Reflections and Poem from Sheri’s 25th Anniversary Service

On Dec. 7, we celebrated Sheri’s quarter-century of ministry through scripture, song, art, reflections, poetry, pies and dancing! Below are reflections given by Randy Yee and Eli Ramer, plus a poem written by Bekah Puddington for the occasion.

Randy Yee’s Reflection

Hi my name is Randy, and I’m a recovering churchgoer. I stopped going to church in the mid-2000s due to dogmas that didn’t seem to fit me or bring me closer to the Creator. In order to “save yourself,” you had to follow in a certain way or sign a covenant, and that didn’t work for me. 

My journey of coming here to First Mennonite Church of San Francisco was like a labyrinth – the path takes you towards the center, through twists and turns, and then you find yourself going outwards again. About seven years ago, I stepped into 290 Dolores not quite knowing what I would find. It had been 10 years since I had attended church.

I had the inkling of going back to something that was familiar but in a different way, and in 2018 came to FMCSF. Kate and I had attended a Mennonite church when we lived in Pennsylvania, and I had enjoyed what I experienced there. In 2018, life had some challenges with Kate going through cancer treatments and my mother-in-law dying from cancer. But I remember that first Sunday here, and it felt hopeful.

What really caught my attention was a meditation Sheri gave. It didn’t feel like a sermon, that is, a public teaching from a preacher to a congregation, centered on scripture, but a meditation, a personal invitation to deeply ponder and absorb a scripture – to move from hearing it to internalizing it. Sheri was inviting us to apply the scripture to our daily lives and to pay attention to the small moments of God’s presence in nature and in others.

Through these years at FMCSF I’m also grateful to Sheri for calling us to remember how we are a community and what is important to us. Over the years she and I and others (the Doom Group) have discussed ideas from Nate Hagen’s podcast The Great Simplification and have reflected on the harm and damage done through the Doctrine of Discovery. These discussions have helped me feel that I’m not alone in confronting the big challenges we’re facing – we are in community and can share the burden together and there is hope out there.

As I end my reflections, I want to read this poem by Sheri which invites us to the mystery of life with Creator:

Instructions
by Sheri Hostetler

Give up the world; give up self; finally, give up God.
Find god in rhododendrons and rocks,
passers-by, your cat. (or dog)
Pare your beliefs, your absolutes.
Make it simple; make it clean.
No carry-on luggage allowed.
Examine all you have
with a loving and critical eye, then
throw away some more.
Repeat. Repeat.
Keep this and only this:
what your heart beats loudly for
what feels heavy and full in your gut.
There will only be one or two
things you will keep,
and they will fit lightly
in your pocket.

Eli Ramer’s Reflection

I remember where I was sitting in that room in 2003, during the annual Sha’ar Zahav Interfaith Service. Clergy from neighborhood churches and members of their communities were there. I remember the pastor from the First Mennonite Church getting up to speak, and I was moved by what she said, although I can’t remember what it was. 

A year went by. The next Interfaith Service. The same lovely pastor. Another inspiring teaching. Then, not long afterwards, at a Sha’ar Zahav board meeting, we were told that First Mennonite Church would soon be worshipping here on Sundays, and that the pastor was looking for people to teach an Intro to Judaism class after each service, for the first six weeks, during education hour. I immediately volunteered, came to five of the six services, stayed for each education hour, and taught the final one, taking a Torah scroll out of the ark, unwrapping, unrolling, and chanting from it, because in a Jewish service, as you may know, we don’t read the weekly scripture verses, we chant them, in Hebrew. 

Chanting. Singing. I was deeply moved by the music here and would tell my friends, when they asked what I liked about the services – “Mennonites are genetically programmed from birth to sing in four-part harmony.” And I kept coming. Because of the singing. The warm welcome of this wonderful community. And because of Pastor Sheri. 

At almost 75, I can’t tell you how many synagogues, churches, mosques, and temples I’ve worshipped in. And I can’t tell you how many ministers, rabbis, imams, priests, pastors, cantors, I’ve heard leading services. But from the beginning, there was something utterly unique to me about Sheri. 

First, her egoless presence. There are times, in the services I’ve gone to, when I felt the clergyperson broadcasting out – “Aren’t I great? Aren’t I special? Aren’t I exactly what you need to hear today?” But that’s an energy I’ve never once felt coming from Sheri. And I’ve been to services where the worship leader is shy, uncomfortable, an introvert, wondering – “What the hell am I doing up here?” – but I’ve never once felt that energy coming from Sheri, either. 

Second. I’ve been teaching meditation for more than 40 years and did my training to be a somatic therapist more than 30 years ago, and whenever Sheri is up on the bimah, I can feel her luminous expansive grounding energy filling the sanctuary, holding every one of us within it, and I can feel the light of her energy caringly blessing us all. 

So, her presence, luminosity, and third, her deeply loving wisdom. Again and again I’ve been touched, as I know we all have, by her clarity, depth, capacity to inspire us. I’ve said to her over the years that I can’t wait to read a collection of her sermons. Hundreds of them. Each one a blessing. And while we don’t yet have that book, there are days when I’m feeling out of balance and in need of inspiration, as a writer myself, and I take off the shelf and read her offerings in this book, A Cappella: Mennonite Voices in Poetry. 

From her poem “Say Yes Quickly” –

Keep saying yes.

You might as well.

You’re here in this wide space now,

no walls and certainly not a roof.

The door was always an illusion. 

So. Your wisdom, Sheri. Your generosity. Your grounding and expansive illuminating presence. Your loving energy. And your words. Which remind us again and again – to yes-fully step forth into life. For we are all children of the Creator. Who have come together in community to support each other in making this a better world. An Eden once again. 

And I say – thank you, my friend. I say – bless you, who are a blessing to us, and to all the world. 

For Sheri Hostetler, in celebration of her 25 years of ministry at First Mennonite Church of San Francisco. —Bekah Puddington

You can see a video of Bekah reading the poem here.