I just returned from the Governor’s “home.” A motor cascade
led us and the whole time I stuck my head out of the bus window yelling,
“woooooo, woooooo!” Now I have a big bruise on my face from a wayward palm tree.
Boy did I feel important – an Indonesia concert band was
playing, “What a Friend We Have in Jesus,” as we entered, and then a dance troupe
performed for us followed by a choir, followed by a speaker, another choir,
another speaker, another speaker, another choir, and another speaker, and
finally the governor. There were only three awake at that time and I was not
one of them. Sorry the pictures aren't great, but you get the idea.
The governor spoke eloquently about the love of God and
Christ and how that is reflected in this gathering. I am always uplifted to
hear a politician speak earnestly and honestly about their faith. You usually
can tell when they are doing in – the shibboleth is not only in the words but
in the way those words are said. It was and is a moment of vulnerability and
honesty.
So on this trip I met:
An Anglican from Hong Kong
A Tazie Monk from France
Someone from New Zealand (I didn’t understand who he was
with)
An Anglican (who was first a Baptist and then a Pentecostal)
from Australia
An African Episcopal Methodist Bishop from Florida
A Lutheran from Brazil
Here is something that I have been noticing – we are a bunch
of introverts! Well, not me, but everyone else. It is like pulling teeth to get
people to open up and talk to me and I’m sure it isn’t the way I look. I
removed my plastic fangs and fake extra-long fingernail just to be sure. It
could be the big palm branch welt on my face.
I have been asking questions, lots of questions. That is how
you get to know someone and find something to talk about, by asking lots of
questions about that person. It usually makes that person feel pretty good
about themselves as well to have all that attention. What I have been finding
is that people have not been asking me lots of questions. I ask a question, get
a one word answer, and that is it. It is like talking to a room of teenagers. I
understand that a lot of it may be the language, but that excuse can only go so
far. Some of it is that many of these people already know each other, have
relationships from past events, and I can understand the reticence. Why share
when you already have friends.
I don’t have any friends
---pause---AWWWW---pause---
so for the sake of survival I need to talk to
people. But pity-party aside, we are here to break down walls between churches,
especially between Pentecostals, Evangelicals, and the more traditional
(boring) churches. Everyone will need to work, and that work will be hard for
such walls to be broken. Yet once again the sin of complacency becomes a
downfall for God’s work.
Ok, that was a little harsh so I’ll soften it up a bit. Until
we are all willing to take chances as individuals and as denominations we will
continue to spiral in our navel-gazing despair ignoring the movement of the
Holy Spirit. Was that softer?
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