We gathered in the familiar living room of the Trinity Center, the counseling center where I work part-time as a front desk assistant, mostly filing papers and collecting money and greeting clients. We formed a somewhat awkward circle using donated couches and chairs. Things began to get quiet as we turned downed the music and started to share with one another. It was an odd mix of young to middle-aged counselors, marriage and family therapists, psychiatrists, managers, and of course, my fellow front desk assistants and me.
I had been working at Trinity Center for about three months, so some in the circle I knew pretty well and some I did not.
And as we closed out our time of Christmas partying, we lit a candle. As the candle was passed around the room, each person shared something that they were thankful for in the year past and something they were praying or hoping for in the year to come. And I was taken aback as each one, young and old, shared stories of family, of transitions, of longing for settledness and hoping for a new year to bring new adventures.
When it came to my turn, I held the candle in my hand, watching the flame flicker and dance, feeling its warmth growing against my palms. And, as I am prone to do in moments like these, I stuttered and started and stopped and blurted out something that must have sounded pretty vague to anyone who didn’t know much about me.
But what I said in that moment was something along the lines of this: “I am very thankful for the two jobs I have – the one here at Trinity Center and my job at Highland Presbyterian. I think both are helping me to live out my calling. And my prayer for 2014 is to know a better sense of home.”
The moment was truly sacramental for me. How better to take stock of the ways and wonders of God in our lives than to take the broader view – to look back, sometimes on hurts and pains and joys and triumphs, and at the same time to look forward.
Such a moment brought to mind one of my favorite quotes from Dag Hammarskjold:
To all that has been: Thanks. And to all that will be: Yes.
As we close the year 2013 and welcome the newness of 2014, I’d like to be begin there. Thanks…and Yes.
To all that has been, I say thanks:
Thanks for the close of a journey at Wake Forest School of Divinity. It was a long, difficult and soul-searching journey. It pushed me spiritually, intellectually and, at times, emotionally. The school helped me open my mind to the world around me and my heart to the God calling me out into it. The professors were teachers and mentors, ones who spoke to me as a student and as a person called of God. At times, they even spoke to me as a colleague. For every community event, every class, ever Thursday night Mexican meal, every worship and service opportunity, and for the completion of a degree by which I have been forever changed, I say thanks.
Thanks for the opening of so many new journeys in the past year. Thanks for friends and mentors at Passport Camps, my summer job this year. I came into the summer tired and limping. The wonderful worship and challenge and vigor of doing work I love, the spirit of community and of love, and the beauty of another life-changing summer picked me up and started me on a journey towards healing. Thanks for friends who kept me in a difficult time of transition – those who sent me encouraging messages and texts when I had no idea where I was going, those who connected me with potential job leads and introduced me to connections, and those who let me sleep on couches and guest rooms as I traveled around searching for ministry placement.
Thanks for two jobs where I feel like I am helping and living out a calling. Just to have a job – that is a thing to be thankful for. But to have two jobs where I work with great people and feel like our work matters to something so much bigger than us? That is something to be treasured. And I am grateful for the hard working, grace-filled people I work with in work that I believe matters.
Thanks for friends and for family. Thanks for people who are always ready to pick up on the other end of the phone when I am in crisis and needing a friendly ear. Thanks for little touches of love and grace along the way – things I did not deserve and could never pay back: for handwritten notes, for coffee mugs, for cases of Ale-8 to remind me of home, for big hugs and deep laughs, and, of course, for coffee and for conversation. These gave me strength and hope when I felt both were in low supply.
To all that will be, I say yes:
Yes to the openness of the future. Yes to God who works and moves and heals, even if not always on a timetable to my liking. Yes to the work I am in, where I feel challenged and called and where I see myself working for years to come. Yes to new places and new callings. Yes to the world that I will resolve to embrace in entirely new and authentic ways. Yes to hope and yes to healing. Yes to home – the home which I will find somewhere, somehow. And if not, I hope it will find me. Yes.
Yes, that is my prayer for what has been in 2013 and what will be in 2014.
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