One week

Well, I have now been in Scotland for precisely one week, and by the time Tuesday evening comes around my time on Iona will also be one week. What have I experienced so far? What challenges or gifts have I received from God in this thin place?

This first week has been filled with newness for me. Getting used to the rhythms and patterns of a new community can take some time and adjustment and that has certainly been the case for me. In fact, that process of adjustment has led to an interesting turn of events which I’ll try to describe here briefly. I came to Iona intended to be the Music volunteer, that is, the assistant to the full-time, resident musician here at the Abby. This position has far less structure than other position like house-keeping or kitchen staff, and so I spent my first five days trying to figure out exactly what it is I should do. The resident musician is a former professional double-bass player for various orchestras and so his technical musical ability far surpasses mine! I began to realize that the music team of the resident musician and his assistant were basically in charge of only receiving music requests for services and playing them, often hymns and songs which are unfamiliar or even completely unknown. Since there are two services every day, the volume of music which they go through is very high.

Anyway, I realized that I did not feel comfortable or able to participate in the music production at such a level. It was a great blessing, then, to become good friends with a girl who is a music student herself and was very keen to take on a role which I’ve described above. After some thoughtful conversations with her and several staff members, we have now officially switched positions! I am now a General Assistant which has the benefit of do a variety of jobs in a variety of places, though generally house-keeping and kitchen work. I’ll also still be involved in the music, but now it will be at a level which I am comfortable with.

Last night, in fact, I was able to lead a Taize service in the Abby Church with a new friend I’ve made. She is from Germany and plays the violin, and so we shared a beautiful experience of leading contemplative, slow, and reflective worship in a beautifully ancient and holy space. I was thoroughly blessed to be able to lead such a service and I look forward to being involved in music like that, which is a much less rigorous capacity than the official music assistant.

Iona, I have been discovering, is a place which seeks to chart a path between fundamentalist traditionalism and ungrounded postmodernism. There are people from so many walks of life who find a safe community here in which to seek God, to seek faith, to understand the meaning of their lives. The ability to accept those who are seeking and unsure of where their true identity lies while also remaining firmly grounded in the life-giving tradition of Biblical gospel is a real gift of the Iona community.

So what am I discovering then? I’m not sure quite yet. It’s been a week of too much transition and jet-lag and I haven’t had quite the time to reflect or pray with intention. But I am deeply thankful to God for providing me another position here with which I feel much more comfortable and I am also thankful for all the interesting and God-pursuing people who I have encountered here thus far.

God’s peace to you all,

Ethan