Here i sit

I was going to pull up a not-yet-published draft this morning, just to keep the blog-ball rolling ya' know. I feel like I've been doing pretty good lately. I read a book, and wrote a post about each chapter. It was almost like old times...

First I checked Facebook though... and I wasn't prepared.

Apparently it was on this day in 2013 that I made the first social media post about being asked to resign as pastor at the only church I was ever a pastor at. My daughter also shared a long post about how proud she was of my wife and I and the influence we'd had in her life. That was plenty of old emotion right there.

I suppose it was no coincidence then that the first post I saw from today was a link to this interview with Dan White Jr. "A Pastor Ripped Apart By Our Divided Country." Wow. I wonder if someone is trying to tell me something?

I'd often wondered why this Dan White Jr. kept showing up as a "friend suggestion" on Facebook. I didn't think I knew him, hadn't remembered hearing of him or anything. Yet it appears we have similar histories. The interview is about how he went from being a pastor to a PTSD diagnosis (actually, CTSD - cumulative traumatic stress disorder). I guess he and his wife now run a pastors retreat center in Puerto Rico. He recovered better than me.

Anyway, it brought up a lot of memories on this Friday morning while sitting in my little spot in the middle of downtown Fort Wayne. I should know better than to read things like this at work (yes, I read the transcript instead of listening to the recording). It reminded me of the lady who left the church because I voted for Obama, the teenage funeral three weeks into the job, so many conversations and counseling sessions, murder, rape, shootings, suicide, and... yeesh... so much more... God, it's so hard just typing it...

My friend, Tom, used to suggest I start a retreat center for burned out pastors. I even remember my counselor recommending I write a guide book for small-church pastors and sabbaticals. There actually was a time when people thought I had something to offer! I even once thought that myself...

Here I sit this morning, though, fighting back tears at the front desk. My biggest concern is whether or not I can muster the courage to be a Healthy Heart Ambassador (it's a Y program that I doubt anyone would even do at my branch because no one really even comes here anymore; and I've already done all the training... I just don't know if I can wear the title).

Oof. I'm worn out... just from thinking about it all.

I recently made a drunken confession to some people that there is nothing I would rather do in the world than to be a pastor again. I guess maybe I mostly just wish I COULD be a pastor again. I know I couldn't... probably because I once was (and I'm weak, unfit, and all that)... but I miss being someone. I miss having friends. I miss liking myself.

I suppose I still have some things I need to work through. If I was smart I'd probably get into counseling again. It's just... you know... expensive, and time-consuming, and... well... painful.

Such is life.

...(I'm okay, btw. Just thinking out loud here.)...

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Ecclesiastes 11:5

“Just as you’ll never understand the mystery of life forming in a pregnant woman, So you’ll never understand the mystery at work in all that God does.”