All that I need to remember…

…and too often forget.

I’ve been thinking long and hard since my last entry–a behavior which should surprise none of you who have the slightest hint of how I operate from day to day.  And I’ve made my desicion–I’m moving home to Wisconsin at the end of this semester, just a couple short months from now.

I struck me immediately last week, as I read my last entry, that there are some missing pieces in my last entry that it’s important that I don’t forget.

First, life is temporary, and so are all of the problems that accompany it.  One way or another, when next August rolls around, I will still be alive (God willing), and I will be going about my life, just as I am now.  Though my location might change, the things that are most true about me and my committments to the way I live my life are fundamentally the same.  In this way, really, all I’m talking about changing is location and attitude.  I will still work in the ministry of the church for the rest of my life.  I will still love teaching more than anything.  Getting people to think about life and the way things are and why they think as they do is still the thing that makes most passionate.  I will still love my family and friends.  I will still love Britt.  These things will all be true, regardless of where I am at next fall.

Second, the people who know me and know what I am about will not see this as any great switch from what they already know.  The people who love me will continue to do so.  The people who do not love me or would change their mind based on this are not people with whom I need to be concerned.  In other words, if this change would make anyone feel differently about me, I say let them change their mind.  I don’t really care.  The people who know and love me understand this and agree with my decision about this matter.

Third, the God I have believed and trusted set this entire thing up.  I needed to come to this place, to make this decision.  While I held the matter in my thoughts for a long time, this decision is the one that is best for me, and it has been all along. It is the decision I’ve wanted to make since I got on the ground in January. It was the thought in my head last October.  It was the desire of my heart since I got in the car to come to Colorado.  Does that mean that I’m a person rooted in an area?  I suppose it does.  Is that a surprise to anyone?  It shouldn’t be.  As much as I love to travel, home has always been Wisconsin.

Fourth, for the second time in my life, I’ve gone through the change of losing all my single friends to marriage.  While I did it once in Wisconsin and got accustomed to it before I moved, it caught me off guard when I moved here. Neither did I pay close enough attention to it.  I just sat alone in my room and thought about other things, ignoring the fact that my friends were going through enormous changes and were doing the best they could with them.  Once I came to that realization, everything got much simpler.

Fifth, I’m not harming anyone by making this choice.  It was arrogant and conceited to think that my becoming a pastor so soon was so important to so many.  It’s no wonder that the mantle of being “the future of the denomination” was such a burden.  It’s only a burden if you believe it’s true and there is some expectation you have about what that means.  What many have told me as I struggled with that remains true:  one way or another, I will become a part of the future of my church, whatever role I take on, even if it be as a layperson.  That future will arrive when the current leaders step aside or down from their roles and hand it to the next generation.  That future will be when the older generation of leaders becomes my generation.  For better or worse, I am a leader.  But that role doesn’t have to be what I’ve made it.  It is time for me to become what I’ve always taught others to be:  A diligent hard worker who takes their life and sees it as an opportunity to work for the Lord wherever they’ve been placed.  It so happens that my place next fall will be in Wisconsin.  So be it.

Sixth, this is just plain the best decision I could make for myself and my future.  So, even if all else fails, this is the decision I had to make for me.  That’s the way it is, and it’s important that I not forget it.  Now I just have to make it a reality, and get through these next two months.