Ending Well [Levi Holland]

Leaving a place that has become home is difficult. It’s unnatural really. We connect to a place and a people, understand the lay of the land and the ethic of a society. To simply uproot is not only becoming increasingly unpopular within a “local movement” orientation, but it is incredibly painful. This is a story about my family doing just that, uprooting from one place to replant ourselves in another.

Ending well, as I have learned, is an artform, not a template. When I told 30 students and their families that I was going to be resigning from my post in Syracuse, NY and headed to Lee’s Summit, MO, there was work to be done. My experience lent me to believe that when pastors’ said “God has called me elsewhere,” that it was a cop out for saying, “I would rather be somewhere else, or there is better opportunity anywhere but here.”  Ending well was going to require brutal honesty, painful vulnerability, and integrity that communicated a sense of calling rather than a sense of abandonment.

At this juncture, language is pivotal. Our inclination is to say whatever is going to get us out of an acute pain situation. “God has called me,” is hard to argue with. Yet that language can be devastating as it paints a picture of a God that has no sensitivity. After all, we had been called to a place, to invest in a people, to learn the land – and now we are leaving? The truth is, the work is never done. There is always more to do. This is where our language, even in the midst of confusion and anxiety, can fortify or crumble our communities. The truth is, our time with our people, in that place, in that land, formed and shaped us in a crucible of humility and service to be sent from this traditional community gathering to the grass roots of Lee’s Summit, Missouri to “be” in our neighborhoods, to “know” our neighbors, and to “become” part of the culture and the land. It wasn’t a better opportunity, it was where we had been formed to fit. It wasn’t a greener grass situation, it in fact costs everything that is comfortable to participate in a mission that is not our own.

Ending well took time. It took time to be sad, time to be numb, time to be angry, time to gain perspective, and time to simply be together. Leaving a people, a place, a worshiping community is not natural. Understanding that neither our resources nor our relationships are ours to possess, but a gift to be received, ought to shape our perspective to invest in people with intentionality.

Our ministry is not ours, but only that which we have joined in alongside.  In this truth, we have been shaped and sent knowing that God continues to shape and form those we left and will continue to shape and form those to whom we are sent.

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[Image by Roman, CC via Flickr]