The Planets are aligned

I said in my past two postings that I have been meaning to talk about 1) family systems, and 2) listening and hearing. I will get to those things eventually, but overall, it's been a crazy week. I worked at a lock-in at Bethel Lutheran Church in Grove City, where my friend Chris Matson is the youth director. My sleep patterns have not recovered. The case in point, It is Friday, and alas, a bunch of folks planned to go to a place called Magic Mountain (Not the 6 Flags in California) where there is mini-golf (or as the "locals" say, putt-putt), batting cages, go-karts, etc. However, I lay myself down to read about 6:15 or so and fell asleep, so when everyone left at seven o'clock, there I wasn't! It's okay though, because tonight has been a good night nonetheless.

Listening and hearing...A few weeks ago, we read a book I talked about called Pedestrian Theology. In it, the author, Deb Grant talks about vocation and calling. It wasn't an explicit theme in her book, but I sensed an overall theme of failing to listen and hearing running throughout the book. In the opening section, she explained how when she and her brothers were out in the "foresty" area behind their house, when their mother would call them in to dinner with a bell/brake drum esque noise, they would often drone it out, for it was easier to ignore it, pretending not to hear, than to hear the sound. What a wonderful metaphor for call and how each of us somehow questions our discernment, wishing "not to hear" and finding it easier to focus on something else rather than the imminent clanging right in the midst of our presence.

Overall, I find it is challenging to listen/hear in the midst of all the noise that goes on in a place like a seminary, Lutheran or not. There are certainly voices of professors, voices of authority, voices of affirmation, voices that push you where you might not want to go, voices of questioning, voices of doubt, voices of culture, voices of the unheard, voices of the too-oft heard, and of course (with props to Reynold Nesiba), the voices in the air which command how things have been done and how things should be done.

Very interesting lists of voices could continue, but I shall move on to the overall theme of my title: The planets are most certainly aligned! For those of you who are not aware, I was a member of the Minnesota All-State Lutheran Choir (MASLC) for three years in high school. I have a number of connections across the U.S. with MASLCers, and the experience I shared with about 150 others in my three years was fabuluous.

Even though I have lost touch with many of the friends I made in MASLC, I have kept a few close contacts. And this week, for whatever reason, the planets aligned and I connected with many of them, even though I didn't realize it until this evening. Earlier in the week, I received a note from Kirsten Fryer, who remains a close friend as she enters her internship year in WI at LSTC in Chicago. We knew even when we were in MASLC that we would become clergy friends someday! Also, as a part of my first year in the group, we did a children's musical entitled "The Storytellin' Man" by Ken Medema. It chronicled the three lost parables, two of which made up last week's lectionary!

Coins and sheep, along with the prodigal son, were part of our musical, and I had the opening lines. Oddly enough, after realizing this in church, my good friend Brad Schultz, whom I hadn't really heard from in some while, left me a facebook message which said, "So here's how my dream went last night. You were doing your internship year at Trinity in Coeur d Alene. We're watching a tape of one of your sermons, in which you commented on each of the four texts in succession, and found ways to connect each one back to MASLC. And everyone else was getting annoyed, but I was laughing. Is that strange?"

Heck yes it's strange. Brad's now a church music director in Coeur D'Alene, Idaho. I stopped to laugh for about 5 minutes when I heard his message, and then I realized that he probably subconsciously connected the gospel to our time together in Maslc, and everything worked out. What a great dream!

Amazing the ways you can connect over nostalgic things! Anyhoo, My mom also ran into my friend Lesley Johnson at a teachers' meeting (MASLC '01 & '02) and called to tell me that, on top of everything else. It must just be a MASLC week! Eh?

Understanding more about myself has led to the overall theme of this week: PSYCHOLOGY! With a lot of reading about family systems, completing a genogram, and going through a full day of boundary training, I'm about ready to drive myself crazy! It seems as if there's a bunch of categories we're supposed to fit into, not fit into, and delve more deeply into our family histories about. Hmm! I think to the words of a song I'm modifying from the immortal Tim Young:

I THINK I'M BIOLOGICAL
I THINK I'M PSYCHOLOGICAL
I THINK I'M NOT REALLY WHAT I SEEM
'CAUSE I'M JUST NORMAL, MAN
AND WHY DON'T YOU JUST LIKE ME!

So long for now. More to come...Fahre ich in Die Schweiz?