Back when I was attending George Fox University, I would drive over the mountain from Newberg to Hillsboro for Thanksgiving with my family. But one year, instead of visiting my parents, I made the long drive to my grandma’s house in Talent, a tiny little town in southern Oregon, and spent the weekend with her. It was a good weekend, and my grandma wanted to know if I’d ever come back again. I thought about it for a minute and asked if maybe we could make Thanksgiving her holiday. I’d just come down every year. She liked that idea. So for 20 years now, I’ve been making the drive down to Talent for Thanksgiving with my grandma.
In those 20 years, my grandpa has died, and my grandma’s been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. So a few things have changed. I do all the cooking now. But a lot of things have stayed the same. We watch Lucille Ball on VHS. We play a game of dominoes each night while eating ice cream and listening to Christmas records. I make cinnamon rolls on Friday morning. And my grandma always asks, “Eric, do you think you’ll be able to come for Thanksgiving next year?” I always say, “Yes!” Which makes her laugh. And I get a hug. “Eric, I love you.” She says it every year while giving me a second hug.
I love her, too. No matter what I face each fall – a dark and stressful season for me – I always have time with my grandma to give me hope, to make me thankful.
I’ll be at my grandma’s house in nine days, and the anticipation has been slowly spreading outward, helping me to see so many other things for which I can be thankful this year. Last Friday, for instance, I got the corrected financial reports for October here at Barclay Press, and I took some time to consider the progress we’ve made since January.
We’ve reduced inventory by 17 percent, we’ve reduced debt by 13 percent, and we’ve increased our reserves by 3-1/2 percent. These are little things. Those reserves, for instance, are the result of just six people making donations of from $10 to $100 a month. But those reserves helped us pay our rent one month, and another month, they made it possible to pay off a line of credit that had come due. (If you want to be one of those people, just click on the Share Stories Change Lives link in the right margin, and donate through Paypal. I would be so thankful for more help!)
There are lots of other things I am thankful for this morning. A hike with friends to Tamanawas Falls on Saturday afternoon. A visit from my youngest sister. Cinnamon roll pancakes at the Blockhouse Cafe in Dayton. Last night’s supermoon.
And just nine days from now, I’ll be getting a hug from my grandma. She’ll be shouting about how much she loves me.
I can’t wait.
Eric Muhr
My third time through
Sometimes it can feel like faith is hard, complex, too much. And we’re not enough. Just like Paul admits in his letter to the Corinthians, we too are aware of our “weakness, fear, and trembling,” of how much we need God. Jen Buck reminds us in this morning’s Fruit of the Vine that this is why God offers us a person, Jesus Christ, instead of principles: “Everything in our lives comes down to Jesus Christ. Many of us find seasons when we come to the end of ourselves – the end of our own human wisdom – and we must depend on the mystery of the power of God working in us.” Jesus makes God’s work visible, tangible, real.
Every once in a while, I read ahead in Fruit of the Vine, curious about where a certain writer might be headed or maybe looking for a message that’s a better fit for my condition than the one assigned. So this is my third reading of Jen’s reflection. On Saturday morning before sitting down with the yearly meeting superintendents of Evangelical Friends Church – North America, these words from Jen were a reminder that “God’s true wisdom comes through our human selves ... despite our fears.” Then on Sunday night after meetings and email exchanges with nearly a dozen writers, this same devotional reflection helped me, in my fatigue, to remember that “God is alive and at work.”
At the end of my time with superintendents on Saturday, we had an agreement that reduces EFC-NA support to Barclay Press next year by 20 percent (a little more than 5 percent of our total budget). At the same time, we have permission to make up those lost funds through contract work supporting the mission, vision, and work of Evangelical Friends Mission and EFC-NA. I don’t know what that means. At least not yet. But Jen’s reminder that I can trust in “God's true wisdom” is what I’m taking to heart.
At the end of my time with writers, we had made significant progress on a new book of poetry, two academic works, two memoirs, and a history. I also picked up and edited short essays from three new contributors, one that I met by accident while checking messages on my computer at a coffee shop Sunday morning. “God is alive and at work.”
Barclay Press is facing difficult decisions, as is each of our yearly meetings. I am convinced that these difficult decisions also present us with powerful opportunities for creative change, and I know God will show us the way through. Especially if we continue to “depend on the mystery of the power of God working in us.”
In this morning’s reflection, Jen offers this prayer, a prayer that I’ll be praying today and for days to come: “Christ, you are the only thing that matters in this life. Thank you that you work through us even when we feel weak.”
Eric Muhr
This wild ride
I’m flying to Canton, Ohio, this weekend for conversations with the superintendents of yearly meetings in Evangelical Friends Church – North America (EFC-NA). We’ll be discussing the future of this organization and its member churches as well as ways to help Barclay Press become a self-sustaining work among Friends. I would appreciate your prayer. The truth is that Barclay Press relies heavily on financial support from each of the six yearly meetings that make up EFC-NA. We will be hard-pressed to make changes. But we must. I am convinced that facing into tough spots and making difficult decisions can open creative potential for growth, efficiency, and efficacy. I am praying that will be what happens (or at least begins to happen) during our time together this coming weekend.
In this morning’s Fruit of the Vine, Dan Cammack shares a story that speaks to my concern. It’s a travel story, one in which Dan and a missionary “are hurtling down a narrow mountain road in the back of an ambulance.” The jeep they started with developed a leak in the right front tire, and “there was no spare ... so we flagged down the ambulance.” There are no seatbelts, and “the young man at the wheel drives like a maniac!”
“This wild ride is exactly why I ask the saints to pray for safety,” Dan writes, and it’s a reminder for us that no matter how comfortable we may feel, the reality is that “life and death are often just a matter of centimeters ... [and] death is always closer than we realize, even when we’re in what we think is the safety of our homes.”
Dan’s message isn’t intended to scare us. This is reality. We’re on a journey, and there is danger along the way. A flat tire. A narrow road. An ambulance with room for a few extra passengers.
We know where we’re headed, but we don’t know if we’re going to make it, and “the young man at the wheel drives like a maniac!” That's why it’s a comfort to be reminded that “our lives are truly in God’s hands wherever we are.”
I’ll be praying for you, and I hope you’ll be praying for us at Barclay Press as well. This is a wild ride. It’s also kind of scary. And I need help remembering that my life is in God’s hands.
Eric Muhr