BEING A ROLODEX [T, 12-7-21]

CHRIST IN WINTER: Reflections on Faith & Life for the Years of Winter

My friend and colleague, Danny Cox, responded to the column I posted on Nov. 26, 2021, about creating the HELP/PATH organization in Bloomington-Normal, IL, when I was the UM Campus Minister at IL State U. He was an ILSU student, active in our Wesley Foundation campus ministry, and a couple of times a week he took on the night shift at HELP, answering the phone.

He said that his biggest problem was sounding awake when he answered the phone. Getting help for the caller wasn’t really an issue, because he had a rolodex with listings of people and agencies that could help with any problem. He just had to answer the phone and flip through the rolodex.

It was something of a shock when he became a pastor to realize that he no longer had a rolodex. So, he said to me, “You became my rolodex.”

That is one of the nicest things I have ever been called, a rolodex! I don’t remember being of that much help to him as he went through his distinguished career in ministry, which outshone my own in many ways. I did, though, enjoy staying in touch with him, knowing what was happening in his life, and learning from him

He was my rolodex once, at a pivot point in my life. I had heard the pale oncologist tell me that I would be dead “in a year or two.” There was so much more I needed to do. I had not walked my daughters down the aisle. I had not held my grandchildren in my arms. Two years sounded like so much more than one, so I worked hard at getting that second year. I did chemo. I did meditation. I did prayer. I did support group. I did journaling.

Then annual conference time arrived, the week-long gathering of all the UM pastors and lay members from all the churches in the Central IL Conference. I looked forward to seeing my “children in the ministry” at those occasions. I had 23 of them, until time began to thin the ranks in recent years. [1] I encountered Danny in the hallway. He’s always been a good listener, so he was patient as I told him all I was doing to gain that second year. Then he said, “It sounds like you’re having in-body experiences.” That literally changed my life.

 

Of course! That was the problem. That was why I was never impressed much when people talked about having out-of-body experiences. I was out of my body all the time. I was in the body of the church, trying to help it get whole. I was in the body politic, trying to help society get well. I was in the body of nature, trying to help the environment get well. I was in every body but my own, and the cancer had broken my body open so that I could get into it!

Well, I have on my desk a large, expensive rolodex that I can’t get rid of. I have offered it to dozens of people and organizations, but no one uses a rolodex anymore. Numbers and addresses are stored on mobile phones and iPads. I think maybe I’ll just write on those cards the names of all those who have been my rolodexes through the years. Each day, I’ll riffle through it, and give thanks for those friends who have helped me become whole, as I have in-body experiences.

Oh... and I wish you an Average Advent.

johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com

1] [Oops, in editing I must have taken that stock line out above. It was, "My children in the ministry say they entered the ministry because I made it look like fun. They all hate me."]I told that stock line to Jim Kiefer a few years ago and got a hearty laugh. He said, “Well, I did have fun, and I don’t hate you.” That was nice to hear. 

John Robert McFarland

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