As I write this entry I am sitting on the seawall at Kinvarra, a small village on the south side of Galway Bay. I have been in Galway for just over two weeks now, where I am volunteering as a fill-in pastor for a congregation whose pastor just left to take another charge. This is the fifth time I have had the privilege of sharing in an Irish congregation for an extended period, and it is another blessing to me. And I hope it is helpful to the church…

While I am here Nancy is working in Vietnam as an English Language Specialist under the State Department’s Fulbright program. She will be there for the two months I am in Galway, then I go back to Greensboro and she goes on to volunteer as an English Language teacher trainer for Project Mercy, in Yetebon, Ethiopia. She gets back to Greensboro in early October, and I leave late that month to teach in Albania for several weeks. Life is interesting!

The ministry in Galway is probably the most unusual I have ever had. That is because the church is a Methodist-Presbyterian African Irish church. Some years ago the Methodist church and the Presbyterian church in Galway, each of which had an historic presence in the city, decided to join forces. Each was quite small and it made sense to unify. So they did, and every eight years there is a change in pastoral leadership and the new pastor comes from the other denomination. The African presence is partly because some Africans came to Ireland when the Celtic tiger was roaring, but mostly as a result of Ireland’s open policy regarding asylum seekers. That policy may be changing because of the changes in the economy of the nation, but for years people fleeing persecution could land on Ireland’s shores, formally seek asylum, and they would be kept, fed and housed until their claim could be adjudicated—a process which takes years.

Because of this mix of peoples and traditions the worship is lively, exceptionally diverse, and somewhat chaotic. There are thirty or forty adults in worship, which for a Protestant church in the Republic of Ireland is substantial, and about 60% are African. There are lots of children, all from African families, plus a smattering of tourists. The regulars mix remarkably well, and each adds to the whole. The church sponsors and member staff a Wednesday informal gathering of people, which usually means asylum seekers and their children. There is playing, drumming lessons, and tea and biscuits. Three days a week the doors are open for six hours and a member of the church is there for drop-ins who just want to talk or pray with someone. And there is the mid-week Bible study which I lead.


The net result of this is that while my responsibilities at the church are clear and important—Sunday mornings, Wednesday evenings, and any other pastoral needs, there is actually a lot of free time. And with Nancy half a world away that defaults to cycling jaunts. So, even though the weather is usually pretty damp, I have explored the Galway area, the Donegal area, and the area south of Galway, the Burren. Living in the church manse as a home base, I expect that the west of Ireland will become pretty well known to me and my bike by the time I leave.

The other day I was musing about the Ackles family—a wife in a time zone six hours ahead of me, one daughter and family five hours behind and another eight hours behind. Conference calls would be pretty hard to maintain, but with Skype and internet an amazing amount of communication is possible. And that is nice…I also was thinking about this season of life, and thanking God for the health and resources to live and serve him as we do now. As The Preacher wrote in Ecclesiastes, There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven…(Ecclesiastes 3:1) I believe that one of the keys to life in Christ is discerning the season we are in and the activity which is fitting for that season. It does no good to look back on another season and long for it again, or to look ahead to a season that may or may not be. Life is a series of seasons, and in each we have a unique call and unique opportunity. That uniqueness is a gift from God and something we need to recognize and engage in fully. We do not live in the was or the will be, but we live in the are—and God has a plan for us right there…

Nancy and I have stopped on a ridge overlooking the Barrow Valley in County Carlow, Ireland. We had a delightful Irish breakfast at a local garden center, and have been driving around, revisiting areas we had spent time in while serving the Carlow Presbyterian church for two months two years ago.

We flew into Belfast last Thursday and spent time with friends in Lisburn, where in 2003 I had done a pulpit exchange with David Bruce. We had lunch at the seaside and strawberry shortcake at Oatlands, a berry growing farm just outside Lisburn. We also visited the local Moravian Church where we were given a tour by the daughter of the present inhabitants of the manse. This young woman was quite knowledgeable, even explaining why in the 1800s the pastor, a Greek minor nobleman, had a replica of the Battle of Thermopylae erected in earthworks in the church yard…And she hopes to come to North Carolina in a year to get to know Old Salem, a Moravian center Nancy and I had visited just a week before.



From Lisburn we traveled via Kells (Book of Kells and High Crosses from 700’s) to Carlow, where I preached yesterday. The service was followed by a sumptuous barbecue with friends and a visit with other friends—people we got to know and love in the summer of 2008. We are staying with one of the families the church for two days, and will leave tomorrow for Camolin and a day with a dear friend from our time in Adelaide Road (Dublin) where I preached for two months in 2007. After that we will pass through Cahir and Fermoy, reconnecting with people we ministered with last September, then to Cork to visit another friend. Finally, on Saturday, we will arrive in Galway, where I will spend the next two months serving the Presbyterian-Methodist church—a primarily African-Irish congregation…I say “I” because Nancy leaves the next Wednesday for 6 weeks in Vietnam as a Fulbright English Language Specialist, then 4 more in Ethiopia training English Language teachers at Project Mercy.

All of which is to say that we are out of Greensboro and away from family now—and we miss them! The doors God has opened for Nancy and me are amazing, but the price to pay is being away from loved ones, especially little ones who are changing so quickly. But that is life and ministry—amazing joy with sacrifice. I think that each of us is called to both, and at most times in life should be able to identify both. We should be able to identify the ministry God has called us to and to experience its joy, while at the same time knowing and experiencing the cost involved in pursuing that ministry. Perhaps that is something about what Jesus meant when he said, Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.…(Matthew 10:39)