The first time I celebrated Communion I wrote down everything I was supposed to do. “Arms lifted.” “Arms down.” “Lift bread.” Like stage directions, so I wouldn’t forget or have to think and talk and celebrate a sacrament all at the same time. I went over it all with my colleague Alex to make sure nothing was left out.
When it came time, I was not too nervous and managed to stay out of my head and focus on my script. Until I got to “Pour out your Holy Spirit…” The stage directions said to hold my hands over the bread and wine as I asked God to send the Holy Spirit to make these simple elements be Christ’s body and blood for us. As I looked down and saw my own hands hovering there, I thought, That’s it? Just my hands are enough? Alex doesn’t have to come do something, too?
It was startling and real in a way I hadn’t expected. And, of course, I told Alex about it later.
We worked together for four years, during which I finally stopped running from or ignoring my call to ordained ministry and agreed to go to Nineveh like God had been asking me for some time (Jonah). I remember talking with other people in the ordination process, wondering together whether being an associate pastor or a solo pastor was more desirable. I heard uncomfortable stories about working “for” senior pastors. They were hard to reconcile with my own experience of stumbling into a friendship and collegial relationship with someone who was a peer in age and a mentor in ministry.
While Alex and I were still serving together, I spent a year going through CPE at the hospital. I wrote one of my reflections about the grace and humanness Alex demonstrated while celebrating Communion. On one occasion, as he lifted the bread, he said, “Then Jesus took the cup.” He stopped himself, smiled, and continued, “Jesus took the bread.” A minute later, as he lifted the cup, he continued, “Then Jesus took the cup.” At the time, I was writing papers and going through ordination interviews and worried more than I should have. I remember being worried for him when he first misspoke. But his acceptance of the flub made it ok for everyone and it offered me another vision of how ministry and ministers could look.
There are very few maxims or standard operating procedures Alex imparted and I memorized, though it seems this is what many people mean when they describe a mentoring relationship. There’s a strange focus on “the takeaway.” What I took away was something constructed over time, in small moments and flubbed lines: an incarnate example of living out a call to ordained ministry with authenticity and grace.
That’s what I needed to make it real. I needed to see how it was done and how it felt, to ask questions – especially when they seemed embarrassing or stupid. I needed someone to say, like Alex did once, “It took me about 10 years to feel like this was really my life, and not a role or persona I was adopting.”
We all need people who are willing to be real and to let that real-ness be visible to others. This is the gift of a mentor and it can be carried further and lived out more fully than any maxim. It’s the gift of resonance between lives.
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photo credit: “Open Table (Rock)” © 2011 Aaron Stiles, Used with permission.