Lessons From the Tailgate Volume 4

While I have been griping about not being able to do what I did when I was in my thirties, I have been overlooking the things that are true in my sixties that were not true then. Some things I just didn’t know in my youth; others I was leery of admitting. Having lots of time on my hands occasions reflection about how the years pass and what happens in the process.

Lesson Number One: Youthful exuberance is tempered by experience. I graduated from seminary and was ordained at twenty-four. I didn’t know enough to be scared to death. I had a rose-colored glasses view of the church and what was possible. I believed I had the capacity to remake the church and bring it to new levels of faithfulness and insight. Forty-five years later, I see that there was quite a bit of arrogance to my youthful exuberance. I also have come to value the experience that years in ministry have taught me about dealing with a very human institution filled with very flawed human beings, including myself.

Lesson Number Two: Book learning is informed by doing the work. Sometimes book learning is helpful and sometimes not so much. I am grateful for my seminary education; it taught me a lot of things. I can still get excited about the declension of a Greek verb. My seminary education did not, however, teach me how to be with a mother who came home from work to find her fifteen year old son had hanged himself in the garage. This life in ministry has taken me to places and situations I could never have imagined in my wildest dreams. When most of the world is walking out, ministers are invited in. Moments of greatest pain and greatest joy are places where I was welcomed, not because I was such a great person, but because I carried the trust of the office of pastor. It is the greatest privilege and most humbling experience I could ever have in this life.

Lesson Number Three: The more I know, the more I know I don’t know. While years have brought me experience that I value and that have made me better at what I do, I know there is much I don’t know and don’t have time to learn. Still, the realization that there is much I don’t know keeps me open to new things and new insights. It also teaches me to rely on others whose knowledge and perspectives are different than my own.

Lesson Number Four: I have become strong in broken places. I’m not talking about bones. I have had my heart and soul broken by pain I thought I would not survive. Having a good therapist was a gift I gave myself. For fifteen years I wrenched my guts out in therapy. It’s how I learned to be comfortable in my own skin. It was no fun in the moment, but I wouldn’t trade it for the world. Doing my own inner work is the single most important thing that helped me internalize the role of pastor and human being in the same package. I have periodically gone back to therapy for tune-ups. Life isn’t always predictable and sometimes stuff knocks me off my pins. Knowing when I need help sorting it all out saved me from myself more than once.

Lesson Number Five: I am still my own worst enemy. It looks different now than it did in my thirties. I was more self-destructive then. I no longer drive a hundred miles an hour because life is too precious a gift to waste on speed. My youthful invincibility is gradually giving way to a more moderate view of what I should and should not be doing. I had a momentary blip when it came to the tailgate.  I am and always will be a work in process.

Lesson Number Six: I am more outspoken than I was in my thirties. My passions and convictions are more likely to make it out of my mouth and my writing as I grow older. It is partly because I don’t care what people think, but mostly it is because the gospel convicts me on a daily basis. Faithfulness to my call means I cannot ignore the things that break the heart of God. Ordination vows have no expiration date.  My goal as I age is to be a dangerous old preacher woman.