It was almost 2 ½ years ago now when you may have last found
me at a Dodge dealership waiting on an oil change and musing about my
dissertation and my grief. That’s not to
say I haven’t had my oil changed since then.
“Fred Weasley” (my vehicle’s name if you didn’t already know it) and I
make the trip to the Dodge dealership on repeat, as it was meant to be. It’s just that I don’t always blog (or post
on social) every ordinary rhythm of life these days. Yet it seems almost prophetic that I, perhaps
unwisely, scheduled this oil change and tire rotation for the morning after my
dissertation defense. I fully recognize
that the vast majority of people would not list things like oil changes, car
washes, and singing alone on a long (or short) drive as spiritual disciplines,
but for me they are. These are consistent
practices that I can count on like clockwork, and I sincerely hope I will never
cease to find God in the everyday, ordinary moments.[1]
But yesterday was anything but ordinary…
This journey to a Ph.D. has been a long one—much longer than I ever expected, even though they do tell you at orientation that you have seven years. When my feet hit the ground in the fall of 2018, I had no idea what the next seven years would hold. To be completely honest, if I had I never would have done this. That’s not to say anything at all in life would have turned out any better than it has, but I’m just telling you Catherine Keller’s “cloud of missed possibilities” continues to follow me through every major life decision, although admittedly I think about this less than I used to.[2] I think we are more than the sum of our decisions and certainly more than our best and worst moments, but as it turns out these things do tend to define us and they probably matter.
Once the date of my dissertation defense was decided, friends and family began asking me very reasonable questions such as, “What do you need to do to prepare for your defense?” I had spent so much time and energy in the writing and editing process of the dissertation that I admit I hadn’t really thought much about what sort of preparation I could or should put into the defense itself. I certainly read and re-read what I had written. I went over the main points in my mind enough times that I hoped they would stick. I typed and printed them out and then decided to go in without notes, because even though notes make me more comfortable, I know I tend to present myself better without them. I ordered a new dress and two pairs of shoes (more on the dress later… the shoes were a disaster, so I went with my faithful silver glitter boots which are so old at this point I had to sew them back together at Christmas, but I figured they had one more day left in them). By Monday afternoon, I had decided there was nothing left I could do about any of it, so I read the entire third part of Sunrise on the Reaping with Caleb. This was probably the best use of my time.
I only attended one other defense at BU, six years ago. At the time, I remember thinking that the process wasn’t that bad. It was essentially an interview over a book you wrote. This is still true. My major concern was that I would forget everything I had written in the midst of this conversation. Mostly, I did not.
We arrived very early (Boston traffic is no joke, and I was not taking any chances). This early arrival allowed me some sweet moments with friends and colleagues who have walked alongside me during these years. I am forever grateful to Nikki, without whom I suspect I may not have survived that first year French reading class (thank goodness Starbucks had the Thursday BOGO deal that semester, too) and KC, who actually stuck it out through the entire defense. Something entirely unexpected was the celebration of the Eucharist in Muelder Chapel. It has been long enough since I have regularly been on the campus of BU that I forgot about this happening weekly on Tuesdays, and it felt like an absolute gift to participate alongside Dr. Charlene Zuill (who was an incredible support to me in the fall of 2021 and also a wonderful part of my journey leading spiritual companioning groups). In addition, although there are few things I love more than presiding over the Eucharist, it is a rare occurrence when a two-pastor family simply gets to participate without any official responsibilities. Again, the only word for this is gift.
I am also thankful that during these early hours at BU I ran into Dr. Shelley Rambo who served as my dissertation defense committee chair. I suspect Dr. Rambo has no idea how instrumental she has been for me in this program, from the very first semester when I begged her to let me into her already full Theology and Trauma class and she asked me to make a case for why she should. If I knew then what I know now, I probably could have made a stronger case, but she mercifully let me in, and some of the principles from that class have carried me through these years and certainly made their way into my dissertation as well. Still, with her very full schedule I didn’t really think she would agree to chair my defense committee. As my advisor Dr. Karen Westerfield Tucker and I discussed committee members, the team began to take shape but still lacked a chair for what felt to me like quite some time (it may have just been the normal process, but I did have a moment when I wondered if anyone would agree). At some point I just threw it out there one more time, “You don’t think we can get Dr. Rambo, do you?” And then one day there was an email in my inbox announcing that Dr. Rambo had, indeed, agreed to be the chair. I don’t think I realized how very much I needed that to be the case until I saw her on Tuesday morning. It was during my short conversation with her that I had the first real moment of clarity in which I actually thought to myself, “I’m going to pass this defense.” It’s not that I genuinely doubted it, and I felt very sure that Karen would not throw me into this without believing I would pass, but something clicked for me in that hallway outside 306 and I relaxed a little bit.
There are probably not enough words in the English language to express how important Dr. Westerfield Tucker has been to this entire process, start to finish. I suppose most people feel this kind of gratitude for their advisors as people who mentor them through the academic process, but Karen has also been there for me and for my family in ways that are so far above and beyond what an advisor is required to do. I don’t think too many people have an advisor who finds a pastoral assignment for their spouse so their family can afford to move to the Boston area or drops off farm fresh eggs and vegetables on their front porches. Thankfully, I don’t suspect too many advisors have to walk their students through the worst day of their lives or help them to navigate teaching responsibilities just weeks later. I don’t think I would have made it through this program with a different advisor. Karen lovingly and gently extended grace upon grace and also pushed me just enough to keep me on track to finish strong.
The rest of my defense committee was made up of Dr. Daryl Ireland, Dr. Brent Peterson, and Dr. Eunil David Cho.
Even in our somewhat small and rather well-connected Nazarene world, I had not met Dr. Ireland before becoming a student at BU. I have been incredibly thankful for him for a variety of reasons but two stand out in particular. First, I think I simply needed another Nazarene walking alongside me, giving perspective, challenging me, and also backing me up when it came to Nazarene particularities and peculiarities. He was beyond valuable as a second reader. I am also thankful for what I originally thought was a somewhat quirky suggestion to make use of the Nazarene missionary books for narratives that might make a case for liturgical practices surrounding entire sanctification. I am Nazarene through-and-through, and I am not above reading a good missionary book! Heck, I even served as the missionary book lady at our local church in Georgia in the early 2000s. But to use them in a dissertation? I was unsure but also desperate enough to get the thing written that I agreed. As it turns out, my hours and days pouring over those testimonies at the Nazarene Theological Seminary library ended up being incredibly important to this project but also inspired a glimmer of hope in me (and I cried a lot at the library).
Having Dr. Peterson as a part of this committee was something of a full-circle moment for me. When he asked me to define grace, I laughed. I’m not sure you’re supposed to find your dissertation defense funny or ironic, but this took me back to my M.Div. and the many times in his class when I pressed him to define grace and was never quite satisfied with the answer. It was, of course, an honor to have him present as someone who profoundly shaped my own interest in and care for liturgy and sacramental practices.
If there was a wild card for me going into the defense, it was undoubtedly Dr. Cho, whom I had not met until he walked into the room. He was also almost my undoing, because he opened his time of questioning by saying that my dissertation “read like a love letter to your church.” I may never have the words to explain exactly why this affected me like it did, but I had a moment when I knew my eyes had become a floodgate with tears pressing hard to spill out and also filling my throat as I tried to swallow without releasing a single one. It’s not that I am afraid to cry or ashamed to cry or embarrassed to cry. If you know me, you know I cry. But I also knew if these tears escaped, I was not going to be able to get myself back together. Dr. Cho followed with a question that was long enough for me to compose myself, but today I am right back to thinking about the church I love, and I’m not doing quite as stellar a job of holding back the tears.
By the time I was dismissed along with family and friends to await the decision of the committee, I felt fairly sure that I would pass, but maybe with conditions/revisions. The committee did not deliberate long, and when they called me back in, they were standing. And who knew just hearing the words, “Dr. Michaels” could pack such a punch? I am going to fix two typos in the footnotes, the case of the Roman Numerals in the Table of Contents, and add a few words to the abstract. The committee also suggested a minor change to the title, which was fine, because I quite literally forgot what the title was anyway. And that’s it.
We snapped a few pictures at my request, and at Shelly’s insistence that we do it before everyone was in tears. Here’s where the dress comes back in. I hate the dress I ordered. It is really unflattering, and I definitely was still holding back tears at this moment, and I am considering having Chat GPT roast this picture, but 1. I am a little terrified of how that would turn out, and 2. I don’t have a Chat GPT account. There’s a world in which I don’t want to post this picture at all, but it’s what I have…
The really good fashion news is that I quickly changed into what I think might be the coolest t-shirt ever, and my purple flower pants have never failed me yet…[3]
Ian, Miah, me, Caleb, and Phil
I sometimes wondered if this day would ever come. But it did. And in this moment that is joy. Philippians 1:6.
Dr. Michaels (that’s who I am now)
[1] This is a note for myself, as much as anything, that I really need to write about the smell of the Dodge dealership someday, because sitting here today I am making connections to my childhood that have eluded me in the past… Ah, fiberglass…
[2] See Face of the Deep: A Theology of Becoming. Also, as it turns out, the last time I wrote about this was at the end of my first year at BU, just after I had completed my district license interview after a 1,000 mile road trip with my two oldest children, and this realization is killing me just a little bit, this morning.
[3] As a note, BU lore has it that you should not step on the BU seal before completing your program. I feel almost certain I walked right over it early on… I might even have a picture of myself standing on it on the first day of my teaching fellowship… it’s hard to say, because the pictures are close up selfies, but the background and angles make me think I may have desecrated the seal and released the BU curse early on… At any rate, I danced on that thing yesterday afternoon… Karen, I am sorry you had to see that, but I’m glad you laughed…
