randalevan's blog

The long journey to reach our starting point

Jacquie and I began our most recent adventure about four years ago. We felt it was time to come "home" to California after having been away for about sixteen years in Spain and New England. That was when we started walking. Where would we end up? What would we be doing? All we knew was that we were committed to loving God, loving our neighbors, and wanted to serve in whatever meaningful way we could both in the San Francisco Bay Area and in Spain.

Overcoming conflict (More on "A Million Miles...")

Donald Miller is a master story teller. He can make you laugh (check out the story about the girl he notices and wants to impress so he tells her he is going to hike the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu - Kindle location 1276), and, he can make you cry (for example, the story about his friend Jim who lost his wife of twenty-seven years to cancer - 2382.) In each, Miller hits home the definition of a story worth telling: "A story is a character who wants something and overcomes conflict to get it." (670.)

I can relate to overcoming conflict. For the past five or six years, I have been asking myself, my friends, family, and God Himself for wisdom about how to live the only life I have to live. I have this sense that I am going to continue to be a pastor, but, that it will look very different than it has looked over the past twenty some-odd years. But what will it look like? That's where my conflict comes in.

Christmas all year round?

Do you know what "Epiphany" means? I had some idea, but decided to look up the definition on dictionary.com. Here is part of what I found:

e·piph·a·ny

/ɪˈpɪfəni/ Show Spelled[ih-pif-uh-nee]

1. (initial capital letter) a Christian festival, observed on January 6, commemorating the manifestation of Christ to the gentiles in the persons of the Magi;

2. an appearance or manifestation, esp. of a deity.

So, Epiphany the holiday happens today. (*And if you have never lived in Spain or any other country that celebrates El Día de los Reyes, you don't know what you are missing. In our kid's experience, living in Spain meant you received gifts on December 25th AND January 6th!)

But epiphany the manifestation of a deity (*in this case, Jesus) can happen any day. Jesus can breakthrough and come to life in the midst of the thick and thin of daily living. But..., how can that be?

How to have an abundance of God

This quote gets me every Christmas season: "No one can celebrate a genuine Christmas without being truly poor. The self-sufficient, the proud, those who, because they have everything, look down on others, those who have no need even of God - for them there will be no Christmas. Only the poor, the hungry, those who need someone to come on their behalf, will have that someone. That someone is God. Emmanuel. God-with-us. Without poverty of spirit there can be no abundance of God." (Oscar Romero, a Salvadoran Archbishop who was assassinated while celebrating Mass...murdered, because the day before he had cried out on behalf of justice for the poor.) Taken from Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent & Christmas, p. 141 & 142.

You are my Beloved - Part II

Here's the second half of the Nouwen quote from the other day...

“I am putting this so directly and so simply because, though the experience of being the Beloved has never been completely absent from my life, I never claimed it as my core truth. I kept running around it in large or small circles, always looking for someone or something able to convince me of my Belovedness. It was as if I kept refusing to hear the voice that speaks from the very depth of my being and says: “You are my Beloved, on you my favor rests.” That voice has always been there, but it seems that I was much more eager to listen to the other, louder voices saying: “Prove that you are worth something; do something relevant, spectacular, or powerful, and then you will earn the love you so desire.” Meanwhile, the soft, gentle voice that speaks in the silence and solitude of my heart remained unheard or, at least, unconvincing."

You are my Beloved

Someone I care about very much was going through a rough time recently. Because I love them, I wanted to comfort them. As I thought about what to say, I remembered a quote from a book by Henri Nouwen, a Dutch priest and prolific author who passed away several years ago. In his book, Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living In a Secular World, he writes:

"Ever since you asked me to write for you and your friends about the spiritual life, I have been wondering if there might be one word I would most want you to remember when you finished reading all I wish to say. Over the past year, that special word has gradually emerged from the depths of my own heart. It is the word "Beloved," and I am convinced that it has been given to me for the sake of you and your friends.