With a Little Help From a Friend - Pastor Beverly
27/09/11 22:50
I’ve learned from experience that moving into a new house is a months-long experience. A year ago, Wayne, Wesley and I moved into the church parsonage and began unpacking boxes. We spent a good 8 months to get through all of the boxes we had. The next step was organizing all of the things our boxes contained.
It made sense to put a priority on organizing the rooms that were used most often by all of us and our guests. The kitchen, dining room and living room were addressed right off.
One of the rooms that ignored until recently was my office in the parsonage. Piles of papers and boxes of materials from the three main areas of my work life (pastoring, officiating at weddings, and quilting) filled floor space, counter tops, and cabinets in such chaotic ways that nothing was easy to find. And, I found myself adding to the piles rather than putting things away because I had not yet designated spaces and files efficiently.
The task of addressing this problem seemed like and overwhelming project looming on my daily workload horizon until a chance observation came my way recently. On the first day of school, when Elder Terry Doremus and I were on site as the Growing Place Nursery School (located in the lower part of the church building) parents and staff were helping the children become familiar with their new classroom settings, something great happened.
There was a window of time when Terry and I were afforded a short break from our greeting and welcoming duties, so we went into one of the rooms used by the church for meetings and Sunday School and such. As Terry and I chatted about nothing much and everything important simultaneously, Terry did what comes naturally to her—she began cleaning up piles and boxes around the room and got things organized into workable, accessible areas. Together, we folded tables, moved equipment (and a piano!), crushed cardboard for recycling. All of a sudden, the room was larger, cleaner, and easier to work in. And, all of a sudden I realized I had found someone with whom I could address the piles and boxes and chaos in my office at the house.
This past Friday, Terry and I spent an entire day assessing, planning, cleaning and designating the shelves, cabinets and work zones in my office. Early in the process we made design plan on paper and then a shopping list attached to a clipboard. Later we headed off to Staples, followed by lunch at Applebees. When we returned, we got to work putting things together and arranging my belongings in such a way that the work zones make much more sense while also making my jobs easier to manage. I know exactly where to go for the shipping supplies when I send out quilts; I have complete confidence of finding all of the materials I need for meeting with a couple wishing to hire me as a wedding officiant; I can reach up to my right and grab my Consistory binder as easily as I can reach up to my left and grab my hymnals, or Bible, or directory of the church members.
I still have more work to do in my office, but being in my here is much more exciting, energizing, and inspiring—not to mention brighter! (Terry encouraged my to get a higher wattage in the bulbs for my light fixture.)
O happy the servant who works in a well-organized office. Thanks, Terry!
Storm Debris - Pastor Beverly
18/09/11 23:21
Some say that Hurricane
Irene will be recorded as one of the Top 10 storms in history. It’s
fierce, ravaging winds and deep deluges of water have caused roads
to collapse, entire towns to be submerged, electric power to be
inaccessible for up to four days, and home after home to be
condemned. In Kinnelon, an SUV was swallowed up as the road beneath
it gave way to loosing of land that became so water-logged it could
no longer sustained the weight of traffic.
In the coming weeks we will continue to hear stories of bravery and heroism, of restoration and rebuilding, of sacrifice and solidarity. If we are lucky, we will have reason to be a part of the unfolding story of how God’s people, even us, draw on a special kind of strength when times are tough and spirits are fragile. If we are lucky we will get the chance to hear a story so sad that the only response will be to say, “That’s truly awful,” and “I’m really sorry.”
I had that chance last night (Wednesday, August 31).
My son, Wesley (11) is a boy scout here in Kinnelon and we got an e-mail from one of his scout leaders that there was a need to go to a church in Pompton Plains to serve dinner for the hundreds of people in the Pequannock area whose homes are filled with water and nearly uninhabitable.
Wesley and I had a simple task of setting out silverware at place settings as one group finished eating and another was ready to sit down at the tables. Near the dinner tables was a table upon which home-made coloring books along with crayons and markers had been piled. During one of the lulls in our work, a young woman in her late teens came to me and asked if it would be okay for her to take two of the coloring books and a pack of crayons to her house because her younger brother and sister (who had been staying with relatives in another town for the past several days) would be coming back to their own home later in the evening. The young woman said that she and her parents would need to tell the younger ones that everything in their bedrooms—all of the furniture and clothing, all of their books and toys, all of their blankets and stuffed animals—had been ruined by the hurricane. “There’s nothing left for them,” the young woman said to me. “I hope these coloring books will help them during those first minutes of shock.”
I gladly answered, “Yes,” to her request, wishing I had some sort of gift card on me to give to her so she could go to a local store and get her siblings something newer and nicer and maybe more personable. It was a horribly, awkward moment. Her pain and her plea were so tender and true. My help was feeble and fleeting. All I could do was to say, “That is so awful. I’m really sorry.”
She thanked me. And she smiled. I’m still crying.
In the coming weeks we will continue to hear stories of bravery and heroism, of restoration and rebuilding, of sacrifice and solidarity. If we are lucky, we will have reason to be a part of the unfolding story of how God’s people, even us, draw on a special kind of strength when times are tough and spirits are fragile. If we are lucky we will get the chance to hear a story so sad that the only response will be to say, “That’s truly awful,” and “I’m really sorry.”
I had that chance last night (Wednesday, August 31).
My son, Wesley (11) is a boy scout here in Kinnelon and we got an e-mail from one of his scout leaders that there was a need to go to a church in Pompton Plains to serve dinner for the hundreds of people in the Pequannock area whose homes are filled with water and nearly uninhabitable.
Wesley and I had a simple task of setting out silverware at place settings as one group finished eating and another was ready to sit down at the tables. Near the dinner tables was a table upon which home-made coloring books along with crayons and markers had been piled. During one of the lulls in our work, a young woman in her late teens came to me and asked if it would be okay for her to take two of the coloring books and a pack of crayons to her house because her younger brother and sister (who had been staying with relatives in another town for the past several days) would be coming back to their own home later in the evening. The young woman said that she and her parents would need to tell the younger ones that everything in their bedrooms—all of the furniture and clothing, all of their books and toys, all of their blankets and stuffed animals—had been ruined by the hurricane. “There’s nothing left for them,” the young woman said to me. “I hope these coloring books will help them during those first minutes of shock.”
I gladly answered, “Yes,” to her request, wishing I had some sort of gift card on me to give to her so she could go to a local store and get her siblings something newer and nicer and maybe more personable. It was a horribly, awkward moment. Her pain and her plea were so tender and true. My help was feeble and fleeting. All I could do was to say, “That is so awful. I’m really sorry.”
She thanked me. And she smiled. I’m still crying.