<![CDATA[STEPHANIE LOBDELL NAZARENE SPEAKER, PASTOR AND WRITER

<![CDATA[STEPHANIE LOBDELL NAZARENE SPEAKER, PASTOR AND WRITER - Blog]]>Tue, 05 Aug 2025 06:39:42 -0700EditMySite<![CDATA[Breath.]]>Sun, 31 May 2020 10:33:14 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/breath

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. (Genesis 1:1-2)

Then the Lord God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life;
and man became a living being. (Genesis 2:7)

Breath.

But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and all the domestic animals that were with him in the ark.And God made a wind blow over the earth, and the waters subsided. (Genesis 8:1)

Breath.

Pharaoh’s chariots and his army he cast into the sea;
    his picked officers were sunk in the Red Sea
You blew with your wind, the sea covered them;
    they sank like lead in the mighty waters. (Exodus 15:4, 10)

Breath.

Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.
Thus says the Lord God to these bones:
I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. (Ezekiel 37:4)

Breath.

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. (Acts 2:1)

Breath.

The breath of God is a power, a life-force.
It creates, restores, enlivens, rescues.
It rips Pharaohs from their thrones and sets the oppressed free.
It resurrects the dead and commands chaos be still.
The breath of God is a power.

The disciples gathered in Jerusalem, waiting as they had been instructed-
for what, they knew not when suddenly, the breath of God came upon them.

Like Adam, they were awakened.
Like Noah, they were saved.
Like Israel, they were delivered.
Like the dry bones in the valley, they were revived.

Empowered by the Spirit, they began to speak, to tell the story of this Jesus. The crowds began to gather.
Clouds of dust billowed as hundreds, then thousands gathered to see the spectacle. The Roman soldiers were on edge.
Was this an uprising? Should they silence the speaker, push back the crowds, disperse the people before things go out of hand?

But wait, what language were they speaking? Latin? No, the language of the Medes. No, that can’t be right.
It’s the language of the Parthians. How is this possible?

Notice: the miracle was not uniformity. The crowd did not morph into a homogenous unit.
Each one maintained their distinct culture, language, and story.
The miracle was the breath of God, moving with power so that every person regardless of ethnicity or origin
might hear the Good News that God is for them in the person of Jesus.

Soon, the disciples would come to realize that this message of hope belonged not only to Jews, but to every nation under heaven.
Every tribe, every tongue. The power of the breath.

Breath feels in short supply these days.

When a man lies dead in the street for lack of breath, when crowds roar in rage, fear, and exhaustion, when people cower behind social media posts hoping it counts as their stand against injustice…we are breathless.

We are in desperate need of a breath of power. Not a power that will crush us into conformity, not a power that will defend the status quo, and not a power that will silence dissent- washing us into an indistinguishable shade of nothing.

We need the breath of God.
We need to be awakened.
We need to rescued from the flood waters.
We need to be delivered from Pharaoh and led through the sea.
We need to be revived like sun-bleached, dry bones.
We need the very breath of Jesus to breathe peace over us, shalom- peace that is wholeness, healing, and restoration for all.

In John 20, “Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’ When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.”

By the breath of God, we receive the transformative peace of God, peace that commissions us into the world.
We become agents of shalom.
We become people of courage who work for peace wherever we have been placed.
We recognize that shalom is not shalom if it isn’t for everybody- when anyone is still suffering under the weight of slavery, abuse, racism, or injustice.

This Pentecost, may the breath of God blow mightily among us. May we catch a vision of the people of God, beautifully diverse into eternity. May we not merely dream of shalom someday but may we go forth into the world and work for shalom,
empowered by the breath of God.

]]><![CDATA[A Chord Suspended- Holy Saturday]]>Sat, 11 Apr 2020 11:04:39 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/april-11th-2020

Are your wonders known in the darkness,
   or your saving help in the land of forgetfulness?
But I, O Lord, cry out to you;
   in the morning my prayer comes before you.
O Lord, why do you cast me off?
   Why do you hide your face from me?
Psalm 88:12-14

Which of us does not know the impenetrable silence of Holy Saturday? Who is unfamiliar with the obscurity of pain unresolved?

Psalm 88 is the psalm of Holy Saturday. Unlike a typical lament psalm, there is no hinge to hope, not about-face to praise. The psalmist cannot muster it. It is as if the writer grew too weary, the pen too heavy to lift. The song simply ends, recounting a painful betrayal. Then, darkness. And not the life-giving darkness of womb or nourishing soil. Murky, dangerous, untrustworthy darkness that leaves you on your guard, unable to close your eyes for the fear that lurks.

As one who has faced the demons of mental illness, I know this frightening place well- the shadows of a mind that feels untrustworthy. But I am also well-acquainted the wounds of human existence: of love unrequited, of grief without consolation, of shame that burns red hot.

I am not unique, not special in the slightest. My experience is simply one expression of the overarching human experience: life set asunder by loss, pain, and even self-contempt.

This is the experience of Holy Saturday: a weighty awareness of all that is not as it should be and the desperate longing for restoration and deliverance.

Like the hustlers we are, we find ways of managing with the tension of unresolved hurt and persistent regret- coping mechanisms that distract us into numbness. Endless entertainment, busyness, cleaning, exercising our bodies into submission- anything that will occupy the mind away from that which we cannot resolve.

I have always pitied the first followers of Jesus who were forced to endure an empty, aching Saturday with no understanding that “Sunday is a’comin’,” and even more so when I understood the implication of that day being the Jewish Sabbath. All coping mechanisms, all distraction strategies were spiritually out of bounds. No busy hands to distract a heart in travail and a reeling mind. Only stillness and quiet to face their regret and fear, the wreckage of their lives.

Today, I will seek to be still, to face the abyss. I reject the idolatry of perpetual humanistic optimism. I refuse to turn this essay back to praise. I discipline my mind, so eager to jump to the resolution of Sunday. I sit in this lament song; I linger in this suspended chord, this unresolved song.

Like those first followers of Jesus so many years ago, I wait in stillness for the mercy of the Lord.

]]><![CDATA[Goal: Unresolved]]>Tue, 31 Dec 2019 14:02:39 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/goal-unresolved

Photo Cred: https://emmamatthews.co.uk

It is inevitable. I walk into Target and I am immediately drawn to them, like a moth to a flame. Rosy pink day planners with gold-pressed lettering on the cover. Desk calendars with inspirational quotes alongside neat lines on which to pen my “three core tasks” of the day. Journals for tracking everything from my eating habits and exercise routines to my reading goals and grocery list.

I manage to make it throughout the checkout line and out the door without buying any of them. I clutch my Christmas clearance purchases to my chest- discounted wrapping paper and snowflake napkins for next December- and actively avert my eyes from the alluring promise of all things new.

I hop onto my phone to check in with friends I haven’t seen in awhile and I am immediately sucked into a vortex of aspirations: focus words, goal lists, digital stakes thrust into the ground of cyberspace for their followers to see. As I scroll through resolutions and “this time I am resolved, seriously this time” declarations, I dodge ads left and right- ads for workout equipment, new eating regimens centered around my DNA (seriously?), meditation guides, a pricey planner centered around the daily BCP readings, and health products that will right all the wrongs within me and, somehow, make me a better mom too.

As I set down my phone, I pause to take stock. I do not feel inspired or encouraged. I do not feel invigorated or challenged. Instead, I feel the cold fingers of shame clutch at my insides. All the “not quite up to par” bits of myself pulse with it: the reading list that fell so short, the belly that is softer and less toned than last year, the writing that I should have done but avoided, the morning routine that I so often failed to complete, the minutes wasted when I wanted to be praying, the full-to-the-bursting daily calendar but not always with the right things…

My inner achiever chomps at the bit of a new year, and with the turn of a new decade (or not, depending on how annoyingly accurate you want to be), I feel the pull all the more acutely, like an undertow threatening to whisk me out to sea. In a way, I want to surrender to the pull, to ride the waves of lists, goals, and achievement indicators out into the open waves. And yet I know, with every swell, every white-crested wave, comes a plunge into the valley- the low place between the peaks. The low places are disorienting and frightening, every goal invisible, every accomplishment unseen in the shadow of the roiling water, my sense of self adrift.

Here’s the truth: I can do the things. I can accomplish the tasks. I can hammer my body into submission. I can drag myself out of bed earlier everyday to write. I can schedule every moment of my day to maximize productivity. I do not struggle with lack of motivation or capacity to accomplish the tasks before me.

And yet, I no longer wish to ride the highs and lows of the waves of accomplishments and accolades. I’ve done it and, while there are always moments of exhilaration, in the end my stomach is always a bit soured by the voyage. The promises are hollow; the newness empty. As soon as I lose those 10 pounds, I’ll find yet another flaw that needs attention. As soon as I write the next article or book, the unquenchable thirst to do it again- to prove I am the real deal for certain this time- will come calling. As soon as I read my ever-growing stack of books, I will lift my tired eyes to discover that 50 more have been written. The hunger is all-consuming. It gnaws at my belly at all hours- when I am playing with my children, when I am going for a run, when I’m washing the dishes, or preparing a sermon- it claws at my insides.

I am self-aware enough to know that my hunger is in many ways innate. I am wired to take action, to set lofty goals and attain them. Perhaps my hunger is not the problem. Perhaps it is my appetite. Perhaps I have developed a taste for that which cannot satisfy.

Bodily perfection (as if that were possible anyway) cannot do it. It cannot sanctify me. As much as my body matters in this life and the next, making it thinner cannot make me into a kinder, more empathetic, more Christlike person.

Writing a best-seller cannot do it. No amount of elusive Amazon reviews will do it. No acknowledgments or awards or attention can make me more honest or insightful or articulate. Nor can they convince me I am enough.

The boldest, most well-delivered sermon, the wisest advice given, the most insightful and beautifully crafted writing, the Insta-worthy motherhood moments of age-appropriate crafts and memories…none of it can fill my belly.

In James 5, the writer says, “Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a town and spend a year there, doing business and making money.’ Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wishes, we will live and do this or that.’”

If the Lord wishes…

I am no Calvinist who ascribes to the idea that every moment of history is pre-ordained, and my task is simply to tap into the divine play-by-play. I reject the notion that God is orchestrating the entire universe in such a way as to teach me, or anyone else, a lesson.

But, with gratitude I acknowledge the eternal desire and movement of God to redeem and restore Creation. And in humility, I recognize the divine intention to partner with humans to do that holy work.

The work is far larger than crafting the perfect reading plan, diet, or any other goal I could conjure up, and yet I feel relief. Because it is not about me. It never has been. The fate of the universe does not hinge upon the strength of my willpower to improve myself.

Mercifully, it hinges upon the uncontainable overflow of Triune Love that invites us all to join in the dance of redemption. It is this work alone that satisfies the growling in my stomach. I am unresolved, committed to nothing beyond partnering with God in the everyday obediences and unremarkable faithfulness of the ordinary.

Yes, I will still keep a planner this year. And yes, I will still journal a few times a week and exercise consistently. I will probably be more mindful of my sugar intake and we might even tweak our family budget. I will persist in diversifying and deepening my reading. I likely even seek out a new spiritual director in this part of the country since my last one refused to move with me to Ohio.

But these “goals,” if I chose to call them that, are not the end. They are the practical means of how I will seek to attune my heart to the work of the Spirit in and around me. Tasks accomplished and goals reached will not free from shame nor will they nourish my soul-hunger. It is only in seeking after and saying yes to the invitation of the Spirit today, and again tomorrow, that my soul is satisfied “as with a rich feast.” (Ps. 63:5)

]]><![CDATA[The Grace of the Face]]>Fri, 22 Nov 2019 11:58:16 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/the-grace-of-the-face

We spout and spew through our fingertips. We belittle and ridicule, we mock and shame with a quick tap on a glowing screen. Individuals fade to fuzzy gray and meld into an amorphous anonymous unit: the Other. Names are replaced with categories, identifiers with unmistakable connotations. “Oh her? She’s a democrat. Oh him? He’s conservative. Oh them? They’re gay. She’s black. He’s Latino. Are they even from here?” Just like that, we exonerate ourselves. We need not listen to them because they are Other. We need not show respect because they are Other. We need not control our violent impulses because they are Other, and the Other is less than us.

I have been Other-ed. I have been treated as unworthy of respect and civility. I have been dismissed and had my experience questioned. So have you. But, when I am brave enough to be still, courageous enough to peer into the shadowy recesses of my heart, I see that I have done the same. I have Other-ed. I have belittled and ridiculed. I have dismissed the experience of others as invalid. I have elevated my experience over and above the experience of someone with whom I disagree, convinced that they just don’t understand reality.

At the heart of my new job is discipling emerging adults to grow in love for and obedience to Jesus. I often have difficult conversations with individuals about patterns of behavior and the fruit it is bearing, including the act of Other-ing people through social media. As I sit across from people who were once only a screen name and a thread of mean words, I am transfixed by faces. Their faces. Their eyes tell a thousand stories. The shadows and creases, the freckles, a dimple. Lines of weariness from untold burdens share the stage with smile crinkles at the edges of eyes. The Other takes on flesh, and becomes the Beloved.
We are transformed by the Grace of the Face. Labels, categories, identifiers we assign to people to keep them separate from ourselves lose their power. They are still them and I am still me. We do not become a colorless mass of sameness. But when we allow ourselves to gaze into the face of the Other, Grace floods in. We are both convicted and healed; we are extended mercy for our sin even as our own wounds are bound up in love. Confession can be made; forgiveness is extended and received.

The Grace of the Face. It is no accident that grace comes to us through skin and bones. It is not a fluke that reconciliation and healing occur through embodied encounters. God’s very self sought reconciliation with estranged creation through Incarnation, God-Become-Flesh. Grace in the Face of Jesus. God in Jesus has done it, reconciled us to himself when we were still trash-talking, fingerpointing, blame-denying, Other-rejecting rebels. Through the Grace of the holy Crucified and Resurrected face, with scars on the brow from the crown of thorns, we are being transformed.

May it be so, and may it begin in me.

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.”
2 Corinthians 3:17-18

]]><![CDATA[Showing up]]>Sun, 06 Oct 2019 18:52:14 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/showing-up

Matt Kean

It has been crickets on the newsletter front, friends. The last three months have been a whirlwind as we have settled into our new home in Mount Vernon, OH and I have jumped in the deep end of my new role as
Campus Pastor at MVNU.

I began the job on July 8th with two very unique challenges: populating an entire chapel speaker schedule for the Fall semester and staffing my entire office with new people.  It was all-consuming work, but the Lord showed up, leading me to vibrant speakers and brilliant teammates to come alongside me in the Campus Ministries Office.

As preoccupied as I was by those two enormous tasks, along with familiarizing myself with the campus and culture, I did not tackle the lengthy lists of sermons and devotionals I was to give during Lead Week and Welcome Week of the impending semester.  Sometimes, you cannot know what needs to be said until you have lived among a people and taken in the lay of the land for a bit.

But, the day finally came when I had to sit down and face the pile of devotionals, services, and sermons to plan and write: 2 devotionals, 5 services, and 4 sermons- all to be given in a 10-day period of time.  In what can only be described as sheer horror, I stared at the blank pages before me and did what only the godliest of preachers ever do: I panicked.

I got up and went to the desk of my very-brand-new office coordinator and, with as much grace and dignity as I could muster, said, "I can't do this." Instead of quitting on the spot as would have been her right seeing her leader in such a state, she gently said, "Have you eaten? Why don't you finish your lunch outside, maybe away from you desk?"

Dutifully, I listened and obeyed.  I went outside and found some steps in the shade where I could eat my yogurt in some semblance of peace. And wouldn't you know it, the Lord showed up.  As I was still for a moment, nourishing my body and breathing deeply, the Spirit stirred in my heart and I knew exactly what the first sermon would be about.  I gulped down the rest of the yogurt and sprinted back to the office to write it out.

For the next two weeks, it happened over and over again.  The Lord showed up, smack dab in the middle of my need.  Toward the end of the marathon that was the first week of the semester, I was so tired and distracted, I crashed my bike on the way home from the office and hit the asphalt face first.  I sat at home with a swollen, oozing cheekbone, with nothing but a sermon outline and 12 hours to turn it into a sermon (plus sleep a little...)

But once again...the Lord showed up.  The words came freely and, the following morning, I was able to preach a good but challenging word to my new parish- swollen, torn-up cheekbone and all.

"I was pushed hard so that I was falling (literally...off a bicycle),
but the Lord has helped me.
The Lord is my strength and my might;
He has become my salvation."
Ps. 118:13-14

Everyday in chapel, we pray a simple welcoming prayer, inviting the Triune God to be present among us.  We pray aloud,
"There is no place where You are not,
yet we are often unaware of Your presence."

How true it is.  The Lord is present among us, yet we are often unaware, consumed as we are by the tasks at hand, the mess occasionally within us and beyond us.  I do not wish upon you the whirlwind that has been my first couple of months in this job, nor do I wish upon you a nasty bike crash and face wound.  But, I do pray that you have the privilege of facing failure and chaos unless the Lord shows up.  May you find the Lord exceedingly faithful.

"The Lord is faithful in all his words, and gracious in all his deeds.
The Lord upholds all who are falling,
and raises up all who are bowed down."
Ps. 145:13b-14

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]]><![CDATA[Untethered]]>Tue, 18 Jun 2019 12:12:54 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/untethered

How much can change in a month? Enough, and then some.

One month ago, I had the ever-holy privilege of administering the sacrament of Communion to our beloved congregation in Idaho.  I openly wept as I spoke each name, declaring the sacred words again: His body broken for you, His blood shed for you.  Tears streamed down my face, off my nose and chin, right into the cup.  I can only hope that pastoral tears shed for love edify the sacrament and add to the mystery.  (At least one lady did not feel that way.  When she saw me bawling over each blessed person, she very subtly slipped out my line and joined Tommy’s line, who was as always cool as a cucumber.  No tear-enhanced communion for her, thank you very much!)

It seems a lifetime ago, but no.  Only a month.  Now, I am 1,852 miles away from what was home, having traveled through seven states, passed through two time zones, and slept in seven beds that were not my own. Our house in Ohio will close on July 3rd, so until then, we are the Lobdell Wanderers, low-level vagabonds reliant upon the hospitality of friends and family.

I wish I was a person who saw disruptions as opportunities for great adventure, and I can be in short spurts.  With great enthusiasm, I point out the awe-inspiring rock formations of Wyoming and make everyone get out of the car in the rain to take a soggy picture in front of Lake Michigan.  I say, “Look how lucky we are, to see so many friends and family that love us so well,” as we plod through state #6.

But the adventure wears thin as the kids tire of the novelty, and I find myself longing for home.  It is a longing that cannot be satisfied, because where is home?  It is no longer in our beloved #Idahome in our sweet little brick 1950 house.  It is not yet in Ohio, not merely because we can’t move into our house yet.  Ohio is foreign, unfamiliar.  Home feels like the wind, passing by but never lingering. Flashes of familiarity but with no staying power.

When it became clear that we would be transitioning to Ohio, I asked one thing of the Lord: that the Lord would untether my heart from Idaho and the church I loved so deeply, so that I might love my new parish, unusual a parish as it may be, and love it well.
Untether.  To separate or unbind.  To pastor is give oneself over to a people, to tether one’s life to the life of a unique community for the sake of Christ for as long as God ask you to do so.  It is costly, but it is the hard, beautiful way of shepherding.  But the untethering, the separating in order to be bound to another in service and love, is costly as well. It feels like a rending within me, a rending that apparently produces enough tears to refill the communion chalice.

But here I am, untethered for the moment.  Without a home for a brief season, a bit fatigued by the adventure of it all.  And yet, I am hopeful.  I am hopeful because I feel the Spirit stirring in me, gathering up the frayed ends of my love and pastoral devotion.  She is weaving them together, preparing my shepherd heart to be tethered in love and service to another, what will become my beloved congregation: MVNU.

I wait in the in-between space, the already but not quite yet.  It is a good place to be. It is a place reminiscent of that coming Kingdom of God for which we wait expectantly, in full trust of God’s intention to create a good future for Creation, and even perhaps for me and for you.

As for my longing for home, I am comforted and challenged by the words of Fredreick Beuchner who said, “I believe that home is Christ’s kingdom, which exists both within us and among us as we wend our prodigal ways through the world in search of it.”
May I find my home in Christ and give myself over fully to the waiting, resting in hope.

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]]><![CDATA[In Due Season]]>Tue, 30 Apr 2019 15:58:34 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/in-due-season

It has been quiet on the newsletter front for awhile. The last couple of months have brought about dramatic changes, the biggest of which I could not disclose until the time was right. A little over two weeks ago, my husband and I announced our resignation from the lead pastorate we share in Mountain Home, Idaho. I have accepted the position as the Campus Pastor (formerly titled Chaplain) at Mount Vernon Nazarene University in Mount Vernon, Ohio. (Read more about it here!)

I did not think it possible to experience every human emotion in one fell swoop, but I can now testify that it is absolutely possible. I am filled with joy and hope for the work ahead, while I am also heavy with grief at leaving a congregation I have loved deeply.  I am excited and eager to learn and grow in this new position, and yet also nagged by doubts and insecurities concerning my abilities and qualifications.  I am grateful that my husband and I will have a chance to flourish in our own ways, and yet I mourn the end (for now at least) of this decade-long season of co-pastoring.

There are many unknowns ahead.  While I will still be a pastor, it will be a very different parish. I have a great deal to learn. Then of course, there are the “practical bits” that consume my thoughts...bits like like preschool enrollment, packing every blessed possession (why do I need four 9x13 pans??), moving across the country, finding a house.  We have yet to find a home that both meets our needs and our budget. At times, I am overwhelmed by this particular uncertainty. I imagine us camped out on the university lawn, with no house to live in, cooking hotdogs over a propane stove while college kids scurry by, eyes wide in horror.

A couple days ago, I flipped to Psalms 104, the assigned psalm of the day.  The text describes the majesty of creation as the Psalms often do, but the Psalmist goes beyond mere description. The writer describes the Lord’s active hand at work in all things: You set the foundations of the earth…You make springs gush forth…You cause the grass to grow for the cattle.  It is not a scientific play-by-play of “how we got streams” but rather a declaration of trust in the lordship of God, the source of all life.  It is a confession of faith: You are Lord.  I am not.  All of creation looks to God, even worried, anxious pastors embarking on new adventures, for God to “give them their food in due season…when you open your hand they are filled with good things.”  We are reliant upon God’s generosity and care.  It is only when God "sends forth the Spirit” that we are created.

I am chastened.  The God who calls, makes a way.  The God who creates, provides.  The God who invites, accompanies us on the journey.  Breathe on me, Spirit of God.  Recreate me once again.  Reorder my anxious heart that I might have eyes to see all that you have done and long to do in and through me.

Take courage, dear one.  The Lord is with you.  In due season, God will provide all your needs according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

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]]><![CDATA[Disruptive Honesty]]>Wed, 27 Feb 2019 01:48:31 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/disruptive-honesty

These past three weeks have been a wild ride in our house with three separate trips to three very different parts of the country. I love ya, Southwest, but we need some space. It's not you, it's definitely me.

A snapshot...

Me to M19, the Nazarene USA/Canada quadrennial gathering in Kansas City

(72 hrs. at home as a family)

Tommy to Las Vegas for a football coach training seminar
(12 hrs. at home as a family)
Me to MVNU, a Nazarene University in Ohio to preach and lead a seminar.

I was anxious about going to the M19 conference for a number of reasons (read about that here), but it turned out to be a wonderful experience, largely in part because I decided from the first moment I was on site to be honest, 100% honest.  Among other pastors and leaders, when someone asks you “How are things going?” it is all too easy to roll the highlight reel, a verbal version of our instagrammed life and ministry.

But no.  For the sake of my own soul, I knew I could no longer play those games.  I was honest.  I shared the good stuff, the new believers, the prodigals returned, the slow and steady discipleship.  But I also shared the broken stuff, the people that left over petty differences in hurtful ways, the flagging giving, the dips in attendance, and the lying voice of anxiety that tries to pin all the church’s disorder on me alone.

A couple weeks later as I spoke at MVNU with students, faculty, and other clergy, I pledged to do the same: honesty, no matter the cost. No false images.  No pretending that I am a walking finished product.  No subtle status cue-ing.  I had the privilege of sharing in a Wellness Workshop about my almost 14-year journey with mental illness.  No lies there either.  No veneer.  No false declarations of healing, but rather honest, vulnerable words about God’s sustaining power and refining work in my life in the midst of a persistent, chronic struggle.

And wouldn’t you know it…in almost every single conversation I had, whether it was with a pastor, a professor, a student, or faculty member, my honesty was met with a grateful sigh, more often than not followed by an honest account of the good and the broken in their own life.  Shoulders visibly slackened, faces lost their tension, eyes lightened.  Stories poured out, not litanies of cynical complaints and blame shifting, but honest stories of triumphs and losses, and the acknowledgement of the personal cost of both.

As I tried to describe the experience to my husband over the phone, he said simply, “Steph, you have the unusual gift of disruptive honesty.”

Disrupt: to cause disorder or turmoil; to radically change an industry.
Honesty: truthfulness, sincerity, frankness

Well, he ain’t wrong.

I don’t know when the shift occurred, but at some point during the last ten years of full-time vocational ministry, I decided that I love Jesus very much and wanted to follow him with all my heart and I was no longer willing to lie about what hurts.

It has been a costly decision in some ways.  Some leaders have pushed back against my speech, written and otherwise, suggesting that my vulnerability is not becoming of the office I hold as pastor.  I bare my soul for the world to see (okay, a few hundred readers max), and I often feel like my whole body is covered by fresh, new skin, unsettlingly sensitive to the slightest breeze.  I am exposed, and I am often left feeling raw.

But, I also have a heart and mind full of emails, text messages, notes, and coffee dates with individuals who have experienced the freedom of the Spirit through my witness, through that disruptive honesty that will no longer hide behind the veneer of Christian propriety.  Women who have also wrestled with the beast that is depression have embarked upon their course of study for the ministry.  Men that have hidden in shame from their own pastoral anxiety have opened the door just a crack and found that they are not alone.

But don’t thank me.  Don’t even look at me, lest you think that somehow my voice has wrought any change.  Eyes on Jesus, friend.  Like Paul, I will boast only of my weakness.  For it is there in the disruptive honesty of my confession that I find the Lord saying over me ever so gently, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.”

Love Jesus, friend.  Follow Him.  And quit lying about what hurts. Freedom awaits. Deep breaths and sighs of relief, and, best of all, the blessed opportunity for genuine Christian community when we lay down the masks.

Grace and peace to you.

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]]><![CDATA[Diagnosis: Pre-Conference Panic]]>Sat, 09 Feb 2019 15:35:17 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/diagnosis-pre-conference-panic

It never fails. I sign up for a conference, excited to see friends and family, eager to learn new things, giddy about attending a worship service I am not in charge of for once…and then it hits. The pre-conference panic.

I know that I will be inundated with information, much of it incredibly important and useful.

I know I will hear amazing stories of faithfulness, of “what’s working” and how lives are being transformed.

I know I will be immersed in new ideas and exposed to innovative practices.

Suddenly, the Liar ups his game in convincing me how woefully inadequate I am, how little I actually know.  I hear the whispers, reminding me of the failures of my own work or, even worse, the whispers of the futility of my work.  I panic, wondering how I will master and implement all the new things I am “supposed” to be doing.  I feel that creeping vine of comparison climbing up my body, its tendrils curling around my neck, trying to choke hope and peace.

Why did I sign up for this again?

A few weeks ago, I was meeting with an amazing lady from our congregation who was exploring the possibility of serving as leader of a ministry in our church.  The denominational-level description of the job is enough to make any grown person burst into tears and run for the hills with its wildly expansive expectations.  I could see the worry cloud her face, silently declaring I canNOT do this.  I assured her that our expectation was not a 100% implementation of every facet of this program, but rather one or two primary tasks, experiments you might say, both to educate and engage the congregation.  “Let’s do this one thing well and see what happens.” Relief flooded her face and we both smiled.

So, as I prepare for this upcoming denominational conference, here’s my pastoral pep talk…to myself.

Listen and learn from others without passing judgment on yourself constantly.
Allow the Spirit to inspire your imagination for your specific context; reject the copycat temptation.
Pick one or two things you can try in the near future. Experiment boldly, but don’t attach your worth to it, whether it fails or succeeds!
Celebrate the faithfulness and successes of others and constantly be attentive to that creeping vine of comparison. Prune it continually until one day, please Lord, it gives up.
ENJOY the gift of Christian community and resist cynicism and critique, if only for a few days. Rejoice and be glad for the blessing of your denominational family, with all its warts, dysfunctions, and challenges.

So here I go! Eyes fixed on you Jesus. Ever and always, fixed on you.

]]><![CDATA[Waiting in the wings]]>Thu, 20 Dec 2018 16:57:58 GMThttps://www.stephanielobdell.com/blog/waiting-in-the-wings

It’s been 88 days since I last preached...

As co-pastors, my husband and I share the task of preaching, often switching every other week, and occasionally preaching in three to four week blocks. The plan was for my husband to preach through October. Then I would bring us home to Advent by preaching through November.  I was ready to roll with a Ruth series.

But plans change.  The last few months at church have been challenging with both attendance and giving down, and not a little bit.  It’s not uncommon, particularly in a military town, for the congregation to undergo frequent shifts, some positive some negative.  This particular shift had been negative.  And I internalized it all.  For weeks, I would return home from church and sob over lunch, convinced we, but mostly I, was failing in every way as a pastor.  I had once joyfully anticipated each Sunday; now I was filled with dread.  A cloud of doom settled on me every Saturday night and I braced myself for the coming reminder the next day of my failure and inadequacy.

In the midst of this secret suffering and shame, a parishioner came to us with what he said was a “Word from the Lord.”  Nothing strikes fear into the heart of a pastor than those few words, not because we fear a Word from the Lord but because that language is often used by immature Christians who have a specific agenda, usually about the worship songs or the sermon series, the version of the Bible you use or the carpet color.

I wish the Word had been about carpet color.  That would have been easier.  But no, It was a Word to me, and it was truer than true.

Stop preaching, the man said to me.  You are so proud, so bold and strong, and yet so fragile, defensive and afraid.  All this, the church, those pews, the offering plates, the pulpit, the whole thing, they ain’t yours.  We don’t need you to impress us.  We need you to love us.  We love you, but we won’t be your trophy.  So stop.  Stop preaching.  Tommy’s got this.  You need to sit still and let yourself be loved.  Loved for who you are, not for what you do, for your brilliance or wisdom.

I laughed.  Then I cried. Then I yelled a bit.  Right there in the office.  I resisted.  I fought back.  And then I submitted.  I had been brought low by some modern day Micah.  I obeyed, in part out of fear of what new Word from the Lord might come if I didn’t, and in part because I knew every word he said was true.  As much as I wanted to rebel and scream, “You don’t know!  You don’t know me, or what I need!  I will preach through Ruth if it kills me,” I realized I wanted to heal more.

88 days.  It has been a lengthy wrestling match between God and myself, usually on Sunday mornings as I get ready to go not preach.  I have begun to see myself clearly. Proud, yet so fragile.  An image of success and wisdom and even insightful cleverness, but defensive, afraid, consumed with those external, measurable indicators of success preachers have to stare down week after week.

At first, this preaching hiatus felt like the harshest of divine discipline, but ultimately I discovered it to be the greatest divine kindness.  Slowly, slowly, my heart softened and
I found God waiting in the wings, for me to get off the stage so He could bind up my wounds. For weeks, everything I saw, read, and heart pointed me back to one truth: my belovedness in Christ to God. I openly wept every blessed Sunday, as the Spirit met with me, lavishly pouring out gifts, reminders, promises.

My congregation did not comment on my absence from the pulpit. Most assumed Tommy just wanted to do a longer series, or that I was finishing writing my book.  I didn’t correct them.  I simply took a back seat in everything.
I humbled myself over and over, quietly playing second, even third fiddle.

Click to tweet!

During a small group Advent lesson, as I led a group discussion on John the Baptist and his call to repentance, I shared the tiniest sliver of my journey, of God’s hand upon me and His refining work in my life. People were kind…and very quiet.  Most folks are not accustomed to bearing witness to pastoral confession of weakness and submission to the Lord’s discipline in their lives.  But they received it and me with love.  They are just so good.

Sunday came as it had been coming, quietly and still slightly achy.  While I still missed the pulpit, I was at peace with God’s stilling hand, but now slightly anxious about my return to the pulpit in a few weeks.  I walked though the foyer, going about small pre-service tasks when a small senior lady from the Wednesday night class stopped me.

I have something I need to say to you.

Please God, not another Word from you.  And not in the foyer.  I didn’t handle the last Word with a great deal of grace and poise.  With trepidation, I responded, “Oh?  What is it?”

She began, "When you first came, I told myself, Okay fine.  She can be a lady speaker.  That will be just fine. But not my pastor. Not a lady. Three years ago in my garden, I remember it was three years ago because the beans were across from the berries that year, God spoke to me.  He said, “Who are you to decide who I have anointed?”  I said, You’re right Lord.  She is my pastor.  Now Pastor, you are anointed.  Anointed to preach the Word.  Don’t forget that.  You are anointed.  Do not fear. Do what you were made to do."

On a regular day, I would have been grateful and inspired by this elderly Jesus follower’s transformation from rejecting a female preacher to embracing one, and I was.  But, more than that, I was stunned by God’s persistent kindness to me.  That he would reach down through this woman, this woman who marks time by beans and berries, and call me back to the pulpit. What holy extravagance.

I had begun to doubt, to wonder if perhaps the pulpit was not the place for me, me with my wounds of pride and fear and anxiety. Perhaps, the Lord was leading me away from the task of proclamation.  I had been so afraid, afraid to return to the pulpit and fall prey to the same patterns as before, to the same debilitating fears and worries, the same defensive mechanisms. My precious gardening parishioner could never have known all that.  But the Spirit did.

I say it aloud to myself:

You are anointed.  Do not fear.

You are anointed.   Do not fear.

In two weeks, I will return to the pulpit.  My wounds, my patterns, my hurts are not resolved, but I am on my way to wholeness, eyes fixed on Jesus.  I will be on this way, this Highway to Holiness, for the rest of my life.  But, I rest in the gift of the knowledge that I am anointed, called to this task.  It has very little to do with me, and every bit to do with the Spirit, the Spirit of the Lord that falls upon God’s daughters and sons.  On me. On you, to do whatever calling you have been given.

You too are anointed, perhaps to proclaim the word from a pulpit, or perhaps to another vocation…to lead with Christlike humility and wisdom, to serve with generosity of spirit, to give freely without limit, to teach with patience and kindness.

The Spirit of the Lord is still falling, falling, falling upon God’s daughters and sons, inviting us all to faithful participation in God’s redemptive work. It is an invitation that, when accepted, transforms, refines, and sanctifies. But above all, it is an invitation stitched together with the cords of divine kindness. Do not fear obedience, Beloved.  Do not fear the discipline of the Lord. Do not fear submission and cleansing.   God is kind, persistently, shockingly, doggedly so, for our good.

May our hearts be open to receive the Spirit that falls, and may our hands and feet ready to obey.

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