Category: Community

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An Awkward Thanksgiving… Tuesday

Where are you God? In 2020, it’s an easy question for us to ask. A pandemic, racial tension unseen for decades, political unrest, and simple frustration with humanity. Unprecedented,  we want normalcy, unlike anything we have seen before, words and phrases that have changed the way we talk about everyday life.

We feel abandoned. We feel lost and we aren’t sure exactly what to do. Our feelings may seem new and solely ours, but we are not the first to feel forgot. The Bible demonstrates the process of grace, rejection, exile, and finally restoration again. 

Psalm 89 is a prayer given to the people of Israel. It’s there to remind the people of the faithfulness of God, even when He seems distant. 

The 89th Psalm consists of four parts. First is the grace—the poet sings of the rule of God. They write of the greatness and wonder of the Kingdom. Then Ethan (the named creator of the work) reminds the reader of the promise God has made to Israel through the line of David. As the second movement in the Psalm closes, he reminds Israel of their rejection of God. Lament frames the third portion. He mourns the exile that awaits the nation of Israel. He weeps over the trials they face. This poem ends with the author returning to the beginning — “Praise be to the Lord forever! Amen and Amen.” 

Some scholars think these words were penned after the nation of Israel had been in exile. The Psalm remembers and reminds them of the pain they endured and the restored hope during their wandering. 

Though no one has driven us from our homeland, we feel the sense of loss that Israel understood. As we enter Thanksgiving, we feel all is lost. I remind you; is not. There is still beauty. The God of the first movement is still the God watching over our hurting world. He is still the God of love with His arms open, ready to receive back his people. 

When we pause on Thursday to celebrate this awkward Thanksgiving, remember that it is only for a time. Exile isn’t forever—it is only a small piece of the cycle.    

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An Awkward Thanksgiving… Monday

What do you do when it’s all different? How do you celebrate when fear reigns? How can we remember when traditions have to set aside for a year? What if this is the last time we all get to be together? 

These are only a few of the questions we are wrestling with as we start this awkward Thanksgiving week. Officials are telling us not to travel, shamers are berating anyone even entertaining visiting family this holiday. It’s a great heaping mass of confusion. 2020 robs us of the one day a year we seem to say, as one, “Let’s be thankful,” right? 

I don’t think so. In 1621, a group of Puritans celebrated one of the first Thanksgivings (there is a debate on the actual “first”). They celebrated because they had survived the harsh, dark, New England winter and had found a bountiful harvest. Everything was new for those first celebrators. Some would never see family or friends from the old world ever again. Many didn’t survive that first winter and weren’t there for the celebration. We shattered friendships and broke the trust with the indigenous First Nations People. 

Those early celebrations had everything right and wrong. They had reasons to be grateful and reasons to mourn. They focused on the goodness—at least for a while. 

In 2020 we may be closer to those first celebrations than any Thanksgiving in the intervening years. Our sense of loss and the distance from loved one’s weigh us down. We, the people, can become overwhelmed by the grayness that surrounds us or we can rise and fight to see the light of day. We can wrestle out the things we are thankful for in this year. 

Thanksgiving is practice. It is more than a day of gluttony. It is the way we wake up. It is the way we see the day. It is the hope we cling to—that things can be better. 

This year, togetherness is limited, but distance does not limit the gratitude we can carry for each other. Paul wrote to the church in Corinth a prayer we can echo today, “I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus (1 Corinthians 1:4).” 

It may be an awkward Thanksgiving, but you can still pray thanksgiving over the family and friends in your life. You can still call and write and let them know you love and cherish them. This is a good chance to practice the habit of gratitude.   

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The Questions You Asked Series… Q6

This question is part of a series, The Questions You Ask. I mean the responses to be short. If there is something you would like me to go more in depth on, please let me know. 

How can somebody overcome crippling loneliness, despite having plenty of friends?

I saved this question for last, because it is the hardest to answer briefly and maybe the most important question asked during this season in human history. I got input from friends in the world of counseling. 

First, we need to garner some understanding of where this pain comes from. There are multiple roots, but here are some questions to consider in self-examination. 

  • Are you battling anxiety or depression?
  • Have you faced a trauma you have shoved down and leaves you feeling disassociated from loved ones?
  • Do you have friends you feel you can be gut level honest with? 
  • Do you see yourself as someone worth knowing?

How do we respond to this pain? You may need to find some professional help, especially in the first two cases (I can point you in the right direction if you need to talk to someone). Beyond that, feelings of isolation and loneliness come from a negative place. God made us to live in a community. You need to change the story you are telling yourself. Start speaking and writing the things you are thankful for, look for ways to serve other people. Look at your thought patterns, are you living in the negative how can you interrupt that flow of self-talk. Lean more into developing a relationship with God who provides the highest value for you. 

I went a little over the word count, but it needed to happen. I end with this quote from Mother Teresa, “If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.”

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The Questions You Asked Series… Q4/5

This question is part of a series, The Questions You Ask. I mean the responses to be short. If there is something you would like me to go more in depth on, please let me know. 

Today I am taking on two questions because they fit together too well to separate. That means the word count is a little higher but still meets the goal because I am under 500 words. 

Why do you think you are helping the community?

My gut response when I read this question was, “We don’t.” I was in a moment of frustration and mad at a couple of people I work with, and that blocked my ability to think clearly. That’s why I waited to respond to this question. 

I think we make a difference. It’s hard, though, to quantify the work that we do. William Bruce Cameron once said, “Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.”

I think this is true with any organization that works with people. We can give you numbers of involvement, but that doesn’t equate to difference made, that’s just the people involved. We may not know the impact we have had until way into the future, or maybe not even until the other side of resurrection. 

So the most honest answer is, I think so and I hope so.

Is there any proof that you are helping the community?

As I mentioned above, it’s difficult to quantify the work we do in a meaningful way. Here are some numbers and a couple of pieces of anecdotal evidence… 

During the 2019-2020 school year, we had over different 300 students involved in our weekly programs. Over 150 on a weekly basis. We had 2 dozen active volunteers. We took nearly 200 people on trips from Spring Break to Spring Break. Those are only the numbers we can track. We also substitute teach, coach sports, work with various committees and support and encourage many youth workers. The reach of our work is farther than we really understand. 

Twice in the last 6 years I have met with students that were on the verge of suicide and we were able to assist them in finding the help they needed. One is now a graduate of Purdue and doing incredible work. The other is a member of the US Airforce and serving our country. 

There are many other stories, but I limited my word count. 

To answer both questions succinctly… I hope and believe. Maybe? 

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The Questions You Asked Series… Q3.

This question is part of a series, The Questions You Ask. I mean the responses to be short. If there is something you would like me to go more in depth on, please let me know. 

In a messed up world (ie. poverty, etc.), how can we be leaders in a broken society?

There is a question, and a George Bernard Shaw quote that hangs over my desk…

What are the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of Lawrence County?

“Some men see things as they are and say, ‘Why?’ I dream of things that never were and say, ‘Why not?’” 

I believe this is where we begin, at least as leaders. Some will think it’s a waste of time or we aren’t solving the problems. We live in a complex world, if we react to the circumstances we end up throwing bandaids on issues and hoping, ultimately, they will heal themselves. 

Leaders will pause and look for the foundation or core of the problem. What is the greatest need? To use your example. Poverty is rampant in city “A”. The reactive response may be to create a shelter or meal center, both admirable works, but do they heal the problem that led to an epidemic of poverty? Is the real issue lack of jobs? Is it a sense of hopelessness? Is there a drug or alcohol problem that contributed to a higher level of poverty? Is poverty the issue or a symptom? 

To lead well, we have to dig down and find the source of the hurt, and from that place we begin the healing process. 

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Change…

Photo by Ross Findon on Unsplash

My alarm sounded and I climbed out of the top bunk I had slept in since I was seven. It wasn’t a typical day but I did all the typical things that formed the routine I kind of had. I showered and got dressed and then waited for Mom and Dad to say it was time to go.

The moment came, and as I walked out the back door of our farm house I told myself I wouldn’t look back. As I walked I looked straight ahead and when I climbed into the front seat of the van I closed my eyes until the house was behind me. I wouldn’t look back. My whole world was changing and I was  terrified but certain I was going to embrace the future.

In my immature eighteen year old brain I had just spent my last night in my parents house. I was heading to college and it was the end of an era in my life. I would never come home again.

I was gone for a month before I was home for a weekend and in the same bed I had slept in for years. I spent a lot of nights in that same bed for several more years as I faced a lot of change.

When I was younger I didn’t like change. That day leaving for college wasn’t thrilling. I still don’t go looking for change but I accept it when it arrives and sometimes I do seek it out.

I’m not alone either. Our culture is full of sayings, “The good old days…, I remember when…, I wish it could be like it used to be.” They are all notions built on our feeling that change is the enemy.

I wonder what it is that makes change so hard… Is it the fear of the future? We don’t know what is coming or if we will be able to handle whatever it is. We can. We have a whole life time behind us that says we can endure what is coming. We never knew what was ahead of us but we still made it. You didn’t know you would struggle in school. You didn’t know you would have an addiction that would steal a piece of your life, but you’re still here. Someone could have told you, “You’re going to be an amazing mom,” and you laughed at them — but now you are loved by your children. We didn’t know, and yet we made the future our present.

I think the pain of change is more about what we are losing. Where the future is unwritten, the past and present we know and we are comfortable with them. I know how to respond to what has already happened to me. If you start changing things, I’m going to lose things — stability, comfort, an excuse. If things change then I may hurt or someone I know may hurt.

We are a people that avoid pain at all cost, but we shouldn’t. Pain reminds us there is life and it is worth living and worth fighting for.

Here is some advice for the seasons or moments of change…

Don’t go it alone. We were not meant to be lone wolves; we are communal creatures and humanity would be better served if we lived that way. Speak out your fears and the things you will mourn in the midst of the disruption. Share each others burdens.

Don’t let anger rule the day. Change is going to happen. As the old saying goes, you never enter the same river twice. Anger is wasted energy in the world of change, because anger rarely makes things better, it clouds our perceptions and feeds our fears.

Do look for reasons to be excited. The fact that tomorrow will be different from today should stir our sense of adventure. Tomorrow is a chance to make something new, or build on a stronger foundation.

Do invite someone to share in your delight. As Paulo Coelho wrote, “Happiness is something that multiplies when it is divided.”

We only pass through this life once and change is part of the process.

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What makes a “house” a “home”?

Photo by Tomasz Filipek on Unsplash

I’ve lived in three houses in my life. From birth to late age five we lived on “H” street in town. Then we moved to the farm out on Highway 58. Finally, at age 26 I bought and moved into my small house back in town on 17th street. With the exception of a couple of years in college before I became a commuter my entire life has been lived with those locations as home base.

It’s an interesting question, what makes a house a home? I have thought of each place as home for differing reasons. When I reflect on them they are all still home in a way. I’m not sure home is so much about a location as much as  where I allow my heart to settle and the people with which I share the place.

In 2008 I was invited to take part in a conference in South Africa. There were some moments leading up to the trip that still leave me shaking my head. I spent a month misreading my itinerary and  missed my original flight. When I got home after realizing I had the wrong departure date I discovered my house had been robbed.  The next morning on my way to catch my new flight we stopped by the bank for me to grab some money and I left my debit card in the ATM and didn’t realize it until I was sitting at Dulles airport in Washington DC waiting for my connecting flight directly to Johannesburg. It was an exciting way to start a journey. I did eventually make it to the conference with no more major issues. South Africa is a beautiful country, unbelievable scenery, warm welcoming people, and cool wildlife. A favorite afternoon activity was to go walk the trails around the campground where we were staying. We were walking along a trail and one of my friends asked, “Isn’t it hard to believe that we are on the opposite side of the world? I still can’t get over it.” I said, “You know, I hadn’t even thought about it. It kind of feels a bit like home to me.” I grew up in Southern Indiana. The Hoosier State and South Africa are nothing a like. “I just kind of feel like this is where I am supposed to be right now.”

A soon as I made that statement I stopped in the middle of the trail, “Do you think maybe it’s because of how we believe that we can feel so at home so far from home?”

C.S. Lewis once wrote, “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.” If I am made for another world then anywhere I set foot in this one can become my dwelling because I know it is only a temporary place. My truest home is in the midst of God. Where I find myself now is a gift that I get to enjoy. That means whether in one of three houses, in South Africa, on a mountain, or resting on a beach I can feel at rest because it’s all a weak reflection of the place my spirit longs for and for which it was made.

In 2012 I lost a job that I loved. At that point I had spent a third of my life working for the same organization and I believed I would spend my entire life there. After the end came I was broken and that led to me being broke. I substitute taught and donated plasma and scrapped around doing what I could to literally keep the lights on. Keeping the lights on also meant that I wasn’t making mortgage payments. I limped along for several months and had lots of phone calls with the bank that held the note at the time. Each time I missed a payment my personal embarrassment grew. I was trying to launch a not-for-profit ministry at the time and for the first six months we were definitely not-for-profit. We had been meeting with students for a few months but there wasn’t money to make payroll. Between visiting a school and preparing to meet with 50 students that night I stopped by my house on 17th street to pick up a few things. There were some papers folded and taped to the front door. I pulled them off and opened them up… I held the foreclosure notice. I was going to lose my house. I didn’t have time to think about it at that moment. There was ministry that had to be done. I pulled myself together I stood in front of a bunch of teenagers that night and told them that God loved them and he saw them where they were and they mattered to Him. In the back of my mind I knew there was a legal document sitting in my car that said in essence, “come up with a bunch of money or get out.”

I walked through the side door of my little house, and sat down in my chair and starred at a painting I have hanging above the mantel. In the silence I realized how numb I was. I didn’t know what to feel so I didn’t feel anything. I looked at the image and said, “God I don’t want to lose my home. I don’t want to lose this place.” I probably repeated it a few times then I was still. In the silence a statement crossed my mind, “Nick, this is a house not your home. I will take care of you.” I had no real reason to believe those words, other than they came from the center of all I believed and still believe. Two days later I walked into a board meeting and told my board of directors my situation and I told them about the conversation I had had sitting in my chair.  I told them I was at peace, I didn’t want to lose my house but I was okay no matter what would come. A few days later all the payroll issues were resolved and a couple of significant donations came in, and I was given several months back pay. When the dust settled I had enough money in hand to catch-up the mortgage and pay the legal fees to stop the foreclosure and I still live in my little dumpy house.

What makes a “house” a ”home”? I don’t really know, but I believe it has more to do with the people that live there than it does with a material dwelling. Home is the memories. Home is the people you share it with. Home can be anywhere you set your feet, because this is just a house. My heart still longs for something it can’t experience this side of Resurrection.

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The Hen Cackles at Midnight

Rose the Hen was painted by @MetaByte_ (Instagram) He does some amazing work.

Oddly enough, a television show about war gave me a sense that everything was right in the world. Some of my fondest childhood memories were hearing the M*A*S*H theme song playing. By the time I was old enough to watch  M*A*S*H it was in reruns that came on after Carson. I don’t think I actually saw an episode until I was into middle school but that wasn’t the point when I was a young boy. If I was hearing the theme song play it meant that I had gotten to stay up late with dad. Most of the time I was asleep before the final note played, but I still tried. I was going to cherish every second I had to stay up late. The warmth of my memories of the show meant that I did eventually start watching M*A*S*H. The show fed into my nostalgic personality and love of history. By the time I was a sophomore in high school I had seen every episode at least once and most of them multiple times. As an adult, once a year, I rewatch every episode of the TV series. Like everyone I have my favorite characters, Sidney Freedman, Father Mulcahy and my preferred era (Potter, Hunnicutt, and Winchester seasons).

One of my favorite episodes is found in season six – The Light that Failed. We find the 4077, low on supplies and morale, in the midst of a bitter winter. When the supply truck arrives it’s filled with summer gear and a small package addressed to B.J. Hunnicutt. B.J. rips open the parcel to discover he had been sent a mystery novel – The Rooster Crowed at Midnight. Over the course of the episode the book if torn apart and pages passed around so the entire camp has the chance to solve the mystery together. The problem arrises when Captain Hunnicutt finds the last page and, subsequently, the reveal of the murderer are missing. Eventually they called the, 97 year old, author Abigail Porterfield.

Though they never discovered who the villain was a noticeable change had swept through the camp. Doctors, nurses, and support staff came to life and were talking about the book. A book at the right time in the right place restored the waining spirits of a small displaced community.

A few months ago, my town had its own, “The Rooster Crowed at Midnight” moment. Except for us it wasn’t a book or a rooster. For us it was the painting of a hen named Rose.

Once upon a time ago my town was a center for the art of stone carving. We had carvers that did brilliant and beautiful things with limestone. Our stone works were famous the world over. Limestone is what put us on the map. During the years between the limestone boom and the modern era our heart for art was mostly forgotten. We still talked about it and acknowledged it, but it stirred neither passion nor excitement in the community. We had grown too familiar and too distant. Then the hen appeared. It wasn’t unexpected, the piece had been commissioned. The artist did his work in the middle of the day with onlookers watching him give life to a blank concrete block wall. When all was said and done, looking back at passers-by was a hen speaking love.

Much like the book in M*A*S*H, our hen lifted the spirits of all who saw it. It got us talking about the future again and who we could become as a community. For a moment it reminded us that we have talent and joy and life floating around in our small burg. It gave us a moment of hope that we might continue to come out of the stagnation we have lived in for more than a generation. It’s only a chicken, but it’s also a beacon of hope. We can be a source of greatness again.

I believe in my town. 

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My Town

Thornton Wilder placed the final act of Our Town in a graveyard. The play was a progression through the life of a small fictional town in New Hampshire. Rather than ending in a cemetery My Town begins near the burial grounds. If you come into My Town from the South, you will pass a field with gravestones dating back to the early 1800s. Some are weather worn to the point the names are illegible. Others are cracked and moss covered. There are many that are works of art. At different points in life I have enjoyed walking the roads that wind among the graves. As an introvert it’s a place I can walk and think and no one is going to talk to me. If someone does start talking to me there are more immediate questions, besides what I am thinking about, that need answered.

Troubling to me… This graveyard has come to be symbolic of My Town, at least in the minds of the citizenry. If you ask the average person about My Town they will tell you, “We are dying.” Ask any given teenager, “I can’t wait to get out of here.” Ask the elderly, “It’s not what it used to be.” My Town has its problems — maybe more than its fair share. It hurts my heart, that people only see the dark spots, they only see the problems. My twentieth class reunion is this year, and I found myself in a discussion with former classmates. Instead of planning or talking about how we might celebrate growth, they spent large swathes of discussion taking shots at My Town. Their focuses were the cliques, and rivalries from nearly a generation ago. In their eyes My Town is a waste of space at the epicenter of all that is wrong with the world. I left the discussion discouraged and disillusioned. Is this all My Town can hope for? Are we merely waiting for a sinkhole to open up and swallow us?

My county has a lot to be proud of, three astronauts, record setting athletes, historic ties to the Red Cross, numerous students that attended the finest Ivy League schools, veterans of every war since the Civil War, and in many ways we built America. Our limestone is found in beautiful buildings across the country. On the North end of my county you can see the quarry that produced the building blocks of the Empire State Building.

We are not a simple backwoods people forgotten as time has progressed. We have a future. We are more than what has been and we are greater than our problems. No person wants to be defined by their failings. When you show up late – once – you don’t want to be know as the person that is never on time. No one wakes up in the morning and thinks, “I hope people remember me for the mistakes I have made.” If that person exists we assume they are struggling with depression, or some neuroses that affects their mental and emotional stability. Still in My Town, the people live in a perpetual state of despair. Most are convinced that we are nothing more than, addiction, pregnancy, and racism — forsaken by God.

As long as we only see our brokenness we will remain broken, trapped in a cycle of destructiveness.

Ronald Heifetz, Senior Lecturer in Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School, said, “You don’t change by looking in the mirror; you change by encountering differences.”(1) If we keep responding to My Town in the same way we will continue to get the same results. It is imperative that we look for the bright spots; the people, moments, and accomplishments that need to be celebrated. Yes, there is a lot of construction that is inconvenient, but what does it mean for our future? A better infrastructure? A city that is more pleasant to look at and walk through? A community that is a little safer? It could be any number of reasons, we only need to pick one and celebrate that for the slightly brighter future it brings. The best things in life take time. They don’t happen over night they keep getting better when we celebrate the victories and avoid getting bogged down in the fits and starts of life.

Will seeing My Town in a new way and a better way be scary? Of course. We are people with a negativity bias, we will have to work hard to see the better tomorrow. We will have to wrestle with our fears and confront our demons, but it will be worth it. My Town will be better for it.

“To be sure, fear of differences can keep us resolutely committed to the status quo, to rejecting what seems foreign and to circling the wagons to keep out the intruder” (2) wrote, Tod Bolsinger. My town has endured the status quo. We have circled the wagons and shunned anything that looked like an advance because it seemed too costly or inconvenient. If we are to live on, if we are to be a community that our young people claim as their home, if we are going to rise above our frailties then we must stare our fears in the face, step over them, and look for the good that is on the horizon. We will need bravery to silence the objectors. My Town is not the sum of its problems.

My Town, somewhere along the way, lost its identity. We lost who we are and a vision for who we want to become. It is time for us to redefine and rediscover who we are as a community.

In the book Switch, Chip and Dan Heath write, “Cultivate a sense of identity and instill the growth mindset.” (3) This is one of the components in changing our current reality. If we are to see a hopeful future, My Town has to decide who it is. We have to find our places of pride and stop allowing our identity to be the things that are wrong. Our weaknesses need work but they are not who we are.

Our Town closes with a discourse from the Stage Manager,

“Most everybody’s asleep in Grover’s Corners. There are a few lights on: Shorty Hawkins, down at the depot, has just watched the Albany train go by. And at the livery stable somebody’s setting up late and talking. Yes, it’s clearing up. There are the stars doing their old, old crisscross journeys in the sky. Scholars haven’t settled the matter yet, but they seem to think there are no living beings up there. Just chalk … or fire. Only this one is straining away, straining away all the time to make something of itself. The strain’s so bad that every sixteen hours everybody lies down and gets a rest.  Hm . . . . Eleven o’clock in Grover’s Corners. You get a good rest, too. Good night.” (4)

My Town has mostly fallen asleep. Many are content to just let the train of life pass by, but there are some that strain on believing we can be better. The more of you that join us that believe and strain, the more likely our hope can become our reality.

My Town is beautiful. My Town is filled with wonderful people, though occasionally misguided. My Town has a rich history. My Town has a bright future.

1. Canoeing the Mountains, pg. 82, Tod Bolsinger

2. Canoeing the Mountains, pg. 82, Tod Bolsinger

3. Switch, pg. 259, Chip & Dan Heath

4. Our Town, pg.103, Thornton Wilder