CPE Day 1

Do you remember your first day of college?

I had flashbacks today. Today was the first day of CPE for me. I knew it was mainly going to be orientation, yet I still had a few butterflies in my stomach last night as I thought about starting something new...going into the unknown. I like change, that's part of my personality, but I do still get apprehensive about new situations.

It must have had me a little bit more edgy than I realized too. I got woken up by one of the kids about 1:30 this morning, and I had a heck of a time getting back to sleep. I rolled around for awhile, finally getting up about 2:30 and hitting the couch with the tv on. I'm not sure how long I laid there watching various late night tv, but eventually I did drift off. Finally about 5 I went back into bed and did manage to sleep until the alarm went off at 6:30.

Honestly, the getting ready part of the morning was pretty routine today, but when 7:30 rolled around, things were definitely out of the ordinary. I hopped in the car and began my road trip. This portion of the day was fairly uneventful, the only major thing that happened was that I forgot my directions to the facility and had to call home to ask what street I needed to turn on...though in hind sight I didn't really need to as there are signs directing to the location on the main drag of the town where I had to go.

I arrived a little early, but not drastically. As it turned out, everyone got there right at the same time and we pretty much all walked up the stairs to our room together. My CPE group has 4 students. Another young guy right about my age and two middle aged ladies with college aged kids.

As I mentioned earlier, today was pretty much strictly orientation. So we went over the structure of the program, talked about what a typical day will look like, filled out some forms, pretty much all that type of thing. All in all, it was fairly uneventful, with the possible exception of an ongoing joke about the shirt that I wore today. Its horizontally striped, white and red. We were getting pictures taken today for documentation purposes, and the supervisor joked that if we make it black and white, mine will look like a mugshot with me in prison garb.

The joke stuck. Somehow I don't think I'm going to live it down...but that's alright. I can handle it.

After eating lunch together, we had one more brief sit down together and then we actually got done a little early today. So I hopped back in the car and headed for home. At the moment, I'm enjoying a brief bit of peace and quiet before I go pick up the kids from day care and school.

Day number 1 is done...so far so good.

Time for a change

Well, its finally official.

This week is my final one at my old job as a trucking broker before I take my leave of absence to focus on CPE and working at the church. All in all, it was a pretty good week. One of the best weeks that I've had since the first of the year. Things went very smoothly and I was able to accomplish a lot in preparation for next week when a co-worker takes over for me.

At least, it all went pretty smoothly until about lunch time yesterday. I had one truck that was really delaying things in terms of the final pickup that I needed to worry about. I ended up fighting that truck all afternoon, staying at the office about 90 minutes longer than I expected to when I went in yesterday morning, and in the end, the truck arrived about 2 horus too late to get loaded yesterday.

Now fortunately, all was not lost as the loaders were also working this morning. But I was annoyed as it delayed my "completion" about 14 hours. But sometimes that's life. You wouldn't have known it from my mood last night though...admittedly, I was grouchy because of this whole deal.

But, fast forward to 7:45am this morning. I called my driver. He was at the shippers, checked in and just waiting to load.

I hung up the phone.

My arms went in the air. I am done.

My first official duty as lay minister...is actually unofficial, because technically I don't start until Wednesday. however, I have a short meeting this morning with another confirmation teacher to discuss how we are going to split up some teaching duties for this fall. That's actually happening in about an hour.

Also, the pastor is gone for the weekend (has been since Thursday) so I'm on call for any pastoral emergencies. Although so far nothing has happened and I haven't gotten called. So maybe that's a moot point.

But long story short...I'll quote the late Heath Ledger

And here...we....go

soupiset's posterous - Home

via soupiset.posterous.com

this video from Paul Soupiset is both brilliant and imaginative. It was my morning prayer today.

Posted via email from curatingthejourney.org

morning prayer | Jeremiah 2:13

Click here to download:

lectionary-sketching-jeremiah-213-hq-proper-1 (25 KB)

This video is from my friend Paul Soupiset...grab a cup of coffee this morning and sink in.

Posted via email from curatingthejourney.org

Lutheran Poster Child podcast, pt. 1

Preisinger Pt1Mp3 by Tim Snyder  
Download now or listen on posterous

Preisinger_pt1MP3.mp3 (13301 KB)

Ever wondered how I went from Lutheran Poster Child to Emergent's most eligible bachelor?

Yeah me neither. But here's the first half of a conversation I had with long-time friend and co-conspirator Nate Preisinger. Nate and I both grew up Lutheran and planted churches in that tradition. In this section we talk about the brokenness, beauty, pain and complexity of our shared story. Oh...and we laugh a lot.

Posted via email from curatingthejourney.org

My Adoption

I've mentioned before that I have been "adopted" by a synod congregation for the duration of the time that I am in seminary. The congregation is Ebenezer Lutheran just outside of Audubon, IA. It is a small country church, with a congregation of about 100 people.
Sunday, I traveled to Ebenezer with my family to be introduced to the congregation and to participate in leading worship. It is certainly a drive to get down there, about 135 miles and nearly 2.5 hours. Fortunately, worship didn't start until 10 so we didn't have to hit the road too early. We actually left home about 7am.

We arrived at Ebenezer a little before 9:30. Its a very pretty country church about 4 miles outside of town on a gravel road. In many ways, it reminded me of the small country church that I used to serve monthly here just outside of Milford. When we walked into the church, we were immediately greeted by Pastor Paul Sorlien. He and I went over the order of worship while my wife and kids chatted with various members of the congregation that were already there. They really made us feel like celebrities and were very encouraging for me in my call, even going as far as having the pastor and congregational president lay hands upon me and bless my journey through seminary.Following worship, we greeted the congregation, and then went down into the basement (fellowship hall) for a potluck lunch that they had prepared. I always say that no one can cook like a Lutheran lady, and they proved it. We had wonderful conversations with many different members, including sitting with a young family that has 3 kids, one of which is nearly my son's twin. They have the same name and were born within a couple months of each other. Needless to say, those two formed a fast friendship. I can easily see many adventures involving those two in the future.

The congregation was so generous, both in terms of their time and hospitality, but also financially. They have offered a tremendous amount of support for me to use for seminary, and I am really beyond words to thank them. they asked me to make a short speech before we ate lunch, and if you can believe it, I was almost beyond words. I was able to say a few words, but precious few. My normal longwindedness was certainly not on display in this speech.
So many thanks to the congregation of Ebenezer Lutheran. I am very blessed by you.

Block Party 2010

Every year Hope Lutheran Church (where I serve) throws a block party for it's neighborhood. It's a pretty beautiful mix of people that come together...

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from curatingthejourney.org

Things Are Changing

Its official. My son inherited the genes from his eyes from every possible relative except me. My wife has had glasses since she was in 2nd grade. Her sisters both have glasses. Her parents both have glasses. My side. Mom and Dad have had them as long as I can remember. My brother and sister both got them at a young age. One of my nieces actually had to get them when she was about 3. I held out. I didn't need glasses until I had been at my current job for about a year, which would have been about 3 years ago...making me about 28 when I got glasses. I have the smallest amount of nearsightedness that can be corrected by glasses. The only time I need them is when I'm staring at a computer for more than about 5 minutes at a time.

Ironically, I don't have them on now as I stare at the computer typing this...weird.

As you can see from the picture above...my little man is getting glasses. A year ago, his eyes were in the same shape mine are...what the doctor described as level 1. Glasses were optional at that point. Now he's at a level 3. No longer optional. So we checked out all the different frames, and this is what he chose. I actually liked them as well. My wife (via picture messages on the phone) wasn't sold entirely on the blue, but in the end, he's the one who has to wear them. He likes them, so we went with blue.

In my son's eye department, things are changing.

I have 2 days of work left this week and then all of next week, and then things change for me. I'm coming right up on the beginning of CPE and my interim position at the church. I'm both excited and scared of this change. Excited from the standpoint of gaining new ministry experience and developing my pastoral identity in CPE. Scared from the financial standpoint of this change. Scared to see how things may continue to change over the next 4-5 months. Scared of a lot...but not so scared that I'm not going to take that first step.

While I was on vacation, trudging up a mountain road and attempting to keep up with seasoned (and acclimated) councilors that were a dozen years younger than me (when did I get old?), I did a lot of praying and God kept bringing my mind to two different churches. One supported me a year ago and the second has "adopted" for the purpose of support for seminary. The first church was making their decision that day. When I got back to camp, I had a voice mail. I listened to it and it was the council president informing me that I had received the scholarship. The second church has invited me and my family to come down to join them for worship and a blessing ceremony this weekend.

Okay God...I hear you.

One more thing is about to change around here. The kids are about to head off for school. It starts Tuesday and both of them are going. One to 1st Grade and the second to Pre-K. How the heck did that happen already? They're growing to fast...which means I'm getting old.

This is not good.

But yet, it's so good.

I know...its a strange paradox of good/anti-good isn't it?

Crazy stuff man...crazy

hipster christianity, tradition & my people

Twice this week I've run into articles making commentary about Christianity and young people. The first was sent to me by my high school English teacher, Christa Allan (who happens to also be a fabulous fiction writer). The article  — "The Perils of 'Wanna Be Cool' Christianity" (Wall Street Journal Online, Aug. 13, 2010) — was by Brett McCracken, author of Hipster Christianity: When Christianity and Cool Collide. The second article was a blog post by the Lutheran (ELCA) Bishop Kevin Kanouse in North Texas & North Louisiana. Both identify a real sense of urgency and both sit honestly with the unresolved tension that exists at the intersection of young people, the church, tradition and culture. But both fail to capture the rather complex conversation that I find most of my people struggling with.

Brett McCracken's article captures some important dynamics of what many of us struggle with. He's dead on when he identifies the struggle to be with the "Christian establishment." I think he's also right about the struggle not about being about "coolness" but rather what is real. I suspect he's even right about many in my generation not wanting something "easy, trendy or popular."

But I question seriously his idea that the Church is merely trying to be one of the cool kids again. McCracken seems to ignore the possibility that there may be real deep theological reasons why the Church must engage culture. For McCracken "cool" and "culturally savvy" are synonymous. That's pretty unfortunate because Christianity is about following this "God with us" Jesus who was a particular person in a particular time. The whole incarnation screams an invitation to engage culture. Of course there are "thin" and "thick" ways for Christians to engage culture (to use the anthropological categories of Clifford Geertz).

As unpopular as it may be these days to defend what's been labeled the emerging church movement, I'm going to go ahead and do it because I think McCracken's analysis of it is so off. Yes, much of the movement in North America got it's spark from Evangelicals. And yes it is certainly informed by postmodern sensibilities that question everything. But I'm skeptical that McCracken has spent any real time in any of the actual faith communities that make up the movement. Having started one, participated in one of the older ones, and having researched others in the UK, I feel fairly confident in suggesting that actually these communities are actually creating exactly the kinds of alternatives to the Christian establishment that he's longing for. Similarly, I just submitted a chapter for a book (expected out in 2011) that argues that creativity is found at the intersection of the given — also called "what lasts in Christianity" or simply "tradition" — and the unpredictable, or in other words the intersection of the future and culture.

Similarly as McCracken's article, Bishop Kevin Kanouse quotes research studies and then writes in his blog post, "It is this sense of inauthenticity that is driving many people away from the community of those who claim the name of Jesus Christ." Sure, I suppose. But to be fair Bishop, it's not that simple. Much of the reason my generation is alienated by its inauthenticity is because...welll...it isn't being honest. For three years serving as a lay pastor in the Lutheran Church (ELCA) we were encouraged to do ministry with young adults and figure out that would look like. "Do something new and experiment," we were told. But then when it came to supporting our ministry we were told "You can have any color car you want as long it is black." As it turns out the Church wasn't ready to make room for communities of faith that are taking improvisation seriously.

The irony of course is that Bishop Kanouse writes this as an introduction to this week's lectionary texts. The Gospel this week, for those using the Revised Common Lectionary, is a text where Jesus debates with religious authorities about the purpose of the sabbath. Bishop Kanouse draws on the Old Testament lesson from Isaiah 58 in which Israel is returning from exile longing for the good ole days. Of course he draws on the value of sabbath for rest, for the soul. That's helpful. But such lack of boldness is par for the course from a bishop so let me be more clear. My church, like Israel is still longing for the days of old. Instead of Isaiah we should be reading Deuteronomy this coming Sunday. In Deuteronomy 5 we find a much different conversation about the sabbath: liberation from that which enslaves us. But we also find the most brilliant display of improvising tradition as a new generation (the old one doesn't get to go!) is commissioned to lead the community of faith into a new day.

This is a much bigger conversation than about being cool or about being authentic. It's about the very complex process of improvisation. It requires careful thought and study; but it also requires real risk.

Posted via email from curatingthejourney.org

hi I'm back. | reflections on CRMC 2010

This past week I was in Toronto, Canada for the 7th International Conference on Religion, Media & Culture. It was a different sort of academic conference than most. It wasn't nearly as stuffy...actually it was quite warm and hospitable. The format was relaxed and filled with long coffee breaks and casual conversations, many following up on presentations made in panel presentations.

Though I as there largely on behalf of  Luther Seminary, there was much of the conversations that connect with my own personal interests in ministry and theology. I'll just mention some brief highlights and re-cap here:

"Masculinity"at the Intersection of Religion, Media and Culture
Center for Media, Religion and Culture, University of Colorado, Boulder

Though I don't think I've ever blogged about this, I've been involved since 2007 with a movement asking some questions about male spirituality. The research presented called into question the rhetoric of Evangelicals who've wanted to combat a supposed "crisis" of masculinity. The research is pretty convincing that the projected "norms" of masculinity (especially as communicated by many Evangelical Christians) just doesn't match up with the lived experience. When broadened to Mainline Protestantism the clash is someone muted, largely because the rhetoric isn't as strong. But if there even is such a "crisis" it is a question about the connection between maleness and spirituality after the progress made by feminist spirituality/theology of the 20th century.

Godcasting, Religious Bloggers // Me, Myself and iPod
Paul Emerson Teusner (RMIT University, Melbourne) & Rachel Wagner (Ithaca College, Ithaca)

Some of my favorite panels were those that dealt with themes of religious identity and new media (blogs, social media, etc.). Paul Teusner presented twice: once on podcasting and then on religious bloggers (specifically emerging church bloggers in Australia). Paul's work on podcasting confirmed what I have suspected for a while: that religious podcasters are seeking to create a space to "talk" about religion/faith/belief in places removed from church subculture. In his research on bloggers he found an important paradox among emerging church bloggers...one he calls the “Religious Cyborg” // real life Christian community happens in embodied ways (incarnation) and yet what happens then in a space in which we do not take their bodies. The real and the virtual collide. Rachel Wagner of Ithaca College did a more explicit presentation about the fluidity of religious identity in these areas using the metaphor of the iPod/iPhone app. We create religious identity today like we go shopping for apps...except in religion there aren't frequent enough new applications, updates and episodes. It's a fascinating way of looking at how our technology effects the "religious self."

Youth (Young Adults too) and Media, Religion & Culture
Various

Piotr Bobkowski (University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill) has done some important research comparing the National Study of Youth and Religion findings to the public profiles of youth's MySpace accounts. Turns out youth were about 80% consistent between formal sociological research and MySpace. Karlijn Goossen (Ede Christian University for Applied Sciences) stumbled into some interesting questions about content v. form in studying the show "40 Days Without Sex" (Netherlands) as produced by the Evangelical Broadcasting Organization. Lynn Schofield Clark's research into the mediatization of religion and the sociology of emotions highlighted a Lutheran youth groups' digital storytelling of their religious identity.

A Take Away: An Idea
Performance Criticism, Media, Religion and Culture

This conference group was good at getting at the performative value of religion, media and culture. That is to say that they "do something" to us. There was a lot on visual media, social media and multimedia. There wasn't much on music -- which is where I'm mostly coming from. I'm interested though in appropriating performance criticism to the study of "contemporary" worship music. Performance criticism is not widely used in theological circles, though Phil Ruge-Jones and others have used this in their work with Biblical Storytelling and he's also written on this for academic audiences. The basic principal here is that form (staging, technology, instrumentation, body placement, audience interaction, tone, etc) all effect the experience of a music performance. Music is best understood not as a "text" but in its performance. Much of the conversation about worship design and music have been shallow resorting to debates about the theological substance of lyrics or mere aesthetics. To my knowledge there hasn't been much serious critical treatment of the performative function of worship music in contemporary and alternative worship. I'm thinking I might tackle this.

Posted via email from curatingthejourney.org

I'm back

As they say, all good things come to an end. Such is the case with vacation.

Out trip out to Colorado was wonderful, but as with all vacations, too short. There was a lot of driving each way. Right about 900 miles each direction, spread over the course of two days of driving.

Some highlights: There are many. Wonderful experiences with the staff and the other families. Seeing my son really break out of his shell and not be overly clingy while at camp. Making some great connections with various pastors from all over the country. The FOOD!!!

An interesting thing did happen about midway through the week. I was in the middle of a volleyball game and looked around. I saw a guy that looked strangely familiar. My first thought was that it was Gordy...aka Gordan Sandquist, a member of Cohort 1. But it couldn't be. He's from Minnesota, why would he be in Colorado? Much less at the camp where I happened to be. But after looking at him over and over for about 30 minutes, my game finished up and sure enough, it was Gordy. Turns out he's already started his internship in Colorado and he was there to see an old friend (who was at camp with his family). So I guess I can't even go to extremely remote portions of the Colorado mountains without running into someone from Luther...crazy.

Some lowlights: 14 hours of driving each direction. Finally listening to my wife while driving past the Royal Gorge in southern Colorado and going to see it, only to find out that they've made a tourist trap out of a natural landmark that would have cost us about $90 to see. Attempting to do a hike that I really had no business attempting and causing some pretty major blisters on both feet.

I could go into great detail about the week, but I think I'll refrain from that. I'll just say that it was a wonderful trip and a much needed time to reconnect with my family after another crazy year.

In other news, two weeks from now I'll be at my first session of CPE, and the next day I start my interim position at the church.

VACATION!!!

As I think about my life "at Luther," I am reminded that living life is an important part of that.

So this posting is about something totally unrelated to my education...at least...almost entirely. I would say that it is about 99.3% unrelated.

I'm on the verge of family vacation. As I look at the clock, I'm approximately 4-5 hours away from freedom for a week. No work, no class, no nothing and I'm very excited. One thing that I've discovered over the past two years, is that this journey through the DL program is exhausting and a real vacation is very welcome. Its also very needed.

For the last 3 years, we have gone to Rainbow Trail Lutheran Bible camp just outside of a little hole in the wall called Hillside, CO for family camp. The kids were 3 and 1 the first time we went and this will be our 4th time out there. Its a great trip in the Southern Colorado mountains. This time around, some friends of ours are coming along with us which will be an interesting change.

So that being said, I'll be offline for the next week, so my apologies to the faithful readers of Life at Luther, but I won't be posting anything.

But I digress...you're probably wondering where the 0.7% connection to Luther is. Well, the fact that its family camp is the start, and I usually end up giving a short devotion at a campfire which could almost be considered a sermon...almost. The other connection is that there is a musician that is there for family camp every year, and I'm setting up a time this fall when he is going to be the guest musician at my home church. Which is sorta like contextual work...way in advance.

Maybe I should drop that percentage to about 0.05%. That might be a little more accurate.

Look for me again in about a week and a half...give or take a day.

A Surprise in the Mail

They arrived today. My books for fall. It's quite the stack for two classes.


That is a lot of books for two classes. Something tells me I'm going to spend a lot of time with my nose buried in them through the semester.

I guess I'm ready for the fall. Sort of anyway. First I need to get through this month, not to mention my family vacation...then I'll be ready for classes to start.

I appriciate the Luther Bookstore for several reasons. First, they put together my books and ship them to me...obviously considering the picture of them sitting on my desk. Second, they will either invoice for the books, or charge them to your student account (they did the latter for me this time around). Third, and perhaps this is the most important one, being the bookstore, they get discounts.

My books for the semester (plus shipping) are costing me $184.94. However, without the bookstore discount, it would have been $234.94. Every penny counts these days, and that's 5,000 pennies.

Now all I need is to receive the syllbus from my professors for the two classes. Then I can compare the books I got to the lists in those forms and know that I'm good to go. I ordered off of the bookstores lists, which supposively are provided by the professors, so hopefully everything matches up and I don't have to return/redorder anything.

Hopefully.

Forgotten Blessings

A few months back I got an email from my synod office saying that they had recommended me to a synod congregation that participates in a program they call "adopt a seminarian." Now, before you have visions of me dressed up like Little Orphan Annie, let me explain what this program looks like.

Essentially, they come to think of the seminarian as one of their own. They support the seminarian with prayer and encouragement in addition to financial support. Apparently this has been going on for them off and on for a few years, but their last seminarian didn't work out so well as they had ended up dropping out of seminary.

Anyways, the congregation was looking for another seminarian to adopt and my name was on the list. The process was fairly simple. In a nutshell, they asked me to send an email to the congregational president talking a little bit about myself as well as my calling into ministry. I did so and sent it off...easy enough. The president replied back to me that they would vote on my "status" at their June council meeting. That happened while I was on campus a month and half back. I did get a message back saying that they had decided to adopt me and that they would be in touch.

Groovy.

Time passed. After awhile, I received an email with an adoption covenant from the congregation. I filled it out and sent it off. At that point, I'll be honest, I kinda forgot about the whole deal as I didn't hear anything more about it for awhile...at least until late last week.

I received notice back from the congregation inviting me to visit along with my family sometime within the next few weeks. Talk about a memory refresher. I can tell I've had other stuff on my mind the past couple months to have completely blanked out on this whole situation, but rest assured I see it as a blessing.

In addition to the invitation from the council president, I also received an email from the pastor of the congregation inviting me to participate in the worship service in some capacity. Really about all I wanted to do. Everything from reading the lesson up to preaching and helping with communion. I responded back that I would be happy to assist in the worship, but I was going to refrain from preaching.

We are going to visit the congregation on August 22nd, but that is the weekend directly following our return from vacation. We leave this Saturday and will return on Sunday the 15th. I'll be spending the following week playing catch up after being gone for a week and also in starting to train/transition some of my work stuff over to the coworker that will take over for me when I take my leave of absence in a few weeks. Because of all this, I think that week leading up to us visiting the congregation will be pretty busy and I doubt I will have time to prep a sermon.

So, there are some big things looming. Vacation next week, which I am so ready for. A visit to the congregation (which includes a 2.5 hour drive, each way...ugg) and then moving into the fall and all the changes that come along with that.

Blessings abound with the busy-ness. I just need to remember to look for it.