Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Covenant Keepers 2013

Covenant Keepers is a gathering of clergy from the Illinois Great Rivers Conference of the United Methodist Church, hosted by our Clergy Care Guides and Pastoral Care and Counseling.  I think.  What I know for sure is that it's two days away from the local parish with a guest speaker, worship, music, fellowship.  Kind of like Annual Conference without the business part.

I had never gone before.  Personal reasons.  Financial reasons.  Schedule conflicts.  Whatever.  Guess I wasn't keeping the covenant, and not 100% sure which covenant I was supposed to be keeping.

That changed this week.  The Rivers of Life Clergy Band got invited to be the worship band for the event. What an honor!  We got to play and sing before our peers and friends.  We were given an opportunity to contribute to the worship experience, lending support to our colleagues in ministry.  And they supported us beautifully as well.  It was a terrific two days!

I've been battling a cold for nearly a week now.  I don't think going to Covenant Keepers did my body any favors.  Today I'm feeling exhausted and a bit run down, and I have work to make up because I was out of the office for two days.  So I'll power through it and collapse when I'm done.

But despite the cold and the fatigue, I have a heart filled with gratitude. I'm thankful for my bandmates.  Their friendship, musicianship, and collegiality mean a lot to me.  We're more than just a collection of pastor musicians who were thrown together to play a few songs now.  We're kind of a mutual support system for one another, a different sort of covenant group.  I'm grateful for all my colleagues in ministry in the IGRC.  It was good to see some old friends and familiar faces I don't get to see often enough.  I'm grateful that I got to meet the new Bishop and hear him preach.  And the Continuing Education credit is a plus!

I'm glad I went.

What are you grateful for today?