Happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked, or take the path that sinners tread, or sit in the seat of scoffers; but their delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law they meditate day and night. They are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither. In all that they do, they prosper. The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for the Lord watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish. --Psalm 1

Rather than apologize for my long silence--without doubt I've missed these posts more than you have--I invite you to rejoice with me in the journey of the past year:

April 3-June 6: While finishing up my master's program in biomedical ethics at UVA, I served as long-term sub for a first grade class at Clark Elementary School. I learned a lot from these kids, who may have more personality than any group of people I've ever met.


July 1-8: I led my fourth and final summer mission trip as youth director at Hinton Avenue UMC in Charlottesville. We spent a busy, fun, holy week working with METRO United Methodist Urban Ministries in the Chollas View neighborhood of San Diego. When we weren't painting METRO's Good Neighbor Center (and one another), we caught some waves at Mission Beach and Coronado Bay, went shopping in the city's historic Gaslamp Quarter, and spent a day at SeaWorld. This is the group at Seaport Village before watching the most incredible fireworks display ever!


July 22: Miraculously, the wedding went off without a hitch (pun definitely intended!). I can't possibly say more than that it was best day of our lives. Sharing it with an amazing group of family and friends was the greatest blessing of all. My grandmother made that cake, by the way!


July 24-August 1: After hanging around Charlottesville for an extra day to spend time with out-of-town guests and folks from the youth group, we left for the honeymoon in Maui. We stayed at the Renaissance Resort in Wailea but managed to explore most of the island while we were there. We drove the famous Hana Highway, visited the Maui Ocean Center, spent a day shopping and lounging in Lahaina, took a helicopter tour over West Maui and Molokai, and attended an authentic Hawaiian luau. We never managed to make the sunrise trek up Haleakala, though, so we still have a great excuse to go back! NOTE: When this picture was taken, I still had my original wedding ring. Unfortunately, it didn't last much longer.


August 12: We moved to Durham, where April's working as a nurse at the Duke Hospital while I'm enrolled as a student in the Divinity School at Duke University.


December 1: I came on board as Director of Youth Ministry at Pittsboro United Methodist Church. It's a wonderful church with a large, active youth program, and we're having a blast getting to know everyone there and growing with them in faith. Already we've participated in Pittsboro's First Sunday celebrations downtown, adopted two local families for our Christmas Shopping Extravaganza, gone caroling at an area assisted-living facility the in homes of shut-in church members, started a local restaurants' small group, taken a Visioning/Ski retreat to Wintergreen, served a Valentine's dinner for the United Methodist Men, cooked pancakes on Shrove Tuesday, held a charity golf tournament, and begun planning for our summer mission trip to Washington, DC!

In no way can these snapshots do justice to the challenges and joys of the year, but perhaps they help explain why the blog has been dormant for awhile.

Although I've been writing plenty of papers, essays, and sermons, I have very much missed the discipline of keeping this journal and the feedback so many of you have offered on my ideas, experiences, and dreams.

By way of recapturing that spirit, I'm embarking on a pilgrimage through the Psalms. Basically, what you'll see are reflections on the state of my life, the Church, and the world, framed and informed by the Hebrew prayer book. There's no logical reason why my musings should mirror the Scriptures in any recognizable way, but I suspect that art and life will, at times, unite to expand, surprise, and bless the project.

The plan is to write as often as possible, and I've even got some stories saved up for those busy or lazy days when I think there's nothing to say. I hope you'll join me for the ride!

From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew know sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. --2 Corinthians 5:16-21

Then Jesus said, "There was a man who had two sons. The younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.' So he divided his property between them. A few days later the younger son gathered all he had and traveled to a distant country, and there he squandered his property in dissolute living. When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs. He would gladly have filled himself with the pods that the pigs were eating; and no one gave him anything. But when he came to himself he said, 'How many of my father's hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands." ' So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him. Then the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.' But the father said to his slaves, 'Quickly, bring out a robe, the best one, and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!' And they began to celebrate. Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. He replied, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.' Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out and began to plead with him. But he answered his father, 'Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!' Then the father said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.' " --Luke 15:11b-32

I moved into my freshman dormitory at the University of Virginia on August 25, 2001, as confident and carefree as anyone in the world. There was no pressure--I had four years to figure out what I would do with my life. Everywhere I looked there were new people to meet and new places to see. We had the world before us. New, transforming experiences waited around every corner to surprise and challenge and bless us in that place.

Seventeen days later, on September 11, I found myself considerably less hopeful, huddled around a tiny black and white television set with twelve other first year students whose names and stories I was only beginning to learn. All of us were paralyzed with fear because of the scenes of terror that were unfolding in front of us. We were worried about what would come next and about our classmates who had friends and family in Washington and New York. Young adulthood is inherently a time of exploration and discovery of the world and of ourselves, but college orientation had not prepared us for something this earth-shattering during our first weeks away from home. If something this horrible could happen so suddenly, and our politicians and reporters and teachers couldn't explain why or how, then just who were we as a nation and as a student body? What common identity could we possibly share? How could human beings claim to be connected to one another when they did such terrible things to one another? As you might imagine, it did not take long for our illusions of wisdom and self-sufficiency to fall away. For some of us, I think it was the first time we realized that we didn't have all the answers. Our fear and uncertainty was a revelation that we did not yet possess the intellectual and spiritual resources to make sense of a fallen world.

Later in the day, after several of my classes were canceled by professors who must not have had any better words for the occasion than I did, I found my way to the Wesley Foundation, the United Methodist campus ministry at UVA. And there I found a group of students and ministers who also claimed no quick or easy answers, but were praying and singing and just sitting, together. These folks honored the fact that something frightening had happened and that we'd likely be dealing with the consequences of that for some time, but they also insisted on a greater truth: the radical gospel claim that we as Christians know the end of the story, that death and destruction will not have the day, that in Christ there is a new creation, healed and reconciled long before we can ever see it.

We learned a new song that day called "The Great Storm Is Over" that was written by Bob Francke in the early 1980s and then made somewhat famous a few years later by a local folk singer named John McCutcheon. I don't have the music with me today, and you might not want me to sing it to you even if I did, but it says:

The thunder and lightning gave voice to the night;
The little small child cried aloud in her fright
But hush, little baby, a story I will tell
Of a love that has vanquished the powers of hell

Alleluia! The great storm is over, lift up your wings and fly!

Sweetness in the air, and justice on the wind
Laughter in the house where the mourners had been
The deaf shall have music, the blind have new eyes
The standards of death taken down by surprise
Release for the captives, an end to the wars
Streams in the desert, new hope for the poor
The little small children shall dance as they sing
And play with the bears and the lions in spring

Alleluia! The great storm is over, lift up your wings and fly!


Hush, little baby, let go of your fear
The Lord loves his own, and your mother is here
The babe fell asleep as the lantern did burn
The mother sang on till her bridegroom's return

Alleluia! The great storm is over, lift up your wings and fly!

It's a song that reminds us of who we are and whose we are. You see, on days like September 11, it is tempting to believe that all hope is lost, that abundant life is just out of our reach, that God has abandoned this old, worn out creation. To think those things is perfectly natural at times like that. It's also contrary to the momentum of the whole universe. For the witness of scripture and the testimony of human experience is that love conquered hatred and life overcame death in Jesus Christ our Lord. No matter how high the climb, no matter how rocky the path, God calls us back again and again and again to the fount of grace. It may not look like the deaf have music or the blind, new eyes. We may not be able to see release for the captives or an end to the war. Streams in the desert might seem like an utter impossibility, but in truth they are a present reality in the life of faith. Alleluia! The great storm is over, lift up your wings and fly!

Later that night, we participated in a candlelight vigil on the main lawn of the university, much like those that were held in countless communities across the country. For us, it was a time of reflection and hope led by Christian and Jewish and Muslim students, who offered readings and prayers from each of their traditions. It was an important moment of unity as we anticipated months and even years of division. And it bore witness to this mysterious but ever-present new creation, which is before us and around us and within us all. The new creation which declares the great storm over even before it has begun. The new creation in which God watches constantly for our return, sets aside the work of the kingdom, prepares a feast in our honor, and rushes to meet us at the very beginning of our journey home.

This parable of the prodigal son is among the best known and most often told of Jesus's stories. It's comforting for us to know that we can never stray so far or sin so much that we are outside of God's forgiveness. The father welcomes his younger son home with open arms and outstretched love even though the boy has demanded his inheritance early only to squander it all and more on wild, faithless living. Before the prodigal son can even spit out the repentant speech he has prepared--"Father, I have sinned before heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; please, just treat me like one of your hired hands"--before he can even get the words out, his father stops him, adorning him with his best robe, a ring for his finger, sandals for his feet, and a magnificent feast for all the household to celebrate that "this son of mine who was dead is now alive again, he who was lost has been found."

It is customary, then, to frame this story as one of sin and grace, of human pride that is ultimately stripped away and God's love which is unconditional and never ends. And I think that's an appropriate way to engage the text. We read the story like this because it's how Jesus sets it up. But I want to suggest this morning that this isn't the only way for us to read the parable of the prodigal son. I think another dynamic is equally at work in the way we are to wrestle with this gospel lesson. Rather than simply being the tale of a foolish young man who cares only for himself and sees the light of truth only after exhausting his fortune and his options, I think this is also the story of an identity crisis in the life of faith. Like the college freshmen who were unable to make sense of catastrophic events beyond their control, the younger son has lost sight of who he really is. In asking to receive his inheritance early, he subverts the family order and removes himself from the reality of his father's life and death. Selling himself as a hired hand to work the fields and feed the pigs of strangers, he forgets that he is heir to a wealthy and generous landowner.

The situation gets so dire that he longs to feed himself with pods meant for the pigs. And then the scripture says "he came to himself." He remembered who he was, and he resolved to return to his father's home, to beg and hope for mercy. What he finds, of course, is a love that's deeper and more lasting than he could ever have imagined, a love that transforms him into a new creation. It's pure grace that receives him home. We're all children of that grace.

The prodigal son's identity crisis is quite significant, but greater still is the confusion of his older brother, who observes the preparations for the feast and chastises his father. He says, "Look, for all these years I've worked like a slave for you, never disobeying any of your commands, yet you've never given me even a young goat to celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours--not this brother of mine, not this blessed child of God--when this son of yours comes back after devouring your property with prostitutes, you kill the fatted calf for him." It just isn't fair.

Oh, how often we focus on the slight injustice we think we have suffered but ignore the grace that abounds in our lives. How often we forget that we are sisters and brothers with all those who have lost their way and come stumbling or falling or racing back in hopes of forgiveness. How often we miss opportunities to be the channel through which the new creation flows. And so the father's words to his oldest son is God's word to us: "You are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we have to celebrate and rejoice, because your brother was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found."

This is a special word of hope during the season of shadow and sorrow that is Lent. I hope you will heed the church's call for reflection and repentance during these weeks that precede Good Friday and Easter Sunday on the calendar. I hope you'll take seriously the struggles and the doubt that are part of the life of faith. But in doing all that, remember that as Christians we are in relationship with the One who holds the end of the story. Remember that new creation is not some distant promise that we'll never see; it's the truth that we live into, and out of, through Christ. And remember that, even when all signs point to something else, in God's time the great storm is already over. Alleluia, lift up your wings, lift up your hands, lift up your hearts and rejoice!

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.