Whatnot

Sue and I were just saying, via -email, how an online friendship is a whole new realm for humanity, with a whole new relational paradigm, with new rules and such. I do feel that coming to know someone in text is beneficial in many ways...I have found myself so much more likely to get to know someone who isn't like me. In "real life" I know I have the tendency to join with people who are mostly like me; I think many of us do. It seems I am more likely to take the time to try to understand someones place in this world when I read their words.

However, so much of ourselves is lost in the written word. Obviously there is the loss of expression, body language, and that face to face connection. Beyond that, it's clear to me that most of us censor ourselves in our written words; not just in the more public blog posts and comments, but even in the more private venue of e-mail. When we have a spoken, face to face conversation with someone, we have to edit ourselves on the fly. We are more likely to say something inadvertently hurtful, requiring the art of apology.

In the beginning, when I started the blog, I hoped that I would find a platform for my voice. I believed myself wizened and having something useful to say. It was my goal to say it and positively impact as many people as possible with my great knowledge and advice. I wrote blog posts to be eloquent, educated and informative. Essentially, I wrote for quality, much of the time. I was certain that one day I would be offered a book deal. (OK well not literally, but the hope was there.)

We all know that time changes things, and I have learned more from you, the beautiful people I have met here, than I could have ever hoped for you to learn from me. There is no measure to the value I have seen in the relationships, the people, I have come to know here. To me there is no point at this time in trying to write for wonder and beauty and a book deal or recognition. You all are worth far more to me than all that, and I just wanted to say so. This blog is no longer my career future, it's my online living room. Sit right down, the coffee is good.

With all that, I still find I have things to say, so I'm not going away. But I'm admitting, that at least for this season, things will continue to be more slow here than I would like. I'm not going to force myself to write for the sake of it.

Likewise, maybe I'm tired of complaining. There have been so many things this last week or two, on the emerging-missional blogs, that I could complain about. We received another lovely mass e-mail from our ex-church; I could easily complain about the content of that. I have read some pretty irritating "stay in church" fodder, and I'm sure I could gripe about that. But why? Most of you who read here, those I know of anyhow, understand my feelings, know my experiences, and I don't need to continue to repeat myself just to hear myself speak.

Instead I am sitting back, thinking. About the good, and where my place is in it. About the places like The Refuge, The Bridge, HomePDX...the really tangible good I see going on in Jesus name. Not sure where all that is going, but it's swirling around in my head looking for something to attach itself to.

Sigh, I'm sure I will still find things to bitch about, like a church that has a "community service day" where all the church members spend the day cleaning up the church. Sigh. Or about the mega-church that calls itself "Family". What part of the word "family" is lost in that? I mean, it has wonderful lovely feelings about it, but seriously? I have a "Family" of close to 10,000 people; 2000 of which I am with at any given time in church? Really?

So I guess in a nutshell, not much has changed.

Oh, but I'm on Skype now, I've been meaning to mention it. Look me up as erinword of you want to chat.

That's all for now.