10/04/2026 - "Friction & Freedom" with guest preacher T-Ann Pierce (Exodus 14:5-7, 10-14, 21-29)

You can watch the sermon here.

When I was four or five, I fell asleep in the backseat of our car while chewing gum.

The gum fell out of my mouth and melted onto the seat. No matter what my mom did to remove it, it never came off completely. Over time, it became a sad, sticky, lint and dust-covered blob. Gross.

Not shockingly, that seat became my permanently assigned seat in the car. 

Car rides when I was a kid were not a Norman Rockwell painting.

Both of my parents smoked in the front seat, never thinking to crack a window.

My brother would poke me, breathe in my general direction, and somehow expand into my side of the car.

On long car rides, my dad only stopped when the gas tank was on empty, so instead of a rest stop, I’d be handed an empty glass peanut butter jar.

I don’t have many skills that translate into positions of high power. However, even before I entered grade school, I could balance flawlessly over a glass peanut butter jar resting on the floorboard of a 1972 Volvo while the car careened down the bumpy highway, my dad changing lanes furiously as he cussed out Wisconsin drivers.

The thought of travel in the 70s weirdly evokes equal parts trauma and nostalgia.

I grew up, had a family of my own, and, of course, we traveled with our own four kids.

We were a planes, trains, and automobiles kind of family. We believed the best way to keep kids engaged and making memories on a trip was to let them experience a wide variety of transportation modes.

To some extent, this was true.

Experiencing different modes of transportation - donkey rides, ferries, Thomas the Tank Engine - gave our kids different platforms from which to build their own memories. Or, more truthfully, their own brand of childhood trauma and nostalgia.

Today, when our kids recall family vacations, they never, ever recall the beautiful art or vistas we sacrificed and planned for them to see. Or the history they learned.

But they do remember every grievance or minor inconvenience endured on any and all vacations.

When I tell you my kids have traveled the world and have the scars to prove it, I am not joking. We have been to the ER in some pretty beautiful places.

And one of my dear friends, who does not have children of her own but has traveled with ours, noted, “The Pierces seem to have an unwritten policy of blame before resolution.”

She is not wrong.

That means if we get lost on a country walk, we must first decide who is to blame for being lost before we can find our way home. If you are bleeding, it is critical to determine whose fault it is before applying the tourniquet. Bone popping out of your leg? Blame first, 911 second.

I’m not proud of this, but it does make for some entertaining storytelling later.

Traveling with your family is not for the faint of heart. Traveling together is hard because but no matter how you slice it, humans will always human.

You can bet on that over and over again.

Think about the Israelites, searching for freedom.

Forget for a moment the drama of the miracle of the sea parting. I can’t get past the miracle of all those personalities not pouncing on one another. 

How could these people possibly get along?

They are traumatized. They are starving. They are physically, mentally, and emotionally drained. They want freedom, but yeah, freedom isn’t looking so great, not when they are all crowded along the banks of the Red Sea with a leader who doesn’t seem to have much of a plan. Is freedom worth the risk?

Imagine the complaining! The fear! The blaming.

The Israelites start to second-guess themselves and each other. Why wouldn’t they blame and doubt? I sure would have.

Maybe slavery in Egypt wasn’t so bad? Maybe they could go back, work a little more efficiently, smile a little more sincerely, be a titch more agreeable, hope a bit harder, and life would certainly be better than this mess they've found themselves in, right?

They are hungry, scared, tired, and impatient.

They are incredibly human.

Imagine this: imagine both sides of your extended family in this impossible situation.

Think about your mom’s side and your dad’s side, all the cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents. Think about those personalities all wandering the shoreline of the Red Sea with seemingly no escape in sight.

Who yells first? Who cries? Who freezes? Who panics? Who needs calming? Who steps in to lead? Who is the problem solver? Who is fragile? Who wants to find the nearest kitchen and start cooking?

Who is hopeful in a positive way? Who is hopeful in a diabolically avoidant way? Who ministers? Who is the first to suggest ‘thinning the crowd’? 

Who is the black sheep? The pot stirrer? The grudge holder? The favorite? The peacemaker? The historian? The addict?

Now add all the people you have ever worked with to this imaginary crowd: the micromanagers, the know-it-alls, the overachievers, the underachievers, the oversharers, the social butterfly, the gossip, the credit taker, the martyr, the rule follower, the rebel.

Add more. 

This time, add everyone in your neighborhood: the gatekeeper, the politician, the chaos addict, the contrarian, the comedian, the busybody, the “everybody’s kids are my kids” person, and the “hey, kids, get off my lawn” person.

Now add, for good measure, those desperate people stopped in traffic on 90 trying to get into Chicago on the Friday night before a long holiday weekend.

Think about those personalities merging with your family, coworkers, and neighbors. Think about the honker, the tailgater, the weaver, the nervous driver, the “I know a shortcut” guy, the “I’ll die before I let you merge” gal, and the sweet as pie “I’ll let you all merge” person.

Exodus describes 600,000 men, plus women and children. Whatever we make of that number historically, this was a big ole crowd of people, a million or more maybe, who are not at their best, so to speak.

This was a massive, messy collection of humans moving together, interacting, stepping on each other’s heels and likely grating on each other’s very last nerve.

This collection of humanity may be one of the most overlooked parts of Exodus.

Remember, God doesn’t free the Israelites one at a time, sending them to airport lounges during layovers, to rest and fill their carry-on bags with unripened bananas and granola bars.

They leave as a people.

Which means they had to figure out freedom while living alongside one another, rubbing shoulders, sharing space, and likely not smelling their best.

I cannot imagine how trying it must have been to be a part of this crowd, and, as one of the foremost thinkers of our modern age, the great and prolific philosopher Taylor Swift once said, “It’s me, hi, I’m the problem, it’s me.”

My personality would have definitely added to the tension.

Being in relationship with other human beings is one of the most rewarding yet emotionally draining, infuriating aspects of being human.

Of course, love and connection are wonderful. Feeling like you belong is life-giving. Sharing, supporting, laughing, crying, solving the world’s problems with people we love gives meaning and richness to our lives.

But dealing with people who bug the bejesus out of us, who have crazy ideas, or who don’t listen to our amazing viewpoints can be really trying.

I mean, we are so right.

How can everyone else not see how right we are?

But to be fully alive, we must live in community with others. We can’t do life alone. We just can’t.

We need each other.

Me personally? 

I am deeply grateful there are people in this world who inspect elevators, fix watches, calculate structural loads on bridges, control traffic in the sky, wash skyscraper windows, and can conceptualize what 800 feet might look like when their GPS tells them about an upcoming turn.

I am not one of those people. Details are not my thing. 

Likewise, no one wants to live in a world with too many types like me. It would be all Kumbaya and no brain surgeries. 

But sometimes you need someone like me, or Pastor Rachel, of course, to sit with you in your existential crisis. To help untangle grief, fear, regret, transition, or whatever on earth you're supposed to do with your life. To walk three steps ahead of you, shining a light on the dark and thorny path you’ve stumbled on.

And rest assured, we'll never make you do math.

We need differences.

We need friction.

There has to be friction.

Marriage creates friction.
Babies and young children create friction.
Adult children create friction.
Aging parents create friction.
Illness creates friction.
Friendship creates friction.
Work environments create friction.
Churches create friction.
Politics creates friction.
Community creates friction.

So do grief, holidays, travel, leadership, money, and different generations.

Put enough human beings in one room and eventually somebody is going to say something irritating.

In Western society today, we’ve embraced this idea that friction between two people means something is wrong.

We equate friction with stress. We equate stress with anxiety. We equate anxiety with harm.

Yes, friction can be harmful, but I’m not talking about physical, emotional, or verbal abuse here.

I’m talking about how we, as a society, have decided that friction, being uncomfortable, is somehow unhealthy. As if friction will physically harm or morally bankrupt us if we rub shoulders with people who bug us.

Being in community with people who frustrate or infuriate us is part of the work we are sent here to do. Being uncomfortable is a huge part of being fully, wildly, freely alive.

Being rubbed the wrong way by people is part of our soul’s journey. It is how we become.

I believe the soul is our inextinguishable eternal self. Our soul needs a body to express itself. And, without a soul, the human self, the human body, ceases to exist. 

Our breath holds the body and soul together. 

With each breath, with each experience, our souls call us to embody our gifts ~ to follow, trust, and live fully, even if it means we make mistakes. Our soul wants us to learn as we go and grow. 

In our society, we often forget that the journey of the soul is not the journey of the ego.

Our soul has no interest in becoming the smartest person in the room or the most revered. Our soul does not want or need us to be more certain, more right, more in control, more respected, or more rigid.

Our souls are here to learn, to experience, to grow, and to become.

The trouble is, we get in the way. We get frightened. We cling to certainty. We protect what makes us comfortable. We hold tightly to who we think we are or who we think we should be. We get too certain about how we think the world should work. We get sharp, brittle, rough.

What are our souls trying to reveal?

We don’t always know.

Believe it or not, in some ways, our soul’s journey is none of our business. Our life’s purpose may simply be to notice when we can get out of our soul’s way and let our soul lead us to more kindness and love. 

To let generosity and curiosity lead us into and out of places where more of who we are meant to become can develop. Like a Polaroid picture. Not just for our own good, but hopefully, for the greater good.

That kind of journey requires a willingness to surrender to friction.

Like sanding.

Think about a carpenter making a chair.

When the chair is first assembled, the wood can be rough. There are knots and sharp edges. Splinters. Places that catch.

So the carpenter sands it.

Friction.

Over and over.

The carpenter doesn’t sand the chair because there is something inherently wrong with the wood.

Sanding is simply one part of furniture making.

With every pass of the sandpaper, the chair becomes more itself. 

The rough edges soften. The surface becomes smooth. The chair becomes safe to touch, comfortable to sit in, and inviting enough to offer rest.

It becomes what it was intended to become.

The sanding didn’t make the chair less of a chair.

The sanding made the chair more fully a chair.

We are like that.

Maybe being free to become who we are meant to become requires a willingness to let people sand us.

This can feel vulnerable at best, terrifying at worst.

Let people hold and voice opinions different from our own?

Let another person puncture our mask of certainty?

Let love demand that we show up for one another even when we’d prefer to judge hard?

Let ourselves rest in the mystery of faith?

Release control?

That requires vulnerability.

It requires humility.

It requires surrender.

But remember, sanding is different from disappearing.

Sanding says I am willing to surrender some of my sharp edges. It doesn’t say you must disappear. Sanding nudges you toward new perspectives:

I don’t need to defend every opinion.

I don’t need to win every argument.

I don’t need every encounter to leave me as comfortable as it found me.

I can ask: What rough part of me might I let soften?

What can I learn from this person that I could never learn on my own?

We can read about compassion.

We can study forgiveness.

We can talk about patience, humility, and grace.

But eventually, we need another human being to give us somewhere to practice what we have learned.

We need someone who thinks differently, moves through the world differently, and doesn’t automatically affirm our every action.

We need people who stretch and challenge us.

And, yes, oh yes, sometimes we need people who show us, in Technicolor, exactly how not to live, how not to treat people, how not to make choices.

Spiritual practice isn’t about avoiding friction.

The practice is becoming willing enough, humble enough, and curious enough to ask:

What is trying to emerge?

What is this friction trying to reveal in me? 

The people we meet along the way help sand and smooth the rough parts of our interiors. 

And, let’s face it, not all friction has the same grit.

Sandpaper comes in everything from coarse, heavy-duty grit to the very fine stuff used for finishing.

One person may not be abrasive at all. 

A mildly annoying coworker might rub against you with only a fine grit.

But marriage? You’ll need the entire grit chart of sandpaper, depending on the season, the day, or the hour.

Parenting a teenager?

You’re going to need something coarse.

Thanksgiving dinner after a contentious election? Wear protective eyewear.

Shaping happens in nature too.

Think about stones tumbling together in a pounding surf. Carried by the waves, their surfaces collide again and again. Friction and force meet, stone on stone.

Slowly, the sharp edges soften.

The roughness is worn smooth.

The stones are not diminished by the process.

They are shaped by it.

Stone against stone. Sandpaper against wood.    

We aren’t supposed to move through life untouched, unchallenged, unchanged.

We are meant to be shaped by the lives that touch our own.

That is what I keep coming back to in Exodus.

The sea eventually parts.

But the Israelites still have to walk to freedom.

All of them. Together. 

The frightened ones.
The complainers.
The doubters.
The hopeful ones.
The difficult ones.
The ones who are absolutely certain they know a better way.

Nobody gets a private crossing.

They walk toward freedom together.

Still human.
Still rubbing up against one another.
Still afraid.
Still learning.
And profoundly transformed by the journey.