May 2021 Newsletter
Hello all!
Putting things in order. I just walked around my gardens holding a cup of tea. This is an image I have had of God since serving in Northfield at Main Street Moravian. I would walk the four blocks from my house to the church and this one house had a large carefully planned front garden. Often the woman of the house, would be studying her garden, slowly walking the stone paths she had created between the vegetation, with a tea cup in her hand. I finally did tell her once that she reminded me of God. She smiled.
I have been cleaning out my file drawers and organizing my desk drawers and meeting notes from years gone past. I am putting things in order. I am not sure why I am doing this. The present disorder of my church office has not caused me great angst or a huge amount of inefficiency. I can find most things I need. But it just feels good to put things in order. On Saturday I found papers I had written in seminary, notes on pastoral care that I had given as a seminary student in my supervised ministry setting. I read that I felt guilty leaving my youth group in Easton, PA. I wondered who would take care of them when I left after graduation. Just a couple years ago one of those youth reached out to me via Facebook just to say HI and let me know how he was doing. It was very satisfying.
As I put old files in new places, I see all the people I have married, baptized, buried, visited. I remember them. I give thanks for them. I am creating space I think for new files as well. Just this week I was able to perform a wedding. I haven’t done that for a very long time with COVID. I will officiate in July at another wedding. There will be some burials as well, this summer, ones delayed by COVID: Wolfram Fliegel, Cindy Jeska, my brother.
Putting things in order, celebrating milestones in life—sorrows and joys. It is all God-like. God walking slowly through her garden, tea cup in hand—seeing and delighting in and remembering all of us and giving thanks.
-Rev. Dr. Amy Gohdes-Luhman