It has been more than three weeks since I have been able to post on this blog. The time has flown by. Melissa and I are still in the process of unpacking in Dallas. I did want to acknowledge that I am still here and hope to begin posting much more frequently in the next week or so. I also wanted to thank those of you who have left very thoughtful comments in the last three weeks. I am sorry I have not had a chance to respond to them. I will make an effort to respond to them as well as things settle down a bit here.

Here are some highlights of what has happened since I last posted:

• Annual Conference was from May 25th – May 29th
• May 25th my brother flew in from D.C. and I got to introduce him to my daughter Bethany.
• May 28th one of my mentors, Doug Strong, flew in from Seattle to be a part of the ordination service.
• May 28th I was ordained an elder in full connection in the Oklahoma Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church
• May 29th Melissa, Bethany, and I returned to Lamont and continued packing. 
• May 30th I played golf one last time and Melissa and I had a very enjoyable meal with dear friends.
• June 1st was my last Sunday in Lamont. It was very hard to say goodbye, but we had a very nice fellowship dinner after the service where Melissa, Bethany, and I were loved on by the wonderful people we have been blessed to serve with.
• June 2nd: Moving Day. Some highlights – We showed up at the Penske pick-up location to pick up the truck we had rented, and were told was guaranteed to be there, and were immediately told it was not there. (More on this in a future post.) I had to drive to U-Haul and rent a truck from them. Thanks be to God there was a truck available in the size that we needed and the person working there was amazingly kind and helpful. We were packed and on the road by 1:30 or so. It was hard to walk out of the empty parsonage for the last time, a place where we had so many firsts and memories. We spent the night with Melissa’s parents in Norman.
• June 3rd: Unloading Day. We got up at 5:30 and drove to Dallas. Melissa and I signed the lease and we began unloading the U-Haul. We were done by about 2:00. I think the high was about 95*…      H-O-T! When we were done there was barely room to stand in the apartment.
• June 4th noticed centipedes kept appearing in the apartment.
• June 6th woke up to the sound of running water. There was a crack in the ceiling of the guest bathroom and water was pouring through it. Maintenance arrived in less than an hour and a half (the water stopped running when the people above us finished their shower) and the leak was fixed in another thirty minutes. Later that day, the exterminator came to keep the centipedes on their side of the walls.
• June 8th we thought all morning about Lamont United Methodist Church. It is really strange to go from leading a worship service every week for three years to just being a visitor in a mega church in upscale Dallas. (We went to the contemporary worship service at Highland Park United Methodist Church, it is called Cornerstone.) This morning Melissa and I prayed for Lamont UMC and for its new pastor. We pray for God’s blessings upon them all.

I just read a very interesting post on Adam Hamilton’s blog Seeing Gray. Adam Hamilton has made the decision, at least for the time being, to turn off the comments on his blog. I can really sense his wrestling with the desire to create a place for people to dialog and listen to one another. Instead, it seems that a few people are monopolizing the conversation, and they are doing so in an unloving way.

I have been blessed during my time blogging to not find that this has been a problem… so far. But, I have also been surprised to find how rude, even hateful, Christians can be on Christian blogs or discussion boards. A few years ago there was one board I finally had to quit visiting, because I realized I always left angry and hurt.

I have not been following Adam’s blog closely enough to know what the comments were about that he found to be troublesome enough to make the decision to go ahead and turn off the comments. But, there seems to be something very mixed up going on in our understanding (and more importantly out practice) of faith when we feel justified bashing someone verbally because we do not agree with them on a particular issue.

This seems to point to a broader concern that I have with the universal Church. People on different sides of issues far too often seem to be unable to respect one another to listen carefully to what they are saying and try to understand where they are coming from. More specifically, I see this happening to some extent with the United Methodist Church – particularly in relation to the most controversial issues.

I am reminded of Wesley’s exhortation that though we may not all think alike, may we not love alike? Unfortunately, this is sometimes used as a justification for doctrinal indifference. This is not what Wesley meant at all. Wesley made a distinction between essential and nonessentials. I wonder if the first step for Christians in trying to find a way forward might not be to first take a major step backward. Maybe instead of talking about specific issues that we disagree on, could it be that we first need to make sure we agree on what the essentials are? Sometimes when I observe arguments between Christians, I wonder if there is anything they agree on.

For Jesus’ sake, may we rediscover the essentials of the Christian faith and learn to listen to one another, remembering that Jesus commanded us to love our neighbor in the same breath that he commanded us to love God.

I am in the midst of what may be one of the craziest periods of my life. Those of you who follow this blog are aware that my wife and I are expecting our first child. The due date was April 9th, so we are eagerly awaiting her arrival at any minute. This is something that I am absolutely thrilled about and really looking forward to. It is also something that has kept us very busy, even in simply trying to get prepared. (Hence the decrease in frequency in posting.)

There is another transition that is not as important or significant as having your first child, but in any other season of my life would have center stage. After three wonderful years of ministry with the people of Lamont United Methodist Church, Melissa and I are leaving. I have been wrestling with and praying about a calling to return to academia. I applied to Southern Methodist University’s PhD program and was admitted. As a result, we will be moving to Dallas, TX in June and I will begin work on my PhD in the fall. I will be studying with Dr. Ted Campbell and Dr. Elaine Heath at SMU. My concentration will be the History of the Christian Tradition with an emphasis on Wesley Studies. My ultimate hope is to teach at the seminary level and pastor future pastors during their time in seminary.

It will be very difficult to leave Lamont. Melissa and I will really miss the wonderful people there. But I am also looking forward to beginning PhD work and immersing myself in Wesley Studies. I covet you prayers as we look to this new phase of our lives (both having a child and beginning a PhD).