Diane...calling Diane...Get your head out of your...way

OK. I admit I am going out on a limb here talking about "hearing a voice" that is telling me where to go to church but what the heck. It will not be the first time that people have questioned me and surely will not be the last.

So this is what happened today.

Its Sunday...that most troubling of days for me since last October. Now in the last couple months I have made some half hearted attempts to find a community to worship with...a place to go and heal I have found some good people along the way but my sense of call within the community has not been satisfied. My sense of call has remained in limbo. Now this may seem strange since I run The House of Concern...a food pantry, close closet and general referral agency... but it hasn't been the same for me since my derailment. I think that is a good word..derailment... As a train on a track, when the derailment happened..I got woefully off course in all things and with many people and that includes my job. For the first time in almost three years..it became a job. it was no longer part of a call it was a job.

So part of my Lenten discipline was for me to let go of the anger and the sadness that has taken over in my life.

I realised to do that I needed to go to churches where I have been and where I was part of community. That worked last week but this week I felt myself wavering. I was going to head to Trinity today but could not get up the energy. I lay in bed this morning reading an email from the good Rev Dr. Tembeckjan and read her sermon from last week and it was good and it got me thinking and I thought maybe I just need to head to Camillus to hear her but that did not seem right.

So I decided not to decide! I mean that in itself is a decision.

I got myself ready to work out at the YMCA and went to do a cardio/strength training full out workout. So I am working along and working up a sweat and I keep hearing this nagging voice in my head... which is saying go to that church on Grant Avenue up by the movie theater. It was just that plain. Go Go Go.

I kept thinking this is crazy i do not know what time services are... it is already 10:00 and I am sweating and in sweat pants and haven't washed my hair since Wednesday and I am wearing my House Of Concern hoodie and have no make up on and I do not even have any money for the collection plate.

So I finished up. I got in my car intended to head home and next thing i know i am on Grant Ave and I think I will drive up and look and see what time the service is and maybe i will go another time. So I drive up... see lots of cars and think OK it has started and i am not going in and then i see a couple walking in and I drive by the front slowly and see a big sign that says"Come as you are".

Okay I get it.

So I park and in I go... met by a very nice woman who gave me a gift bag and found me a seat. There were people singing...some of that Praise modern singing that i am less than impressed with but they were doing it with gusto and I do like that and the band was good. The sound system was good and despite my clothes I did not feel all that out of place. So I am checking the place out and I think to myself If God wanted me here and I believe he did..there must be something I am supposed to get from this.

So the first reader comes up and he reads" There are many kinds of gifts" And I thought yes, yes there is.

Then we were on to the video and it is this man from Syracuse and they are ending a series on exercising your spiritual muscles.

This week was about service and how we serve and who chooses us to service.

He talked about being chosen by God to serve. That we are all chosen to serve by God. Chosen by God. Picked by God.

I keep being derailed because I forget who chose me. I am only derailed from the Episcopal church... i am not derailed from service. I am not derailed from worship. I am not even derailed from community unless I choose to be.
God has picked me as he picks us all.

We get to come as we are. Stinky, unwashed hair, sweats, it is to follow him...as we are. He makes no conditions for me that I am unable to follow. He does not care if i am a deacon in the Episcopal Church..it will not make him love me more... or less.

He does care if I let myself get derailed. That is not serving and that is not following.

That is my ego getting in the way of Gods bidding.

So will I go back next week..perhaps..I might even clean up a bit. I do know that if God is talking I am listening and I am following.

Amen