{"id":18413,"date":"2018-06-22T22:19:35","date_gmt":"2018-06-23T05:19:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=18413"},"modified":"2018-06-22T22:19:35","modified_gmt":"2018-06-23T05:19:35","slug":"stopping-by-woods-on-a-snowy-evening","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/stopping-by-woods-on-a-snowy-evening\/","title":{"rendered":"Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was sitting glumly in office of my spiritual director.\u00a0 It was in the week before Holy Week, and I was feeling stressed.\u00a0 As I looked ahead to all the special services and extra activities that lay ahead, I had the sense that everything was just happening to<\/em>me, and that I had very little say in the matter.\u00a0 I am a Presbyterian minister, so week by week, I am called to \u201cstand and deliver\u201d, which I seek to do faithfully.\u00a0 But still, it felt like a lot of external effort and very little internal life.<\/p>\n

To borrow from Robert Frost, my feeling was that \u201cThe woods are beautiful, dark and deep, but I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go before I sleep.\u201d<\/a>[1] And so I was gearing up to press on through another high and holy time in the church.<\/p>\n

As I described my feeling about all of this, my director listened and started asking some diagnostic questions.\u00a0 He wanted to get a sense not only for everything that I had to do, or even how I was feeling, but mostly, for where or how I sensed God to be with me in the midst of it all.<\/p>\n

I admit that I wanted him to just side with me, and say, \u201cyea, they\u2019re working you too hard.\u201d\u00a0 Or maybe, \u201cby this time next year, you should be off to greener pastures.\u201d\u00a0 But instead, he zeroed in on my own sense of being wiped out from relying on my own resources, inventiveness, and effort.\u00a0 He wanted to know how I could find God again, in the midst of my busy ministry life.\u00a0Not off somewhere else, but right in the middle of it all.<\/p>\n

I shared about how I wished I was reading scripture more regularly, not in order to preach or present on it, but just for my own sake.\u00a0 And then, I shared about how relating to other cultures and languages was always enlivening to me and gave me energy.\u00a0 And there, in a rather ordinary room, on the Wednesday before Holy Week, God showed up again.<\/p>\n

It was the still small voice of which we read.\u00a0 The way of the camel that nuzzles a nose under the tent, and soon enough is fully inside.\u00a0 It was in reflecting with a patient friend, that I heard myself describing the kind of spiritual life that I really wanted, and then, to hear God\u2019s invitation to me again.<\/p>\n

In a way, The Deep Change Field Guide<\/em>by Robert E. Quinn is speaking into the same situation that I faced.\u00a0 This book, which is a companion to Quinn\u2019s earlier work Deep Change: Discovering the Leader Within<\/em>, is meant to be a practical way to engage these big questions of our lives.<\/p>\n

Quinn describes the dilemma faced by leaders and workers and most people in modern society.\u00a0 It is that, where we seek deep meaning and joy in our work and our lives, and we want to be effective and successful in what we do, we are often caught in paralyzing patterns, fears, and ruts.\u00a0 Our efforts to change ourselves often lead nowhere and leave us feeling more stuck than before we started.\u00a0 In the Christian sense, this is analogous to a \u201cworks righteousness\u201d approach to life.\u00a0 The fact of the matter is, that we just can\u2019t do it on our own.<\/p>\n

That is where the Field Guide\u00a0<\/em>comes in.\u00a0 It offers a set of easy to use and helpful guided reflections and worksheets.\u00a0 It does what a good spiritual director or counselor, manager or friend might do.\u00a0It asks you questions about yourself, your purpose, and your goals.\u00a0 It uncovers the problems that you face and your hopes, dreams and wishes for a future that is different from the past.\u00a0 Sometimes just writing it down, or saying it out loud is the intentional step that you need.<\/p>\n

I am certain that this is a book that has helped many people take that important step, to clearly and reflectively write out some of what is usually stuck inside.\u00a0 For me, it isn\u2019t the resource that I would choose or go to, but I can see how these books have become best sellers.\u00a0 The need is great because it is part of our modern human experience.<\/p>\n

After my conversation with my spiritual director, I set up a personalized reading plan for the 50 days after Easter, leading up to Pentecost. \u00a0It included hearing the scripture in different languages and with different Bible translations. \u00a0It was a great practice and led to reconnection with God in that time.\u00a0 But still, after a while, as tends to happen, it reverted to just relying on my hard work and dedication once again.\u00a0 And in that moment, I didn\u2019t go to a best-selling business guru for advice.\u00a0 I returned to a trusted friend, to talk and listen together about where God was in this new season.\u00a0 And to try and listen for the invitation to let God begin the deep work once again.<\/p>\n

<\/a>[1]Frost, Robert, \u201cStopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.\u201d In The Poetry of Robert Frost<\/u>, ed. Edward Connery Lathem, 224. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1969.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was sitting glumly in office of my spiritual director.\u00a0 It was in the week before Holy Week, and I was feeling stressed.\u00a0 As I looked ahead to all the special services and extra activities that lay ahead, I had the sense that everything was just happening tome, and that I had very little say […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":103,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1312],"class_list":["post-18413","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-robert-e-quinn","cohort-lgp8"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/103"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18413"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18413\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18414,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18413\/revisions\/18414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}