Welcome!

I've created this space in order to provide you with a central location to learn a little bit more about me, as both a pastor and a person.

In May, I graduated from Princeton Theological Seminary with my Master of Divinity degree. I have greatly enjoyed my three years at Princeton, and I am looking forward to leaving the seminary and delving into the world of ministry. As of January 2011, I am "Certified Ready for a Call" through the Inland Northwest Presbytery.

During my time before and during Seminary I have worked with a broad range of churches and ministries, as you can read about on my PIF (posted on the right). I care deeply about real community in churches: becoming a fellowship of friends who meet with and care for both one another and the stranger alike. Christian Education has also been a major focus of my ministry thus far, in youth, young adult, and adult settings. I enjoy teaching and learning, and look forward to serving a congregation of people who are engaged in their ministry and excited about the directions God is calling them. Also, I love preaching and creatively engaging with worship as an expression of who we are before God.

When I'm not in worship or a session meeting, I love spending time with my husband, John, our son, Enoch, and the various animals we care for (including a dog, a few ducks, and some chickens). I believe food is not only delicious, but a great way to create and share in community; I can frequently be found reading cookbooks, scouring the farmer's market, or experimenting in the kitchen. You might also catch me in the living room, reading any book I can get my hands on, listening to bluegrass, or perhaps indulging in an episode of Star Trek.

Below, you'll find two recent sermons I've preached. The first video is a short sermon I preached in Miller Chapel for the weekly Seminary communion service. The scripture, Psalm 65:9-11, was read by my dear friend and fellow student, Wendy Mohler. The second audio clip, on Isaiah 49:1-6, was preached at the First Presbyterian Church of Dutch Neck, NJ, where I have been blessed to serve for the past two years. I hope you enjoy them both!

I wish you and your congregation all the best as you discern God's call for your leadership needs. I am looking forward to getting to know your congregation better in the weeks ahead!

Kelly Boubel Shriver
kelly.shriver@gmail.com

Psalm 65: 9-13

Psalm 65: 9-13 from Kelly Shriver on Vimeo.

"You visit the earth and water it,

you greatly enrich it;

the river of God is full of water;

you provide the people with grain,

for so you have prepared it.

You water its furrows abundantly,

settling its ridges,

softening it with showers,

and blessing its growth. 


You crown the year with your bounty;

your wagon tracks overflow with richness. 

The pastures of the wilderness overflow,

the hills gird themselves with joy,

the meadows clothe themselves with flocks,

the valleys deck themselves with grain,

they shout and sing together for joy." (NRSV)

“Give us this day our daily bread.” Too often, I think, we hear this phrase preached as a call to the daily, a reminder to live in the moment, not thinking too far ahead and not lingering too long in the past. And although this message isn’t wrong (after all, the manna in the desert went bad if the people took more than they needed for a single day), this message runs the risk of becoming narrow and myopic. If bread is merely a daily commodity, we miss the abundance of the larger picture.

Bread, in my experience, is not a commodity measured in 24-hour increments, but is instead a substance which demands thought and planning. Most of the loaves of bread we in America love to eat, the fat, crusty, seedy loaves from the bakery baskets at Wegman’s, take days of planning and care to create. A loaf of sourdough bread, for example, can take months or even years to develop. Once a strand of yeast is captured, developing, feeding, and caring for that yeast strain amounts to something of a family tradition. Bakers across the world are known for the strain of yeast they build their sourdough from: here in the US, most of our sourdough comes from the San Francisco yeast strain. Artisan breads, including sourdough, start from what is called a “sponge,” a paste made from flour, water, and a little yeast, which you let sit out for a number of hours or even days. The sponge bubbles and ferments, building the flavor and complexity it will add to the loaf of bread.
The crumb of the bread also takes time to develop. Crumb refers to the density of the loaf: How much give does it have against your teeth as you take a bite? The chewier your crumb, the longer the bread takes. Gluten, from the flours, needs to convert to create the crumb, and it converts through the hours of rising time. Needless to say…bread is not a “daily” endeavor.

A beautiful loaf of bread also demands sweat and elbow grease. Our poor kitchen table has grown all too wobbly thanks to many hours John and I have spent kneading bread on its surface! In The Supper of the Lamb: A Culinary Reflection, which is a lovely treatise on food and theology, Rev. Robert Capon, a chef and Episcopalian priest makes the following comment about kneading: “Knead well. It perfects the texture of the bread, and, more important, it is good for your soul. There are few actions you will ever take that have more of the stuff of history in them. A woman with her sleeves rolled up and flour on her hands is one of the most gorgeous stabilities in the world. Don’t let your family miss the sight.” There is something about bread that is, at least in my house, the very definition of home, in all of its time consuming activity and work. The sight of the sponge bubbling on the counter raises the anticipation of fresh bread for tomorrow, the sound of John kneading away at the table is truly a sound of stability, and the scent of yeasty bread baking in the oven makes even the coldest days seem a bit warmer. Bread, from start to finish, is decidedly not daily.

For most of us, the thought of baking bread might stop here, but growing up in the Palouse region of Washington State, it was impossible to escape the ubiquity of the grain needed to make the bread. You see it when you drive out of Spokane in any direction. There are large, community grain silos in every town. Even our local distillery markets their whiskey as produced from 100% WA wheat. In the Spring, the fields are full of young wheat, rippling like a green lake; by the height of summer, the stalks are brown and pregnant with grain. Fall brings the gathering of the sheaves, and winter marks the fallow period, when the stubble of harvest promises to restore the soil. Just as bread is not a daily endeavor from the perspective of human bakers, bread is even less so a daily endeavor from the perspective of the land and those who farm it. The Psalmist reminds us that the rivers of water, providing the people with grain, the furrows and settling ridges are blessed with growth by our creator and provider. The years are crowned with bounty by the one to whom the valleys deck themselves and shout for joy. Our sustainer has been planting our loaves of daily bread years in advance.

Every year, the grain once again grows up as tender, green stalks. Every year the sun continues to dry those stalks into the amber waves we sing about. Every year the harvest comes again, and every year, the stubble of the fallow field stands testament to the God who has once again provided daily bread. And just as the fields seem their emptiest, full of overturned dirt, the little green shoots spring up again, a moment in which it seems our God has said, that was fun, let’s do it again! The soil does not forget the one who has caused it to overflow with richness, so let us not forget either. For our God has planned our daily bread before we could imagine it, be it the literal bread of the field and table, or the sustaining friendships and vocations we are called to live into as the body of Christ.

So enjoy the bread given to us this day. Take freely of the abundance of the table set before us. But in the bread of today, remember the hope that God’s provision did not start in this moment. And will not end when this table is emptied. Our bread is not daily. Our creative God cares for us abundantly, preparing for us bread, through the days, the seasons, and the years we have been given.

Isaiah 49:1-6

“Listen to me, O coastlands,
pay attention, you peoples from far away!
The Lord called me before I was born,
while I was in my mother’s womb he named me.
2He made my mouth like a sharp sword,
In the shadow of his hand he hid me;
he made me a polished arrow,
in his quiver he hid me away.
3And he said to me, “You are my servant,
Israel, in whom I will be glorified.”
4But I said, “I have labored in vain,
I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity;
yet surely my cause is with the Lord, and my reward with my God.”

5And now the Lord says,
who formed me in the womb to be his servant,
to bring Jacob back to him,
and that Israel might be gathered to him,
for I am honored in the sight of the Lord,
and my God has become my strength—
6he says,
“It is too light a thing that you should be my servant
to raise up the tribes of Jacob
and to restore the survivors of Israel;
I will give you as a light to the nations,
that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” (NRSV)

This is the Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

When my sister and I were in early elementary school, car trip were a nightmare for my parents. Lauren and I would sit in the backseat and whine the entire 6 hours from our house in Spokane to my grandma’s house in Portland. I would pinch her, she would shove her pillow onto my side of the car. I would retaliate, like any good big sister would, by hovering just on the edge of “Lauren’s side,” with my hand in her face, taunting “I’m not touching you, I’m not touching you!” I’m not totally certain how my parents survived. That is, until they discovered the most magical tool in their parenting arsenal: headphones and a walk man. They would give Lauren and I each our own set of taped radio stories, and we would be silent for the whole 6 hours. In fact, Lauren and I were always a bit sad to arrive at grandma’s, because it meant the walk men had to be shut off. To this day, a good story will capture my attention completely, no matter what medium it is told through, be it a cassette tape, a book, a movie, or a photo album posted online.

Donald Miller, an essayist I happen to enjoy, recently published a book called A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, which is about what makes a good story. Donald realized that his life, if he were watching it like a movie, was about as entertaining as watching someone buy a car. Instead of wallowing in this sad state, Donald set about finding out what makes a story interesting and worthwhile, which is what this book traces. The underlying premise of any interesting story, Donald argues, had four points: a story is interesting when there is a character who wants something and overcomes conflict to get it. Essentially, stories are worthwhile when there’s purpose and meaning behind the action. Donald figured his life was missing purpose, there wasn’t anything he really wanted, and he wasn’t confronting any conflict to achieve it.

This is exactly where we find the Israelites in today’s scripture. Their story has lost its center, there’s no purpose or meaning to their lives. Now, Isaiah is an interesting book. It’s actually three books in one: 1, 2, and 3 Isaiah. Part one goes from chapters 1-39: the Israelites are back in Jerusalem, the Assyrian Empire looms over them, but there are still Davidic kings on the throne. However, part one ends on a dark and ominous note. As you read chapter 39, you can actually hear the foreboding music in the background. The king, Hezekiah, has invited and welcomed an envoy from the Babylonian Empire. Hezekiah and the Babylonians have a great time, feasting and enjoying one another’s company, and Hezekiah even offers to show them all of the great storehouses of Israel’s treasure, the King is totally convinced days of peace lie ahead. However, the chapter closes with Isaiah’s prophecy that all of the goods in those storehouses, and even Hezekiah’s own sons, will be carted off to Babylon.

Second Isaiah, which starts in chapter 40, picks up the story several decades later. The Israelites, as we know from other prophets such as Jeremiah and Ezekiel, have been carried off to Babylon. Now, the Babylonian exile is perhaps the most significant event in Israel’s biblical history. See, nations at this time understood themselves to be under the protection of various national gods. The Israelites were protected by YHWH and the Babylonians had Marduk and Nebo and others. For Israel, being defeated by the Babylonians was equal to YHWH being defeated by Marduk and Nebo. How could they trust in God, if God allowed Jerusalem to be destroyed? They were a people whose story was losing its center. On one hand, YHWH seemed defeated, so there was internal struggle over what their centuries of tradition amounted to. On the other hand, Marduk and Nebo seemed to have won, so there was external pressure to accept the Babylonian religions. Their story lacked purpose and meaning, because the people were floundering about, looking for a center.

This is where our text for today fits in. 2 Isaiah, which is generally thought to be chapters 40-55, is entirely composed of hopeful prophecies given with the intent of reestablishing YHWH was Israel’s center. The prophet Isaiah is trying to give the people their story back: he’s trying to help them find purpose and meaning. Through the prophet, God is saying: “Listen to me! Pay attention! You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified. You were called before you were born, you are a polished arrow in my quiver, You are my servant, you are gathered to me, and I am your strength.” The prophet, through this reminder of Israel’s call, is giving the people their center back. They are a people called to be the servants of YHWH, and the God who calls them gives them strength and has a purpose for them.

The call of this passage doesn’t stop at reminding the people of their center. The call actually extends further. They are not merely called to raise up Israel; according to the prophet: “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel.” No, reestablishing the nation is, apparently, not a big enough story for Israel! The prophet goes on, “I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” These people, exiled for decades in a foreign land, bereft of their God, their temple, and their very way of life, are not just called to reestablish their own nation, but to reach out to the whole world, proclaiming the salvation of YHWH for all people. This is not just inviting Israel back to their story, this is a total upheaval: their center is established clearly, and their purpose and meaning are definite. With the strength of YHWH, share salvation with all people.

While this is a beautiful story, Second Isaiah can be a little overwhelming to read all at once. Their story is so huge, it seems impossible. I’ve found this same story far more accessible on the smaller scale of Donald Miller. In his quest to find meaning for his own life, Donald begins to pay attention to the stories around him. He starts asking himself what is the thing he wants? What opposition is he going to overcome to achieve it? I won’t ruin the book for you, because I hope you all pick it up and read it, but Donald’s life ends up going an entirely different direction than he ever expected. Donald bikes across the United States, hikes the Inca trail, establishes a non-profit organization to promote mentorship, and now serves on the President’s task force on Fatherhood and Healthy Families. The story Donald is now living is far more interesting than that of a man going to a lot in order to buy a car. He found a center, a purpose, and meaning for his life, and it became a story worth telling.

We are surrounded by people who seem to be living lives that are worth hearing about. Edna Adan Ismail is a Somali woman who studied to become a nurse-midwife, rose through the ranks of the World Health Organization, and moved back to Somaliland where she established and now runs the Edna Adan University Hospital. She funds the hospital, in part, with the entirety of her WHO pension. Her hospital provides obstetric and gynecological care for women in the region, and in the past ten years has helped over 10,000 women deliver their babies, free of charge. Her maternal mortality rate is almost on par with the United States, quite a feat in a country with one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world. Countless women and children have been saved thanks to her initiative and care. Edna is a woman whose story matters, because she has a purpose and a center.

Personally, I find stories like Donald’s and Edna’s inspiring and encouraging, but I also find them intimidating. I’m not biking across the United States to raise money for an organization, and I’m certainly not saving tens of thousands of Somali women! However, I am confident that all of our stories can be valuable, because of the center we claim.

Isaiah cries out to remind the Israelites that they have a story centered on God. They are a people with a center and with a purpose: they are called to share the mighty story of God’s deliverance with all nations. We too have been given a center and called. Both as a community and individually, we have been given a center in Jesus Christ. Our strength and motivation lie in the life, death, and resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Not only are we told about this center in scripture, but we are given the Holy Spirit, who daily walks with us and works to remind us of our center in Jesus Christ. We have a purpose, our story has meaning. We have been called to make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that Christ has commanded us. We have been invited into the biggest story of them all, the same story Isaiah invited the Israelites into. It is the same story that motivates the good work Donald Miller has done. It is the story of the gospel, the good news, which is for all people. We have been given a place in the beautiful and expansive story of God, and we have been called to tell this story to others.