Season 3

HH and I hate-watched/love-watched Succession on HBO during his COVID recovery. No redeeming characters. Beautiful scenery. Excellent writing/acting. We were hooked.

Winning looks like many different things. For the parents of young children, winning is keeping them alive for another day. For grievers and addicts and desperately sad people, it’s about keeping ourselves alive for another day.

For a political party, winning means election success even if a problematic candidate prevailed. For the 1% winning involves even more wealth. For the Argentina National Team it’s 120 minutes and a four-round penalty-kick shootout for the championship.

“Love wins,” we say. This is a faith statement that can be applied to every life situation.

In these last days of the year, living as if love wins is the way to go. It feels great. It fills the soul with a pure power that tempers our fears and washes away our dread. It assumes there is something bigger than we are.

Whether we are dealing with deep grief or family estrangement or a wholly uncertain 2023, may we win in the end because we tried our best to love.

It’s amazing what the Lord has let us learn. E.J. Edmiston

BSE attends a worship service called Ignite and the church’s website describes it this way:

Our vision is for the presence of God to ignite a movement of worship in us so infectious that it brings others with us into His presence. Responding in public worship is often where change begins; the change of a deepening personal relationship with God. Our weekly gatherings spark new spiritual relationships while refueling ones already established. 

I was thinking about Church Names and Worship Service Names and even Financial Grant Names that we come up with today in hopes of energizing The Church. Aspirational names I’ve come across lately include:

• Renovation – Where we get cleaned up and rewired? Yes please.
• Blaze – “This girl is on fire.” And eventually we all are.
• Amplify – Loud and getting louder.
• Power Surge – “It’s not a church. It’s a movement.“

Scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California announced this week that they had “achieved ignition” and I don’t know what that means but The Wall Street Journal is wary and The New York Times is pumped.

According to Nature, humans have created “a nuclear reaction that generates more energy than it consumes” which means that it’s possible that we could one day have “endless energy.” Goodbye fossil fuels forever. Hello healthier planet.

As I meet with people who love Jesus and serve the Church, I occasionally hear words like “ignite” but I more often hear words like “depleted” or “done.” Yes. Many of us are.

And yet in the year of our Lord 2022 and on the cusp of 2023, something amazing has happened in the creation God made that generates more energy than it consumes. Imagine this happening in The Church.

• Imagine that we experience more energy after the Middle School Retreat than we expended to create it.
• Imagine there is a surge of power after the Session Meeting instead of utter depletion.
• Imagine that we begin the new year feeling ignited rather than stone cold.

I don’t know how nuclear fusion works and I don’t know how spiritual ignition works, but the same God makes each possible. Even with my active cheerleader gene, I can’t make people excited about what God has done, is doing, can do. But we can be like the Livermore scientists by . . .

• Imagining what’s possible.
• Being patient (It’s still going to take at least a decade to tap this energy for everyone.)
• Telling everybody what we’ve already seen/learned/realized.

Enlivening our congregations has nothing to do with the names of our churches, our ministries, our worship services or our pastors. (Remind me to tell you the story about the pastor who changed his name to “Randy” the same Sunday his church changed their name to “Journey” because “they both sounded cooler.” The church still closed a couple years later.)

We can even call ourselves St. Luke’s Lutheran or First Presbyterian or Our Lady of the Lake and be “ignited” if we are authentic and genuinely humble regarding God’s love. Life is about who God is. We just need to pay attention and marvel and respond.

Image source.

It happened on this date ten years ago.

First, read this.

If you are feeling enraged or hopeless or paralyzingly sad over the gun violence that continues to ravage our nation, please also take some great or small action today. Click here to find out who to pray for and what to support financially. Read about those who died and what they meant to people. Look at their faces and remember.

Some of the best advice regarding how to love and care for those who grieve comes from AAM and NMG who say essentially the same thing: Each of us gets to choreograph our own grieving. Please honor those who grieve by following their lead.

And although it feels pointless sometimes, we must continue to be activists against hate and misinformation.

Lord, have mercy upon us.

I’ve come to realize recently that I cry a lot, but I don’t, I don’t, I don’t cry over grief. Like, I’m not crying over the death of my father and my brothers and my mother or my other brother, or even the condition of the world or you know, or every sparrow that falls. I end up crying over beautiful things. Stephen Colbert in an interview with Anderson Cooper about grief

I remember a friend telling me that she couldn’t cry over the losses in her life because – if she started – she might never be able to stop. There had been an inordinate amount of ugliness in her childhood.

I get that. Who wants to be re-traumatized, which is what happens when we remember unspeakable pain? And yet, if we can’t cry over our deepest sorrows, I wonder if it keeps us from reaching the point when – like Stephen Colbert – we also can’t feel the joy of what’s deeply beautiful in this world. I wonder if part of spiritual maturity is having such gratitude for life that we cry more because of the beauty of what God has allowed us to witness than the shattering pain. Some moments are too sacred for words.

I pray that all of us – especially those who grieve – have those moments this week.

This is a crying week for me. Ten years ago today I was enjoying a Christmas staff party with Greek food in Chicago when my phone rang. Cindy had died in Virginia after a particularly nasty adventure with cancer. She had shared stories about her sorrows that made me marvel over her resilience. She had a lot of things to cry about, and yet we usually cried together because we were laughing so hard over the ridiculous things of life or marveling over the holy things of life. I can only feel joy today because her life was a testament to what can happen when people are treasured. The beauty of her life makes me want to weep with joy.

Ten years ago this Wednesday, the lives of innocent children and their teachers were stolen and subsequently their families were changed forever because of one of the most excruciating shootings in U.S. history.

Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more. Jeremiah 31:15

That verse goes on to say “Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears; there is a reward for your work,” says the Lord: “they shall come back from the land of the enemy;  there is hope for your future,” says the Lord: “your children shall come back to their own country.”

When I consider the parents who lost their children ten years ago, I can’t imagine a reward that’s worth surviving one’s children. And yet, I believe that there is still hope in their future. I don’t know how it happens. Some human beings literally cannot survive the grief.

I trust that the God who knows our deepest pain in both life and death is immeasurably loving and the incarnation seals it for me. Why do I have this faith and others don’t? I don’t know. But having this faith makes me want to weep with joy.

Another podcast I really like is Kelly Corrigan Wonders and she often ends interviews with a series of questions like “When is the last time you cried?” The last time I cried was Saturday night watching this scene from Joe versus The Volcano. Joe’s got a terminal illness. He’s stranded on a raft in the middle of the ocean with a woman whose life he has tried to save. And he prays:

Dear God, whose name I do not know – thank you for my life. I forgot how big . . . thank you. Thank you for my life.

God bless the grievers this week.