Yippee!! I finally have a new blog started for our Madison life:

http://77squaremiles.blogspot.com

One of the pitch lines for Madison is "77 Square Miles Surrounded by Reality," just so you know the origin of the title.

Hope you all are doing well--and I'll look forward to hearing from you on the new blog!

Peace and love,
Jess

Hi folks -

I haven't written on here much lately because I'm not exactly sure what to do with this. It's set up as a blog for First Pres, so I think I'll be closing it down when I get myself organized in Madison. Haven't thought of anything catchy for the next one yet, but I'm sure I'll have new adventures to write about soon (and without a job, a LOT more time to write :) This will stay up and have a link to it when it rolls around.

Also, here's my new email address: jessscholten@gmail.com

Grace and peace and much love,
Jess

The Season of… Ambiguity

One of Tom and my favorite movies is Pleasantville. There are certain things in life that come up again and again from the movie that seem to fit with how we experience the world. When we moved to High Point almost six years ago, we were lost an incredible amount of the time. Check out any Mid-western town on a map and you get some nice, square blocks—winding roads that regularly change from one name to another threw us for a loop. We would joke, “What’s at the end of Main Street? Why, of course, the beginning of Main Street!” The weather report on the news each morning that first February was one day after another of, “Sunny with a high of 72 and a low of 68.” For real? Yup. For real. Day after day of Pleasantville.

If you haven’t seen Pleasantville, in a very brief nutshell, it’s a movie about change—how things like knowledge and exploration alter how we experience the world. It is a progression from the known into the unknown. Pleasantville as a town moves from constant and predictable to the murky waters of giant question marks. The closing scenes of Pleasantville include the characters sitting on a park bench—“What happens next?” [queue puzzled look] “I don’t know. I don’t know.”

So it is fitting then that this transition for us from “Pleasantville,” North Carolina, back to the “Homeland,” has a lot of question marks as well. I feel like I say, “I don’t know,” quite a lot right now. The Presbyterian Women’s meeting today was on the seasons of our lives. I suppose whatever season we are in in life, there is an enormous amount of ambiguity. Thank you for traveling with me through some of mine.

Grace and peace,
Jess

Missing the Point or Right on Target?

I was scanning Life is Good flair on facebook. (For those of you out of the "flair" loop, it's basically virtual buttons for your virtual cork board for your virtual life.) People can create their own buttons and post them as well, so about one of every twenty is a play on Life is Good. Sometimes it's the funny, Life is Crap stuff, but mostly it's people who have created buttons saying things like, "Life is good--eternal life is better" or "Life (with Jesus) is good."

Uhg, there's this gut reaction in me that says these folks are missing the point.

Life is good. It doesn't have to be separated into a Jesus category to be good. Sometimes sitting around a campfire is good. Sometimes a long hike is good. And as a Christian, I see God at work in the goodness--Creator, Sustainer, Redeemer. It's impossible not to see those things through God lenses.

But then again, I appreciate those lenses. When I hike, the knowledge that God has created and sustained what is around me is moving. It deepens my experience of hiking. And maybe messing with the Life is Good theme is someone's way of trying to remind everyone of God's presence--to deepen someone else's experience in the process.

So what's your take?

I guess I have Wisconsin on the brain because just this morning I was listening to NPR and there was this guy on singing, "I've got cheeses, I've got CHEESES! I've got cheeses," and I thought, "Wow, that's seriously a WI song" until I realized it was the gospel NPR station and that guy probably had Jesus, not cheddar and swiss.





Lots of you have asked about Tom and about my visit up to Madison a few weekends ago. Tom is doing well and loving his new job. We had a great visit for his birthday. You can see more pictures at:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=6079&id=1036928837&l=024e1&ref=share

Peace and joy,
Jess

I was reading Elle magazine on the plane the other day. (I know, hardly seems me, but there it is.) There was a fascinating article on mixing high fashion with lowbrow culture. The author—Stephen Milioti—wrote of seeing a woman combine a Rolex watch and David Yurman gold cuff bracelet with a white t-shirt, jeans, and sandals: “The mix of low and high in her wardrobe was studied and flawlessly executed.” Milioti went on to reflect on various ways we “slide effortlessly from elite to street”—from fashion (combining Mizrahi’s Target flats with $8000 lace pants) to politics (Hillary Clinton of Yale Law throwing back a shot in Indiana for some blue-collar appeal) to television (“You watch John Adams and American Idol.”).

I couldn’t help but immediately think of the ways we combine high and low in faith—(in an official sounding lecture voice): “According to John Calvin, the theology of atonement….”/“What a friend we have in Jesus” kind of thing. One of my favorite days of church in the last year was Stewardship Sunday—down-home puppet show silliness with old-school organ and sermon. I used to think that part of the minister’s job was to bridge these two arenas—the six semesters of theology and the real world of the congregation.

I suppose that is a pastor’s job in some ways, but what God gives us in Scripture doesn’t need the bridge—a psalmist cries out in need, a woman mourns the death of her son, a sick person reaches out in hopes of a healing touch. It’s the perfect combination of the greatness of God’s overwhelming love and the lowbrow approach of God coming to earth as a human. Talk about style!

Sacred Spaces

With so many sites and churches, one would think the holiest spots would have been during our morning touring--the spot where Jesus met the disciples, the church built over Mary's house, the path of Paul. But the most sacred spaces on the trip for me were those times of worship and reflection away from the crowds and the designated locations.

Above is our morning worship space next to the Sea of Galilee--worship in the round, with the lower left view through the trees out onto the lake. One afternoon, I spent some time there reflecting on the day and the movement of God in our lives when a small breeze ran through the tree tops. The leaves of the tree I was sitting below were wide to the point of being almost round, thick, and almost perfectly flat. As the breeze moved through them, made a clapping sound that made me think the trees of the field clapping their hands. That had always sounded like a strange verse--and praise song--to me, but I suddenly knew in a new way what that meant. I scanned every Psalm trying to find the verse--turns out it's Isaiah--but I'm thankful for the time and the reminder of the Ruach that God is indeed always with us.

Isaiah 55:1-12 Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live. I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David. See, I made him a witness to the peoples, a leader and commander for the peoples. See, you shall call nations that you do not know, and nations that do not know you shall run to you, because of the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, for he has glorified you. Seek the LORD while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts; let them return to the LORD, that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.