Disorientation

Tonight ends this wonderful week that I have had to build community with my fellow Young Adult Volunteers (YAVs) and be inundated with information that will be useful in this year of service.

We closed with an amazingly powerful worship service. As many of you know, music is a big part of my life. I love to sing and be moved by music of all kinds. As many of you may not know, my love language is Words of Affirmation. This, combined with my love of music, makes lyrics of songs extremely important to me. Here is a collection of lyrics from tonight's service that were particularly meaningful to my spiritual experience in this service. None of these lyrics are mine, and some pieces come from other countries and cultures.

If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
If I settle on the far side of the sea,
Even there your hand will guide me.
Your right hand will hold me fast.
-Psalm 139

During the Invitation for Communion:

"Please join as we sing as they have through the ages...

Sanna sannanina, sanna, sanna, sanna!!"
-Sanna

Take, O take me as I am,
Summon out what I shall be,
Set your seal upon my heart and live in me.
-Take, O Take Me As I Am

Let the rains go,
Let the healing river flow,
Let justice roll like water.
Let the days begin,
When new life enters in,
And let your kingdom come.
-Prayers of the People

This is the moment,
This is the moment,
This is the moment, now,
This is the moment,
This is the moment,
This is the moment,
And it belongs to God

Este momento,
Este momento,
Es el momento en punto,
Este momento,
Este momento,
Este momento,
Es el momento.
-Este momento, This is the Moment

This last one has become such a central part of my spiritual and religious life and my discernment journey. We sang it at the end of the discernment event in March where I found out about my site placement in the Philippines, and it truly stuck with a group of us. After worship, a group of us took a guitar outside and sang together at the top of our lungs this wonderful song.

Will you come and follow me
If I but call your name?
Will you go where you don’t know
And never be the same?
Will you let my love be shown,
Will you let my name be known,
Will you let my life be grown
In you and you in me?

Will you leave yourself behind
If I but call your name?
Will you care for cruel and kind
And never be the same?
Will you risk the hostile stare
Should your life attract or scare?
Will you let me answer prayer
In you and you in me?

Will you let the blinded see
If I but call your name?
Will you set the prisoners free
And never be the same?
Will you kiss the leper clean,
And do such as this unseen,
And admit to what I mean
In you and you in me?

Will you love the "you" you hide
If I but call your name?
Will you quell the fear inside
And never be the same?
Will you use the faith you’ve found
To reshape the world around,
Through my sight and touch and sound
In you and you in me?

Lord, your summons echoes true
When you but call my name.
Let me turn and follow you
And never be the same.
In your company I’ll go
Where your love and footsteps show.
Thus I’ll move and live and grow
In you and you in me.
-The Summons

This last part is a collection of phrases from worship that stuck with me and will comfort me as I live this year.

Richard Williams, the director of the YAV Program, served in the Philippines and shared a story with us tonight that someone else told him as he was about to leave. "You will go there (the Philippines in my case), and your heart will be broken. But God will be there with you to fill it again."

We recognized each site and presented them with prayer cards that we have been signing all week. Then, we confirmed our commitment to this unbelievable community with the words "Go with God and with the love of this community."

I have now been commissioned five different times for the work of this year. I am feeling so humbled by the incredible sense of mutual support from each of these commissions. Each faith community is different and knows me in a different context, but I am constantly amazed by the words from two of these commissions: "Serve with energy, intelligence, imagination, and love, relying on God's mercy and rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit!"

It's time to go out with joy, peace, humility, and love.

A New Religious Experience

As many of you know, I worked as a camp counselor at Bethelwoods Camp and Conference Center in York, SC, this summer. The week of July 4th, we had a different sort of camp experience. The high school youth program of Covenant Love Church in Fayetteville, NC, brought about 150 high school students to camp Saturday-Tuesday.

They had been setting up at the end of the previous week, and I could hear their worship team practicing in Horton Lodge late into the night every night. It sounded like we had a concert or huge music festival at camp, something I've never heard in my 15 years at Bethelwoods.

I had heard that this was a different sort of church, different from my strong Presbyterian roots or anything I had ever experienced before. I was a little skeptical about what this would mean, but I was open to showing extreme Christian hospitality to a group that was using our facilities.

We would help to serve them meals and facilitate activities for the kids each afternoon. Many of the leaders were college students, like me, who cared about sharing God's love with youth, like me. They had a passion for the kids and for the ministry they were doing, like me. However, the youth and leaders were also different. This was the first time I could truly be a fly on the wall and observe a truly multicultural and multiracial church. I saw so many different tints of pigmentation that were not simply fair, pale, or tan. It was a breath of fresh air to see what the Church could be. Clearly, it was a successful ministry. How else do you convince 150 high schoolers from all different backgrounds to go to a camp three hours away for a few days to be outside and, you know, learn about Jesus and stuff like that? Crazy talk.

Monday night was the final night of worship, and a few of the staff decided to head over to at least check out this contemporary and charismatic worship service we had heard so much about. I was open to what would happen because I can find nothing but benefit from experiencing different religions or expressions of faith; however, I came to the service with a certain amount of skepticism. I was open but ready to critique and analyze anything I saw.

We lingered toward the back as the worship team played songs and the words were projected onto a screen. So far it was a typical contemporary service. The folding chairs were filled. People swayed with the music with their hands at various levels in the air, and a group of youth were at the front jumping up and down, sometimes yelling and screaming, worshipping together as if they were at a concert. Again, not my personal preference of worship method, but I was not there to judge. If I want to take myself seriously in any form of interfaith dialogue, I know I need to be open to experiencing Christian traditions that are not my own. It was with this attitude that I began to observe and then participate in the worship service.

As I read the words on the screen, I could find no fault, theological, factual, or spiritual, in them. We sang, asking the Holy Spirit to be in this space of worship. I agree with that. We sang, asking the Holy Spirit to break down our walls so that we could fully experience the Spirit's presence. We all have walls and barriers that we need to allow God to break down. We sang about God's love and our love for God. That's a pretty key foundation of my faith. So far, I was feeling pretty comfortable.

Then, the music continued in the background, and leaders of the church came into the crowd to pray with/over worshipers. A leader would talk with the person very closely before asking to pray for them, always asking consent. Another person would move chairs and other obstacles out of the way and stand ready to spot the person if/when they fell to the ground. I was amazed by what was happening. It seemed as though everyone ended up on the ground in positions that seemed unnatural to me. I was somewhat skeptical of this because I did not, and still do not, fully understand the theology behind this practice. At the same time, my heart yearned for someone to come pray over me. Even if I had never experienced prayer in this way, it was still apparent that it was powerful.

Eventually, the leaders made it back to our safe counselor corner. They knew that we had just drifted into the service and probably had never experienced worship and prayer like this before. Eventually, one of the leaders made his way to me and asked if he could pray for me. I said sure. He told me that I didn't know why I had wandered into their service but that God had called me to be here for this experience on this particular night. I should write this down that night (Monday, June 30th, 2014) and make sure to tell people what God did for and through me that night.

Well, I'm about 6 weeks late, but I think it still counts.

I still did not know exactly what this night held in store for me. He held my head and a woman had her arm on my upper chest/shoulder area. Both of them prayed over me with such conviction, and yes, sometimes they spoke in tongues. I did not fall backwards or lay down on the ground. I did feel an intense spiritual presence in this time, though. I cannot explain it, but I believed his words.

After they had a chance to get to each of the staff, the youth pastor gathered us and thanked us for coming to check out their worship even though it may be strange and/or different from our comfort zone of worship. He was not speaking some crazy talk. He had biblical passages to support his arguments, but he was not pushy. It was actually quite comforting.

Later in the service, I felt myself becoming quite emotional. It was clear that God was telling me something. I moved to a chair, sat down, and burst into tears. Sometimes God puts things on your heart that you are not ready or willing to face. God was telling me to face my fears and anxieties about my year serving in the Philippines. I cried and cried. This was the first time that I had actually allowed myself to think about the tragic possibilities of my year of service. I could be swept away in a typhoon. I could fall off a jeepney and die. I could miss a significant life event in my friends' or families' lives in a year. I could find it difficult to do my work or lose sight of God or feel absolutely and completely alone in a new culture. I could get sick from food or some virus to which my body is not accustomed. I knew that no matter what, God would (and will be) with me through any and all of these scenarios, and that I would never be alone truly. However, this was my time to acknowledge these fears that I had pushed out of my mind whenever I thought about the Philippines or anyone asked me if I was scared. After I cried it out, I remained in my seat to continue to observe the service.

I didn't know what I was going to get into as I watched the next part of the service. They started talking about Baptism in the Holy Spirit and how certain people receive this gift. They asked anyone who wanted to be prayed over to come to the front to meet with a leader. I saw two other staff members, my friends, walk to the front. I decided to go up, but I was just going to watch.

Not quite.

One of the leaders asked me if I was heading to the front. I explained I just wanted to watch. He asked me if I wanted someone to pray over me. Hesitating, I said, "Sure?" He then led me to the front and brought me to a prayer leader. She explained what was going to happen and told me to raise my hands, close my eyes, and let myself be open to the Spirit. I felt a hand on my stomach, my shoulder, and head. I knew multiple people were around me, and I heard lots of speaking in English, as well as other sounds. As I stood there, I tried to be open. I felt my arms kind of go numb, but I could not put them down. I definitely felt a presence of some sort within me. Eventually, I let out something that sounded a bit like the gibberish I speak with my friend Julie. After a while, we stopped praying like that, but I still felt an overwhelming sense of the Spirit. I continued to pray silently.

At the end of the service, they asked all to stand who had been baptized by the Holy Spirit. They also asked for people who had given their lives to Christ and wanted to be baptized. We headed over to the pool, and I lifeguarded for the baptisms of 40 people. Some were students. Some were leaders. Some were re-dedications, Some were for the first time.

Now is this fully in line with my personal theology and faith? Does it really matter? It was clear that a religious experience occurred during that worship service. Hopefully, that will lead to lives changed for the better in order to further God's will in this world. That is what matters.

I am still a skeptic, but in that night, I experienced God in a new way. Nothing can change my mind about that. I believe I will have to take this understanding and expand it on a case-by-case basis. For this instance, though, I could find no theological fault with the preachings and teachings. I did not observe anyone forced into anything or any condescending tones if people did not have the same experiences. I observed and participated in a group of people worshipping God in a way that was different from what I normally do. I now have a newfound respect for different expressions of worship to the Triune God.

12 Days and Counting

For those of you following the transient life of Angela Williams, here is an update.

As of July 31, 2014, the YAV (Young Adult Volunteer) office has received $6,395 in contributions toward my year of service!!!!

This means that I have surpassed my individual fundraising goal of $4,000 and have contributed $2,395 to our team goal of $20,000 (an additional $4,000 per volunteer going to the Philippines). That is super exciting, and I am beyond grateful for each and every one of you who has shown financial support so far. I am really behind on writing my thank you notes due to this little commitment of mine called camp. I'm sorry, the children demanded more of my attention and energy, but I promise I will get those out in the next week and a half!

For those of you who have not yet donated but would like to, please click here. Don't worry about getting it in before I leave. You can continue to support me financially throughout my YAV year.

Now for some logistics. On Monday, August 18, I will fly from Charlotte to Chicago to Newark to end up in Stony Point, New York, for a week of YAV orientation. From what I know, it will be much like the discernment event was in March, where I found out that I was going to the Philippines. We will have lots of personal and group time to process and prepare for the year of service with a wonderful support system of other YAVs from each site, YAVA (YAV alums), YAV staff members, and other representatives from the PC(USA) community. I am excited to reconnect with the people I met at the discernment event and meet all of the other YAVs who will be serving this year.

Monday, August 25, I will leave for the Philippines with my four other YAV companions who will be serving with me. Seventeen hours of flying and three hours of a layover in Tokyo later, I will be in Manila. Unfortunately, that is not our destination. We will then have to travel by air, possibly sea, and land in order to get to Dumaguete.

I have finally received some more information about the work I will be doing throughout this year. I will be working with the National Heroes Institute, a Christian school located in Kananga, Leyte. Google Maps told me it was a 5 hour trip northeast from Dumaguete to Kananga, which involves driving and two ferry trips. Needless to say, I don't think I will be living in Dumaguete as I serve this school. Kananga is across the island from Tacloban City, which was wiped away by Typhoon Yolanda. The storm also did significant damage to the school by destroying many of its classrooms. If you want to know more about NHI, watch this video, which features my supervisor, Dobert Moriles.

I do not know exactly what work I will be doing in the school, but I am still very excited! Dessa, my site coordinator with YAV, told me that I am God's answer to their prayers because of my background in religion and psychology. I would call NHI the answer to my prayers, as I know God will use this experience to guide me on my journey of vocational discernment. I am already thinking about how I can use my camp counselor experience in a school setting. I wonder what different vegetables Filipino children would come up with if I taught them the vegetable game. How can I incorporate the camp fire experience (read: songs) into a classroom? Will sleeping lions still work to get the younger ones to rest? What games and songs can the children teach me? Is this God urging me to pursue Christian Education along with the Master of Divinity in seminary?

These answers and more to be answered in a later blog post.

Now to get away from the soap opera style.

This summer, and more so this week, I have started to acknowledge my anxieties toward this adventure. Those range anywhere from fears of being washed away in another super typhoon to making sure I don't pack too many t-shirts. For most of the summer, I simply pushed those thoughts away. I didn't have time to think about them or worry about the future because the day-to-day happenings at camp took up my time, energy, and attention. However, I did have a pretty unique religious experience this summer that forced me to acknowledge and at least partially process my nerves. That experience will be coming out in a blog post a little later this week.

Until then, salaam, peace, and shalom, my friends. May God's grace follow you wherever you may go.

Update on the Philippines

As many of you know, I will be spending the next year serving as a Young Adult Volunteer (YAV) in the Philippines. This is a wonderful program through the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) that I am proud to call my own. I will be leaving for a week-long orientation in Stony Point, NY, on August 18th. On August 25th, I will leave New York for the Philippines, which includes a 3-hour layover in Tokyo (which is cool because I can technically add another country to my list!).

During my year of service, I will likely be working with child development centers in and around Dumaguete City. The structure of the year includes a month-long orientation, three-month homestay, and living on my own or with other YAVs in an apartment.

The program expects us to "live simply," which I completely buy into. In order to do this, we receive small stipends relative to our sites and costs of living. Another part of the program consists of building support before we leave. We are building up our cloud of witnesses who will support us through prayers, pledges, and gifts and who will share in this wonderful journey with us.

It costs around $24,000-$28,000 to send one volunteer abroad for a year. Thankfully YAV and PC(USA) absorb most of these costs. However, as YAVs, we are expected to raise $4,000 of support as individuals and to work toward a team goal. The team goal depends on the number of YAVs assigned to a site. I actually just recently learned that we will have 5 YAVs in the Philippines, two more than the 3 I expected. The team goal is an additional $4,000 per volunteer after the required $4,000 of individual support. The deadlines we were given were that we needed to raise $2,000 by July 15, 2014 and $4,000 by January 1, 2015.

This week I received my first fundraising update since I started at the beginning of May.

I am ecstatic to announce that I have already achieved my individual fundraising goal!!! As of Friday, June 20, 2014, I have received $4,915 in support for my YAV year!!!

This is absolutely wonderful news! I am so thankful to everyone who has already pledged their support, financial or prayerful, and to those who have yet to give their support.

Tonight, I was at worship at Bethelwoods. Our worship leader gave a message on creation and community. He told us about how the largest trees in the world, the redwood trees in California, grow so large, yet have such shallow root systems. They support themselves by intertwining their roots with the roots of the trees around them. He also addressed the belief (that I share) that God doesn't give you anything you can't handle. He added onto that by saying that God also expects others to help you.

That is exactly what has happened here. I am so incredibly grateful for everyone I know, and even some I don't, who have used their resources to support my YAV year. I feel so supported and loved right now. I know that it with God's help that I am doing this year of service and that God's will is working through so many people who feel a call to support me, this experience, and this program.

This is still just the beginning! The next goal is getting to the $20,000 team goal!

Thank you so much for your prayers, well wishes, and support. It is truly a blessing to have such a network.

I Should Be Dead

It has been almost a year since the day I should have died. It was Friday, June 21, 2013. I was on a camping trip with some of the counselors from Camp Shawnee, the camp in Eastern Kentucky that I volunteered with for the past two summers. We had driven out to the Whale's Watch overlook at Red River Gorge in Kentucky. I had been there the year before and found a great quiet place about 20 feet directly under the main overlook. I had decided to go back to that place. As I was coming out to return to the group, I heard seven of our group of eleven counselors calling to us to come back up. They were ready to leave. I had come around the rock to find three other counselors a little lower than the main overlook. The only thing separating me from them was a 30 foot rock face. I talked to one of the counselors who knew my abilities and experiences the best and asked him if he thought I could/should come across the face that way. He said it would be a lot of small fingerholds, but he thought I could do it. About 20 minutes later, I find myself about two-thirds of the way across this rock face and in the following position.

My dear friend Owen took this picture moments before my ~30 foot fall

As you can see, I am not using any equipment. I have no harness, no cables, no ropes, no nothing. It was a very dangerous situation. I was definitely foolish not to turn back to find a safer way to get back to my friends. I let my ego and desire to please others get in the way of my safety. I didn't want to keep them waiting, so I wanted to take the quickest route to reunite with the group. Clearly that did not end well for me this time.

Eventually, I exhausted my physical and mental strength holding on to that rock for dear life (literally). I had held on waiting for my friend to come closer to spot me and advise me on the next moves. Unfortunately, it took too much for me just to stand in that one "safe" spot. I did not have the energy or trust in my own abilities to make it over the protruding rock to my left.

When I fell, I hit my legs on a rock that was wedged between this rock face and the neighboring one. People who watched the fall (I'm still sorry that you had to see that Greg, Owen, and Eleasha.) say that rock acted as a spring board for my body. I fell again to a second rock below, where I hit my chin, arm, and the right side of my rib cage. From that point, my friend who was chasing me as I fell says he could not see how I landed. I remember tumbling a bit until my feet got stuck in a slanted position enough to stop my body. Once they stopped, my body completely slumped into itself. I was knocked unconscious for about 30 seconds as my friend tried to scramble safely to get to me.

As I regained consciousness, I started moaning. My lifeguarding/first aid skills went into action. I didn't move anything for fear of a head/neck/back injury. I cautiously moved my fingers and toes so I knew I was not paralyzed without disturbing my spinal cord. Eventually I was able to examine myself and stand up on my own. Nothing was broken or severely sprained or strained. I was covered in blood and dirt. My clothes had holes torn in them from the jagged rock I landed on. My red string from Tsfat was torn from my wrist during the fall.

After a 45 minute walk/hike to try to find a way to get back up the now ~50 feet to the top of the overlook and the rest of the group, we made it to the van where my wonderful friends bandaged my scrapes, tried to stop the bleeding (which was only from surface scrapes), and made a sling for my arm, which prevented me from hurting my bruised ribs.

Walking in as-is to the Emergency Room in Lexington, KY

I was immediately thankful to be alive. I coped with the pain and shock by talking and joking. Whenever I stopped that, I would feel the pain. A very long night later, I was back at camp with no concussion, broken bones, nothing worse than a bruised tailbone and ribs, and some surface scrapes.

Humor was the best coping mechanism for this situation

It was a miracle.

I did not believe in guardian angels. Now, I have to. There is absolutely no way that I made it out of that accident with relatively no injuries without some divine intervention.

That fall has definitely impacted my life since that day. In camp circles, it's a good fun fact and perhaps the best story I have so far. In school/the real world, it doesn't really come up. I thought I had dealt with the emotions of that day and given my thanks to God for saving my life enough last summer.

Until I got to staff training at Bethelwoods. I went to write in my journal the second night of staff training. The last entry was from the middle of July 2013, when I tried to journal about the experience. For whatever reason, I had not finished the story. I decided to finish writing and processing it that night.

I still thought I was good. Completely processed. Nothing left to see here.

Boy, I was wrong.

Today, we did the high ropes course for training. I've done this course plenty of times before. I'm not afraid of heights. I trust myself, my lobster claws, the ropes, my facilitators, and the trees. I felt rushed today. I was the last to go up in the trees. I did not put on the butt strap of my harness, which caused my leg loop to slip a little bit throughout the course. I was careless. I tried to start climbing up the tube net before my partner got there. I was impatient.

After lunch we processed the high ropes course. I've also done that plenty of times. However, this time it hit me like a ton of bricks. All of the real world and faith applications also fit with my experience last summer. I climbed out on that rock face alone. With no support. Yes, I had friends who cared about me around, but I had complete trust in myself to get across that rock face. I had left God, my support (harness, ropes, etc.) behind. I truly realized how much I had messed up on that risk management.

I was thinking about what would have happened had Jacquie been on site. First, she would have killed me. Just like Julie and so many of the other staff from the past three summers would have done had they seen what I was doing.

I had messed up so much. So why is it that I was spared? Why was I allowed to live? Why did God save me from impending doom? Earlier, I believed it was because he has a greater plan for my life. It was not my time to die.

This year, I have experienced way too many (and one is too many) deaths of young people, both near and far to me. Gus Deeds. Kelsey Durkin. Lara Gass. Eric Alter. Hendon Poe.

Each of these deaths has affected me on varying levels. Each of these deaths (as well as the lives these people lived) is different. It wasn't until tonight that I truly understood a greater reason why I was so deeply affected by the loss of these wonderful young people.

I should be with them. I should not still be on this earth today. But I am. I am still alive because this omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent God I love has some sort of plan. Not that Gus, Kelsey, Lara, Eric, and Hendon did not have bright futures. I just know that as a human, I cannot fathom or even try to understand God's full plan for the universe and each of us. For whatever reason, I am still here, though. The same God who created the entirety of the universe did not let me die on that mountain.

Why?

I don't know. I can't know. All I can do is be thankful. All I can do is hope that I live a life that is even partially in accordance with God's will. All I can do is count the many blessings I have experienced and will continue to experience because of God. It is because of God's amazing and wondrous grace and love that I am here today. Everything that has happened in the past year may not have happened had I not been saved that Friday last June.

Tonight for staff worship, we wrote a prayer on a piece of paper and burned them together. I was already becoming a mess before we even started writing. I was simply so overwhelmed with emotion and feeling God's love for me.

As we waited for everyone to finish, I realized that had God not saved me that day, I would not have returned to my home. I would not have met all of these fantastic staff members. I was so appreciative for the hugs, back rubs, gentle squeezes, and all signs of comfort I felt from everyone around me. We have been together for a week. Already, I feel God's love surrounding each and every one of us. I feel Christ's light shining through each of us to others. I know that whenever I am down or emotional, I have people to go to, as well as people who will know to leave me to cry alone whenever I need it. This is what makes camp beautiful.

I'm so excited to continue to discern God's will in my life for the present, the immediate future, and the distant future. Praise be to God who loves and cares for all of God's children.

#LexStrong

Originally written Wednesday, April 23, 2014.

Yesterday, Tuesday, April 22, 2014, a VMI senior took his life. This marks the third student death in Lexington this year. The first, Kelsey Durkin, a Washington and Lee undergraduate senior, lost her life in a drunk driving accident December 3, 2013. The second was Lara Gass, a third year law student at W&L who was killed in a car accident on I-81 on March 18, 2014. The most recent was Eric Alter, who was supposed to graduate, commission as a second lieutenant in the Marines, and get married to a brilliant W&L senior in the next two months. It has truly been a tragic year for students in Lexington. Each of the university communities has experienced a great and untimely loss.

Fortunately, we are all members of a strong community. Divisions and differences may exist from day to day, but we all come together in times of crisis. That is the beauty of humanity. As I reflect on each of these deaths individually and as a whole, I do not wish to say that any loss is more or less tragic than another. It is impossible to put a measure on the worth and value of any human life. Each loss brings with it certain questions and misunderstandings. At the heart of this is "Why?" Why would this happen to Eric, Lara, or Kelsey? How could God/a superior being/the universe let this happen? How could anyone deserve to experience this? At the end of the day, I don't know. I cannot know. No one can.

Death, loss, grief is so difficult to deal with, particularly in the case of young people. Definitely in the case of suicide. As a part of the grieving process, we can ask ourselves, "What if?" What if I could have done more to prevent it? We can torture ourselves with these two words.

As can be expected, I was most affected by Kelsey's death, and I still am. I took some time to mourn Lara's passing, but it did not severely affect my functioning. I simply did not have a connection to her. I was in shock and numb upon hearing of Eric's death. I had heard of suicides at VMI before, but not someone my year. Not someone my friends knew. Not someone who was engaged to a fellow senior psychology major. Not someone who seemed to have so much to live for. Each of these students had so much going for them. Each was set to graduate with me in May. Each life was cut so short.

Up to this point in my life, I feel that I have dealt with plenty of death, too much in my opinion. However, I know that it is only going to continue. Such is life...and death. It never gets any easier. It never makes any more sense. How do you continue to try to make sense of the nonsensical?

Interestingly enough, God always finds a way to make the Spirit's presence known. Sunday was Easter, and I went to two church services. My dad gave a wonderful Easter sermon on not living in fear, despite the fact that we have so much we can be afraid of. This is a sentiment that I have been fortunate enough to experience and learn from both of my parents in all of my life experiences so far. We then went to Oakland Avenue Presbyterian Church, my home church for the second service. Our interim pastor, Bill Wood, gave a different sermon that focused on 1 Corinthians 15:12-17. He emphasized that if Christ were not raised, then all preaching and faith is in vain, and we are still living in sin. The tone of his message was a bit more somber than what I expected from an Easter sermon. He mentioned two stories of pastors who had family members die unexpectedly and their reactions to those deaths. I had come to the service expecting a more optimistic sermon about the joy of Jesus's resurrection. Little did I know that the sermon would thankfully stick with me and help me to process the events of this week.

Today, I had the great fortune to visit Union Presbyterian Seminary in Richmond, VA. It was an absolutely wonderful time of learning, discernment, and getting to know the welcoming community. I was able to participate in their weekly community worship service. It was a vibrant service with a great variety of music and a powerful sermon given by a graduating student. He began with a metaphor of graves as books. We try to fill something as huge as a life into a small grave and a whole story into the pages of a book. As we read books, we become invested in the characters and eagerly turn the pages to read more of the story. However, as we near the end, we realize the inevitable end of the characters' lives when the pages end, and we place the book on a shelf somewhere. Maybe we come back to flip through the book in remembrance of those characters' adventures, but it is only a memory. Much in the way that we visit the gravestones of loved ones to remember their lives and legacies.

Mark's gospel "ends" (This is up for scholarly debate. At Union, apparently Frances says it ends at verse 8.) with Mary, Mary Magdalene, and Salome afraid after finding the tomb empty and not telling anyone of Jesus's resurrection. His explanation for Mark ending here is that he acknowledges that it is scary to deal with Jesus's resurrection. Mark does not give us that resolution for a reason (so others had to fill in the gaps to give the resolution because we can't handle not having closure). He then challenged the students, staff, and faculty to face the fear of the resurrection, to keep alive the Easter story into the Easter season that only begins with Easter Sunday. It is our job to continue to show the joy of Christ's resurrection throughout the world after the church service ends every spring. All of these messages brought together in these few days have truly given me the tools to be able to process Eric's death.

One of the most memorable sermons I have ever heard was given by Laura Smith Conrad many years ago. She challenged us to treat every person we met as though they were Jesus. See the face of Jesus in all those around you. If only we did that, how this world would be different. If we reacted to every death the way that we react to Jesus's death and resurrection, it wouldn't make it so much easier, but it may be a more positive coping mechanism. If we learned from their legacy and lessons they taught us and told the world how they changed our lives for the better. Life goes on, and we should remember them by remembering and living out the lessons they taught us, not by dwelling on what we cannot change. We have hope and joy from having faith that we will see them again.

Happy Ash Wednesday!

Ash Wednesday might be my favorite day in the liturgical calendar. It's a pretty nondescript holiday that hasn't been corrupted by commercialism...yet. It's an important part of my personal spiritual life to be disciplined for 40 (47) days that culminates in celebrating Holy Week. Every year I get questions about why I observe Lent and why it is important to me.

"I didn't know you were Catholic."
"I'm not. I'm Presbyterian."
"Oh, I thought that was just a Catholic thing."
"Nope. I've been doing Lent since elementary school at my Presbyterian church."

This year I have decided to give up complaining as a part of my Lenten fast. It will be a very difficult thing to cut out of my life, but I think it will help to make me more self-aware. We have so much to be thankful for, but we so constantly complain about what we don't have. Hopefully this will allow me to cut out some negativity out of my and shine more of my light and God's love to the world. A recent trend in Lenten practices has included taking up something new rather than giving up something. This year I am also adding a new practice to hopefully complement the lack of complaining. I want to write down three things for which I am grateful each day of Lent. Perhaps this will become a lifestyle change. We let so many of our blessings go by without recognizing them as such. Additionally, no matter how bad a day seems, we must remember that God has still blessed us with so much. It's about seeing the silver lining of beauty and joy in the sometimes dark depressing cloud that is the world.

Today two of my friends have reminded me of my Ash Wednesday last year in Jerusalem. It was a roller coaster to say the least. I really needed a Christian spiritual experience a month into studying abroad in Jerusalem. I expected to have a service at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher at 6 pm. We arrived around 4 to do some sight-seeing beforehand because it was my first time visiting the holy site. Around 5:45 we started asking around for the service. Turns out it was actually at 6 am. I was sulking on the way home (an instance of not realizing my many blessings and complaining about something insignificant) and decided to try to make my own ashes in the apartment. That turned into an ordeal involving live plant leaves, a Hanukkah candle, lots of wax, and "ashes" that lasted about five minutes on my forehead.

This year I was able to attend Lexington Presbyterian Church's Ash Wednesday service and dinner, a much more straightforward affair than last year. It was another wonderful spiritual experience that I have not had in a while. The words of the imposition of ashes speak to my soul.

From dust you came. To dust you shall return.

It reminds me of the reality of humanity. As Walt Whitman put it, What good amid these, O me, O life? Answer. That you are here—that life exists, and identity; That the powerful play goes on, and you will contribute a verse." Our lifetimes are so short relative the length of history. Throughout these 40 days, I hope that my contribution to the powerful play will be to bring some light and positivity to this world.

"Dance, then, wherever you may be. I am the Lord of the Dance," said he. "And I'll lead you all wherever you may be, and I'll lead you all in the dance," said he.