Following the Fool

Following the Fool

            Today I want to share the story today of what launched me on this journey into the Wild. In the Fall of 2014, I had served as the pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Whitesboro, Texas for over four and half years. It had been a wonderful time, yet I felt myself getting disconnected. Bored. Not looking forward to going to the church building and participating in the ministry of the church.

            This church of 65 members, located a few miles west of Sherman, Texas had done many wonderful things while I was there. Started a Saturday morning community breakfast in their fellowship hall that served between 100-150 people each week. Participated in a mission trip to Guatemala. Renovated the 1878 sanctuary, last updated in the 1950’s.  Offered tutoring to 3rd graders from a local elementary school. Loved one another and the community.  Learned, worshipped, shared with one another.  I was thankful to be their pastor. It had been a great experience. Yet I felt pulled away.  Why?  I didn’t know. I was troubled by what I felt. I really didn’t like feeling this way.

            In October 2014 I had a dream.  I had been listening to my dreams for several years and worked with a Jungian therapist named Suzi to help me draw meaning from them.  In the dream, my friend Freddie Smith and I were security guards for a convention center hosting a religious conference.  We were to let the “right” people in and keep the “wrong” people out.  A man came up to us acting all crazy.  I told the man he could not come in.  He must leave.  He didn’t.  He just kept acting like a fool.  So, I put him face down on the floor, borrowed Freddie’s handcuffs and cuffed him, stood him up, and waited for the police to come and take him away. 

            In my work with Suzi, I have learned to use active imagination to re-enter a dream. I sat in my prayer chair, replayed the dream in my head, and when the fool came up acting crazy, I asked him what he wanted. He told me he wanted me to come with him.  In that moment, I knew I had heard a deep truth.  I must go with him. I did not understand what that meant, only that I would follow that fool.  I would be leaving First Presbyterian Church of Whitesboro.

            I shared this dream and the active imagination with Suzi. She saw the new movement. My life was about to break open and break out. It would be foolish. It would be life-giving. I felt excitement and nervousness stirring.

            A few weeks later I attended a retreat with Suzi and Jim, another therapist, at the Crescent Moon Retreat Center. During the retreat I shared about my work at First Presbyterian Church, Whitesboro.  After finishing, one member of the group said, “You sound bored.”  Truth washed over me.   I was bored.  Suzi asked me, if I was willing, to share my dream about the fool. I did. The group then told me that I had an excitement in my voice and light in my eyes.  I needed to pay attention to that dream. I needed to follow that fool.

            In March 2015 I announced to the Session that I was leaving the church to begin this new adventure.  I told them I was being called by Christ to a time apart and that I had no idea what that looked like or what that meant.  I would leave after the first Sunday of June.

            This decision to leave this church was difficult for me.  It meant leaving the place I fully believed God had called me five years earlier.  I so enjoyed my work there. I also enjoyed my full-time income. Though my wife had a good job with a good income and insurance, we would soon have two kids in college. I would be contributing little in terms of money.  That was a hit upon my male ego.

            In leaving, I felt a sadness and a grief which was more than leaving these people whom I loved. It was a sadness around leaving my work at the church.  We had good worship, good Sunday school and bible studies, good fellowship, and good spirit in the church. But I was being called to something other, something beyond who I was as a church pastor. I have three theological degrees.  I have thirty years of experience serving the local church. Yet I knew I would not find what the Fool was calling me to be in the local church, at least not at this time. I had to leave and go out.

            The decision to leave was also easy.  I had within me a deep YES to this new adventure, a sense of excitement building within me.  I didn’t know how long it would last but I knew I had to do it.  Now four and half years later, this foolish journey is still unfolding.  Each day I still wonder.  Each day I say YES again.