I was excited because my teaching pastor (the senior minister who is supervising me) Deb had given me the responsibility of writing and reciting a short chalice lighting for the start of the service. Deb welcomed everyone, I sounded the bell, Deb read a beautiful Rilke poem. And then I pulled from my pocket my painstakingly written . . . to-do list for the weekend. I had grabbed the wrong piece of paper from the table as I dashed out of the house that morning.
"This is it," I thought to myself. "Here you are, and there they are. Let's see what happens now."
So, rather than say to the congregation: "Fold laundry; buy salad stuff; change cover on couch . . .", I recited the chalice lighting text from memory -- which, as it turns out, was not all that difficult to do as it was very short and based upon a poem I had written just a few weeks ago.
And later I started thinking that this experience is what congregational life is really like. You work on something, you become a part of a community, you lovingly prepare something to share with others, you practice -- and then, when things go wrong (as they so often do), you improvise. And, almost always, things turn out alright.
What's most exciting to me as I have begun this two-year period of learning in an real-life congregation is the fact that it's actually happening. My seminary classmates and I have taken yet another leap into the unknown, trusting that, while the world may be dangerous, it is also a place that calls us to act in faith.
And, as much as we might prepare for something -- even agonize over it sometimes -- I have a feeling that it is this faith that, in the end, will be of most importance to us.
(And, just in case you're wondering: Yes, the laundry did get folded, the salad stuff was purchased, and the couch cover was changed . . .)
