I lost my joy. I suspect there are a few of you who feel the same way. Not that you aren't happy, but there is this deep place of celebratory joy which you once knew that really doesn't come around much anymore.

There was a time when I was a pretty joyful guy. Not “blind to the world's problems” kind of joyful, just “blessed to be blessed in the midst of this mess” kind of joyful. Lately though, I've found joy to be an increasingly difficult thing to come by.

The thing is, I have every reason to be joyful. I'm lucky enough to be married to an amazing woman – truly amazing. I couldn't be prouder of my kids who, in an age of “be different just like us” are very much their own kind of different simply because they aren't afraid of being themselves. My personal interests, like my blog, just keep getting better. I have some of the best friends in the world. Yet, I'm not the generally joyful person I once was.

It's a dull malaise that I just can't quite shake. I don't like it. Not one bit.

Recently though, I've been catching little glimpses of my joy making cameo appearances in the storyline of my life. I like it. A lot.

The question is, why now? Why not back then? 

I can't say that I have the complete answer yet, but I am beginning to have some insights to it. The first glimpse happened at the Wild Goose Festival in Shakori Hills, NC. Frankly, given the setting, I did not believe for one moment that it was where I'd start sorting out my joy. 

It was on a piece of tick-infested farm land with temperatures and relative humidity in the nineties. I'd gathered with  a bunch of strangers under an oversized, white tent that was purportedly meant to provide a venue for musicians and speakers to present their gifts, but it seemed to be equally adept at trapping the heat and humidity pouring off of all those gathered. Joyful, right? Admittedly, I wasn't so certain.

Part 2 of my sabbatical adventure away from the church entitled: "Church No More."

A few weeks ago I (an ordained minster who has gone to church my whole life) walked away from church– for three months. It is what I've decided to do with my sabbatical. You can read about my initial thoughts on my blog or on The Huffington Post. As the journey unfolds, I will be blogging about it in this series entitled, “Church No More.” I hope you will not only follow along, but add your voice to the reflection by commenting or joining the discussion on my FB page.

It might be that the thing which concerned me the most about leaving the church was losing my spiritual community.  It's not that I thought the spiritual-but-not-religious folk were helplessly lonely people wandering around seeking a spiritual community. Not at all. I  just assumed that it might be immensely difficult to find and plug into a community like that in the course of three months. I also couldn't help but think it would be just a bit – well, fake to seek out a community for the sake of observing them and then leaving a few months latter.  Not just fake but somewhat mean spirited and completely missing the point of community.

Here's the thing, I am a minister. I understand myself to be a person who ministers by following the lead and teachings of Jesus. (I also happen to follow the teachings of many other spiritual and/or thought leaders from Buddha to Neil deGrasse Tyson, but that's for another post some other time). Because of that, the idea of life without a spiritual community gives me the heebie-jeebies. (I apologize for using such a technical term, but a duck is a duck is a duck).

Why? Why do I break out in a heebie-jeebie induced sweat/panic-attack at the thought of having no spiritual community? Jesus. That is to say, at the beginning of his ministry the first thing Jesus did was create community. He marched himself down to the shoreline, yelled out to a bunch of folk (who would never really understand him or his teachings) to “follow me,” and they began ministering together. It would seem that for Jesus a prerequisite to ministering and doing the work of God (possibly even relating to God fully) is to be in community.

As I walked away from the church, I had no spiritual community. Heebie-jeebies for real.