Yesterday I hiked over this little town with a friend. This is a friend that did the Peace Corps. She is incredibly talented and intelligent -- and rooted in Maine. We agreed we could both never live in this little town. That's it. That's the whole town. There isn't even a local store to pick up milk. It's been converted to an antique shop. My hiking said she could live there if she knew there was a definite end. This is how she survived the Peace Corps. It was only 2 years. I have heard this from other Peace Corps friends. And then, she stopped and turned around to face me. "Is that what you think of Portland?"
My answer didn't satisfy her. It wasn't exactly what I had thought of my time here -- but I don't see this as forever. I don't know that there will ever be a place where I settle forever as clergy. (Do we do that?)
While I was running today and thinking about this conversation, I remembered something that Sara Miles had written. She talked about Ezekiel's story and that strange command to eat the scroll. This is how I feel sometimes. I want to eat God's words. Not only in a feast. I want to dig into text. I want to swim into it. I want to be lost in it. But, I also want to eat my own words. I want to swallow my own pride and surrender to the fact that this is (actually) in God's hands. Not mine. And so, I turn to the Book of Ezekiel.
1 comment:
that ezekiel text is exactly my favorite text. it is what i feel like sometimes when i am preparing to preach, the blessed weeks that i get...and then there are the other weeks.
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