This column features learning and insights from Faith At Work's partnership with the Everything Must Change Tour with Brian McClaren.

My dog Bongo and I are playing at our local dog park; he is hip-deep in mud, and very happy. I tell a friend that I’m taking Bongo for a dip in a nearby stream called Four Mile Run. Immediately I hear gasps of disapproval. “You know how toxic that stream is, don’t you?” This is in Arlington VA, in a stream shed restoration project that has been active for 9 years. Apparently, there’s more work to do.

A Prayer from the Tour

Immediately I’m taken back to the Everything Must Change Tour. In each city, we had an opening prayer that acknowledged where we were. In Florida we prayed:

Let us pray, saying, “Lord, hear our prayer.”

Leader: Lord, our Creator, We are here in the watershed of the Manatee River, which flows into the Tampa Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, which flows into the Atlantic Ocean, which is one of the great oceans that encircle our planet. We thank you for this good earth, for its cycles and seasons, its beauty and balance. May we fulfill your calling to us to care for this earth in gratitude, humility, and joy.

ALL: LORD, HEAR OUR PRAYER.

Leader: We are here today near the ancestral homelands of the Calusa and Tocobaga Indians. We thank you for these rich cultures, and we mourn the injustice done to this land’s original inhabitants. May this history of injustice remind us to be agents of your justice, your compassion, and your peace.

ALL: LORD, HEAR OUR PRAYER.

Leader: We are gathered in the city of St. Petersburg, in the state of Florida, in the United States of America. We pray for the leaders of this city, state, and nation. Give them wisdom and a heart to learn from you and lead us in your ways, by their work, their word and their example.

ALL: LORD, HEAR OUR PRAYER.

A prayer such as this immediately signals to me I’m in a new spiritual place: where the people gathered to pray are honest about who we are, and where we are. We give this to God. It is both confession and gratitude.

It is also an invitation to know my watershed address – I am a part of it. Know it; connect to it; take responsibility for it. And that is also the invitation that the Everything Must Change Tour gave us: wake up. Acknowledge what is happening. Then go and do our part.

Other Voices from the Tour

As FAW’s primary presence on the Tour, I heard so many heartfelt hopes, wishes, dreams, questions and struggles:

• The economics professor who wondered if it made any sense to take his well-to-do students on service learning opportunities;

• The priest who said, “If I were to preach this Jesus theology in my church, I’d lose my job. People really don’t want to hear it.”;

• The many people who said, “Why isn’t my church like this? Why aren’t we talking about these things?”;

• The three single mothers who adopted children. We talked about how essential rest and a nurturing community are in the call to parenthood;

• The man who said, “My church is so action oriented. I need a clearness committee to listen for my call, and not get pushed into being on a church committee. We need to pause long enough to hear God, not just act frantically to save the world all the time!

• The pastor who said: “I’m an introvert! Of course I can read a book on how to change! The problem is gathering people to ask them to help hold me, pray with me, as I go deeper into those vulnerable places of discerning my call.”

• The organizational coach, who said: “My spiritual director yesterday helped me realize how much I want to make a big difference in the world! That's why all this small stuff means so much. I have to give that up, let go and let God....that's my prayer.”

• The woman who said about her church attendance: “My heart left a while ago, but my body still sits there.” She talked about her desire for real community in church, being known, supported and nurtured in life, and connected to God’s faithful people, and how small groups might help.

We Need Help

In my conversation with that woman, it became clear her struggle was between wanting community, and giving up time to encourage those relationships. She wanted deeper connection, but only on Sunday morning from 10-12noon.

I have the same struggle, as I consider the training to be a county stream steward for my local river: it takes 8 Saturdays, and then 50 volunteer hours. I’d rather my call be less costly. More convenient. Then I remember the opening question at the beginning of the Everything Must Change event: How awake am I to the reform needed in myself?

It isn’t that I haven’t made changes already. I carry a large bag with me to all stores, for purchases. This took developing the habit of carrying the merchandise and food in, immediately unpacking, and carrying the bag out to the car again. I carry a travel coffee mug most days, and buy the “Just Coffee” from the tour sponsor (www.JustCoffee.org). We have a pesticide/herbicide free lawn and garden (it’s much cheaper), and use phosphate free soap (available at Target) to keep life-killing chemicals out of the stream.

These lifestyle changes have all been very easy to make, as they have involved no sacrifice of time. Yet I still struggle with walking to work. I walk Bongo for an hour most days, and then get into the “I’m so important” mindset of needing a car to rush around. I could walk. Those errands can wait. I struggle. Should I make the time commitment to the Stream Steward training?

From Wake Up to Action

Wake up. Then, in faith, by faith, begin to join God’s action for justice, and right stewardship. So my prayer today is, “Lord, its Tiffany. I’m in the watershed of Four Mile Run, the Potomac River, of the Chesapeake Bay. It is such a toxic stream that friends are worried if Bongo goes swimming in it. God, I have work to do, in this watershed. It is not right, not a good and joyful thing, to live by such a hurting stream and not be responsible for my connection to its waters. Help me take the next step for the good of your world! I am willing to act for justice for this little stream.