Meanwhile...

Seven Years Ago while sitting in LAX, the idea of the hero's journey as analogous to my own journey began to take hold for me. Since then it has been a major filter for me as I process the events of my life both large and small. It certainly has become a recurring theme for this blog.

My last entry dealt with the in-between place I found myself in. I anticipated this entry to be about waiting and choice. I thought I would be writing about how the hero's journey ends when the hero returns home (or at the very least finds a new place of rest). I expected to be writing that now rather than seeing my journey like Frodo returning to the Shire or Alice finding her way back to the tree by the river bank, I felt my journey had become a series of quests with rest still far in sight.

This would be true Sunday to Thursday.

Two things happened on Thursday.
I received a text asking if I was available for a phone call with Pastor Doug of Cal Heights United Methodist Church here in Long Beach, and my mom started to feel feverish around 11:00 pm.

Friday morning two more things happened.
My mom woke me up at 1:10 am complaining of fatigue and shortness of breath and asked me to dial 9-1-1. The ambulance arrived shortly thereafter. From the emergency room my mom was wheeled directly into surgery to have a shunt placed to flush out a 99% blockage in her right artery. By 5:00 am my mom was in the ICU and allowed to get some rest. I went home and slept for a couple of hours.

At 9:00 am my phone rang. It was the call from Pastor Doug. We discussed the denomination and the position they had available. We talked a little shop. He asked if I could come in on Monday for lunch. He then went on say "after that I will show you the church, I will take you to where we do our background checks, and then we can get you started." I realized that with no formal interview I had just been offered a position at Cal Heights United Methodist.

Obviously I needed time to think.
I truly had no idea what was going to happen from day to day. Some days my mom was fine and being discharged the next day looked hopeful. Other days I was asking the doctors if my brother should be buying a plane ticket to come see her.

The position that was offered was for a part-time interim Youth director. Not exactly what I was looking for.

In the midst of all this, there was also a lack of clarity as to what my mom would need when she left the hospital.

Then I had the hero's journey redefined for me.
Above I spoke about the hero's journey being one of returning home. In fact I wrote something very similar before I left for Copperopolis. Yet somewhere in the last six months I had grown a desire to be great and important. To have others know of my work and my calling. To have others know of me. I had defined for myself the hero's journey as a quest of greatness, a proof of my value and worth.

Somewhere underneath my desire to be present, to make a difference right where I was, I had grown restless and allowed outside voices to be the barometer for my worth. I had allowed others view of my calling and work to be the definition of those things.

To be brutally honest, I am still processing all of this. 
Still looking to find meaning in it all.
Still trying to find the balance. Not wanting to make this last month one of fate, seeing these events as necessary for God to work. And yet, not wanting to make them mean nothing seeing them as pure happenstance.


--Serving Him alongside all of you, just from further away
--Jesse Letourneau

Tune in Next Time.. When our hero has some distance and clarity on all this to share with you all, or simply uses this space to rant about Kermit the Frog.

Now what?

Let's just cut to the chase.

I am no longer employed by CCBC. June 25 was my last day of service for that congregation.

I found out that I would be leaving the church the same week that I posted my previous blog. And for now we are going to let it serve as the recap of my time there. It will serve as my public thanks for the opportunity to serve that congregation.

Which leads us to the titular question, Now What?

I'm not totally sure. I have some irons in the fire as they say. More on those when I can talk about them.

Beyond where I will land next, I still find myself asking the question, Now What?

When I began this blog, I saw the goal of arriving at the destination as the purpose of life.  I was never one to enjoy the trip itself. While working at ARCG I began to see this life we live as a journey. I learned to stop and look around. To appreciate where I was in the moment. I began to notice and learn from where I was, rather than needing to spend all my energy worried about where I was going or why I wasn't there yet.

However, where I have been lately hasn't been all that enjoyable. I left three places of employment that I truly enjoyed (one of which I never even began), broke my elbow, and had my car of seven years finally stop working. All of these experiences have left me wanting to end the journey to finally arrive somewhere.

And yet, in this same time frame I found two churches that taught me about community and communion, I have seen my gifts and talents married to a calling that impacted my life and the lives around me, and I got a front row seat to the first year of the life of my niece.

When I see everything on balance I am called back into an understanding of life as journey not simply as destination. I am called back into trusting that God is present with us. I am able to once again stop and look around. To appreciate where I am in the moment. I begin again to notice and learn from where I am.

What this all means about the direction I am walking in, I am not yet sure. I am still reflecting on all of that. But if my current understanding holds, next time we will get back to mixing over analysis of superheroes with my personal theology.

--Serving Him alongside all of you, just from further away

--Jesse Letourneau

Romans 12:15