The Boy is Back in Town

I’m back in Chattanooga. Surprised? Me too. But, I had to make a choice, and I think I chose well.

I was gone from home a month. I learned at least as much in that month as in the entire year preceding it. What exactly those lessons were is a subject for another post. For now, you will have to content yourselves with the story of how I got back here. To be precise, it is the story of how I arrived at the decision to return.

This story must begin with an understanding of my intentions in going to South Dakota. From exploring the ACMNP site, speaking with representatives on the phone, and attending the training conference, I gathered that ACMNP is a two-fold ministry, divided into relational and formal aspects. The formal ministry is the Sunday morning services, put on for the rangers, staff, and visitors in the parks. The relational ministry takes place through the constant interaction with coworkers, in which relationships are fostered and, through these, faith is shared. This second aspect was my primary reason for going to Custer. I wanted to spend a summer getting to know other people from all over the country, hanging out with them and discussing the meaning of life, as well as whatever else came to mind.

I was mistaken about this second aspect of the ministry. In point of fact, the relational ministry is much secondary to the first, and any significant interaction with fellow staff members is usually rare, if it happens at all, outside of the work environment. But I was not to find this out for weeks. In the meantime, I just tried to cope.

After a little more than two weeks at Custer, I felt nothing so strongly as a feeling of complete isolation. In truth, there was a support committee in the area, and they were wonderful, but all of them lived about an hour away. Thus, my only hope for daily human interaction was my fellow employees at Sylvan. This would have been fine with me; actually, it’s the very reason I came. However, it didn’t exist. Between extensive langauge barriers, conflicting work schedules, and the absentee commuter population, I was rarely able to spend even an hour with anyone outside of work.  So, I spent three weeks wandering the park, the common areas, and the lodge by myself. It was a great time for introspection, but I was thoroughly 'spected by the end of the first week, and going out of my mind by the end of the third.

So, I realized that all I wanted was to leave. But I wasn't about to leave until I tried to fix things first, so I started a campaign of sitting down with people who had more experience than myself with the ministry. First, I went to the head of my support committee. There, I got my first inkling that perhaps I had been quite mistaken in coming to Sylvan. My leader told me two particularly helpful things. She told me that Sylvan was one of the most difficult sites in the ministry, and that she herself often questioned the ministry’s decision to put anyone there. Secondly, and more helpfully, she said that I had completely misunderstood the focus of the ministry. Later, she told me that she had never met anyone with such a huge misconception of what ACMNP did. In point of fact, the ministry was not focused on the staff and coworkers. Rather, the primary work of ACMNP is putting on the worship services on Sundays for the traveling public. In fact, the staff rarely, if ever, has much of anything to do with the ministry, although the volunteers in the parks are encouraged to do as much as they can to engage the staff.

Now that I knew that my reasons for coming to the park had all been wrong, I set about finding out why I was supposed to be there. More than anything else, the ministry is something like a worship internship, in which students are given the opportunity to try their hand at planning and leading formal worship services. These services are attended almost exclusively by devout Christians, who are “uncomfortable missing a service,” according to my leader. I asked around, and found out from those who have been there that the ministry rarely brings in non-Christians, and that the services are almost never what you might call “life changing.” Now don’t get me wrong, I still think that they’re wonderful, and a valuable service to Christians across the nation. It’s a fantastic opportunity for anyone who wants to explore formal ministry, or needs a summer job and likes outdoor living. However, it isn’t the ministry that I came for, and, after trying to work it out for a few weeks, I found that it also isn’t a ministry that really utilizes my talents.

Having discovered these things, I called the national head of the ministry.  I asked whether we could rearrange things: if he could get me moved to one of the other nearby sites, so that I would have fellow volunteers to work with me, or help to get my work schedule changed. He confirmed what I had learned, and had a few good reasons for staying to offer me, but he also told me that there really wasn’t anything he could do to improve my situation. So, without the possibility of moving to another lodge or somehow getting another volunteer to work with at my site, my decision was simplified to two alternatives. I could either stay and hope things improved, waiting to see what would happen, or I could go home and try to engage myself elsewhere.

With this in mind, I came to grips with the fact that staying would mean an altogether different ministry than I had expected, and one that I wasn’t sure I wanted. I’ve no intention of becoming a worship leader, and an internship along those lines wasn’t, in my own eyes, at all worth my misery. Of course, God’s intentions and my own can be vastly different, so I was determined to wait out the week before deciding anything. I prayed a lot, examined my options, and continued, with no success, trying to engage anybody I could find to hang out for a while.

So it was that, after working for a month, I decided to call it quits.  And now,  here I am. I’m trying now to find something else that will utilize my gifts. You may be wondering if I have any regrets. Of course, I wish things had worked out, because it was a beautiful place and I’m sure I could have grown to like it there. However, I feel better now than I have in a month, and I’m sure that I made a wise choice. No, I do not regret my decision.

I must say that I do not wish to disparage ACMNP. It is a unique ministry which fulfills its purpose well, and if I’m ever passing through a park on a Sunday, I will certainly try to attend their services. It simply wasn’t a ministry for me.

Yet fear not. This is not the end of my blog. I still have to finish recounting my trip to South Dakota, as well a few hikes I took while there, and my trip home. And, best of all, Europe still awaits. So stay tuned.