A year after his death, Peter Gomes still inspires. Irie and I saw him preach at Duke in January of 2006, just before we moved to Vermont. While in Vermont, The Good Book gave me the courage to speak my conscience on gays in the church. I wrote him and said so.
In homage, I will borrow a story from Gomes tomorrow in my Ash Wednesday homily.
My favorite quote from this interview: "It's much easier coming out as a homosexual, than it is a conservative."
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Manna & Mercy
We had a great time on Wednesday night with our first Manna & Mercy study. If you want to know more about the Bible and what it tells us about how God is mending the entire universe come to Second B at 6:30 on Wednesday. The whole world is invited . . .
The Emergence Church(es)
Well, we have all safely arrived home from our 2012 Adult Retreat in Santa Fe, NM. I want to thank the Adult Retreat Committee, small group leaders, and the many, many others who helped us to have a great time in New Mexico. Special thanks to Stephanie Nash, Scott and Nancy Sharp, and Melanie Davis for the untold number of hours they put into making the weekend a real success. Well done, friends; well done.
And how ‘bout our Adult Retreat leader Phyllis Tickle. Phyllis has keen gifts for perception and analysis and a personality to pass it along. What a mind and what a spirit. Somebody said she is basically Book TV meets Molly Ivins!
For those who didn't go on the retreat, you will probably hear those who did coming back and talking about things like "emergence" or the "Great Emergence." I know this can sound like esoteric, in-the-club speak, but you already know what emergence is. You swim in it. It is the world you live in. And the Great Emergence is simply what the world has come to over the course of the last 150 years. As Phyllis said, the Great Emergence means the world you live in "ain't your great-granddaddy's world" and "there's no going back."
Here's a small sample of signs of emergence Phyllis gave us to consider:
- Technological information is doubling every 9 months 27 days.
- The average person will have five different careers in his or her lifetime.
- We live in a "glocal" world - "When Greece catches a cold the whole world catches pneumonia."
- In 1905, there were 8,000 cars in the US. Today, there are 8,000 in the parking lot. (Ok, that's an exaggeration.)
- When you pull your car into the driveway, you call on your cell phone for someone to help you bring in the groceries. (That's not an exaggeration!)
Again, as Phyllis said, this ain't our great-granddaddy's world. In fact, it's not my granddaddy's. And it may not even be your daddy's.
So, the question Phyllis has us asking is this: What will the "emergence church" look like in order to live in and speak meaningfully to this brave, new world? Perhaps in order to get at that question we might need to talk not about the emergence church, but rather emergence churches. Our great-granddaddy's church had a white steeple out up top, screwed-down pews inside, read from the KJV up front, and set women in the (at best, metaphorical) back. This was true pretty much regardless of whether your great-granddaddy was Baptist or Methodist, black or white, a city or country boy. The churches of the Great Emergence are going to be much more unique, particular, and contextualized.
Jesus said, "The Kingdom of Heaven is like a net that was thrown into the water and pulled in fish of all different kinds" (Matthew 13:47). The boat has always been a symbol for the Church universal. What we are now learning in this very different world is that the Church universal may actually be better symbolized not by one single boat, but by a multiplicity of different-sized boats, fishing with various sizes of nets, on extremely divergent bodies of water, in order to catch those fish of very different and many kinds.
So the question for Second B isn't so much, "What will the Emergence Church look like?" It is rather, "What is Second B going to look like in this Great Emergence?" In other words, what kind of boat are we going to need to be sailing?
I'll wade out into that water next week.
And how ‘bout our Adult Retreat leader Phyllis Tickle. Phyllis has keen gifts for perception and analysis and a personality to pass it along. What a mind and what a spirit. Somebody said she is basically Book TV meets Molly Ivins!
For those who didn't go on the retreat, you will probably hear those who did coming back and talking about things like "emergence" or the "Great Emergence." I know this can sound like esoteric, in-the-club speak, but you already know what emergence is. You swim in it. It is the world you live in. And the Great Emergence is simply what the world has come to over the course of the last 150 years. As Phyllis said, the Great Emergence means the world you live in "ain't your great-granddaddy's world" and "there's no going back."
Here's a small sample of signs of emergence Phyllis gave us to consider:
- Technological information is doubling every 9 months 27 days.
- The average person will have five different careers in his or her lifetime.
- We live in a "glocal" world - "When Greece catches a cold the whole world catches pneumonia."
- In 1905, there were 8,000 cars in the US. Today, there are 8,000 in the parking lot. (Ok, that's an exaggeration.)
- When you pull your car into the driveway, you call on your cell phone for someone to help you bring in the groceries. (That's not an exaggeration!)
Again, as Phyllis said, this ain't our great-granddaddy's world. In fact, it's not my granddaddy's. And it may not even be your daddy's.
So, the question Phyllis has us asking is this: What will the "emergence church" look like in order to live in and speak meaningfully to this brave, new world? Perhaps in order to get at that question we might need to talk not about the emergence church, but rather emergence churches. Our great-granddaddy's church had a white steeple out up top, screwed-down pews inside, read from the KJV up front, and set women in the (at best, metaphorical) back. This was true pretty much regardless of whether your great-granddaddy was Baptist or Methodist, black or white, a city or country boy. The churches of the Great Emergence are going to be much more unique, particular, and contextualized.
Jesus said, "The Kingdom of Heaven is like a net that was thrown into the water and pulled in fish of all different kinds" (Matthew 13:47). The boat has always been a symbol for the Church universal. What we are now learning in this very different world is that the Church universal may actually be better symbolized not by one single boat, but by a multiplicity of different-sized boats, fishing with various sizes of nets, on extremely divergent bodies of water, in order to catch those fish of very different and many kinds.
So the question for Second B isn't so much, "What will the Emergence Church look like?" It is rather, "What is Second B going to look like in this Great Emergence?" In other words, what kind of boat are we going to need to be sailing?
I'll wade out into that water next week.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
All Mixed Up
October 15, 2009
Today I bought Gabrielle her first biography on Martin Luther King, Jr., Martin's Big Words by Doreen Rappaport and Bryan Collier. I crawled into bed beside her and broke open the crisp pages.
In 1955 on a cold December day in Montgomery, Alabama Rosa Parks was coming home from work. A white man told her to get up from her seat on the bus so he could sit. She said no, and was arrested. . .
As we laid there sharing a single pillow, I explained to Gabrielle that there was a time in our nation's history when white people like her daddy wouldn't let black people like her mommy sit on the front of the bus. "And that was very mean," I added in a soft but very serious tone. "But Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King changed all that. They made it so that black people could sit at the front of the bus and drink from any water fountain they wished. They made it so that mommy and daddy could get married."
There was silence.
"What's bi-ra-chel," she asked.
"Bi-racial means you are half black like mommy and half white like daddy."
"I like pink," she said. "And white, and blue - and red."
"I like red, white, and blue too," I told her.
"All mixed up," she said.
"Yes, all mixed up," I said.
And then the lyrics of that old Peter, Paul, and Mary tune came dancing through my mind.
I think that this whole world
Soon mama my whole wide world
Soon mama my whole world
Soon gonna be gettin' mixed up
Today I bought Gabrielle her first biography on Martin Luther King, Jr., Martin's Big Words by Doreen Rappaport and Bryan Collier. I crawled into bed beside her and broke open the crisp pages.
In 1955 on a cold December day in Montgomery, Alabama Rosa Parks was coming home from work. A white man told her to get up from her seat on the bus so he could sit. She said no, and was arrested. . .
As we laid there sharing a single pillow, I explained to Gabrielle that there was a time in our nation's history when white people like her daddy wouldn't let black people like her mommy sit on the front of the bus. "And that was very mean," I added in a soft but very serious tone. "But Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King changed all that. They made it so that black people could sit at the front of the bus and drink from any water fountain they wished. They made it so that mommy and daddy could get married."
There was silence.
"What's bi-ra-chel," she asked.
"Bi-racial means you are half black like mommy and half white like daddy."
"I like pink," she said. "And white, and blue - and red."
"I like red, white, and blue too," I told her.
"All mixed up," she said.
"Yes, all mixed up," I said.
And then the lyrics of that old Peter, Paul, and Mary tune came dancing through my mind.
I think that this whole world
Soon mama my whole wide world
Soon mama my whole world
Soon gonna be gettin' mixed up
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
And All That Jazz
Another cross-posting from this week's Second Page article.
What a Sunday! I want to thank Ray Fargason and his friends for blessing us so richly with the joyous sound of jazz in our worship.
The timing couldn't have been better. Last week we said goodbye to three very special congregation members - Randy Juergens, Bill King, and Janelle Bevers. In addition, a number of Second Bers attended another funeral service Stephanie Nash and I officiated on Wednesday. It was a hard and very emotional week. We needed a little jazz to lift our spirits up come Sunday. As the band started in on Amazing Grace, there were faces smiling, feet tapping, then hands clapping, and now the choir processing, and everybody singing praises to God. And the words to that old Psalm filled my mind, "Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning."
In our liturgical tradition, every Sunday is supposed to be a "mini-Easter" - a proclamation of resurrection over death. After so many losses, this Sunday was indeed that for me.
But as I have reflected on this past Sunday's worship, I realize it was not only those in mourning who found the worship so powerful. There was a certain quality drawing all people in. It was jazz - yet it was Baptist. It was old and familiar - yet it was new and exciting. It was liturgical - yet it was electric. It was high church - yet it was warm and inviting. It was true to our roots - yet it was branching out. It was what this week's adult retreat leader Phyllis Tickle calls "participatory" worship.
And when Cloud 9 dropped me off at home Sunday afternoon, it occurred to me that in three years we ought not to be saying, "Wow, remember that Sunday way back when? That was a really great Sunday. We ought to do something like that again one of these days."
No, it is my hope that we will be saying, "Remember that worship. That was during the season of Epiphany. And that worship was an epiphany for us. That was when we started down the road. That was when it dawned on us that we were called to have the most unique and life-giving worship service in all of Lubbock week in and week out."
That is my hope.
We are in the early stages of our search for a new pastor of worship and music. Dixie Marcades has just joined the search committee, which already consisted of Ray Fargason (Chair), Kathleen Campbell, Nancy Weiss, and me. As we move forward with our search, we welcome your ideas and input. If you have comments or suggestions about what it is that we ought to be looking for then please write us.
Above all, please be in prayer for us as we seek the Spirit's guidance and look forward to the person with the gifts and graces to bring us a mini-Easter every Sunday morning.
What a Sunday! I want to thank Ray Fargason and his friends for blessing us so richly with the joyous sound of jazz in our worship.
The timing couldn't have been better. Last week we said goodbye to three very special congregation members - Randy Juergens, Bill King, and Janelle Bevers. In addition, a number of Second Bers attended another funeral service Stephanie Nash and I officiated on Wednesday. It was a hard and very emotional week. We needed a little jazz to lift our spirits up come Sunday. As the band started in on Amazing Grace, there were faces smiling, feet tapping, then hands clapping, and now the choir processing, and everybody singing praises to God. And the words to that old Psalm filled my mind, "Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning."
In our liturgical tradition, every Sunday is supposed to be a "mini-Easter" - a proclamation of resurrection over death. After so many losses, this Sunday was indeed that for me.
But as I have reflected on this past Sunday's worship, I realize it was not only those in mourning who found the worship so powerful. There was a certain quality drawing all people in. It was jazz - yet it was Baptist. It was old and familiar - yet it was new and exciting. It was liturgical - yet it was electric. It was high church - yet it was warm and inviting. It was true to our roots - yet it was branching out. It was what this week's adult retreat leader Phyllis Tickle calls "participatory" worship.
And when Cloud 9 dropped me off at home Sunday afternoon, it occurred to me that in three years we ought not to be saying, "Wow, remember that Sunday way back when? That was a really great Sunday. We ought to do something like that again one of these days."
No, it is my hope that we will be saying, "Remember that worship. That was during the season of Epiphany. And that worship was an epiphany for us. That was when we started down the road. That was when it dawned on us that we were called to have the most unique and life-giving worship service in all of Lubbock week in and week out."
That is my hope.
We are in the early stages of our search for a new pastor of worship and music. Dixie Marcades has just joined the search committee, which already consisted of Ray Fargason (Chair), Kathleen Campbell, Nancy Weiss, and me. As we move forward with our search, we welcome your ideas and input. If you have comments or suggestions about what it is that we ought to be looking for then please write us.
Above all, please be in prayer for us as we seek the Spirit's guidance and look forward to the person with the gifts and graces to bring us a mini-Easter every Sunday morning.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Holding Each Other Up
This is a cross-post from my reflections last week in the Second Page, our church newsletter. After our wrote this, another one of our beloved members Janelle Bevers passed. Her funeral was on Saturday, and was the fourth funeral our church was a part of last week.
What an incredibly hard, but good week. And what a church.
There is a memorable scene in Exodus 17 where the Israelites are making their way through the wilderness and are suddenly attacked by Amalekites. Moses dispatches Joshua to go out and fight while Moses climbs to the top of a hill from which he has a bird's eye view of the battle. There from the top of the hill Moses' raises his arms, the staff of God held high above his head. "As long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning, but whenever he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning," (Ex. 17:11) Two men, Aaron and Hur, then come to Moses' aid. They take hold of Moses' drooping arms and help him hold them up the rest of the day, all the way to the setting of the sun. And this is the way that Joshua and the Israelites won the battle against the Amalekites.
It seems an unusually large number of Second B families are in the midst of some battle right now. This week we bury two Second B members, Randy Juergens and Bill King. Other members are doing all they can to choose life against the onset of Alzheimer's, cancer, and other debilitating afflictions. Pillars in our church are in the waning days of their lives. Some among us carry that most sorrowful burden of having to watch their own children suffer.
And it is here, in the midst of life's greatest struggles, that I see you visiting one another. I see you cooking for one another. I see you sending prayer cards to one another. I see you holding and hugging one another. Simply put, I see you loving one another.
I want you to know what a tremendous privilege it is to pastor a congregation full of Aarons and Hurs - companions who, when the weight of the world is too much for us to bear, walk up the hill beside us to help carry the load. And you do this all day long, till the setting of the sun, and then even beyond, back down into the night and through the valley of the shadow of death. What faithful friends you are.
Not long ago I stood in the kitchen of one of our dearest members who had just lost her husband, and I heard the words I will no doubt hear hundreds of times over the course of my pastorate at Second B: "If it wasn't for this church I don't know where I would be."
And I thought to myself, "Thank God, we don't have to know."
What an incredibly hard, but good week. And what a church.
There is a memorable scene in Exodus 17 where the Israelites are making their way through the wilderness and are suddenly attacked by Amalekites. Moses dispatches Joshua to go out and fight while Moses climbs to the top of a hill from which he has a bird's eye view of the battle. There from the top of the hill Moses' raises his arms, the staff of God held high above his head. "As long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning, but whenever he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning," (Ex. 17:11) Two men, Aaron and Hur, then come to Moses' aid. They take hold of Moses' drooping arms and help him hold them up the rest of the day, all the way to the setting of the sun. And this is the way that Joshua and the Israelites won the battle against the Amalekites.
It seems an unusually large number of Second B families are in the midst of some battle right now. This week we bury two Second B members, Randy Juergens and Bill King. Other members are doing all they can to choose life against the onset of Alzheimer's, cancer, and other debilitating afflictions. Pillars in our church are in the waning days of their lives. Some among us carry that most sorrowful burden of having to watch their own children suffer.
And it is here, in the midst of life's greatest struggles, that I see you visiting one another. I see you cooking for one another. I see you sending prayer cards to one another. I see you holding and hugging one another. Simply put, I see you loving one another.
I want you to know what a tremendous privilege it is to pastor a congregation full of Aarons and Hurs - companions who, when the weight of the world is too much for us to bear, walk up the hill beside us to help carry the load. And you do this all day long, till the setting of the sun, and then even beyond, back down into the night and through the valley of the shadow of death. What faithful friends you are.
Not long ago I stood in the kitchen of one of our dearest members who had just lost her husband, and I heard the words I will no doubt hear hundreds of times over the course of my pastorate at Second B: "If it wasn't for this church I don't know where I would be."
And I thought to myself, "Thank God, we don't have to know."
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Reflections on Ardelle Clemons life
These is my tribute to Ardelle Clemons printed in this week's Second Page:
On Monday of next week I and many others from Second Baptist will travel down to San Antonio to say goodbye to Ardelle Clemons. It is hard to express just how much Ardelle’s life and spirit helped to shape me, Irie, and indeed all of Second B.
When I was a young boy at Second B I knew Ardelle only in a very limited way. Hardy Clemons was then the senior pastor at Second B, and Ardelle was first and foremost in my mind Hardy’s wife. When I was a child I thought like a child, and I thank God that as I grew up I put away such childish thinking. In fact, we all did. Ardelle pretty much insisted on it. The other day Penny Vann told me that when he and Joy first joined the church back in the 70’s, someone introduced Ardelle to them as “the preacher’s wife.” Penny said Ardelle looked at that person square in the eye and clarified. “I am Ardelle,” she said.
I was reacquainted with Ardelle and Hardy while I was in divinity school in Durham, NC, and they were in Greenville, SC. Once a semester I would drive south from Durham to Greenville and stay the weekend with the Clemonses. I always looked forward to sleeping in the big “Grady Nutt Memorial Bed” upstairs and waking to enjoy a cup of Ardelle’s “Brazilian style” coffee – half coffee and half milk. Just the way Ardelle liked it.
What amazed me about Ardelle most on those trips was the way she jumped right in on the late-night, theological bull sessions. She could hold her own whether we were talking about the modernism of Harry Emerson Fosdick, the fundamentalism of Paige Patterson, or the temperamentalism of First Corinth. Ardelle knew theology and, having grown up a preacher’s kid, she knew church — or, as she lovingly called it, “the fish bowl.”
It was Ardelle’s way with navigating the fish bowl that I give the most thanks for. Once Irie and I were engaged and then first married, we spent even more frequent weekends with Hardy and Ardelle down south in Greenville. I had stopped kicking against the goads and decided I was for sure going to be a pastor, and that decision left Irie – all of age 22 – afraid she needed to learn to play the piano and knit doilies so as to fit into her new “preacher’s wife” role.
Ardelle showed Irie another way. She modeled how someone could be the wife of a pastor while at the same time keeping her own name and identity. Ardelle encouraged Irie take up only the things she wanted and felt called to take up in church – regardless of how short-handed the youth department or any other ministry in the church might be. “Feel free to be your own person,” Ardelle told Irie. And Irie listened. She listened because Ardelle spoke with the authority of someone who had not only survived being a pastor’s wife, but excelled at it. I thought of Ardelle when at our first church Irie said thanks but no thanks to being a part of the ladies’ auxiliary. Irie felt the freedom to be Irie because Ardelle had the courage to be Ardelle.
There is a saying attributed to Jesus that for me summarizes the gift Ardelle gave to Irie, me, and so many others here at Second B, First Baptist Greenville, and across the country. In the Gospel of Thomas Jesus says, “If you bring forth what is in you, what is in you will save you. If you do not bring forth what is in you, what is in you will destroy you.” Though not canonical, the saying is true. When we are free to be, and love, and express our true selves, then the truth of ourselves will set us free; and then we will be free indeed. This is the gift Ardelle Clemons gave to so many of us. She showed us how to be ourselves.
A decade after all those trips from Durham to Greenville, I find myself planning one more final road trip south to see Ardelle. Yes, I’m going to pay my respects to my first pastor’s wife. But I’m also going to pay my respects to a friend, and a mentor, and a fellow-traveler who showed me and so many others the way.
I’m going to pay my respects to Ardelle.
On Monday of next week I and many others from Second Baptist will travel down to San Antonio to say goodbye to Ardelle Clemons. It is hard to express just how much Ardelle’s life and spirit helped to shape me, Irie, and indeed all of Second B.
When I was a young boy at Second B I knew Ardelle only in a very limited way. Hardy Clemons was then the senior pastor at Second B, and Ardelle was first and foremost in my mind Hardy’s wife. When I was a child I thought like a child, and I thank God that as I grew up I put away such childish thinking. In fact, we all did. Ardelle pretty much insisted on it. The other day Penny Vann told me that when he and Joy first joined the church back in the 70’s, someone introduced Ardelle to them as “the preacher’s wife.” Penny said Ardelle looked at that person square in the eye and clarified. “I am Ardelle,” she said.
I was reacquainted with Ardelle and Hardy while I was in divinity school in Durham, NC, and they were in Greenville, SC. Once a semester I would drive south from Durham to Greenville and stay the weekend with the Clemonses. I always looked forward to sleeping in the big “Grady Nutt Memorial Bed” upstairs and waking to enjoy a cup of Ardelle’s “Brazilian style” coffee – half coffee and half milk. Just the way Ardelle liked it.
What amazed me about Ardelle most on those trips was the way she jumped right in on the late-night, theological bull sessions. She could hold her own whether we were talking about the modernism of Harry Emerson Fosdick, the fundamentalism of Paige Patterson, or the temperamentalism of First Corinth. Ardelle knew theology and, having grown up a preacher’s kid, she knew church — or, as she lovingly called it, “the fish bowl.”
It was Ardelle’s way with navigating the fish bowl that I give the most thanks for. Once Irie and I were engaged and then first married, we spent even more frequent weekends with Hardy and Ardelle down south in Greenville. I had stopped kicking against the goads and decided I was for sure going to be a pastor, and that decision left Irie – all of age 22 – afraid she needed to learn to play the piano and knit doilies so as to fit into her new “preacher’s wife” role.
Ardelle showed Irie another way. She modeled how someone could be the wife of a pastor while at the same time keeping her own name and identity. Ardelle encouraged Irie take up only the things she wanted and felt called to take up in church – regardless of how short-handed the youth department or any other ministry in the church might be. “Feel free to be your own person,” Ardelle told Irie. And Irie listened. She listened because Ardelle spoke with the authority of someone who had not only survived being a pastor’s wife, but excelled at it. I thought of Ardelle when at our first church Irie said thanks but no thanks to being a part of the ladies’ auxiliary. Irie felt the freedom to be Irie because Ardelle had the courage to be Ardelle.
There is a saying attributed to Jesus that for me summarizes the gift Ardelle gave to Irie, me, and so many others here at Second B, First Baptist Greenville, and across the country. In the Gospel of Thomas Jesus says, “If you bring forth what is in you, what is in you will save you. If you do not bring forth what is in you, what is in you will destroy you.” Though not canonical, the saying is true. When we are free to be, and love, and express our true selves, then the truth of ourselves will set us free; and then we will be free indeed. This is the gift Ardelle Clemons gave to so many of us. She showed us how to be ourselves.
A decade after all those trips from Durham to Greenville, I find myself planning one more final road trip south to see Ardelle. Yes, I’m going to pay my respects to my first pastor’s wife. But I’m also going to pay my respects to a friend, and a mentor, and a fellow-traveler who showed me and so many others the way.
I’m going to pay my respects to Ardelle.
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