Having spent the fall absorbed with resume writing, I’m already dreading having to construct a concise description of what exactly I do at this job. I’m basically assistant to the Big Guy, which means that I pick up what Mark doesn’t have time for. In the first week that included taking notes at a meeting; helping plan the layout of an amphitheater; directing a bulldozer in its digging pattern; editing articles; pruning olive trees; organizing guesthouse reservations; taking photos of students in a metal-working shop; taking photos of an arrest that took place on the grounds; and accompanying groups on tours of the hospital.
Lutheran World Federation, the organization I’m volunteering with for the year, owns the land here on a small hill between the Mount of Olives and Mount Scopus. (www.lwfjerusalem.org will tell you about the organization. www.lwf.org, or "Love Worth Finding" will help you "Discover the Love of Jesus.") Augusta Victoria Hospital is our primary project and has been operating since 1951, serving the impoverished and refugee communities of Palestine. We emphasize social services and humanitarian outreach rather than proselytizing, and as a result get a fair share of liberally-minded church groups on Holy Land tours who drop by the grounds to hear about the work LWF is doing over here. I’m going to wager a guess that these groups will be one of the most amusing aspects of the job.
Yesterday, Pastor John and his 37 congregants from Freeland, Washington arrived on their charter bus accompanied by a frenzied tour guide and eager to see the hospital, the chapel, and, most severely, the ladies’ restroom. With a bunch of liberal Lutherans from Washington state, I was in my element. About nine people from the group had been to Holden Village, the isolated wilderness community where I spent a summer two years ago. The fact that I had met one of their pastors from back home while he was preaching at Holden added further to their awe. They were, in short, enamored.
As we followed William, the head nurse around the hospital, Pastor John made small talk here and there, asking how I got this job, what I had studied, and whether I was considering seminary, which he assumed was the next logical step after an English degree. I assured him I was not. Ascending the steps from the basement cancer center, William explained that the space had previously been a well that was dried out and then transformed into the radiation treatment room it is today. “A well to a cancer center. Huh,” said Pastor John. I remarked that it sounded like a sermon waiting to happen.
With their guide reaching a new level of panic (“We have to get to Dormition Abbey by three o’clock!!!”) Pastor John and his friendly flock were herded back onto their bus, waving goodbye and wishing me luck as they disappeared behind the tinted windows.
“And Margit,” Pastor John said, before climbing aboard. “Seriously. Consider seminary.”
Sir, you don't know me at all.
