"Blest be the dear uniting love"

Well, what a difference a week makes!  This time last week, Scott and I were exhausted from loading the last big pieces of furniture and boxes of "stuff" from my office at First Prez into our cars and depositing everything pretty much as you see it here, in the middle of the house.  I was sitting down to run through my sermon one more time, praying that I would be able to contain my tears until after the second worship service.  As Scott and I talked late into the evening, we laughed and cried as we remembered some of the tumultuous events of the last 8 years of ministry shared with the people there, especially as we remembered some of those saints of God whose hands I held as they lay close to death and whose funerals I preached.  

As Sunday rolled around, I was hopeful that I could remain tearless until at least 12:01pm, and actually, that was the case until about 12:07 or thereabouts, and I was able to say the things I felt the Spirit leading me to say to the congregation this one last time of standing before them in the pulpit.  Dr. Monica Sparzak had composed an arrangement of "O, For A Thousand Tongues to Sing" and "Lo, He Comes with Clouds Descending"  which she played as the prelude, so it was a very Methodist-infused service of worship, which surprised no one.  I told them they had learned more about Wesley than they could have ever expected or wanted! We sang "Ye Servants of God," I quoted from the United Methodist Book of Worship as well as the Presbyterian Book of Common Worship, and I read one of Charles Wesley's hymns as the closing blessing.  It was a time of giving thanks for the way our stories have intersected and a time to celebrate the ties that will continue to bind us no matter how many miles may lie between us.  As Galatians 3: 23-29 tells us, our essential identity is our unity in Christ, and that is stronger than even the parts of ourselves that we oft-times think most important:  our racial/ethnic background, socio-economic status, or gender identity.   

As I write this, I am still in Fayetteville, but this time next week, I will be on an airplane high above the Atlantic, heading towards a new chapter, a new adventure, a new path forward in ministry. It is impossible to say how things will unfold and what the future holds, but I hold fast to the words I shared with them from the pen of Charles Wesley  as words of promise, hope, and trust --

Blest be the dear uniting love
that will not let us part;
our bodies may far off remove,
we still are one in heart. 

Joined in one spirit to our Head,
where he appoints we go,
and still in Jesus' footsteps tread,
and do his work below. 

O may we ever walk in him,
and nothing know beside,
nothing desire, nothing esteem,
but Jesus crucified! 

We all are one who him receive,
and each with each agree,
in him the One, the Truth, we live;
blest point of unity! 

Partakers of the Savior's grace,
the same in mind and heart,
nor joy, nor grief, nor time, 
nor place, nor life, nor death can part.