Our Stories
Seeking a New Focus
By Char Forslund | posted 07/24/2008
"But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." (Matthew 6:33)
Early this spring we discovered that we had guests in our backyard...cute guests, but uninvited. Rabbits! Two or three adorable little rabbits hopping around in our backyard, usually early in the morning or in the late evening. Our mini-dachshund, Sparky, did not think they were as cute as the rest of us and routinely alerted us with incessant barking when they appeared. After a week or so we began to wonder, "Where do they go at night?" Sparky solved that mystery by sniffing and inspecting every floor furnace vent every day...they went to the crawl space under the house! Not so cute!
We discovered they had probably migrated from a nearby golf course and they advised us to locate an extermination expert to prevent becoming: Forslund/Brunson Family and Rabbit Warren. Multiple calls later we learned that the only legal way to attack the problem was by "live trapping". Fine, we didn't want to kill the little critters, just get them to leave. As the technician/trapper explained there are all sorts of rules and regulations to be followed plus a special license. Then we talked about the cost...wow "live trapping" must be a lucrative career choice, but the clincher occurred when the "trapper" informed us that rabbit poop is, and I quote, "Caviar to rats!" Rabbits, maybe...rats? A big all capital NO! His trip through our crawl space determined no rats...yet. So we signed up, paid up, and waited for the traps laden with rabbit enhancing food to go to work...and we waited, and waited and... finally we heard a trap spring shut with a loud snap and raced to the back yard. Yea! We had trapped one of the --- a squirrel! The dutiful trapper appeared and took said squirrel to a new life on someone else's property further "out", and we set to waiting again. Every day we saw less of the rabbits and yet more noise from the crawl space. Hmmm? AND THEN Ron saw a very large orange tabby cat, that no one in our neighborhood knew, squeeze into the hole of the crawl space. (Just to clarify - you do not seal up the crawl space until you know every animal is out...think about it.) So we now added a large cat trap in the crawl space. More dollars. Still no rabbits.
Two days later a dazed and sleepy Dillon met me in the kitchen at 7:00 A.M. "Grandma, I didn't get any sleep! Was that noise all night the cat?"
Making coffee by rote, I nodded, "Yeah, it's definitely the cat howling." When Mr. Trapper arrived mid-morning, a very huge orange tabby cat was raided from our crawl space, angry, clawing, and hissing in the crate on his way to the Humane Society.
Score so far: squirrel – 1, feral cat – 1, rabbits – 0
We never did catch a rabbit! (Wow, a song lyric) but the crawl space is closed, silent, and smell free. I maintain that the squirrel was unlucky, the cat ate the rabbits, and we paid a hefty bill for those results.
At Creekside, we are currently embarking on a process that is a whole lot more complicated and important than our little rabbit hunt. But just like our backyard adventure, we Creeksiders need to have a clear vision of what we are seeking. We need to patiently and collectively focus on the fulfillment of our vision by seeking God, His heart, and His blessing constantly and continually. We do not have a job to do. We do not have a position to fill. We do have to submit and subject ourselves individually under God and Grace so that it is His will being acted out among us.
Ron has been a Covenanter since infancy and I for the 45 years since our marriage. We have held many positions of leadership and teaching through those years. We firmly believe that there are some specific things that need to happen as we seek His will and His way for Creekside.
We need to ALL seek ways of communication as we deal with our efforts to heal and move forward. We all need to practice openness and honesty that addresses our problems through forthright, on going communication within the body and with our leadership. A kind of communication where our leadership team gets input and guidance from members of the body and we honor the work they are doing for all of us. A process of on-going communication where no member of our worship community ever feels "blindsided" again. Through prayer and supplication we need to seek one anotherness and value for every person in our community. That is the process for healing, trusting, and moving joyfully on.
We need to be patient, to understand that there is no hurry. We need to tell one another often and in truthfulness, "God has His hand on the Worship Leader for Creekside. His hand is resting on the shoulder of the person He has chosen to lead the Spiritual Formation of our children. He knows and is embracing the person He is nurturing and growing to be our Pastor. We need to deny fear and seek His wisdom as He leads us and heals us. We need patience.
We need to be expectant and ready for surprises. As much as we all believe that God's desire is to bless Creekside and its ministries we must also believe that His idea of those blessings will be revealed to us only to the extent that we care for and nurture one another and seek His guidance with prayer and patience. God may have incredible surprises ahead!
We need to watch out for the rats! The enemy gloats over our disunity and hurt. The enemy is the Enemy. We must seek one-anotherness. We must stick together. We must talk with and to each other and not about each other. We must build a strong circle of faith and mutual respect. Our leaders must be open and forthright with us through this process. We must respect their efforts and encourage openness and dialogue. We must build trust in our community through honesty, openness, affirmation, and by inviting the body of believers that is "Creekside" into the process. I believe we need to tap the rich well of leadership that inhabits Creekside and make many more of us involved, informed, and expectantly participatory. There is a huge reservoir of experienced leadership at Creekside. Let's drain it and defeat the efforts of the enemy by our open-handed, open hearted togetherness under God and Grace.
We need to know it will be costly! God is requiring change and honesty, and most importantly, the unity of the body under Him...not under a pastor...not under a leadership team... but the unity of all of us under Him. We are not trapping rabbits here! We are going to have to step up to the plate and take responsibility individually and collectively.
The only total, absolute truth is that we serve a present tense God who loves each of us unconditionally.
----So here and now fellow believers---
----Hear and know fellow believers---
The present tense God we serve today requires us to submit to Him, actively seek Him, and above all else believe that the desire of His heart is to bless us.
Lord,
When the focus gets blurred
and who and what we are
has fuzzy edges,
we look to You
to sharpen the view
and remind us who we are...
chosen children,
Yours.
Love and Joy,
Char
To respond to this message, email Char at charforslund@comcast.net.
