Spiritual Musings from the north Metro

I’ve started blogging again. I’m going to do my best to share a blog every Monday morning—or early in the week. I don’t know how long I’ll keep this up, but I’d like to keep it up for a while. 

I’ve written many blogs in the past. When I first started as the pastor at Chain of Lakes, I wrote almost every day. I ended up writing 129 blogs in 2009. But the last few years, I’ve written far less. Last year I only wrote two blogs; in 2021 only eleven. 

But I recently got inspired to write again. And before I got too far into this blogging adventure, I wanted to force myself to answer the question, “why?” Why do I want to share approximately a 800-word blog at the start of the week? 

My search for an answer to this question led me to a phrase that captures what I’m trying to accomplish. And the phrase is “spiritual musings from the north Metro.” Let me take some time today to explain what I mean. 

Spiritual.

I am a spiritual being. Ever since I was very young, I knew there was a God. One of my foundational moments was looking at the sun as a young boy from underneath the clothesline of my neighbor. As I was lying on the grass the thought came to me, “there has to be a God.” I believe in God.

I look at the world from a spiritual lens. I want to see people, events, activities, gatherings, and wonder how God looks at them. This is my ideal perspective. 

I want to see the community land in a better place. When I became a pastor thirty years ago, I had the belief that the world can’t get better unless the church is involved in it getting better. I had read about the successes of the Civil Rights movement and the farm worker movement and saw how the church had helped those two movements be successful. This social-justice perspective formed me. I went to Union Seminary in New York City—a place that believes in social justice. 

I understand that some people don’t believe that social justice ministries should be part of a church. And some believe that social justice ministries will lead the church to be political. My example for any ministry has always been Jesus. Jesus went out of his way to help and support those who were on the outside of his world—the poor, women, the Samaritans, those who were blind, those who could hardly walk. In his very first sermon, Jesus said that his mission as to bring good news to the poor. If I can follow Jesus in leading and helping any social justice ministry, then I feel I’m living up to my spiritual calling. 

But before you peg me as a “liberal person who wants to change the world,” let me share some other understandings that I have about being spiritual. I’m just as passionate as prayer, worship and Bible Study as I am about helping the homeless. I want to become the person God wants me to be. And I don’t think I can do this unless I’m daily talking to God and daily reading the Scriptures, and frequently going to worship. And I want others to grow in their personal faith too. I don’t have an agenda in helping—I just want to help people grow closer to God. 

I'm religious too. I'm the pastor of Chain of Lakes Church. And at times I'll write in this blog about what is happening in our faith community. And even though I want to build up this religious community, I'm not trying to write from a religious perspective.

It's this spiritual lens from which I want to share in this blog. 

Musings

“I like to write.” This is what I found myself saying to my coach a month ago. And as I reflected on my response, I came to the conclusion that it’s time to start blogging again. If I had another job, I would be a columnist for a newspaper—and on occasion I’ve written columns that have been published in the newspaper. 

I’m a writer. As a pastor I have the opportunity to write a sermon every week. I write a full manuscript—about 2,500 words--that I edit at least three times. 

Almost every Monday morning I write in a journal. I’ve done this for almost thirty years. 

I like to write. 

I don’t find writing easy, but I find it necessary for me. It’s important for me to put down on paper the thoughts that I have. 

I’m interested in what is happening in the world. And when I see something I often want to write down my own thoughts. The word that I think best describes these thoughts are musings. According to the Cambridge on-line Dictionary a musing is a “thought or comment on something a person has been thinking about for a long-time.” 

In my on-line word search I came across the Cambridge dictionary and discovered that in  ancient Greek and Roman stories, one of the nine goddesses who were believed to give encouragement in different areas of literature, art, and music was described as a muse. 

I want to give encouragement in all areas of life. I see myself as a person who has spiritual thoughts about people and events in the world. These thoughts could be described as an opinion. But “opinion” seems a bit strong for what I’m trying to accomplish. I want to put out my thoughts—a musing—without being overly argumentative. It doesn’t really bother me too much if people disagree with my thoughts as I’m not trying to win an argument. I just want to share these thoughts--spiritual musings. 

The purpose of my musings is to bring people together—not separate them. I don’t claim that these musings are always right or correct. I certainly don’t expect that people will agree with them. And sometimes I’ll feel very strongly about what I share, so it might seem argumentative. 

A musing seems to be what I’m trying to do. 

From the north Metro

I believe that people write from a location. That location forms their perspective. My location is the north Metro of the Twin Cities. A person could describe this place as Anoka Country, but I see my location as a bit broader than that. I’ve lived in the north Metro since June 2009. In some ways I don’t consider this as my home location, but I’ve lived here long enough to believe that I have a basic understanding of this place. The north Metro is a dynamic, fast-growing area of the Metro. It is made up of fascinating people. Right now the north Metro shapes my views of what is happening in the world.

This is my location, and I don’t see my location changing for a while. 

“Spiritual musings from the north Metro.” This is the new title of my blog. No matter where you live, I hope you’ll join me on this journey by reading and commenting on these spiritual musings from the north Metro.  I'd also love it if you would share it with friends and email your thoughts and blog topics to pastor@colpres.org.