I was born and raised a Texan by two amazing parents, a mother from Louisiana and a father from Arkansas. (Of course, my dad likes to say he’s from L.A….lower Arkansas. [Insert laughter here for the dad pun.]) I lived in the same house on the same street until age eighteen when I moved across the state to attend Texas Tech University. There, I met my person, my soul mate, my partner in life, Brandon. (I also crushed a major in mathematics as well, for those of you who were wondering.) Brandon and I were married shortly after he finished his undergraduate degree and shortly before we started seminary together. Three years later, I graduated with two masters degrees, because why get one when you can get two for the same price?? (I refer you back to the math degree.) One degree is a Master’s in Educational Psychology and the other, a Master’s of Divinity. The latter is the one I had been dreaming about since I was in sixth grade. The former was one I found out that I needed whilst being a youth minister during my college years.
My resume reads like a manifesto of a madwoman
Brandon has been the head pastor of a church since 2007. It’s the same year our first child was born. (Our total kid count is two for those of you who don’t like waiting until later to find out.) It’s also how long I’ve been doing odd jobs that fit the schedule of Brandon’s role as pastor and our desire to have a parent at home as much as possible when our kids were preschool aged. My resumé reads like a manifesto of a madwoman but it’s mine. It’s my story. And I claim it in all of its weirdness and oddity. To make money I have sewn costumes, refinished furniture, tutored children in math, ministered to youth, fashioned draperies, ministered to college students, homeschooled other people’s children, guided others in the ways of essential oils, sewn essential oil bags, created products with essential oils and sold them at farmer’s markets, taught math in private school, taught math in public school, and before too long something else will get added to this list. Maybe church consultant. I guess we’ll see, Lord willing and the creek don’t rise. (If you’re not southern, well neither am I. Texas is not the south. But I do love a good saying and that last sentence is a saying as good as they come.)
Jill, no one is ever going to take you seriously until you get ordained.
My Episcopalian priest-friend Nancy from the North
In my fortieth year of being alive on this beautiful planet, I strongly desired to become credentialed in something, something that would allow me to do for a living what one of my masters degrees had trained me for. See, I know how to be a counselor, but I’m not credentialed in it so I can’t make money at it. I’m also trained to be a minister, but there have been lots of roadblocks to that including the fact that I was not ordained. So in my fortieth year of being alive on this third rock from the sun, I sought to become credentialed in something that felt substantial and worthwhile. And well, it didn’t happen. So in my forty-first year of being on this….well, you get the point. I trained this year to become a church consultant. And then I did my fieldwork in church consulting and now I have a certificate that says I’ve checked all the boxes and someone is now allowed to pay me for my services. It felt so darn good that God then laid on my heart to finally get ordained as well. Well, that and my Episcopalian priest-friend Nancy from the North who plainly said, “Jill, no one is ever going to take you seriously until you get ordained.” So on the day before my 41st birthday, my husband and children and church and parents all laid hands on me and ordained me in the absolute most beautiful service I have ever experienced in my life. Someone later described it as a cross between a wedding and a baptism. Yep. It was just that beautiful.
God is like that, though
These days B and I have two kiddos and two doggies and a house in the woods that we recently painted the most beautiful navy blue. We’re weird in that we actually like and enjoy our children. We miss them while they are at school and cherish our moments together. But maybe even stranger, we truly love and adore our church community. They have been salvific for us in every sense of the word. If you have asked me a decade ago if I would ever be happy living in suburban Alabama, I would have laughed in your face. God is like that, though. Surprising. Creative. Patient.
I’m working to open myself up to all of the ways that God reveals God’s nature, and so I’ve promised myself to write and photograph and document all of the things that the Spirit lays on my heart as important. My hope is that this website gives you glimpses into the nature of God as God is revealed in my life. And that those glimpses bring you nearer to the One who breathes life into your nostrils and smiles with joy over who you are.
If there are ways I can help you or your family or your church, please reach out to me. I’m certain that I would love to help.
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