"And the rains came down..."

At the writing of this entry I have completed my second day of flood relief work at the River Plantation neighbohood in Bellevue, Tennessse (suburb of Nashville), and I am worn out!  I am working through a disaster relief organization called Service International.  They have organized and directed volunteers throughout various flood damaged areas in Middle Tennessee.  River Plantation had anywhere from 6 inches to 7 feet of water in its homes.  I have been placed in work crews consisting of 80 the first day (including a Presbyterian youth group from Nebraska) and about 30 the second day.  The homes have already been "mucked out" (meaning gutted - just studs remain) with basically all the contents of the family dumped uncerimoniously just outside their door.  Our job each day is to move the piles from the yard out to the street so that bobcats (mini bulldozers) can push the trash into big piles where larger equipment places it in dump trucks to be carted off.  So for the last two days, I have basically been a garbage man.  We have moved SO MUCH trash in these two days, and yet SO MUCH MORE is still to be cleaned up here and all over Middle Tennessee.   

The fellowship and camaraderie with other volunteers has been fantastic.  We work well together and actually have a lot of fun despite the hot conditions, dirty labor, and sometimes overwhelming smells.  One thing that has been particularly hard is the emotional toll this work takes on you.  We are basically going through people's lives as we load their earthly possessions into wheel barrows.  Clothes, kitchen supplies, furniture, toys, books, diplomas, awards, family pictures, Bibles all ruined and all heading to the dump.  The sheer volume of the piles makes it easy to begin to "depersonalize" this work, but then the most random item will pull you back to the fact that real people are really hurting and have lost so very much.  One such item was a framed cross-stich prayer that I found in a "trash" pile this morning.  After finding it, several volunteers and I decided it needed to be pardoned from the pile, so we found a sunny spot and propped it up to let it dry and so other volunteers could see it.  

The prayer sums up much of what I wish I would remember to pray for myself each day.  It also is a painfully appropriate prayer for the victims of this flood.   

God grant me the serenity

to accept the things I cannot change;

courage to change the things I can;

and wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time;

Enjoying one moment at a time;

Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;

Taking, as He did, this sinful world

as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right

if I surrender to His Will;

That I may be reasonably happy in this life

and supremely happy with Him

Forever in the next.
Amen.

--Reinhold Niebuhr

-MRB

"I know the plans I have for for you..."

So what is the plan?  I have been asked that a lot.  One thing we are trying to be very intentional about is to not plan any more than we must.  We'd like to just let things unfold as they will.  Some of God's greatest gifts are received by doing this.  I need more practice at that - this summer will be a great opportunity!
But there obviously has to be some rough plan to the flow of our summer.  Most of those factors are determined by family schedules and travel plans (can't tell Continental Airlines we'd like to fly to Edinburgh "sometime in early July").   So the rough and (somewhat) flexible plan is this:

Week 1: Michael to Nashville, TN, for a week of flood relief work
Week 2: Mommy's Sabbatical:  Laura & Katherine Mae go to the beach with her mother, sister and niece.  Michael = "Mr. Mom" to the boys
Week 3:   Packing, overdue projects around the house.
Week 4-5ish:  Family trips: first with Laura's family and then with Michael's
Week 6-11ish:  Scotland!!!  Pulpit exchange with Bridge of Allan Parish Church, Bridge of Allan, Scotland
Week 12:  Recover!

So I'm hopping in the car to head to Nashville right now.  Not sure what all will unfold, but I'm quite confident it will be a mix of comforting and challenging, new and familar, but, above all, in accord with God's good and hope-filled plans.      -MRB

"He maketh me to lie down in green pastures..."

On the sixth day of creation God made humankind. Male and female were they made, in God's image. While we know God made us "fearfully and wonderfully" and proclaimed us to be good, we do have limits and we do have needs. One of those needs is the need for rest. And so God gave us a gift - in the form of a command: "observe the sabbath". The summer of 2010 will be for me and my family a unique opportunity to observe this command and receive the many gifts it will surely bring. I am grateful first to God and also to the Session, congregation, and staff of First Presbyterian Church for providing this opportunity and for covering duties in my absence. I hope to use this blog as a kind of journal to chronicle my experiences throughout this sabbatical. It will also provide you the chance to check in on me from time to time. Keep me and mine in your prayers as you and yours will be in mine. Pray that God will bless our time apart this summer that it would prepare us for the next season of ministry up ahead. Though God is "making me to lie down" this summer, which takes me away from many of you, please remember and know how pleased I am to be on the Journey with you. -MRB