Messy Reflections

This post is inspired by my mom's much more essay-like post on mess. see joannelehman.blogspot. My life is messy these days too. Before leaving for Christmas I was very pleased with myself for cleaning off my desk. It included filing a semester's worth of minutes to a meeting I don't regularly attend- throwing out random pieces of paper- and putting all my bits of scrap paper for lists into one place- but after being back in my office less than a week my desk has returned to it's "normal" state of messyness- of course planning for two conferences is aiding the mess-making.
The funny thing is I try so hard not to be messy- and in general I think I'm pretty organized. I make lists, lots of lists. In fact, when I was a student I used to be able to gage my stress level by the number of lists I made, but these days- with an office and generally one specific place to keep my list- that isn't as much of a gage.
I have often thought that it's part of my personality to need at least one place in my life where I can have mess. Currently my house is not messy- and I switch cars too often for them to be messy- so I guess my office is my place of mess.
But it is my contention that real life is messy. A house, or office, or car with a little mess in it means that there is life there. And lives are messy too... because people are messy... it's what separates us from the robots. We don't always act in predictable, intelligent or unemotional ways. Sometimes we follow our heart, when our brain is telling us to do a U-turn. Or we make a mistake (translate: mess).
When I think about pastoring someday- it will happen I think- I realize that I want to pastor a messy church- because a messy church is a church where people are real, open, and honest about who they are. People are messy... all people... not just some of them. Those who pretend thier lives aren't messy are just fooling themselves, and others and denying thier God-given humanness. So let's be messy... but let's be honest about it and willing to accept the care, love and support of others in our messy lives.
Enough rambling... time to get back to my messy desk.