This Week at Trinity, Beamsville

Friday, May 3, 2019

Dear Friends,

I have been asked a lot lately if it feels like the time here in Beamsville has flown by. Yes, yes it has. Today marks my last time writing to you in this form, just a couple of days ahead of my last service with Trinity. There is a lot of things that have happened in the past eight months, even though it doesn’t seem like a long time. Fifteen sermons (apparently), and more letters, emails, and prayers than I could probably count. Of course this is only taking into account what I can look up on my computer, and in terms of what I have accomplished and grown into… there may not be an easy way to quantify that. The week for me has been a tallying of “last things.” Last visits, last bible study, last committee meetings, all sorts of last things. And this isn’t the first time this has happened either. Recently I was confronted with the varying social media posts I made during the end of my first year of university, slowly counting down my five exams with increasing amounts of angst and bitterness over the year coming to an end. I was being overdramatic but I really did value the people I was living with in the university residence hall I was on, and just the romanticized first year experience coming to an end. But life is complicated, and trying to understand that “end” as I come to this “end” seems strange I think because I’m at a much different place in life and have a bit more perspective. Three years and a month and a half later I went back to university for convocation. On our way out of campus I had my family pull over to take a picture of me in front of the first year residence, so I could put it on Instagram like a good millennial. I wrote, “I first stood here nervous and emotionally shutdown. Despite being only a little less of both of those, I’ve made changes, and I’m pretty happy with where I am now. Thanks for reminding me of old Scott and how much new Scott is just a new permutation of the same kid.” We are always growing, and always reaching new endings. Endings are a good time to look back and take a new look at who and where we are. Many thanks for being with me through this time of growth, and helping me reach yet another Scott-permutation.

With love, Scott

“Our ancestors in faith bequeath to us experiences of their faithful living; upon their lives our lives are built.” (A Song of Faith, The United Church of Canada)