Hmmm...good question. Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh or "I am who I am" is a pretty good start!

Well, what's funny, Morgan is that Gungor doesn't refer to God as a "she" in the song - but that of course was the logical implication and the teenagers were keen to that logic! There is hope yet. And your comment is a reminder to me to keep using the feminine pronoun liberally - along with the masculine - without fear of a being called a heretic. It is, after all, good old orthodox Christianity to believe in a gender-full God.

Adam - I just got to reading your post this week and love your articulation of the issue. With a youth pastor for a husband, I see this as a particularly thorny issue for teen ministry. Young people perhaps need the safety of same-gendered groups to speak frankly about their budding sexuality - but again, what does this communicate to those who can't or don't put themselves in the binary guy/gal category? Even having same-sex youth leaders sadly is not a guarantee that abuses won't happen. I love the idea of forming teen groups around interests - and trying your butt off to not let one group become stereotyped as the feminine or masculine one.

Thanks, Lara, for raising the issue of how (and why) to talk about sexuality on the blog. As a daughter of an OB-GYN nurse I am so grateful for the medical explanation of sex so early on in life (Way to go to Ray, too!). Perhaps the birthing videos were a bit much...but they certainly impressed upon me the gravity of our biology. One thing to remember when talking about sexuality - especially with teens: Any virtue can become a vice if we are unbalanced in its pursuit. For many teens the struggle is to be chaste, but others may need to be taught the healthy exercise of sensuality.

Ah, I wish I could take each of you to coffee and mull over these sentiments. Chris - I concur with Andrew about how important your thoughts are. The question I come back to is: Who is my church community? Is it a cop out to say that it's my family - my brother with whom I'm now living thousands of miles away from home or my dad who I'm able to see regularly only with multiple trips out West every year? Can I say it's my friends - the ones with whom I do spend time regularly in North Carolina but who are never in the pew next to me on Sunday morning? Can it be the ones I am already "doing life" with although we're not calling it church?

I hesitated to even write this post, not wanting to throw the category of "female faculty in theological education" under the bus. I envy that David and Barbara made real connections with women role models at divinity school and hope that my experience will change in my final year. However, I do think there's something going on institutionally that puts pressure on untenured female faculty at many universities to perform double-duty as both good Christian women (read: feminine homemakers) and esteemed academicians (read: masculine professionals).

Thank you for these wonderfully thoughtful and supportive comments. It makes me even more adamant that the church needs to be more creative and imaginative in its preaching and programs. Perhaps small groups should have a smattering of people from all walks of vocational life? Perhaps those who volunteer in the nursery or with the youth should be people that DON'T have children rather than those who already have a stake in those ministries? And perhaps sermon illustrations should reflect the diversity of metaphors the text itself offers?

I hear you, Kathryn. My husband has learned the art of reverse psychology in this department. The more space he assures me I have for myself, the more I choose time with him out of my wellspring of energy (and not guilt). There's something to this whole love + free-will formula God created...

These comments all point to the human desire to have enough, to know what is enough, and, as Eric pointed out, to be enough. What's fascinating about the connection to "doing enough" is that the word for enough in Hab 2:5 is indeed translated as rest in the NIV. Not having enough is never having rest, a stark contrast to the life Jesus promises.

Eric, Thank you for the time you put into your comment on the fullness of pacifism. I was speaking out of my own place of brokenness in the paragraph you cite, wanting to be a pacifist but instead passively responding out of my fear to engage. Pacifism is indeed a very active engagement with the world's injustice, as you yourself have demonstrated. I am grateful for your words of both challenge and encouragement;