I half expected it to be complete with fireworks and a parade, but the way it happened was simplistic enough that I was captured by the beauty of it. It was something I had been wanting and desiring with all of my heart for TOO long of a time. Now that it's here, I'm more fascinated by my path than my shock of my realization.
I don't recall there being anything extraordinary about the day. I ran some errands, became sad that there wasn't a present waiting for me at the Post Office (darn Eastbay and their dirty tricks!), and went to have a little fun at the PHIVE-O training. My time there was pretty typical. I threw zingers at the newbies and they stared at me in shock. Good times. But then came the psycho-social exercise we do to alleviate frustrations with our roles. As a peer educator, as an HIV instructor, we are not allowed to put personal opinion into anything we say or do. We are human, however, and do have said thoughts and feelings. In order to make things a bit more bearable, we do an exercise where an assortment of words are on the ground. We are instructed to pick one word and describe what it means to us.
Even only a few days after, I can't recall what my first word was. I do remember speaking about moving to a more individualized state. Maybe it was faith, maybe family, I have no idea. But that's not really what matters in this conversation. The true marker of the day was the second word. "Community." I knew I was going to speak on it the second time around. I figured that I would just say something to the effect of "I love the early church community. Go fight win." That's not what happened. We were further instructed to somehow tie-in the word we had selected back to our HIV/AIDS experience.
Down came the proverbial lightning bolt. I don't think I was fully realizing what I was saying until I was finished. When it had come to be my turn, it was like a confession came out from deep inside me. "I want to be a pastor." I announced. I didn't have a chance to be shocked, because I kept right on going. I can't decide if it was God prompting me to figure things out or if it was my habit to continue talking while I thought about things. Either way, I kept right on going. "I want to form a church focusing on community. I want the church I lead to be a place of love and warmth for every person. I don't care if a person is positive or negative, homosexual or heterosexual, black or white, they are going to be welcome in my church. Everyone deserves to feel God's love, to be consumed by it, and that's my mission. The church I work in (or create)... I want us to have AIDS outreach programs. To focus on the poor. To have dinners that the entire community attends."
Man oh man. And just like that I began my new path. It's incredibly insane and extremely exciting to be walking down a road that I had imagined would be a peaceful one. And now that I'm on it? It's like I have no regrets at all! Like I was made for this... that it just took me a long time to figure out. The ultimate epiphany was that my becoming a pastor wasn't for me. Sure, my relationship with God is going to change a lot, but I'm not going to depend on that title for a relationship with him. My becoming a pastor involves other people and their paths. God wants to use me as a tool. What an awesome feeling!
I don't recall there being anything extraordinary about the day. I ran some errands, became sad that there wasn't a present waiting for me at the Post Office (darn Eastbay and their dirty tricks!), and went to have a little fun at the PHIVE-O training. My time there was pretty typical. I threw zingers at the newbies and they stared at me in shock. Good times. But then came the psycho-social exercise we do to alleviate frustrations with our roles. As a peer educator, as an HIV instructor, we are not allowed to put personal opinion into anything we say or do. We are human, however, and do have said thoughts and feelings. In order to make things a bit more bearable, we do an exercise where an assortment of words are on the ground. We are instructed to pick one word and describe what it means to us.
Even only a few days after, I can't recall what my first word was. I do remember speaking about moving to a more individualized state. Maybe it was faith, maybe family, I have no idea. But that's not really what matters in this conversation. The true marker of the day was the second word. "Community." I knew I was going to speak on it the second time around. I figured that I would just say something to the effect of "I love the early church community. Go fight win." That's not what happened. We were further instructed to somehow tie-in the word we had selected back to our HIV/AIDS experience.
Down came the proverbial lightning bolt. I don't think I was fully realizing what I was saying until I was finished. When it had come to be my turn, it was like a confession came out from deep inside me. "I want to be a pastor." I announced. I didn't have a chance to be shocked, because I kept right on going. I can't decide if it was God prompting me to figure things out or if it was my habit to continue talking while I thought about things. Either way, I kept right on going. "I want to form a church focusing on community. I want the church I lead to be a place of love and warmth for every person. I don't care if a person is positive or negative, homosexual or heterosexual, black or white, they are going to be welcome in my church. Everyone deserves to feel God's love, to be consumed by it, and that's my mission. The church I work in (or create)... I want us to have AIDS outreach programs. To focus on the poor. To have dinners that the entire community attends."
Man oh man. And just like that I began my new path. It's incredibly insane and extremely exciting to be walking down a road that I had imagined would be a peaceful one. And now that I'm on it? It's like I have no regrets at all! Like I was made for this... that it just took me a long time to figure out. The ultimate epiphany was that my becoming a pastor wasn't for me. Sure, my relationship with God is going to change a lot, but I'm not going to depend on that title for a relationship with him. My becoming a pastor involves other people and their paths. God wants to use me as a tool. What an awesome feeling!
posted by Whit at 2:18 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home