it is good friday. (and i am avoiding writing my final paper for a grad school class by writing these thoughts. all spurred on by a lengthy response i wrote to a former sunday school student of mine who asked if i was still teaching at a church somewhere ..)
i used to write/talk/think a lot more about my faith. (see the TWENTY YEARS of this blog for that living proof. ha. beth moore reference for those who care.) back when i was certain of everything. back when i did beth moore bible studies every. week. (still a huge fan of hers.) back when i thought boxes could be checked and desired outcomes handed back to me for my doing it the right way.
because gosh darn it, i had earned those outcomes by doing it the right way. and by the right way, i mean things like church every sunday, tithing, reading your bible first thing in the morning. family devotions. adopting a compassion child (shout out to getawakl who is in law school and sometimes is my favorite kid. even though we have never met.) saying “gosh darn it” instead of “god damn it”. which, SHOCKINGLY, as it turns out, none of those things are the secret password to getting your prayers answered. actually… god damn it on that. (and if that line offended you, you are free to exit stage left. and probably should. it gets worse from here on out…)
because if you could EARN something for your faith, i was going to be first in line for the star stickers handed out spiritually.
for most of my life, i taught sunday school. i started teaching sunday school when i was in high school. and never stopped. i was the poster. child. of. teaching. sunday. school. it was WHO I WAS. (i mean, i am a teacher. so naturally, i loved teaching. and i loved God. so VOILA, sunday school teacher.)
and because i apparently thought God was running a rewards program, i doubled down. neighborhood bible study. (for women only. again, baptist. IYKYK.) sunday night youth group when my kids were teenagers (which may explain some things about their current spiritual leanings. i was… a lot. deeply earnest. aggressively present. probably trying to earn all of our gold stars.)
until 2020. you know, pandemic.
then in 2021 we left the baptist church. for lots of reasons. that is its own essay. not for today. and we joined an anglican church where they isn’t a sunday school for me to teach.
praise. God.
these days, i don’t spend hours each week pouring over the bible. not because those days weren’t good. they were. they fed me. they shaped me. they still hold me together. i don’t disavow any of it. i loved teaching the Word. i loved the hundreds of college students, young adults, and clearly middle-aged adults still in a class labeled young adults. (baptist people… again. IYKYK.)
it’s just that back in those days i used to approach it from a place of “i know.” and “i want you to know.”
facts. ideas. outlines. three points, sometimes all starting with same letter. all points neatly tied up with a bow. (i was very good at that, by the way. once my friend jennifer and i tried to write our own Bible study. which proved harder than we thought. so maybe i wasn’t THAT good.)
today someone slid into my DMs (which sounds far more scandalous than it was) and told me they had seen my instagram story about having a young person over to have dinner. they loved me as their sunday school teacher (whist they matriculated at FSU) but what they really remember were the meals at our house. that’s where they felt loved. where they felt listened to. those are their fondest memories.
that made me think. because somewhere along the way, without announcing it, or making a curriculum for it, or having three alliterated points, “dinner serving lea” is now my thing. not teaching about Jesus. just feeding people. (now it’s more a literal feed my sheep. not the metaphorically feeding through teaching.)
our new church is named incarnation. which really etymologically perfect. one who embodies. small. anglican. super artsy. diverse. no big programs. no sunday school for me to teach. we just just show up. and are loved so well.
before we ever visited (or even knew the name of the church), the priest’s wife invited me over for tea and shortbread with the family because they had a kid coming to leon that wanted to take theatre class. they just wanted to meet me and hear about the AMAZING theatre department at leon. (i am sure i remember them using that adjective.)
before i knew their theology. before i knew anything about the church, we just sat around the table together. drinking tea. and eating the most amazing homemade shortbread. talking about shakespeare and plays we love. i heard jon, the priest’s, british accent that makes it feel like c.s. lewis might walk in at any moment. then we played some improv games. and that is why we go to that church. because british accent. shortbread. improv games. and feeling seen/heard/loved. maybe not in that order. my motives are always coming from a mixed bag.
this church has seen us through the four hardest years of our lives. they pray. they fast. they make me tea and shortbread. they come see my plays at leon. even the one about a religious huckster.
but also, people from our previous baptist church also have loved us well these last four years. they have not stopped praying for our family. call, text, go to coffee/tea with me. we left the building but kept the people. and a lot of wonderful memories.
and nowadays…
i don’t preach (unless you count very long DM responses and posts like this).
i don’t teach (other than for a zillion hours a week at leon).
i don’t spend hours preparing anything “christian.”
i even stopped doing the children’s sermon at incarnation this year. no gold stars for me. sometimes sunday morning is church and sometimes it is just… starting a pot of soup. and reading a book. in my pajamas.
but i feed people. mostly on sundays. and mostly soup. cause it is easy and uses one pot. sometimes i make things like “change your life” chicken. add some ice cream sandwiches.
our doors are open. a. lot. usually unlocked. people just knock and walk in. i kind of love that about us.
yes, i still believe the gospel is the best news ever, is true, and changes lives. i just no longer feel the need to package it into a three-point outline (note that was three points. why am i like this?). i have more questions now than i used to. about God. about why He does what He does. about why He doesn’t do the things i really, really, really need Him to do. about His silence. about His timing. about His marketing team. about the people who claim they know Him and then do things that make me want to scream in the abyss. why i love Him and also constantly do things that make me want to scream in the abyss. why am i like this?
but i have more certainty about His love than i ever did before.
because i’m certainly not earning His love these day. no gold stars for me. i am irreverent most of the time. i’m not performing in the role of good christian. i have 0 scripture prints from hobby lobby in my home. i’m clearly not cleaning up my language. i refuse to stop watching scenes from heated rivalry over and over again. episode 5 ending scene lives rent free in my head. THEY DESERVE SUNSHINE. or is it “they deserve SON shine”? (you can take away a girl’s sunday school class but you can’t stop her from coming up with relevant lesson titles.)
and somehow… He stays. He holds me.
He must shake His head a lot at my antics. but He gives me glimpses of Himself in all the people that love me and my family so well. i see Him in every face around our table. and even in episode 5 ending scene of heated rivalry (listen more conservative friends, you were warned to leave early on. you have only yourself to blame. well, and my quirky writing style that kept you entranced.)
in the gospels, Jesus talks a lot. beautifully. powerfully. Jesus was a Teacher. He has some really great things to say (that no one in political power or even in some pulpits seem to be aware of but that is also another essay for another day). but i know there were so many unseen meals than sermons. so many long walks. quiet conversations. things that didn’t make the final editing of the book. things that mattered.
He tells so many stories. (and He is very good at coming up with them.) and asks a lot of questions (and He is also very good at coming up with those). but i imagine He listened even more than we know about. and without side eye. with just… care. compassion. and curiosity. though i suspect He already knew the answers. because… (insert drum roll here) He WAS the answer. (Jesus juke for extra points.)
i feel less religious these days. less right about everything. less certain of anything. or any outcomes. or that my prayers will ever be answered till we have faces (which is what i should be writing on this morning. great book by c.s. lewis. read it if you haven’t.)
and total side quest here… people, and i mean only a few people, ask when i am going to write a book. what would i write about? HOW I KNOW NOTHING FOR CERTAIN… it isn’t a really catchy title. or thing people want to read. we read to know things. not to not know them.
but instead of feeling religious. righteous. reverent. or relevant. i feel more like a server. a cook. a table setter. a linger after the meal and play a game gal. a dish washer.
maybe that is closer to Jesus. or at least closer to who i need to be right now. but again, I KNOW NOTHING FOR CERTAIN (maybe it is a catchier title than i realized.)
Jesus washed feet. and thank God (literally) i only wash soup bowls. and that one giant pot that needs to soak for two full days before i finally deal with it.
i know less. but maybe i love more.
i teach less. but maybe i learn more.
i read my Bible so. much. less. (don’t ask, i will lose my AWANA stars) but feel it more in my bones. as i ache for all things to be made new.
my life looks so different at 58 than sunday school teacher lea thought it would look. more gritty. gristled. grim. and yet, full of more grace than i ever would have thought i would need.
less like the perfect family christmas card picture i always wanted. but it is full.
full of strangers welcomed into our family. of foreign accents at our table. of people that don’t look like us or share our name. but are woven into our stories and etched into the soup spoons. (really, we have 18 soup spoons with names etched on them. my husband has some kind of laser etcher. it’s a whole thing.)
i know more about the people next door. my extended family. old friends. my book club gals. the dinner divas. new friends. spain. argentina. anyone who happens to land at our table on a sunday afternoon. and sometimes the random thursday night because a soccer boy from germany is in tallahassee for spring break. or two young adults coming to help another neighbor need a bed to sleep in for a week. i never mentioned the gospel to them. just gave them a bed to sleep in and some of sue’s homemade pimento cheese (which is pretty close to giving them the bread and the wine. it is in the message version of the bible. look it up.)
sunday is still the Lord’s day. all of them are His (another Jesus juke. i. am. on. a. roll.) and my most important lesson to learn on sundays might not be from the church pew that morning (though i do love jon’s british accent telling me the good news) but over the soup bowl that evening.
as we move toward easter, i’m reminded that the thing that changed everything wasn’t the sermons. it was the sacrifice. the giving. the serving. it wasn’t words. it was The Word made flesh that dwelt among us. full of grace and truth. (that is from memory folks. all those years of sunday school teaching paying off. i didn’t even have to google it. boo yah. your girl’s still got it.)
right before Jesus died and then right after He rose there are accounts of meals shared with friends. and maybe the most remarkable part, these are also meals shared with enemies. shared with one who would betray Him. he cooked for the disciple who ran away. for those who didn’t believe Him. He makes a meal for all to share. no matter what they did or are about to do. that would make a good sunday school lesson (i am sure i have taught it before) but also it makes for a good life. spent over bowls, stove tops. sinks. tables. games of rumikub.
Jesus kept feeding people. all kinds of people. and maybe that’s the whole lesson. not a better outline. a power point presentation. or a tighter theology. not getting it right. not having the gold stars.
just… a table. maybe that is the deepest magic of all (narnia reference for my last gold star attempt)
happy easter.
let’s love each other. in word and in deed.
indeed.