Part of my Lenten discipline is going to be keeping up with weekly reflections in here. I've decided to do that through an Apostles' Creed 101--dividing up the Creed into 6 parts, one for each week in Lent. I've had my own questions about the creed--who doesn't wonder about Jesus hanging out in hell--but now's your chance to ask your questions about the Creed. Feel free to email me: jess@firstpreshp.org or drop a comment.

Also, for those of you that have a hard time remembering when to check (or have gotten tired of my not consistantly posting), let me know and I'll be glad to send out a reminder email when I've done the weekly post.

I hope you've eaten some terrible today to honor fat Tuesday. And I hope you have some reflecting of your own in store for this Lenten journey.

Peace,
Jess

Busyness—One of the “Seven Deadly Sins”

“I’m SO busy!” They are uncountable, the number of times we’ve heard this phrase—from co-workers, family members, overheard cell phone conversations. Busy, busy bees we all are. It’s as if we value the fact that we are busy—like a badge we wear. Pinning on the “I am busy” button somehow seems to equal the “I am somebody special” sticker—as if the busier the better, the more worth we have.

It doesn’t sit well with me, though. My preaching professor in seminary introduced me to Eugene Peterson, the minister-mentor-through-writing and theologian from whom I not-all-that-cleverly stole my blog name. Peterson writes again and again of busyness as the antithesis of spirituality, drilling in a sense that to be busy is no badge of worth but rather some sort of character flaw equated with laziness.

“The word for ‘busyness’ in Russian is also the word for ‘vanity.’” I ran across this in a quote in the Christian Century from Social Research a few months ago. And it seems about right. Perhaps not in the world’s eyes, where we are proving again and again who we are by what we do. But in God’s eyes, where what we do will not change how much God loves us, where we could cross off everything on our to-do list—or better yet burn it—or better yet, take out the batteries and resist the temptation to hotsynch—and we are still loved completely and wholly for who we are and not a bit for what we do.

Thanks be to God!

Happy Valentine's Day!

"Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God." (I John 4:7)

So on this day, love your spouse, love your friends, love your family--but make a special effort to love someone that you might not choose or want to--a stranger, perhaps an enemy, that person that drives you crazy with irritation--in the name Christ this day.

Love,
Jess

As far as I know, there isn't a direct commandment about bragging. Sure, there's all that about pride and such, but I've never read anywhere in Scripture, "Thou shalt not brag."

But there's something I kind of like to brag about in my head about First Presbyterian Church. Not that I have any credit in it, but I am pretty proud to serve a church where we have a two young adults in missions--one in Miami and one in Tanzania. Megan and Andrew were grown up and off to college before I ever got here--but it says something about their church family (our church family) that they had their ears and eyes open to God's call.

So when I got my latest addition of National Geographic, I was pretty excited to see a big chunk of it designated to images of the Serengeti and Crater Highlands of Tanzania. It brings some of Andrew's experience to my living room. And then the last few pages were a special on a photography camp NG hosted in Little Haiti, Florida--and suddenly a piece of Megan's experience is also in my reading chair.

Coincidence or providence? Your call, but I thought it was a pretty cool God connection.