The Priority of Family

All good things must come to an end. It's a difficult lesson in life to learn that all things - whether it's your favourite television show, your years in high school, a great cup of coffee a sermon series or a job - eventually they all run their natural life cycles and they're done. I'm acutely aware of that today as I wrap up not only my five part series on the priorities of Estevan Alliance Church and my four days of saying good bye to the Build Team (Transformers figures for those of you who haven't been following the blog) - but I'm embarking on my first day of professional ministry without Joanna.

The news it out there and it's not a secret so you may have already heard but effective April 1st Joanna is done at EAC. This is not an April fools joke, check the time of the posting - it's past noon already. Many of you are aware that over Christmas while we were in the UK Joanna was hospitalized with excruciating pain in her lower right abdomen. At first they thought it was appendicitis but an ultrasound revealed that she was carrying around a large ovarian cyst somewhere in the 12cm in diameter range. The cyst had twisted and caused pain that Jo could only describe as worse than labour. One overnight stay in the hospital and a dosage of both morphine and Demerol later things had settled down and she was able to return home. Upon returning to Canada we did some follow-up appointments, were referred to a specialist, underwent blood tests to rule out cancer (which praise the Lord was ruled out!) and the advice we received was to wait this out. Eventually the baby would get so big that the cyst would be compressed and would rupture. The rupturing would be exceedingly painful and would probably necessitate another stay in the hospital but within 48 hours Joanna would be fine and no risk was posed to the baby.

Well a couple of months later both the baby and the cyst are bigger and things haven't gotten better. It's gotten to the point where Joanna is no longer able to continue her duties at the church and needs to be at home resting a lot. She is in a lot of pain much of the time and at this point because of the pregnancy there is nothing the doctors can do without risking premature labour. So this is the end of the season of life that I have worked with my wife.

If you'll allow me a little emotional rambling before I get to the body of my post for today I just want to say what a privilege it has been to have partnered with my wife in ministry over these last six and a half years. I know that to an extent every pastor's wife is a partner in ministry with her husband - I believe that and celebrate what those women bring to their husband's ministries - but I have had a special experience. I had the opportunity to watch as my wife took a risk and stepped out into the pastorate, as she had her calling affirmed by God and the people she ministered to and as she overcame struggles and obstacles to become exactly what God called her to be. She was and is and will continue to be an example to me of how to be a person serving with humility and dedication in ministry. One of my greatest regrets is that while right now we are on the cusp of a milestone moving forward in our family of churches in which I believe that we will finally see godly and called women have their callings affirmed and validated in an official sense through ordination - my wonderful wife will not experience the blessing of that affirmation. A woman who was called and equipped by God if I ever knew one will be added to the long list of others who completed their time of vocational ministry before we were willing to accept the things that God was doing in and through them. A sad day indeed.

But as Semisonc so eloquently taught us in their hit song "Closing Time", Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end, and now is the time for new beginnings at Estevan Alliance Church. We have the chance to move forward, to re-focus, re-staff, re-tool and recommit to being the type of church that I believe God has called us to be and to that end I want to finish our five part series on the priorities of the church with the priority of family.

It will be no surprise to you that this is important to me if you've ever heard me preach before. I have a strong sense that the people of God are to see each other as a family. That means that we need to be a church that loves each other unconditionally. That means we need to be a church that supports and encourages people. That means we need to be a church that lovingly rebukes and restores people. That means we need to be a church that respects our elders (I speak of age not office here) and values their experience while at the same time allowing our young people to grow up, spread their wings and take the reins when the time is right. That means we need to be a church that enjoys spending time together and that we don’t need an agenda or a purpose to get together. That means we need to be a church that is there when the chips are down, that can be counted on in times of crisis and will celebrate with each other in times of joy. That means we need to be a church that not only tolerates – but loves and values the family members on the fringes – our strange aunt Beatrices of the faith and our crazy cousin Larrys. It means we need to be a church where blood – in this case the blood of Christ that binds us together – is thicker than water.

The book of Acts paints a picture of a church that did life together every day and in every way - it says: 

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favour of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
Acts 2:42-47

That’s what it’s like to be in the family of God. To that end I want you to know that my door is always open. I want you to be free to come to me, talk to me, pray with me and do life with me. I am here to serve God and to serve you. The demands of ministry may sometimes take me out of my office – sometimes I’ll be on visitation, or in a meeting, or away at a conference, or preparing a sermon or counselling someone and will be unavailable – but I want to promise you  that I will carve out half a day every week during which I will make no appointments, schedule no meetings and plan on attending no events so that I can be available to you. Every week on Wednesday mornings from 9:00 in the morning until around Noon I want you to know that you can drop by, have a coffee, shoot the breeze, ask for prayer, talk about scripture or just visit. My office is open, coffee will be on and every so often I might even have some snacks – this is your time and I’m here for you. I am promising to make time for you because that’s what family does.

Joanna and I want to let you know as we embark on this new beginning of life that you are our family and we’re here because we love you. We wanted to stay in Estevan because God placed in us an unexplainable passion for this congregation and this community. I can say with integrity and absolute confidence to you that with all the world open to us there is no where we would rather be than here. Thank you for calling us. Thank you for standing by us and thank you in advance for the years of amazing ministry we are going to experience together.

And now what I'm sure you've all been waiting for: More Transformers!!!!

 Keeping up with the themes of endings and new beginnings I finally finish off with the Build Team and with the entirety of my Robots in Disguise collection in doing so. Today's figure is the diminutive leader of the Build Team, the orange bulldozer Wedge.

Wedge is a bot that has something to prove. He's the smallest and the youngest member of the team (and of all the Autobots in the series). He was programmed to be a construction bot working on building space bridges but he's very eager to prove himself on the battlefield and rushes into dangerous situations without much thought for his lack of experience. To their credit the rest of his team not only tolerates his impulsiveness but seem to have a mentoring relationship with him - allowing him to lead them despite his youth. 

Wedge when combining to form Landfill always makes up the torso and head of the gestalt. He is the one figure that cannot be swapped out for another member as he is the only one with the proper features for connection and with the head for Landfill. For the combined form, Landfill is an impressive specimen; he's very colourful and armed to the teeth with the various weapons and implements of his component figures. This figure sat on display in my office for a long time and has a special place in my heart (he also matched the decor but that's another story) but as I said at the beginning, all good things...

Until tomorrow and another new beginning,

Chris