The Good Note

B-flat is my favorite key in music. There's just something about the way the frequencies of the notes resonate in your ears when you hear a song played/sung in this key. I'm not sure where I developed the particularity towards such a strange thing in music, but I've always had these sorts of quirks. To make me sound even more like a dork, and to give some contrast, I find the saddest key to be D-minor. You can define what "sad" means in this case.

As I sit here listening to Jason Mraz's new album, "Yes," I'm basically counting down the days until I leave. Speaking of Mraz and music, I will be attending his concert in Vancouver at the end of October. To say that I am excited for this is a severe understatement.

Touching on the topic of Vancouver, I'm every bit as reluctant as I am nervous. I'll be on my own now, and given who I am and some of the things I've struggled with in my life, I question every day about whether or not I'm ready to be doing this. Confidence has never been a strength for me, and so I'll always doubt myself and somewhat return to the things that I know and am comfortable with. However, the fact that I feel this way about moving to Vancouver is the very reason I need to do it. Time and time again in my life where I'm forced to step out into the world, I grow. And this is where the excitement comes in. I'm a bit of a visionary, so I'm always picturing myself in certain cases where I'm making an impact around the people I'm with.

Even though I'm someone that doesn't have confidence, I do have confidence in the fact that I'm being taken care of. During my week of coaching with AIA this past summer, I was my usual self being timid on the first day as I am trying to catch up to the other 4 coaches and finding my place on the team all while needing to perform - meaning that I had to actually teach the kids how to play soccer and teach them about Christ. I forget when I mentioned that I am a pastor, but after the first drill, one of the volunteers, an older lady, comes up to me with a big smile and says to me, "coach Sunny, you're going to be a great pastor! I just know it." I think she could see that I was completely caught off guard by the comment so she explained to me why she thinks so. And after she told me, I could openly admit that I wasn't even aware that these little things I was doing within the first couple hours of camp would be noticeable. So I concluded that this was only possible because of the people that have raised me and grown me. I managed to pick up on habits, attitudes, etc., from people that have shaped me into being able to do such things that can draw such a comment. That volunteer made my day, and I was so incredibly grateful.

So, coming back to the Vancouver thing, I have no doubt that God will take care of me. I just have to battle my weakness of being afraid of things. Like I mentioned earlier, I'm super stoked to get to know these people and help reshape their church. I'm a big picture guy, so I'm also eager to see the potential that is in these people and how we'll be able to get there together.

Due to circumstances, and I might even lean toward them as unfortunate, I really haven't been serving in church since the end of my internship. I definitely feel terrible about it. During my last semester, I said that I'd take a break because I was really tired, so I did. Coming home for the summer though, I always felt like I could contribute, but I didn't. Other than helping with worship a couple times and volunteering during the week of soccer camp, I haven't done anything to help my home church.

It's a little sad on my part to think that everything I had done and accomplished for God before bible college is now basically vanished. To me, the generation is mostly turned over. So I start to question many things, the latest being whether or not I've overstayed my time at home. Admittedly, it's a little difficult for me to do much knowing that I'm just going to leave again, so I can't really commit. But the thing that pains me the most is to watch those who are serving now basically having to relearn everything that I learned when I grew up serving. It puts a bit of a salty taste in my mouth because this indicates that I may not have completed my job in passing on what I had going for me. I've gone from "the guy that plays guitar and leads worship" to "oh yeah, he's Justin's/Sarah's older brother." Instead of being engulfed by service, I'm left a bystander.

I'm not okay with this because I'm still way too passionate about my home church. I want so badly for my friends and family to have a fire the size of the freakin' sun for God; and instead, it seems more like we're shivering in the cold while someone tries to restart the fire for us. So, what this means for me going forward, especially into Newbern, is that I have to make sure that God's work through me is at least as close to finish as possible before I leave. I am as determined as I've ever been in my life to be so passionate about Christ and the Church that it infects the church and community I'll be working in. I don't want to end up leaving due to selfish reasons, only when God calls me elsewhere. I have absolutely no idea how to get there or if it'll happen the way I envision it at all, but I'm all-in.

It starts with me - this is my good note.