Westminster Confessions

Midterms are over and I am in North Carolina (staying with Sarah, John, Ethan and Maggie). Ethan is recovering from his surgery and we are trying to keep him entertained (I think we are well on our way to the world record for back-to-back viewings of “Toy Story”). Since most everyone is napping, I’ll take a moment to catch you up on how things are going.

So, what have I learned the most so far this semester? For those of you who know me well, you will understand how much I have changed. For it wasn’t anything from my theology class or Old Testament Intro or even Hebrew. It was the fact that instead of studying for my midterm one night I read a book. No, not re-reading one of the books that was assigned for this semester (which I’ve also been doing all week) but, rather, a book that one of our professors read from during chapel this week. You know, the kind of reading that you do when you pick up a book and don’t put it down until you are finished. The book is A Distant Grief by F. Kefa Sempangi. Some of you may have heard of it; it is the story of a pastor and the journey of his church and family through the horrors of the reign of Idi Amin in Uganda during the ’70’s. In many ways it is challenging me to think about priorities, and why God has chosen to bless me to live in America, and how can I be a godly steward of the opportunities given to me. It is also challenging me to think about seminary life (and the life of academia and/or theological scholarship in general). I’m learning that my education here should be more than academic. We all “know” that, but we seem to be significantly challenged in practicing that! I’m not chucking studying by any means, but I am spending more time getting to know people, taking the time to help some fellow students study, and reading books that challenge my soul. I’m also looking for ways to notice the opportunities to live the gospel that lay (or is that lie?) at my feet. So if someone has a need, am I willing to share the bread that I have in my house? Am I willing to give up some of my precious scheduled time to listen, or pray, or help when THEY need it and not when it is convenient to ME? Sometimes we are so focused on preparing for the future ministry that we miss the small opportunities right in front of us.

Last Sunday Mark and I were excited to go to worship service with our instruments in hand. For the first time since leaving VA we were part of the musicians for worship in our church. What a joy to be able to play violin again during worship service. There are several teams which rotate in the schedule and we hope to join with one of the teams a couple of times each month.

The drive down to NC was a tale. Mark took me to pick up my rental car after our last class on Friday. The idea was to get out of town and south of Philadelphia well before rush hour. Unfortunately, the car was not ready, and even after a half-hour wait I was not on the road. When I finally had everything in the car, the trunk would not close. The poor manager had an internal struggle. On the one hand, in a desperate attempt to get me on the road, he wanted to give me another car. On the other hand, the only car he had on the lot was a luxury Volvo (I had a reservation for the compact economy car). So, I have a Volvo for 10 days. Now, I am not really a car person. Just give me reliable transportation. I was just glad to get on the road. But this is not a car, it is a mobile environment. There are more controls than I can identify. I can tell you how many miles I can drive before I am out of gas. I can tell you the temperature of every area inside the car (and outside). I have a better sound system than Mark and I have ever owned. And leather seats. I never did understand the leather seat thing, but I can remember the commercials of Ricardo Montalban pointing out the “rich Corinthian leather” (pronounced: “reech Coreentheean leathuh”) of some fancy car. It was a good thing, though, that I was riding in such well-appointed luxury, for I did not stop (except for gas once) during the 10 hour drive (apparently I was not the only one who had somewhere to go that day, traffic was horrible). In fact, now that I know that the passenger seat has a separately controlled “bun warmer” I can just take some leftovers and keep them warm for the return trip. The only thing that the car doesn’t have that I wish all rental cars had is an indicator on the dashboard that points to which side the gas tank is on!

Speaking of marathon trips… another thing that caught my attention during midterms was the thirty-third running of the Iditarod (the great dogsled race through Alaska). It took the winner 9 days to finish. The last person should finish today, on the fourteenth day of the race. You may be wondering why in the world I would be interested in that… don’t worry, I’m not looking to take up another sport. But I do think that I’ve finally figured out why I like following things like the Tour de France and the Iditarod and why I liked long-distance running and riding a century bicycle tour with Mark (100 miles in a day), and why we chose to climb the 46 high peaks of the Adirondacks with our daughters during our summer vacations (that run-on sentence was for Mark). It is because I like the idea of pushing physical limits and persevering through. So, while I’m pushing the limits of my gray matter, I will have to be content to enjoy other people’s pursuits of endurance. But, perhaps if I work real hard I can figure out a fall training schedule so that Mark and I can do one long bike tour in October.

Well, I suppose that’s enough rambling for now. Perhaps as the week wears on I will have a chance to write about some of the things that have been swirling in my head recently.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 21st, 2005 at 2:48 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.