Disappointed

So, this past week was a roller coaster of emotions. Emma went back to school. Elizabeth started Kindergarten down the hall from her mom. This is devastating. I am not ready for her to be at real school yet. Elizabeth's teacher is a church member and she told us Liz was a good little student and well-behaved. Madeline starts preschool tomorrow. She spent the week farmed out to friends and church members. She is a funny girl and has everyone completely fooled.

This weekend was supposed to be my third annual Fall Choir Kick-Off and music reading session. We were going to look at our Christmas music and a nice dinner was planned. However, as the week progressed it appeared that we would get the brunt of Tropical Storm Fay. So, we first decided to cancel the dinner. Then, Friday, we decided to cancel the rest. We had several events planned at the church this weekend and all of them went to the dogs. All around us, cities had buckets of rain and high winds. It barely rained here. Saturday, supposedly the "worst" day, we spent at home wondering when the storm would finally get here. It never came. Granted, if we had decided to keep things business as usual, there would have been a major storm. But for some reason, Panama City was spared. I think it is my mother's fault. We have had the quietest hurricane seasons these past three years and I attribute it to my mother's intercession. I just never get to have any fun.


Tomorrow I start my fall class at the community college. Let me tell you, it is a full class. It is interesting for me to have big classes because I never had classes this large when I was teaching in Texas. Even when I taught a semester at Tarrant County College in Arlington, my classroom only held like 24 students and none of my classes at Southwestern were ever bigger than about a dozen (with the exception of my ensemble). It is a much different dynamic having a larger class. It is harder to get to know students and easier for them to blend in.


Several months ago I mentioned reading about a book called Post-Charismatic by Randy McAlpine, an emergent blogger who used to be involved in the Vineyard. Well, I finally got ahold of a copy of the book, harder than usual since it has not been published in the United States. I have read most of it and it has been pretty good. It outlines several of the major reasons people leave the charismatic movement, and for the book's purposes, charismatic includes traditional Pentecostals, charismatics, and Third Wavers. You can look back at what I thought originally about the issues addressed in this book here. One thing I really appreciated about this book was how well McAlpine documented the history of some of the kookiest "doctrines" of charismania, especially his discussion of the Word of Faith, Shepherding, and Latter Rain movements. Some of these things filtered down to me back in the day, but in a VERY distilled manner. One of the funniest things, and also one of the scariest, was the realization that many of the things that are equated with heresy are some Latter Rain teachings that are being proffered by a church not too far from mine.


One thing that I am hugely grateful for, after reading this book, is that I missed a lot of the worst abuses of the charismatic movement by being a part of the Assemblies of God. Despite the things that drove me bonkers about Pentecostalism, at least I was involved in a movement that would stand up to ideas that were heretical and McAlpine mentions this often, citing position papers that the General Council published to combat heretical teachings or spurious thinking. It is odd that as much as I do not miss some of the nuttiness of charismania, sometimes I still miss that old feeling. One thing that has been a significant milestone for me is that, though I still do not come out to everyone I know about being a Pentecostal in recovery, I am beginning to embrace that part of my life again. This has come back to me in a wash all of a sudden. This past week our senior minister's son-in-law was in a horrible motorcycle accident, and I have rarely felt the compulsion to pray, really spiritually pray for anyone in the good ol' fashioned way, since I ventured into this new life.

I am disappointed with myself. Granted, I have really been in a legitimate crisis of faith over these last several years. I have struggled with a spiritual identity crisis and discussed the frustrations of it often on this blog. But is this an excuse to not practice the spiritual disciplines that I know I need to practice? You know: truly spiritual prayer, exercising the gifts of the Spirit, reading the Bible, and meditating on holy things. Sure, I am busy serving in vocational ministry, but I feel like it is not a very spiritual endeavour at times. We do good things, but I worry that I do these things because it is my job and not because they are the things Christians should do. And, as I continue on this path to ordained ministry, I worry that if I do not stem the tide now, there will be no opportunity later. And, since this week I began the application process to go to seminary, I want to make sure I am in the best place spiritually as possible before I start down another academic rabbit hole, another thing to fight for my time.

The likelihood that I will be where I think I need to be soon is not very likely, but at least I am more acutely aware of where I think God wants me to go/be. I want to be right here, but I also want to be me. And I guess that makes me a post-charismatic United Methodist.



That's my Kindergartner there. God love her.