Pause. Rest. Sabbath. Stopping.

Islandic ways for a pilgrim priest to walk through a Sunday.

To begin the day, I walked down the hill and up one hundred steps to worship at Akureyrikirkja. It turned out that it was children’s worship today, which included much singing with dancing, leaping, and hand motions with a bevy of blond haired children. Of course all of the worship was in Icelandic, but the familiar Gospel about Sakkeus (Zaccheus) was easily understood. Joy and delight.

After a “small” dipped cone at the place reported to have the best ice cream in Iceland, my friend and I were off on a road trip to what we called the top of the world–scenic driving and stopping along Tröllaskagi.

The day included poking in and out of churches, breath-taking vistas, endless pastures polka-dotted with sheep of a variety of colors, a picnic overlooking the fjord, yarn shopping in the grocery store, and cappuccinos sipped outside overlooking a harbor.

The highlight of the day was a happenstance stop at the church in Ölafsfjarðar. The priest, Sigríður Munda Jönsdöttir, was just leaving for the day, and graciously stopped to tell us about the church. This led to wonderful conversation about their outreach ministry with children. Our time together ended with praying the Lord’s Prayer in our own language.  As Sigríður kept saying, “We are all one.”  After hugs all around and contacts exchanged, we parted with big smiles at how God had brought us together that day.

Pause. Rest. Sabbath. Stopping.

Hlé. Hvíld. Hvíldardagur. Stöðva.

Yesterday’s five hour drive from Reyjkavik to Akureyri in the far north of Iceland ended up taking my friend and me nine hours–not for any reason except that we get easily distracted and like to stop and look. This time, jet lagged as we were, we also had to pull over for two fifteen minute naps along the way. 

Today we decided we would have a walking day. We spent most of the day walking hilly Akureyri, jacket hoods up and down depending on the rain, doing the same kind of easily distracted traveling that we usually do in the car. 

Walking with a friend, that means there is twice the stopping and starting.  With the extra stopping, more not so tiny treasures get found. 

A place to stop and draw in an art museum. 

Painted sidewalks. 

Stoplights reimagined after the 2008 financial crisis in Iceland. 

Stopping meant an interesting extended conversation with a shopkeeper. As is often the practice, Icelanders want to know where you are from. When my friend replied to the shopkeeper’s query that I was from Houston, and that, yes, I had flooded, five feet worth, his look of deep compassion was unexpected. He began to talk about how distressed the Icelanders were with the devastation;  he was even more distraught about the response of Pastor Joel Osteen to the flood, as had been reported in the news in Iceland. Iceland!

This gives me pause. I don’t know the whole front and backstory of Pastor Osteen’s actions. As clergy who has made her own pastoral mistakes, I want to give him the benefit of the doubt. However, I am struck how viral such actions of perceived neglect from a person of enormous wealth and professed faith are noticed and remembered.  Especially when there was so very, very much more extraordinary responses offered, some of which the shopkeeper did speak also. 

Still, this is why we Christians must always strive to be known by our acts of love, so that is the Gospel that is always preached. People near and far notice. 

I ended the day praying LiveFeed Compline with my friends at St. Mary’s.  Revd. Alan will post it seven hours afterwards in St. Mary’s Compline hour. In the midst of the sunset outside my hotel window, a rainbow shone. 

In the morning, I’ll walk down the hill to the local church for Sunday worship; I understand it’s their version of “Rally Sunday.” That should make for a lively beginning of the day. 

Meanwhile. I’ll end in Icelandic for good bye:  Bless Bless. 

7.30 on Friday morning. I’m having coffee at Keflavik airport. 

Wednesday morning, I awoke to an email invitation to participate in an online study called, “How to Travel Like a Pilgrim.” How could I not say yes?

As I’ve journeyed and waited and journeyed and waited, I’ve spent time reading and listening to the excellent resources written by Lacy Clark Elman.  
Lacy invites each pilgrim to select a theme. Mine is thresholds. 

A threshold is the place where we go from one space to another. Metaphorically, it can represent a time of transition.  Lacy writes, “Those who wait at the threshold are at the cusp of great change, aware that things have shifted……”  The massive flooding in Texas will do that. 

I feel immersed in changes right now, and so as I travel from one place into another on the Icelandic vacation now become pilgrimage, I’ll spend time pondering and praying about doorways and passages and doors open and doors shut and doors that have floated away. 

But now I am very jet-lagged. So I’ll simply be present with my latte and the voices of people from all over the world. 

At this very moment, I was scheduled to be on a plane to Iceland.  Except I’m sitting on a couch in the Miller’s home writing this.

As  I walked through the days after my second flood in less than two years, a place of joy  was anticipating the trip my friend and I had planned several months ago to go again to Iceland.

The last time I went to Iceland, it was only weeks after the Tax Day Flood.  My friend, whose home is in Georgia, had been visiting me when during that storm and had gone through the flooding with me. In Iceland we found healing and beauty and rest.

We planned this return trip to Iceland sitting on the couches of the Cuellars’ home, my temporary housing this past year.  We would go to the places we hadn’t visited the last time, and we would celebrate my return home to the beautifully restored Rectory.

Then Hurricane Harvey changed everything.

In the days after the flooding, I began to replace items destroyed by five feet high flood waters.  I quickly ordered a new coat, suitcase, art supplies, and shoes to replace those destroyed in this second flood, and I had them delivered to my friend in Georgia since mail service was uncertain in Houston.

Then Hurricane Irma began it’s own destructive path. Weather projections placed its route through Georgia about the time we were scheduled to fly out of Atlanta.

This morning, after a day and night of Irma’s torrential rain and roaring winds in the Georgia mountains, my friend has awakened to downed trees, blocked roads, and no electricity.   Even though Irma has passed, it is not likely she could have made it to the airport.  Thankfully on Sunday we had been able to change our travel plans and are on a flight to Iceland on Thursday.

With two extra days in Houston, I can continue to  prepare to move into my new temporary house.   I’ll have two extra days to make sure things are well in the parish before I leave.

God has brought me in safety to this new day.  The birds are singing.  I’ve had coffee and eaten breakfast while enjoying the hospitality of friends.  Soon I will get in a car generously loaned to me by still other friends and go to a job that I love. I have hope and possibilities and resources beyond measure.

There is a prayer from the New Zealand Prayer Book that Rev. Katie+ prayed during a Facebook Live worship.  It’s a prayer that we can all hold on to in the midst of the changes and chances of this life.

God of the present moment,                                                                                                            God who in Jesus stills the storm
And soothes the frantic heart;
                                                                                                        Bring hope and courage to all people in uncertainty,
                                                                  Bring hope that you will make us the equal of whatever lies ahead.                                      Bring us courage to endure what cannot be avoided, for your will is health and wholeness;  

You are God, and we need you.
       AMEN