Sunshine and Seeing Through

Palm Sunday.

Bright, warm sun that lures the 4th and 5th grade leaders outside, small groups trailing out in front of us as we give them tasks to illustrate the idea of perseverance. One group is playing football, another trying to hit a target with a frisbee. My girls are scattered on a hillside, taking it in turns to run barefoot circles around the gym.

We move to the edge of the property, and they twirl through the long row of trees. Faster. Slower. Stopping to pull sharp things out of tender feet.

Palm Sunday, we take the time to play, even those of us who are all misplaced limbs and awkward timing. Because, I never have learned the art of making round things travel in the direction that I intend, but that doesn't seem to stop the kids. Not today, at least.

The 6th grade girls pull out an inflatable ball for volleyball before middle school starts. 8th grade boys the octagon. 6th grade boys for monkey in the middle after service. High schoolers for frisbee and four square before youth group.

And, perhaps, these are our palm branches, or mine, at least, this spring time laughter the cloaks that we throw under the feet of the approaching king.

A king on a colt.

All misplaced limbs and awkward, excited gait. The disciples must have shuffled through the branches, high stepping over sharp edges and kicking at things, now and again, the way that high schoolers so often do. Let themselves ignore the nagging hints of wrongness, because, today was a day for celebration.

And, I see them in these kids. In the one who throws things at me: tennis ball, chalk, wadded up bits of paper that ping off my cheek as we settle into breakout groups; see the teenaged disciples walking, playful along the road; wonder if, when the first one fell asleep in the garden, the others thought of throwing something at him to wake him up, or if it was the sort of slow falling where rooftop talks fade into blackness and then sunrise.

In the group that freezes in hesitation when someone suggests that we break apart and the halting conversation that follows, as if we're learning to walk with a missing limb; see how the two on the road to Emmaus could have missed it, been so caught up in their own heads, their own grief, that they didn't see their rabbi walking beside them.

In the way that we start to head towards the corner we've been pointed to, but they veer back to the red dot, the indicative rug where we always meet; see the disciples returned to their nets, back to the known and the familiar.

We're talking about the concept of Trinity tonight. They're more comfortable with the Holy Spirit than with this distinction between Son and Father, and I make a note to talk more about Jesus. More about Jesus than Paul. More about Jesus than the nuances of trinitarian heresy. More about Jesus to these ones who make me think so much of His very first followers.

Calvary Night

High schoolers.

Bonfires. Banana splits. Bodies every direction that you turn.

There are either 130 of them here or 140, a tightly packed crowd of heads that we count, instinctively and with varying levels of success, as if there might be a point in the night where we were asked to give a reckoning. A moment where the Divine might step down and require a roster, a list of what we've done with these precious lives.

It's a children's ministry habit, not a high school one, this always knowing how many you are responsible for. This counting of bodies and souls before you even realize that you are counting. Because, not all of these are even "ours." We've combined with another youth group tonight. But, we count them anyways.

So long as they are here, they are ours.

So long as their faces echo in our prayers; so long as their voices fill this space with truth and laughter and music; so long as they are here to pour out and be poured into, they are ours.

Some of it is simple Grace, boys still young enough to come at me with a lowered shoulder or a gentle kick to the back of the knee, to laughingly acknowledge that I could no longer take them down -- but that it no longer seems to matter. The physicality of draping a scarf around a freshman neck while we talk. You are seen. You are known. Even in the midst of all of this. Let me use the solidness of our beings to prove it.

The smell of 120 shoes thrown into the middle of the room for a mixer that might be suited to better ventilated spaces. AC that can't quite seem to kick in and decorations that flutter loudly when the kids prop open the doors for air flow.

Ice cream. Wood smoke. Soccer balls and name tags.

Not because of the things themselves, but because of the sense memories that follow them, the grounding-ness of food and warmth and wind and sunshine. The relationships that they make a space for, the layers of reality.

Because, Divinity hovers over and in this place, Grace and Love and Mercy that would comfort these kids. See them as messengers of healing and wholeness. See them healed and whole.

So, we come, months into this process, this transition, messy and beautiful and hurting. "Calvary Night" we have been calling it, after the name of the church that has joined us. Calvary Night. Calvary. Where the Christ came, messy and beautiful and hurting. Where Divinity hovered in and over and, somehow, incomprehensibly, turned its back, so that we might be healed.

Calvary night. It would have been Good Friday. Mourning marked by a broken, impatient hope. Sorrow interrupted by Sabbath.

And, I wonder if we aren't so much the same.

We hold the match to these Sabbath lights that flicker in the parking lot. Offer food, community, music, tradition. And, underneath the consistency of it, some of our kids grieve.

They carry some of the same questions that the first disciples must have, the 'why's' and the 'how long's' and the 'what next's.' A milder set of the unmet expectations that must have sent Jesus' young followers reeling, knocked them from their feet as the world around them consumed an all too familiar meal of bread and wine.

These kids are excited by the possibility of what is going on here, awed by it, overwhelmed by it. Using the novelty of it to propel themselves through. But, a little lost in this sea of unfamiliar bodies. A little befuddled by what they have created.

It washes over their faces in honest moments. The loneliness of being one in a crowd. The uncertainty when we split up small groups not-quite-the-way-they-expected without warning them, because we didn't know ourselves. The wishing and the reminders of what isn't.

"It was nice," they tell us afterwards, child after child repeating the same words that must have been shared over post-youth group frozen yogurt, "having a youth pastor. Even if he wan't ours."

Because, we're still searching. Five and a half months later, we're still looking for someone to meet the sky high list of expectations we have for the one who will be allowed to shepherd our kids. Searching. Waiting. Watching to see God move.

Because, all of Jerusalem had been in an uproar about This Man, and, surely, surely as they lit small flames in the darkness, broke bread, and sang ancient prayers. Surely there were echoes fresh in their minds.
"...neither does one light a candle and hide it under a basket..."
"...collect the pieces that are left over..."
"...beware the leaven of the pharisees..."
"...do this in remembrance of me..."
"...this, then, is how you should pray..."

"What are you doing, God?" These teenaged disciples must have wanted to scream it at the sky. Wild flutters of hope mixed with desperate grief. "What have you done?"

And, yet.

Sunday came.

Resurrection.

God be praised.

Sunday changes the story, lights a fire that changes the world. Sunday brings joy and healing and disbelief. Triumph and victory like the world has never seen. Sunday makes Friday worth it. But, Sunday also gives us reason to remember.

Our Calvary night is on a Sunday, echoes of this older story, deep in the center of Lent, pulled between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Already. Not yet.

So, they hurt. But, we also celebrate.

In the Middle

"I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace."

My 5th graders stand on a hillside in bright sunshine and shout the words, playing with an app that superimposes their playful squeals with special effects - rock slides and flying cars. And, I am caught in the tension of it.

These beautiful words, and the realities that they are echoing, unknowing.

Missile strikes that are as unreal to them as the giant spider effect or the USS Enterprise flying across the screen. A conflict in Syria that has been going on since they were six or seven years old. South Sudan. The Gaza Strip. Refugees returning to rebuild in the Ukraine. Ferguson. The list goes on and on and on.

And, yet, we are here, running, laughing, playing, building these beautiful words into them, so that, when they start to know, they will have something to stand under, something to hold on to.

"In this world you will have trouble. But, take heart! I have overcome the world."
John 16:33

Because, if these words were true in the midst of Jesus' upper room discourse: occupied Palestine, Roman brutality, a soon to be crucified Christ, soon to be scattered disciples, then, they are certainly true now.

True for our 5th graders who are growing up into a messy world. True for the 8th graders, about to feel themselves scattered to new schools and new challenges. True for our high schoolers, far more aware of current events, walking forwards without a youth pastor even as we find ourselves with more and more children.

There is peace here.

In the midst of this tension.

Middle schoolers who sit, enthralled, watching stories of people who were unafraid to step out and do big things - small things, with great faith. We talk about it a little in breakout groups, and I bite my tongue, try not to push them too hard, try to let this be a thing that they come up with on their own. Because, they already have ideas. They simply need a space to let them grow.

Because, these 8th graders are firmly caught in a tension of their own, deciding, each week, what skin they are going to try on for the day. Chameleon like, testing to see what feels safest for this transition up to high school. This group or that group? Familiar or new? And, of course, whether or not to let any of these strangely zealous adults along for the ride.

So, we dance.

In the midst of the phone borrowing and video taking and game playing happening around us, we dance with emotion and expectation and responsibility. Steps that I half remember from my own 8th grade year. Movements that the mama bear in me wishes I could shield them from, and others that I wish I could capture, let them hold on to.

Remember this, guys. Remember that brief moment of certainty, of belonging, of knowing that the God of the universe thinks you enough.

Remember that you are never alone.

Because, I would gather them all up if I thought it would help, these 8th graders and these juniors who are so alike. Climb with them to the Top of the World - climb, not drive, because their bodies need to move to listen. Tip their heads back to the stars. And, tell them again and again.

You. Are. Not. Alone.

Not when you have my full attention in the hallway, and not when our small group is too big but you give it your best anyways. When church is long over and the emotions come bigger than you ever wanted to handle. When there are people everywhere and you think that you're excited about it, but you're also pretty sure of the frustration that must have led that man's friends to dig a hole in the roof. Even then, you are not alone.

And, you are loved.

More than the words that catch in my throat would ever be able to express. You are loved with an infinite, restless, unceasing Love. You are precious. Treasured. Held in the palm of one who is captivated by the details of your being.

The God big enough to contain an ever expanding universe loves you with a love that never ends.

We love you with as much of that echo as we can fit into our finite souls.

You are never alone.

Our course, I'm pretty sure that there is a chapter in the leaders' handbook about NOT totally freaking kids out. So, we'll go with icebreaker questions and high fives instead and let them go out star tripping after youth group on their own. Because, even when we aren't very good at saying it, holy cow, do we ever love these kids.

It is Lent. The tension of waiting. Waiting for the beautiful. The Resurrection. Knowing that the Passion and the Crucifixion come first.

Searching for Peace in the midst of a world full of troubles.

"But, take heart! I have overcome the world."

iNTERSECT

We take our post camp numbers-high and seem to keep running with it, adding a few kids every week, until the ones who have been here faithfully for years turn to me with a bright light in their eyes to report what they have carefully counted, none of us sure where on earth we're getting these numbers from.

None of us sure of anything except that God is doing something in and around us. That new kids are signing up for clusters. That the Haiti applications are gone before we can blink. That we are suddenly faced with the thrill of scrambling for leaders.

Numbers have never been the thing that we are going for, but there is a holy sense to watching new and old faces come through the door, as if we are slowly going over the same picture with another color. Something that was unspoken but missing. A rainbow forming around us. It could so easily be older brother of the Prodigal Son, but, instead, they rejoice over each life like finding a lost coin.

Whoever you are, we've been turning this place upside down looking for you.

We are at 64 high schoolers, and there is a different sort of feel to it these days, skirting on the edges of so many things that could be messy and so much that is inherently beautiful. 

 They are talking about summer opportunities tonight, making each other pancakes and flitting through conversations about Haiti and local-ish ministry trips, about RFKC and clusters and Student Owners. And, they are beautifully confident in their ability to handle these things. 

 Because, it is Haiti season, has been for weeks now, as we talk about what we're going to be doing (we don't know), when we're going (we think we know), and who is going with us (right now it looks like everyone and their uncle). 

 Lent and Haiti, where they are growing like weeds, alternately thriving and struggling, acutely aware of the things in their worlds that are and are not.

And, it is this season that reminds me not to pull the thread to quickly on life, to slow down and breathe. To enjoy the magic that is these kids suddenly sprung to a new kind of life. Because, spring comes early in the desert. A wash of February green that teases us with the idea of summer around the corner.

Here but not now. Already not yet. Eternity in the middle of these everydays.

The slippery sort of eternity that disappears if you look at it straight on for too long, that has to be caught out of the corner of your eye and held onto gently. Eternity that exists in kids who are thoroughly and completely who they are. 

Gryffindors who are making pancakes, washing dishes, and taking attendance with the sort of focused responsibility that is changing the world with every act. Ravenclaws analyzing, questioning, finding their niche and settling into the rhythms of this place. Slytherin kids who are here specifically for pancakes and laughter and the intentionality of community.

Talking about future, past, and present in a giant jumble of bodies and stories and emotions.

There are hints of things rising to the surface. Old hurts that are nearly ready to be dealt with. The sparks that are the rubbing together of so many lives. Anxieties that meet like amber on a cat. But, tonight we are beautifully present. Washed over by Grace. Enough.

Tonight this room is filled with hope, memory, safety, anticipation, and playful grace. Tonight, the light is bright, and it is easy to see.

Snow Blast 2015

Middle school camp comes the weekend after, four of us repacking into bags that still carry marks from high school retreat. But, the kids are ready to go all in. So, all in is how we go.

They help us with name tags and luggage and anything that they can think of to stay close and avoid waiting on the bus. The boys save me a seat just as they have for so many camps before this. I am quietly reprimanded for not being at church last weekend and loudly reminded of the Grace that covers - that these growing ones found the words that so often elude us. That, thirty minutes in, forgiveness has already been asked and offered.

And, then, we do whatever it is that you do on middle school bus rides. We talk. Play cards. Heads up. Mad Libs. Listen to music. Walk and stand and officially prove our bus driver the most patient person on earth. Devolve into slapping games until the backs of hands are red skinned and stinging. Watch as the kids slowly become confident that they can do this without ear buds or movies.

Pull into camp and hear them declare, "This is our camp." "[Summer camp] was just a break, but now we're back."

This muddy, slushy, rainy place. This is their camp.

Even when the music is not at all what they were expecting or we mark our first cabin time with not-the-kind-of-tears-that-you-hope-for-at-camp, they are happy to be here. So, we spend another weekend spoiling our kids.

Mini marshmallows roasted over tea lights. Basketball games with made up rules that somehow allow for dog piles of 7th and 8th grade boys. Time and space to just relax, to be young, to trust that their leaders have their backs.

That we'll spend our early mornings plotting and planning and moving pieces of stage and furniture so that they have a place to come up front during music, and an angle to see the screen. That we'll block off entire sections of chairs so that they have a place to sit before they've even thought about crawling out of a warm sleeping bag. That our instinct is defense rather than reprimand. That we'll warn them ahead of time of the things that might throw them off and call out the good whenever we happen to see it. Because, we see so much good in these kids.

They've grown up so much, these 8th grade girls who quote back to me the things that I told their 6th grade selves, who find a Saturday night space to ask questions and listen to me answer in my raspy voice. Still young enough to let us explain the world, but old enough that I can watch the gears turning in their heads as they weigh our words and the testimony of our lives.

They're brave and quirky, and they know that we think they are marvelous because of it. But, we spend the time to go back over what they are, to talk about what's coming, to give them tools and hope and salve for these anxious hearts.

Our 8th graders fight with fear, and it makes them brave.

Our 7th graders fight inadequacy, and it makes them strong.

Our 6th graders fight ignorance, and it makes them wise.

Brave enough to pull close to leaders and let us help to sort out the messy and the beautiful. Strong enough to laugh and mourn and create safety like a bubble around them. Wise enough to watch and learn, to mimic the Christ-likeness that they see, encourage it by their careful attention.

Yes, we see good in these kids.

In the midst of the ups and downs, we see kids who are allowing the Spirit of God to shape and mold and change them. And, I love it. I love that I have spent five years watching these 8th graders learn to trust. Trust God. Trust us. Trust each other. Five year watching them learn to recognize peace.

I don't have to carefully introduce the boys to their counselors anymore. Don't have to give those constant reassurances that, yes, this man is safe, and, yes, that one is too. They roughhouse with their leaders without stopping to read my reaction at every catch. And, I am slowly learning the art of being available anyways.

The one who has always been so sensitive to worship music no longer surges with discomfort when hands in the room begin to raise. They stay up until 4:00 in the morning talking about anything and everything. Or, some of them do, even while mine fall into an early sleep, exhausted with this business of growing up and learning Love.

The girls shrug when they don't have an answer or tell us they don't know, rather than fighting us off with nonsense statements or desperately grasped at distractions. They pull each other into doing things. Separate for long hours and then come back with a confident ease, no longer the littles who told us every time that they were going to use the bathroom - in our cabin.

Instead, for this short weekend, at least, they simply are. In the midst of the missteps and the new counts of getting older, they prove themselves valiantly up for the task. Things that would have thrown them for hours take minutes, and I watch, again and again, as they rely on the strengths of their classmates, the strengths of the classes that surround them, to fill in the places where they are uncertain.

Because, growing up so often means growing into the idea of interdependent community. (And, learning to give grace for adults who are still trying to learn what it looks like to do community.)

Together. Washed in Grace.

When we've barely gotten started and my name tag is already around a 7th grade neck.

When I make a comment about having "lost my children," and 7th and 8th grader of the not-in-my-cabin variety both look at me with a mostly mocking, "Umm. We're right here."

Be careful with your tongue. They are paying attention. They remember.

Kid from school who follows like a shadow during free time.

The ones who come to stand close during music, this one still, those ones squirming, that one watching carefully. Always watching. Slowly putting words to the way that we do this thing.

Dodge ball games that drive the staff camp nuts with their constant questions and burning drive to prove themselves. Not winning. Disappointed. But, better able to handle it than last year.

Girls jumping in to help the boys in dodge ball. Boys jumping in to help the girls in volleyball. Teamwork encouraged by fiercely protective leaders. "We'll talk to them. But, there was no purple."

Cookies frosted and eaten. Wanders taken through muddy fields and slippery paths. Long stretches sat by an almost unnecessary fire. A kid who comes silently close after our final breakfast, testing my resolve to push us towards this "packing up and going home" phenomena that is supposed to happen next.

Another bus ride. Eking out final moments while we wait for parents.

Missteps and missed connections but also old habits and familiar patterns.

It was an interesting year. A raw 'just under the surface' kind of a year. A 'not what we were expecting' year. A year to run headlong into Grace and prove that it is still strong enough to hold us. That, even when the whole world is topsy turvy around us, there is reason to do this messy thing together.

Reason to spend time looking for beauty.

Reason to learn to trust.

"Identity Theft"

 

We settle with 98 students into an echoing gym, and they are bright with an energy that is ridiculous, hilarious, over the top absurd. Goofy, happy, and so excited to be here.

The boys have made a tradition of hand delivering luggage to the girls' cabins. Camp has made a tradition of nachos and hot chocolate waiting for us. And, even the freshmen settle quickly into these routines.

We are suckers for these kids, falling into ministry trip style habits of spoiling them even while we push them. Trading hats with boys who want a pom pom rather than a plain black beanie. Eye rolls and laughter at behaviors that are so much younger than what they are often allowed to be. So many moments where we follow their lead and let them call the shots.

They are known. And, they are loved.

We tell them, as often as we have cause to, that they are loved. Call them by name. Remember stories. Engage as deeply as we can. As if being without a youth pastor is constant excuse to remind them of value and worth.

Somehow, beyond our planning or our control, the most important thing is that they are together, in the presence of a powerful God.

They are young and light - and occasionally lacking in the prefrontal cortex - but there is Grace here to cover.

Grace for late night talks and midnight adventures in a half frozen lake. Leaders who carry responsibility when there is a chance to lay blame. And, kids who love each other through the ups and downs and sideways of it all.

We don't have a youth pastor. But, we have a team. 122 of us who are here for a common purpose. Fearfully and wonderfully made. Powerfully loved. Uniquely gifted.

Kids who stand on stage and lead worship with amazing confidence and skill. Who play instruments and provide glow sticks for throwing during during the final song. Stack chairs and reset chairs and stack chairs and reset them again.

Throw toilet paper until the air is thick with the taste of floating fiber and sweat. Wander through the woods until our feet are soaking wet and then come back to dry out with s'mores by the fire. Crowd surf and share honestly and laugh until our sides ache.

 

 Pray and allow themselves to be prayed for. Make space for the goofy and the absurd and the constant cogs in motion that is the reality of a team led retreat.

When 75% of the kids are there within ten minutes of the arrival time and we suddenly have almost an hour - because, what, Bethel people are never this early?! -  the Student Owners jump in and come up with something to do.

When the schedule shifts like puzzle pieces, they shrug and move on to whatever we tell them comes next. Where they need to be. When they need to be there. With the things that they need in order to be successful. These kids are quietly, honestly incredible.

They listen to two different speakers and still make the brain space for a 45 minute session on spiritual gifts.

 

My sweet cluster girls come early to stake out a place in the front row during my breakout-that-turned-out-to-be-a-large-group-session-instead. They listen carefully and respond authentically and do everything that we could think to ask them to do. When I run out of words during prayer, one of the boys speaks into the silence and prays for me instead.

Freshmen boys throw their arms around each other in this tight huddle as I pray for one of them and they each pray for him in turn. The girls tuck their heads in just as close. And, no one blinks twice when the toilet paper from the game is reused to care for snot and tears from all ages and genders.

We are together. Early morning, pre coffee time for quiet conversation and clumsy messes. Meals and free time, sessions and games. Bus rides and late nights. Mistakes and Grace.

Mainly, we are running headlong into Grace. Middle school style. Finding the limits. Testing to see if it will still hold us. Praying that they find its endlessness. And, bouncing back to find the hands that formed the universe still reaching out, secure.

Because, of course they are.

But, sometimes we need this reminder. Sometimes we need to play at what it might look like to live a little more like Acts chapter 2. To start conversations that we hope to continue long after camp has finished. Sometimes we need to wash ourselves in charis and eucharisteo.

There is a space at camp for being both a little bit younger and a little bit more mature. A space for imaginary adventures and wandering wild child through the woods after a pack of deer. For trusting each other to be the holders of stories that are shared with a supernatural ease. For photo bombing and play fights in front of the bathroom doors. For songs that echo in my head as I wake up in the middle of the night to pray for these kids.

   

 "Here in you, I find shelter, wrapped within the arms of wonder, Lord of all, so beautiful."

"I'm wide awake, drawing close, stirred by grace."

Over and over and over again I wake up to the words running through my head, to these insistent reminders to pray and pray and pray some more. Pray on the ride up as we follow the buses and the director of children's ministries comments on the strangeness of not knowing what is going on inside. Pray when I watch some of them fight back the way that Bethel kids have always fought back, proving themselves "responsible" and "mature" and "able to carry the world."

Even though the missteps have already been forgiven.

When I wish that Grace was a tangible thing I could throw over them like a blanket. Let them feel the strength of it with their fingers, see it, test it, know that it is real. Wrap them tightly enough to drive out the fear that ties their hearts in knots. That tries to whisper "not enough."

Pray during chapel. During free time. During games. Cabin time. Early mornings. Late nights. I am reminded that the most important thing that I can do is pray.

I've taken my 45 minutes to speak truth about spiritual gifts. Asked for their ears and their hearts and left the rest up to the Spirit. I bounce around, spending nights in different cabins, riding up different than back, but always separate from our girls. And, through it all, I pray.

Because, whether it is an ocean that separates us, or a few hundred yards, prayer is still the lens through which we see Grace. Still the tugging reminder that there is a someday coming. An already, not yet. Eternity to wash our mess in steams of living water, to join in with our hands and our hearts as healing comes.

"And, the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations."

I think of these kids: fearfully and wonderfully made, powerfully loved, and uniquely gifted. And, I can't help but imagine what could be, what will be.

"All fear removed, I breathe you in, I lean into your love."

98 kids. 98 living, breathing reminders of Love and Grace. And, I can only hope, that in our few short hours of weekend, they also have caught a glimpse of that. Have seen their strengths. Seen their giftings. Seen the way that the Body is meant to function together.

Not always smoothly. Far from perfectly. But, together.

Washed in Grace.

I can pray that they will let this be their identity.

Advent: Love Candle

 

"Four more days until Christmas!"

The kids say it over and over and over again, giddy with an excitement that still keeps careful track of one another. Tracks presence and movement and mood like a whirlwind of a barometer.

Christmas is coming, but I don't hear a single set of lips spill over with wishes or gift lists or plans for new belongings. Instead, they watch each other - carefully. Make time and space for seeing and being seen. For taking care of each other.

And, they remind me, in their constant shadowing of these lessons that we try to teach them, what it means to love in a way that prefers others.

Agapé.

My 5th graders keep eagle eyes on the door to make sure that I catch each new arrival. Stuff three little girl bodies into every two chairs. Send off the phone case with a boy who loves the R2D2-ness of it, while they cradle the vulnerable electronic in their hands, passing it between them, taking turns at games.

Laugh as we discover that our *shl*y's share all three initials, born on the same day but different months. Jump in and out of conversations as we cross the parking lot, graciously giving each other the space to speak. Listen to stories about Brucho and rotate through drawing and filming in a two-directions-at-once pattern that ought to be completely confusing but somehow isn't.

This is how they know to love.

A 7th grader who pops in with an uncertain, "Jessica, watch me win!" glad to be back, but not quite sure where he fits in this motion filled room that is just like he remembers it - but also so very different.

The quiet 8th grader who leaves his normal place to come sit down, to sandwich the returner between us and declare that he was missed. Pulls him into a group for the game and keeps him close for the rest of the morning. Gives him a place to belong.

Girls who vocalize the parallels between what they're learning at school and what they're learning at church. Books that they're reading. Papers that they've written. Class discussions that have been had.

We talk about The Outsiders with middle schoolers in the morning and The Lord of the Rings with high schoolers in the evening. A wildly goofy group of kids who are bursting with this need to laugh, to connect, to simply be together in the midst of the holidays, they race through the assigned questions with the half answers and blunt sarcasm of a group of Gryffindors whose brains are anywhere but where we're trying to take them. The silence of Ravenclaws who are feeling the same.

And, I remember the flame that my eagle eyed littles watched this morning, tempting each other to run their fingers through the heat, the way that the curious have for centuries and millennia.

Love. Agapé. Others preferred.

Reason enough to let the questions slid. Drop the leader "should's." Follow the conversation to wherever they need to take it. To Tolkien and Lewis. War and creation. Faith and competition. And, the stories that change us.

Because, they are at that perfect age. Knee deep in the process of sorting through childhood stories. Deciding what is true. What is true enough. What is worth keeping.

Let them learn to step forward in the defense of Hobbits, and they might begin to see the value in shepherds. Might begin to believe that the powerless have worth. That a small act is enough. That there is good, Glory that shines brighter than any light they have ever seen.

That there is reason to love.

These are story kids on their way out of a roller coaster year, and I have to think that there is a reason this is the second Inklings conversation that I have had in the past week with separate but overlapping groups of teenagers. The second time today that we are tying stories to Scripture and Scripture to stories.

A reason for blending theology and imagination, as if the two are ever truly separate.

Perhaps, is has something to do with the idea that every story is about Love.

And, so every story is about God.

"Since it is so likely that children will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic courage."
- CS Lewis

Advent: Joy Candle

"I get to light the Joy Candle, today!"

The girls come into Sunday school already certain of this one thing. They don't yet remember the word "Advent," but, they know what it means. They know that these flames mean Hope and Peace. That today we are adding Joy.

So, they circle up in our space under the arc of the stairs, and we do.

Sit for a moment around three flickering lights. Explain how we are going to spend the rest of the morning. Blow them out. And, start working on a project.

They draw and film and talk and laugh, and I treasure the casual intensity of these moments, where they are filled with a joyful purpose, and we don't have to separate the relationship building from the "go out and change the world." This is open ended work, unhurried, go however far you happen to get. The story of David and Goliath isn't going to change between now and whenever we happen to finish it.

These stories are written down. Unchanging.

David won. The angels came. The Messiah was made flesh.

Joy.

The Greek suggests "joy because of grace" or "grace recognized," as if our joy is tied, not to the circumstances around us, but to our eyes to see those circumstances. We take the time to look for Grace, and Joy is there waiting for us just around the corner, like a faithful sunrise, alternately bright and gentle in morning tired eyes.

Today, we are looking. 

Carving out time. Or, perhaps, simply noticing when time is carved out for us.

For M*t** to run up behind me on our way into the gallery and to take a few stray moments just before he has to leave. 

"I hit you [with the playground ball]. That means that you're it."

We pick up another kid along the way, and barely get started before their families are ready to head home, but this is grace recognized. This is conversation in an athletic language that I fumble through with a thick accent and terrible grammar but hopefully communicate in anyways. This is a simple spending of intentional time, which is a language that I speak more fluently. Chara.

Grace.

Grace when another group of them is wild and goofy during music, each of them for their own reasons and in their own way. Acting out until they can get a leader's hands to settle heavily on their shoulders, prove that they are seen and known and understood.

"Get[ting my] kids under control" would easily take hours of real talk that they aren't yet ready to have, so we do our messy best instead, one of the boys physically skittering away from me when I ask a seemingly simple question that pushes too far. Hands on shoulders. Eye rolls. Laughter. Intentionality about letting them use behaviors to draw closer.

Even, occasionally, letting things play out when they manage to attract not-quite-the-kind-of-attention-they-were-looking-for from other leaders.

They glance at me, and I know that it isn't what they intended. Didn't mean to get in in trouble. Didn't have the words to simply ask for the things that they needed. They're eighth graders this year. Sometimes grown up. Sometimes still little.

Always honest with their behaviors, even when they are not always truthful with their words. Because, today, a lie during the game communicates more openly than anything else that they could think to do.

Today, we need to run full tilt into this Charis. Body slam to see if it will hold us.

And, we make it through, standing on the edge of Grace. Recognizing it. Rejoicing in the moments where it rushes over us.

I bite down on the questions that are burning on my tongue and simply let them be. Shoot hoops with M*tt** when he hangs back after Ignite. With K*r*n and J*s**h and D*n**l before we get started. Pour in before holiday travel pulls them across oceans and state lines, as if we can somehow build up a stockpile for the moments when they are going to need it.

Joy in the fact that they are asking, making needs known in the best way that they know how. In the odd sense of trust and community to this mess. In the fact that God is bigger. Great. Gracious. Glorious. Good.

Old lessons remembered. Grace found in these ever changing eyes and restless bodies.

Grace in the stance of the high schoolers as they crowd around a table to read through question cards with joking seriousness, and it becomes clear that they really did miss each other last week when part of the crew was gone for a performance. Missed being together in a way that, really, has very little to do with us as leaders.

There is a balance of personalities and peer groups that they thrive off of, and I think how lucky the next youth pastor is going to be, to inherit these kids.

Sit in a circle as we fiddle with the rug and talk about anxiety and the ways that we combat it. Tell the truth that is also a promise, "I pray for you guys at 8:45 and 2:45 every day [as I drive past a local high school]." Help a stray phone find it's owner, and pray for them for easily the dozenth time today.

Prayer like breathing as they catch on my thoughts or tug at my heart.

Because, somehow, in the midst of all this, in the ups and downs of everyday moments, this is where we find Grace. This is where we find Joy, waiting, close, just around the corner.

Advent: Peace Candle

 

We lit the Peace candle yesterday, watched yellow flames dance near the fingers of fifth grade girls who struggled to listen to directions. Sat with a heart that wanted to whisper to me of anything but peace.

Four white emergency candles in an empty cake pan. A borrowed lighter. Fumbled explanations.

Peace.

When I don't have my stuff together. When I'm tired and my heart hurts for my kids. When my head is foggy with the disconnect of too much information all at once. It is still December, and the Christ is still coming, and I still remind myself in the simple act of lighting these flames of Hope and Peace. Because. He. Is. Still. Coming.

Because, He came.

And, He promised to leave us with a peace that passes understanding, a wholeness to stand in contrast to the brokenness of the world around us. To stand in contrast to our own brokenness.

Eiréné.

Wholeness. Peace. Quiet. Rest.

All of the things that we feel the absence of so acutely in this second week of Advent, as if life itself is a reminder of the things that are to come, a shaking until we settle into this rhythm of prayer like breathing.

And, maybe that is what we are doing. Maybe we are smoothing out the wrinkles that a year of life has put into us. Straightening out the four corners of Shalom. Peace with God. Peace with self. Peace with others. Peace with Creation. I think of a talk from the Justice Conference in 2012, and I see the hints in the ways that we do this jumbled up day.

Like the slow process of untangling the Christmas lights and deciding which bulbs are broken or burned out, we do the slow work of sorting through our own brokenness as we prepare for the creation of something beautiful.

For the coming of Light.

"Prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain. The glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all the people will see it together, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken."

Isaiah 40:3-6

These may not be mountains or valleys that we are struggling with today. There are brothers and sisters around the world - and around the country - who are receiving that distinction. But, this rough ground shall become level too.

I think of summer camp three years ago, stepping out of the hubbub of a game to stand by one of my sixth graders. Stand by a puddle. In silence. Dropping in rocks, bits of gravel, one by one. Slowly finding the words that needed to be said. Until the hole was filled.

And, one by one, all too often in silence, we are dropping pebbles into these low places. Stepping out of the hubbub of the "game" to stand together and fill in the gaps that need to be filled.

Pray through with the one who isn't there but wishes he was.

Drop.

Settle on the floor with three from very different groups, who are all here to be honest. To be raw one moment and laughing the next. To be wide eyed exhilarated and drooping framed exhausted. To maybe not be doing this thing right, but to be intentionally doing it.

Drip.

Listen as one, who was long convinced that no other leader cared to learn his name, sings the praises of the man who invited them over for pizza and Fellowship of the Ring, swords and shields and helmets. Watch as, for one of the first times in three years, he sits away from me for music and lesson - with that very same leader and group of boys.

Drop. Drip. Ping!

Do youth group, once again, without a youth pastor, without a dozen of the kids who are out of town for a gig. Come. Hearts raw. Ready to sing when we don't know the words. Talk when we don't know the answers. Be silent when there is nothing to say. Wonder at this church in the second chapter of Acts. Listen to the uniqueness in each of them that connects with different aspects of the early Way. Pray like breathing.

Splish. Drip. Drop.

Because, this peace candle has a second name. Some traditions call it the candle of preparation. Prepare the way of the LORD.

So, we'll align ourselves with creation, with the heat and smoke that comes from these simple flames. With the Divine, through these unspeakable reachings of our hearts. With ourselves, as we take the time to admit that today is a struggle. And, with each other.

Fill in the gaps. Raise the empty places.

Shalom.

ID Night

The high schoolers plan a pre-retreat night, and I am not sure how to capture the everythingness of it in this concrete form that we call words. Because, it wasn't perfect. And, they weren't perfect. And, we weren't perfect.

But, it was good.

It was good to come together in the midst of Advent, to remind each other of the Holy that is coming, the Grace that surrounds us now.

To bring what are essentially three different youth groups together and find the tension - and hopefully the Divine - in our unique ways of existing and overlapping. Because, we each know the feel of our own version of this thing, and it is good, for a moment, to step into anothers' shoes. To hear the stories that come out of it. The ways that we strive, as a story telling people, to make sense of it all.

The kids in the back of my vehicle laugh at crowded spaces as they double buckle to fit an entire team, "This is just like Haiti! At least no one is sitting on any soccer cleats this time!"

It is cold. December. We're wearing ugly Christmas sweaters and jeans. Running a scavenger hunt that they put together. Shuttling less than five minutes from the church to a coffee house.

But, it is just like Haiti.

Sort of, in that story telling way that draws out connections and meanings. A crowded van. Packed full with energy and trepidation, frustration and excitement. People they knew and those they had just met. Working together. A team.

Unexpected plot twists and community despite it all. Protests on the edges of our consciousness. Hope and pain carried with us like precious cargo. Uncertain footing but a certain God. Parallels that we feel, even if we couldn't put the words to them.

In some strange sense, this is "just like" Haiti.

The Gryffindor kids in the back of my van tell stories, draw connections, let each other in. The Ravenclaws go back over the scavenger hunt, what they've done, what they have yet to do, how they can best finish quickly.

Several of the Slytherin boys give up on waiting for the shuttles altogether and simply run the short distance instead.

Fearless. Grace filled. Brave.

They started planning this thing with the youth pastor, finished it without him, and this brave is a stubborn choice that they are making. A choice to jump into the jumble and the mess together, to keep moving forwards even when things don't go quite according to plan. To tell stories and to trust that there is a bigger picture.

And, as the room clears out from these eighty-five teenaged bodies, the leaders linger to tell our own stories. Stories that stretch back through youth pastors and well over a dozen sets of kids. Years of doing this, loving this way, watching them grow and learn and stumble and hopefully get back up again.

Unspoken, it is a promise.

A stubborn choice that we are making to stick it out through this thing too. To join the kids in the midst of their brave and hurt, their energy and trepidation, frustration and excitement. To do our level best to ensure that, no one has to do this on their own.

Because, we're getting ready for retreat. Looking to the other side of Advent. Preparing for moments where we paint community in bold strokes that they can look back on all year. Living out stories as we get ready to create dozens more. And, the theme is a steady reminder that, although we might not know who is going to be coming we with us, we do know Who will be there.

We know that we have an identity that can not be shaken, an unchanging Creator, a shelter in the midst of any storm.

We know that this is Just. Like. Haiti.

And, just like Haiti is good.

Advent: Hope Candle

November 30th.

The first Sunday of Advent is an interesting one, and I am reminded with a sort of gentle force that there are no easy answers. That we are waiting. Lighting the Hope candle, even while we read passages of prophecy - confession and lament.

Looking to a better day to come.

Reminded that it is okay to be mixed up and muddled and watching grief play in their eyes, to create a safe space and allow them to begin to name it. That actions sometimes communicate louder than words. And, that time is precious.

Because, one of my fifth graders comes spilling over with half formed words about a family hurt. One of them whispers questions about sin and grace and mental illness that I can't help but answer, even while the presenter continues to talk. All of them clasp hands and elbows - and occasionally fall full to the ground - working through team building challenges while we read the verse.

"For I am convinced that...nothing has the power to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Over and over again. Until church is suddenly out 10-15 minutes early. And, we're weaving through bodies to find a lost Bible. And, it doesn't matter what else we had planned. Because, time is up.

But, time is also a gift.

An in between services that stretches long and gives us precious time to connect. To watch them play in the octagon until they are stumbling with exhaustion. To verbally pull in the ones who have been hesitant lately, too busy trying to find the fuzzy eighth grade line between grown-up and still-little. To laugh with them and have nonsensical conversations and make sure that they are seen. To talk and be and let them slip my spare name tag around their neck, where it will stay for the rest of the service.

Because, when my name is on one side and theirs is stuck to the other, it doesn't matter so much who is claiming who. It's Advent, and we're doing this together.

Slipping into leaders' meetings and back out again. Sitting behind the octagon to talk. Jumping in to play. Being body slammed by a slight seventh grader who hasn't been here for months, his everything coming a hundred miles an hour, and my name tag almost instantly over his head.

So that there are two extras of "me" wandering around this crowd of middle schoolers and a half dozen stray tags littering my actual back.

Game time, where we Google on someone else's phone, because one of the sixth grade girls is playing with mine. Where we take turns following the ones most likely to know the answer, and the girls who spent so many hours notebooking with me last year clump up during the Bible questions, instinctively sure that someone has the answer buried in their heads. That I know, even if they don't.

Music. Lesson. Filtering back to the places where we 'always' sit, as if there was a magnetic pull to this habit, a silent need to be close. Together.

Goofy at first, in that manic sort of way that means trying to forget, trying not to think about it, like an over tired two year old running wild lest they find themselves suddenly asleep. 

Sometimes, they don't need words to say what they want to say. Sometimes I am paying enough attention to do goofy when they need to. To know when to make eye contact and when to acknowledge their sassy comments. To let them peel the extra names off my back and to sit quietly when the talk gets hard and there are silent tears that don't quite fall from eighth grade eyes.

Because, there is unspoken grief here, even when the girls use breakout groups to begin to put words to it.

"Hold on, it get's better."

"Hold On Pain Ends: H.O.P.E."

"Jesus went through greater suffering than we have, and He knows what it's like."

They stay close when they need to feel safe. Wear my tags and chase each other across the giant room. Relax a little every time someone teasingly calls them by my name. Body slam and then slow until I can catch them. Stay until little sisters are fidgeting with impatience to go home.

Not because I am magic or because this place is, but because this is what we do with our heavenly Father.

We pull close. Slip the identity of Christ around our necks. Call each other by this name, 'Christian,' a thousand times over, until we begin to remember. Throw ourselves into Divine Grace and slow just enough to see it slip into the in betweens. Stay and wait, even when the world around us fidgets with the impatience to just 'make it better already.'

Wait for the already, not yet coming of the Christ. The Redeemer. Rescuer.

Hope in the midst of lament.