233. Extraordinary!

One of my goals for this year is to have some extraordinary times. I went to the dictionary and found the word divided this way for pronunciation: ex-traor-di-nar-y. The definition is: beyond ordinary. Yes, that’s what I’m looking for this year—some things that are beyond the ordinary.

And yet, I also think of the word divided this way: extra – ordinary. And I think of those times which are actually quite ordinary but somehow something takes them into the realm where they are also “extra” ordinary.

Thich Naht Hanh would say that all of the moments of our lives are “extra” ordinary, whether it is taking a walk slowly and feeling the earth beneath our feet, or whether it’s drinking a cup of tea and sitting not rushed but truly intent on savoring that tea, or whether it is getting up in the morning, looking out the window and seeing the sun quietly cutting through layers of mist and fog. Suddenly it is no longer ordinary. Instead it is extra – ordinary.

So I’ll see in this year to come how many of each I have.

232. Refugee Each Of Us

We have passed the time in the church year where they commemorate Jesus and Mary and Joseph fleeing to Egypt. But as we approach spring, we may be coming to the time when immigration is a political issue. But really all of it is about feeling like a stranger and wanting to be welcomed. I wrote this song because it seemed to me that at one time or another in each of our lives, we are the refugee and know within ourselves those feelings.

You can sing this to the tune “Come Thou Long Expected Jesus,” but also try reading as a poem. As you read, see if you can find yourself and your life experiences inside the poem.

—

Refugee Each of Us

—

We have wandered from our starting space,

Far from land where we were once bound,

Searching every day for a resting place,

For a spot where peace can be found.

Never quitting, no never giving up,

Looking always for freedom’s clear light.

Refugee each of us, wanting to know a welcoming,

Moving out of the dark of night.

—

Traveling through the desert wasteland,

Thirsting days and moments of fear,

Aching only to stand on solid ground,

Take a breath, feel air so clear.

Moving out of confusion, shakiness,

Wanting shackles we carry to fall,

Refugee each of us, hoping for love surrounding us,

Listening always for God’s clear call.

—

Tell the stories of Israelite people,

Tell the tale of Abraham too.

Then remember the Holy Family

As they fled for Egypt, so new.

They’re the ones who have gone before us,

They’re the ones who can show us the way.

Refugee each of us, faithful to trust in God alone,

Heading always for God’s new day.

—

Can be sung to #196 UMH – Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus

© Copyright 2009 by Ann Freeman Price

231. My Preaching Years

I feel so lucky to have been able to preach for the years I did (and sometimes still do). It came about when I was the music director at a small American Baptist Church in Nyack, New York and they fired their minister (as American Baptists can do). They had in the congregation, a person who had been attending for a period of time, who was working for the New York Board of Health, but was also an ordained American Baptist preacher. His name was Jim and this Nyack church asked him if he would be the preacher. He said “I will, all but one Sunday a month.” Then they turned to me and said, “Would you be the preacher on that Sunday that Jim has off?” I said, “Sure.” I had already preached for them one Sunday in 1990 and one Sunday in 1991, so they knew I was could do it. So from 1992 to 1995 I preached once a month. Then Jim had to resign because of his health and I preached weekly from June of 1995 to June of 1998.

By then I was in the United Methodist process for ordination and in June of 1998 was appointed to St. Paul’s United Methodist Church in Nyack as co-pastor and as a local pastor (which means that I wasn’t ordained yet). And actually I never was ordained because I served in Nyack for two years and then retired at the age of 67.

My daughter-in-law Lila told me the story of early in my preaching time. She said, “You know the other day I said to David: Where did your mother learn to preach? She’s just been doing it a short time.” David said, “She’s been preaching all her life.” Lila said, “No David, she’s just been preaching three or four years.” David said, “No Lila, she’s been preaching a very long time, as long as I can remember.”

Maybe so—but here’s what I love about having had that eight years of preaching and a taste of ministry. I loved the wrestling with scripture. I had had it before when I wrote curriculum for various denominations but now this was for adults and now this was for me. What in the world do I say about this scripture? What in the world does it mean?

And I read and I struggled and by Sunday I would have figured it out. I searched for stories that would compliment and help. I searched for quotes and for poetry, but mostly I searched for meaning—what does this mean—what do I say? I learned it’s not easy but at the same time it is rewarding. Because I usually read twice or three times as much as I needed and so I was the richer.

Now I’m a lay person again and I’m a lay person who knows that it’s both a challenge and a privilege to preach. And every once in a while when in a Bible study or in some reading, I come across a really difficult passage I still say to myself, “Hmmm…How would I preach this?”

230. Dream of Preaching

As I continue to go through my old journals, I came upon this entry from February of 1997—sixteen years ago. It is here just as I wrote it then:

I woke up yesterday with a dream that I had been asked to preach somewhere. I think in the dream I was clear about where but by this time, I don’t remember. Anyway, then I was asked not to preach (I think because of my liberal leanings) and I said “No—I was asked and I am going to preach.”

The sermon I preached was on the Love Test and I basically said that when we walk the road of Jesus we use the Love Test—of not excluding, not judging, not turning our backs on, and loving, just loving. And when we hold our actions and our beliefs up to that Love Test, we can tell if they hold up or not. Because the Love Test always remains constant.

I told those who were listening to me preach that when my children were younger, I told them that when they say “always”—This is always true. You always do this.—when they say “always” they were often wrong.

But the Love Test of Jesus is one of the instances where “always” is appropriate. There are no exceptions. When you walk the road with the Christ, you always love, you always include, you never turn your back on, you never judge, you always love.

I woke up feeling that this was an amazing discovery of the exception to my rule to the children.

—

It’s one of the advantages of writing things down—years later you have totally forgotten about it and as you prepare to throw away most of what you wrote down, you still can re-discover a kind of a neat dream.

229. Do You Have a Spoon ?

I came upon this true story this week. David, my son, and Lila, his wife, and I were at Ocean City and had gone for breakfast at this pretty nice restaurant on the boardwalk. Lila asked for a spoon for her coffee and the waitress said, “We don’t have spoons.” She walked off and we spent the next 15 minutes imagining why they wouldn’t have spoons—saving money? some family tragedy involving spoons and it was cheaper to not have spoons than to provide therapy for the family?

We ate breakfast—good blueberry pancakes—and as the waitress brought us our check I said, “Just as a matter of curiosity, why don’t you have spoons?” The waitress got a puzzled look on her face and said, “We have spoons.” Lila said, “I asked for a spoon.” The waitress said, “Oh I thought you said: Could I have a scone!”

Some stories last for a very long time and sometimes just a word or two brings them back in all their hilarity. And suddenly you’re in Ocean City around a table brainstorming why a restaurant doesn’t have spoons.

Whatever!

228. Stand in the Sun and Benjamin Franklin

In these postings #162 is about being positive and in that I wrote about growing up with the positiveness of Norman Vincent Peale and Pollyanna. Then, just the other day I came across this quote from Benjamin Franklin: “Do not anticipate trouble or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.”

I think that’s true in more than one way here in the middle of winter grayness and chill. I remind myself every day that we’ve passed the winter solstice and the days are getting longer and the dark of the night is getting shorter. Today as I did morning exercises on the floor, rainbows danced across the ceiling from the crystals hanging in the window being touched by the sun rays.

News broadcasts are focussed obsessively on the negative. I watch them only a little. When I hear a true story that is loving and generous, I tell it to others, to counteract the feeling that all is bad and that good has died.

The amazing truth is that I get to create the attitude with which I live this day and this moment. I can include the woes of the world, or I can include the wonders around me. Guess which I choose?

227. Peace in the World

It seems appropriate to write about peace following a posting about Gandhi. And yet, I have fluttered through this entire day figuring out what to write. It’s such an immense subject. I have read extensively over the last few years: The Great Turning by David Korten; The Moral Imagination—The art and soul of building peace by John Paul Lederach; Every War Has Two Losers—William Stafford On Peace and War, edited by Kim Stafford; and am currently reading A Power Governments Cannot Suppress by Howard Zinn; and a number of books by Thich Nhat Hanh.

Thich Nhat Hanh writes about beginning with yourself. A number of the books are hopeful about the possibility of enough people wanting peace that it will make a difference. There are positive things going on all around the world.

I should say something about Walter Wink and his insistence that redemptive violence does not work. We say we’ll just go to war this one more time and then we’ll have peace. We say this is a bad means to get to a good end but it will be worth it in the long run. And it isn’t. The reality is that violence does not work.

Non-violence works—over and over and over again. And each of us has the power within to be non-violent.

Howard Zinn ends his book A Power Governments Cannot Suppress with these words: “The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is in itself a marvelous victory.”

Amen.

226. Sixty-five Years Ago

On January 30, 1948, Mohandas Gandhi was assassinated. I was 15 years old and I’m sorry to say I was totally unaware of the happening or of the man. On the anniversary of the death of this Gandhi, let me share just two quotes:

—

Noncooperation with evil is as much a duty as cooperation with good.

—

If you love peace, then hate injustice, hate tyranny, hate greed—but hate these things in yourself, not in another.

—

I need to read some more about this man.

—–

225. Where I Am From

In 2006 I went to Kirkridge Retreat Center in Pennsylvania to a writing workshop led by Ina Hughes. She said to write “Where I Am From” and not to write: I am from Indianapolis and was born in 1933.

—

Where I Am From

—

I am from

chicken and dumplings

hand cut by Grandma Freeman

picked up by me for her

to drop into the boiling

—

I am from

houses with too many people

and apartments with

too few

—

I am from

standing at the front

of the church at two

years old to sing alone

Jesus Loves Me

—

and I am from

arguing and reading

workshop going and

carving out for myself

what I believe about

that Jesus

—

I am from oatmeal cookies

then or now

absent of raisins

filled with nuts

—

cookies that fill

empty spaces

caused by

where I am from

—

Ann Freeman Price

© Copyright 2006 by Ann Freeman Price

—

It’s an interesting exercise. I’ve done it different times in different years and come up with a very different poem every time. Sit for a minute and think about where you are from, and then write it.

224. When – Then

I wrote this today partly because my granddaughter needed a poem from me for the newspaper she’s putting out. But after I wrote it, I realized it was so true for me. I’m not truly a winter-lover. Sometimes I don’t mind winter and snow storms if I can stay in the house, which I can do now that I’m 79 and I can just say “I’m not going anywhere today.” But even so, there comes a time in winter when this poem kicks in. And today is that day.

—

When—Then

—

when the temperature drops

to nine point five

and the snow turns grey

at the edge of the road

—

when there’s no blue sky

for six days straight

and the branch breaks off

from the weight of the ice

—

when clouds hang heavy

and the wind whistles loud

then I just start counting

the days to spring

—

—–Ann Freeman Price

© Copyright 2012 Ann Freeman Price

—

The deeper question is how many “When – Then’s” do you have in your life. How many of those situations are there for you where after three or four “when’s,” you find an almost automatic “then” kicks in.

Another example for me is when clutter starts to accumulate in my living space, and when it gets worse and worse, and when there are piles of stuff on the floor or on chairs, then, oh yes, then I start to freak out and get ahold of it, and have a day where the clutter gets re-organized and looks more ordered.

I’ll have to think about whether I have any more “When – Then’s.”