Meet the Traveler

I have always felt like that Bible passage that says, "I am a stranger in a strange land," like I am a traveller passing through life. I have lived many places during my 58 years. By the time I was 25, I realized I had lived in over 20 different dwellings. No, I was not a foster child. My mom & step-father had us moving a lot at night. I would ask, "Why are we moving at 10 o'clock at night?" They would respond, "Because it's cooler." When I was a teen-ager I realized: they were staying one step ahead of the landlord they owed back rent to. For some reason my family always bounced back to Batesville, Arkansas. Since that is where I spent the most accumulated time growing up, I have adopted it as my hometown.

Since the age of 25, I have moved around a lot on my own, pastoring churches. Every place I moved to felt temporary, and I would wonder, "How long will I be here?" I felt like Abraham on the way to the Promise Land. No place felt permanent. No place really felt like "home."  Even my favorite place--Colorado--felt temporary. When I moved to the Denver area, I instantly fell in love with Colorado, and I wanted to stay there until I died. But still that haunting question was always with me: "How long will I be here?"

Now I'm in the Oklahoma City area, and I know that this is temporary. I am a "chaplain student," that is, I am in a two-year program called CPE--Clinical Pastoral Education, and OU Medical. I am a chaplain intern at OU Med and at OU Children's Hospital. I am a part-time chaplain at two local heart hosptials. I love being a chaplain. I feel as though I am coming into my own, and I know that this is what I am to do for the rest of my life--be a hospital chaplain.

Okay, so I've got my career settled for my remaining years, but I know that when the program is over, I am moving on to a new location, someplace where I will be a full-time chaplain. So I am still the traveler. This blog is about my thoughts and obsevations as I travel through this life.

Thought number one: Life is not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be lived.

My life has certainly been a mystery. Things have happened to me that I never expected, never thought would happen. When you are young, you think about what your life will be like. Then as your travel through your life, following the roadmap your have set out for it, you stop and look at how different it is, and you think, "Okay, this is interesting. This wasn't part of the plan. How do I fix this?"

So, this blog is about the Mystery that is my Life, and the quetions that come with mystery. Questions like, "Why did God allow this to happen?" As I chaplain, I get that one A LOT. And, "Does everthing happen for a reason?" Many believe that everything does happen for a reason. Yeah, I have questions about that. Questions about meaning, purpose, pain, suffering, joy, blessings, family, free will, predistination, choice, and what just hits us upside the head.

I have been called an unorthodox Christian. I love philosophy, Qunatum Physics, I have a healthy respect for Buddhism, and I am a committed follower of Jesus Christ. My observations will not always be orthodox. But they will be honest.

~Your Fellow Traveler,
Steve