I'm Thankful. Now what?

Happy Thanksgiving! I know the story of the pilgrims and the Native Americans that is the "origination" of Thanksgiving, but I can't quite figure out how it's turned into one day a year where we eat a gigantic meal, sit around and list off the things we're thankful for and watch some football. I somehow think that the whole concept of "the first Thanksgiving" got a little warped and twisted in there.

I hear that Rev. Ben gave an awesome sermon on Sunday (which I didn't hear, since I was teaching) about what we do with our thankfulness. I can't tell you what all he said, since I wasn't there, but I'm going to venture out on a limb and say that he likely pushed people to do more than give thanks.

Giving thanks isn't enough. You can be thankful, but it's what you do with your thanks that matters. Thankfulness is an attitude, but for attitudes to mean much, there must also be an application. So what do you do or how do you act, because you're thankful. Really, there are only four things I need to list that covers them all...

1. My family. We may not always get along, but they love me, unconditionally. The love they have taught me is the love I bring to the table with others.
2. My friends. They are my rocks, my strength and my sanity. They push me to be a better person every single day. Because they keep me going, I can healthily and happily serve others.
3. My job. I love what I do. I get to work with the most awesome stylists, salon owners, receptionists and students in the world. And I couldn't ask for a better team of coworkers (who are also my friends). Every day, we get to help people feel great about the way they look while putting food on our tables. I live for the moments where I get to see a smile on the face of someone who feels just a little more confident.
4. My faith community. I seriously have the most incredible faith community surrounding me. It's not just the community within my local church, but also the extended community - other clergy, lay leaders, scholars and seminary students I've met along the way. They continue to challenge me, push me, support me and encourage me through my faith journey. Because of them, I am made a better, more thoughtful and more compassionate person every single day. The faith that they continue to feed is the faith that continues to feed my ministry and my call. 

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! Bless you and may you be a blessing. 

The Lens

This week, a couple of times I have had some really interesting conversations about removing our experiences from our faith to be able to share our faith with others. I still stand by what I've said: that you cannot remove experience from faith because our experiences are the lens through which we view our faith. Let me see if I can muddle these thoughts from my head into some sort of sense in black and white...

First of all, I should start with the fact that I don't think you can truly share your faith in a way that can be meaningful outside of relationship with another person. I won't knock on the door of a stranger and ask them to listen to me talk about this incredible God that I love. Sharing faith is meaningful when people are curious - curious about the God I follow or curious about the life I live. I'll continue to say I'm not a shove-my-God-down-your-throat kind of girl and I mean it. With all my heart.

So, when in relationship with others, if it comes up or if you ask me about it, I share my experience. It's not good enough to say I believe in the Christian God and leave it at that. In these conversations, there's an important why. And that why... It is the lens through which I view what I believe.

All the things I have experienced in my life - the joy, the peace, the heartache, the brokenness, the love - play into my experience of God. And as all of those things have happened, they have shaped the way I have come to understand who and what God is and how awesome her love and peace and divine presence is. So to remove those experiences of God from my faith, I remove the understanding of God I have formed and will continue to form.

Without those experiences, God is just a word... No meaning, no weight, no implications. But through my experiences of God, I have formed a deep, rich and meaningful faith. And I can share that with others. If I don't share with you my experience of God, I can't share anything about God, other than the word. So yes. My experience of God is the lens through which I view my faith. And if I remove that lens, I have nothing to share...