Saying Goodbye to Dorothy

"There ought to be a place where 

nobody gets old  

and nobody has to die."

           from the movie, "Cocoon"

We got the call Monday. “Dorothy has died,” the worker from the Nursing Home said. “Huh?” I exclaimed. Though she has gotten weaker and sicker we never thought she would leave us this soon. She was 88 year old and we were her caretakers. She was my wife’s last aunt.

Her husband died in 2009—and even before his death we could tell that something was wrong. Dorothy was just not herself.  And after his death because she was afraid to stay alone we had someone to stay at night. This evolved into finally someone was there around the clock. Most of those that sat with her were great. They went beyond the call of duty. They were all black—and they cleaned her house—not part of the job description—cooked great meals—also not part of the job description—and loved her.

Finally—realizing she would never get any better we moved her from Tuscaloosa to Birmingham where we lived. She went through a round of nursing homes. I think she was at four different places. Two of those places she managed to get her purse and walk out the door. Fortunately she didn’t get very far—but she said she was going home. The people that attended her in all those places were wonderful. We could not complain. She was safe, reasonably contented, well fed and surrounded by care. My wife especially made sure that everything was good for Dorothy.

When we moved from Birmingham to Clemson we brought her with us. She lived down the street from us—maybe five minutes away. She received good care all the way to the finish line.

But the heartbreak of watching her slowly, ever so slowly drift away from us was hard to take. To the end she always knew us and was delighted when we came. That delight lasted about a minute and then she was gone into herself. Mumbling and saying things we could not understand.

So yesterday we had the sad task of going to the Nursing Home and getting her belongings. She was in a room with a woman in a wheel chair that looked out after her. Dorothy’s bed was next to the windows. Plants lined the ledge of the windows. We opened her closet--where she kept her clothes and shoes. So many of those pants and tops we did not recognize. She kept switching clothes with her neighbors.  We opened the little drawers that held her treasures. There was little there.

“Just leave the things you don’t want and we’ll either give them to some patients or dispose of them,”  the Director said. So we took two oval-shaped pictures of her young Mama and Daddy. She talked about them to the very end. How they had visited her. She told us how they were doing and how much she loved them. In her tangled mind they were still alive—maybe our parents, good or bad, are always alive somewhere in our memories.

So after thanking the staff—we left holding two tiny pictures. It all comes down to this at the end I guess. We spend all our time buying and collecting—and at the end we are all the same. We take nothing with us.

Dementia—Alzheimer’s is a terrible disease. Terrible for those that loved the person as much as they who slowly leave us. We don’t know its origin and though many are working on discovering where this comes from—we still have few answers. 

Except for a few people scattered around the country, a handful still in Tuscaloosa and a relative or two—Dorothy will be forgotten.  But we will remember the richness of most of her 88 years...and her smile and her quiet kindly ways.

And so Monday in Tuscaloosa I will open the blue leather-bound Bible with her name on it. I will read some of her favorite well-thumbed passages. I will  remind those that come how special she was and remember that old grace we sing about so often really is amazing. It took her all the way to the end—and now she is enveloped in love and peace.

Dorothy with her two nieces--she lived with them
 several years while they were young girls.

Dorothy Wheat Spitzer

November 11, 1926-February 23, 2015

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Academy Awards Time For Us All

Photo by cliff1066 / flickr

It’s Academy Awards Time. And up and down the red carpet the stars and semi-stars will preen and strut and just know they will win. There is probably as much egomania there as you would find at a Preacher’s convention.

I make no predictions—though I do have some favorites. But I’ve been wishing I could pass out my own golden statues to the stars in my own life. People that made it possible. Those that, as Fosdick said, “put the stars back in my sky.” We all have these people were at times our lifeline or just put their arms around me and said, “You can do it.”

I’d have to begin taking a golden man and handing it out to my parents. They did what they could. Hard times. Little money. Despite all sorts of difficulties—they stayed together and kept our little family going. Their names were never in the paper except maybe their obituaries. But without them I don’t know what I would have done.

I remember my first grade teacher. That little barefoot boy thought she was the purtiest woman I ever saw. She took an interest in me. Made me feel like I mattered. Pass me another Oscar please.

I remember a friend during those painful growing-up years. Two, in fact. We laughed; we talked about everything, Jesus, the future, movie stars and just about everything else. They helped me over that awkward hump. I am grateful.

I remember a Junior-High School teacher. She sidled up to me and said, “Are you going to college?” And the light came on. If she thought I could go—maybe, just maybe I could.

I remember my friend that never made it to college—yet she saved up her nickels and dimes from her menial job and sent me money during those college years.

I probably don’t have enough Oscars to go around for the college years. The friends, the teachers that opened doors I did not even know were there. Those years helped shape me forever. Or I should say the members of my academy.

Seminary brought more heroes and champions. Friends, a Professor who whispered one day, “Did you ever think about writing.” The teachers who opened the black book and showed me a more excellent way.

Churches—Lord knows I did not realize at the time how many stars were there on those pews that would become part of my constellation. Old fat Deacons...neighbors that showed us how to change diapers and such. Or those along the way that challenged me and kicked my rear when it was needed. Those that genuinely cared about me and mine. Search Committee chairs...preacher-friends who made things fun. Faithful folk that came by with ham biscuits or casseroles or sometimes even a Christmas tree. Or just to really ask, “How you doin’?”

Of course my wife and my kids—for putting up with a Pastor-husband-father who often was too preoccupied to be much help. They loved me anyway—still do for some strange reasons...they deserve a golden statue. Probably more than one.

That handful that never, ever forget an anniversary or a birthday or Christmas. After all these years they remember and make me glad. Pass me another Oscar please.

The Two Amigos that just added the spice and richness and love and care despite who I was or what was happening in my preoccupied life.

Whew—I could go on and on. When they cut me open there will be many of their names written on my heart—it would be hard to find that organ.

I hope the passing out of these Golden Awards—will trigger something in your own mind—and you will remember with gratitude. Line up your own Oscars sometimes today or tomorrow and pass them out and be glad.

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

First Sunday in Lent--Rainbow Time

photo by Mikey G  Ottawa / flickr

"It is up to God 
  to make 
 something 
out of the mud
 and mess 
of the flood."
   
          --Will Willimon

Today we begin that long journey of Lent. For seven weeks we will plod along.

Thinking about the One who first took that journey to the Cross. Thinking about once upon a time when we said yes--and meant it with all our hearts. But then...life happened.

    Disappointments...

    Joys...

    Pains...

    Laughter...

    Sinning...

    Confessing...

    Sinning...

    Confessing...

    Enemies...

    Friends...   

    Defeats.

    Victories...

    Love...

    Peace...

    Grace...

    Grace...

    Grace...

The Genesis text for today is that old story of Noah and the ark. And the rain that came and came and came. And after forty days a dove flew back with an olive branch in her mouth. And Noah and his rag-tag family slowly, tentatively stepped out on dry land.

And so the old Negro Spiritual is right on target:

“God put a rainbow in the sky,

    a rainbow in the sky,

    a rainbow in the sky.

  It looked like the sun 

    wasn’t gonna shine anymore,

  God put a rainbow in the sky!”

And so on this first Sunday of our Lenten journey it’s rainbow time. It’s hopeful time. It’s faith time. One of my favorite books is William Armstrong’s Through Troubled Waters. One day he and his wife had three little children and were happy with their lives. His wife went to the Doctor with a sharp pain. She never came back. And young Armstrong was left not only with his own terrible grief, but trying to comfort three children who missed their Mama night after night. So the book is his story of how the flood came and washed so much of his family’s life away. But he tells  how slowly, so slowly he thought it would never be any better—the water slowly, ever so slowly went down and his own particular dove came with an olive branch in her little hand—and life went on. And so his book’s title, Through Troubled Waters.

His family discovered, like Noah that God really does put a rainbow in our lives. Overarching it all—and that covers a whole lot of territory—there is this rainbow.

And as I begin my Lenten journey—I hope I can remember the rainbow, not only for these seven weeks but also in the days that follow.

 “When God shut Noah

     in the prayerful hour,

  God put a rainbow in the sky.

    the sun grew dim,

    and the day was dark.

 God put a rainbow in the sky.”

--flickr

--Roger Lovette  / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Same-Sex Marriage--Daybreak in Alabama--Sorta

photo by listentoreason / flickr

The Gay Rights Struggle in Alabama is really reflective of the Civil Rights struggle in the 60's. Governor George Wallace stood at the door to the University of Alabama saying Alabama would not allow Vivian Malone and James Hood, two black students to attend that University. He lost.

Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore in Alabama has said that same-sex marriages are against the law and will not be performed in Alabama. A Federal  District Judge has declared that the states' ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional. Some counties follow Justice Moore and some counties have listened to the Federal Judge and some Gay couples have attained marriage licenses. The New York Times reports that of Wednesday 48 out of Alabama's 67 counties were issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. So couples who have been denied this basic right for years are now receiving  the legal privileges of  marriage. Other couples in the state have been turned away.

Several states face the same confusion. In South Carolina the Governor and Attorney General  have vowed to block these marriages. Yet because of Federal Courts' ruling--same-sex marriages are being performed in South Carolina every day. Like many other issues before us, people's rights are either confused or lost in the shuffle while politicians preen and pontificate.  It looks like the Supreme Court will have to settle this matter soon.

On this issue I keep thinking of those great old words: "Liberty and justice for all." This all takes everyone in. We must be patient with those good folk who disagree with us. If we really do believe in this all we must include those people who are on the other side of this issue. These are our brothers and sisters too.  It took many folk a long time to come to terms with civil rights for everyone. Even today--after all these years--the vestiges of racism are still with us. But we have come a long way. And we still have a long road ahead on gay rights.

Years ago the black poet Langston Hughes wrote a wonderful poem called" Daybreak in Alabama." Even though he had his own people in mind--I  think this poem speaks to the rights of gay people everywhere today also.

"When I get to be a composer
I'm gonna write me some music about
Daybreak in Alabama
And I'm gonna put the purtiest songs in it
Rising out of the ground like a swamp mist
And falling out of heaven like soft dew.
I'm gonna put some tall tall trees in it
And the scent of pine needles
And the smell of red clay after rain
And long red necks
And poppy colored faces
And big brown arms
And the field daisy eyes
Of black and white black white black people
And I'm gonna put white hands
And black hands and brown hands and yellow hands
And red clay earth hands in it
Touching everybody with kind fingers
And touching each other natural as dew
In that dawn of music when I
Get to be a composer
And write about daybreak
In Alabama."
 --Langston Hughes, The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes, pp. 220-221

photo by Susan Melkisethian / flickr

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Dean Smith--More than A Basketball Coach

(Once in a while you read something so good that you want to pass it on to everybody. Ken Sehested has been plowing the gospel field for a long time. Lord knows it hasn't been easy. But he keeps reminding us that God's field is a whole lot bigger than most of us imagined. Want to know more about Ken's work check out his new blog: Ken Sehested @prayerandpolitiks.org . Thanks Ken for letting me share this good tribute to Dean Smith.)

photo by walmart turns / flickr

Dean Smith: A remembrance

by Ken Sehested
        I once preached in the Chapel Hill, North Carolina, church were legendary basketball coach Dean Smith was a member. Smith, who died this week, was not expected to be there that morning, since his University of Carolina team had a road game, far away, the night before. Then he and his wife slip in the back about the time I get up to read Scripture. I doubled-down on the text and tried not to make eye contact during the sermon.
        In my youth I played every sport that used a ball, of whatever shape or size, from dirt yard marbles to Boys Club ping pong to Division 1 college football. I loved the college campus recruiting visits, during high school, receiving a bit of “expense” money, prowling the game time sideline with the prospective team and a pre-arranged dance date after the game. Though I always felt bad about the unlucky coed assigned to this high schooler who, to add insult to injury, didn’t dance or drink, for reasons of evangelical piety. Though I’m not an active participant in the muckraking exposure of how major college athletics programs find themselves awash in cash, I applaud that exposure.
        The capitalizing of college sports, in particular, is tragic. For example, the legendary Hall of Fame football coach Woody Hayes of Ohio State was among college football’s royalty from the ‘50s through the ‘70s, making a bit over $40,000 in later years.  The new legendary coach at Ohio State makes $4,000,000. The Great Recession mostly exempted major college sports.
        Other examples are easy to find. In 2012 Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel won the coveted Heisman Trophy, college football’s highest honor, the first freshman so selected. Manziel is known for his distinctive victory dance after scoring touchdowns, rubbing his thumbs and forefingers together in the universal “show me the money” sign language. This past January, during the televised broadcast of a college football bowl game, an ESPN reporter gleefully described one standout player as having a “big heart and no conscience.”
        The comment has a gladiatorial quality—and nothing in common with the great psychologist Abraham Maslow’s view that “Almost all creativity involves purposeful play.”
        Given current brazen realities, it's particularly appropriate to remember Dean Smith, hall-of-fame basketball coach at the University of North Carolina, who died this week.
        Part of the news coverage of Coach Smith’s passing is this tribute from his pastor, Rev. Robert Seymour, retired pastor of Binkley Baptist Church in Chapel Hill.
        “[Smith] was willing to take controversial stands on a number of things as a member of our church, being against the death penalty, affirming gays and lesbians, protesting nuclear proliferation. He was one who has been willing to speak out on issues that many might hesitate to take a stand on." He was among the first coaches in the South to recruit a black player, and he caught hell over it.
        Coach Smith’s character is testified to by his 96% graduation rate among players, many of whom he kept up with after their departure, including Hall of Famer Michael Jordan. Both his former players and coaching colleagues testify to what Smith taught them, not just about the game but also about people and about life.
        Smith has been credited with a number of tactical innovations in the game that remain, none more common—in collegiate as well as in pro basketball—of a successful shooter pointing to the teammate who passed him the ball. He took talented individual players and taught them to play as a team rather than as individual stars.
        Where I grew up, basketball was a distant second to football’s popularity. But every time I hear the round ball’s echo off a hardwood court, it makes me remember that my Mom taught me the game, she having been a high school all-state player and, for a season, a semi-pro player in one of the industrial leagues that formed during the 1940s. “I was a bit chubby then, particularly for a basketball player, and frequently got unkind remarks from the opposing team’s bench,” she once told me. “But when I kept scampering by their defenders, they shut up.”
        I suspect the ability to play and the ability to pray come from common sources. To do either well, you have to be all in, purposefully, but always prepared for surprising turns. Both invite a certain abandonment, the pursuit significantly influenced neither by desire to win nor fear of loss, the playing and the praying being their own sufficient goals. All awareness of the self as separate from the activity is eclipsed, the sheer delight overshadowing whatever difficulties accompany. A joyful freedom displaces fretful obsession.
        In the immortal words of Kris Kristofferson, “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.” Which enables you, in the equally immortal words of Satchel Page, to “Work like you don’t need the money. Love like you’ve never been hurt. Dance like nobody’s watching.”
©Ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Ash Wednesday Words

photo by gocycloves / flickr

"Never place a period where God has placed a comma."
--Gracie Allen

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday and I keep remembering something Gracie Allen said one time. “Never place a period where God has placed a comma.” The ashes we take on our foreheads on this first day of Lent—are not periods. But they sure don't look like commas, do they?

Often when something hard crashes in on us we have the feeling that this really is an end—or a permanent stop. Paul understood this feeling. He was an old man with thinning hair when he wrote: " For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.”

On this first day of Lent we think of all the false starts and stops. We recall all those prayers: "Help me! Help me!”  we keep sending up. We remember how nothing, it seems ever changes within us—or without us. Who would have believed in 2015 we would still be fighting over voting rights. Or still wed to our old love of money—and still burdened down, like Christian in Pilgrim’s Progress—with some other hard load on our backs. Personally and socially.

Old gloomy Housman expressed this:

“Oh never fear, man, nought’s to dread,

Look not to left nor right;

In all the endless road you tread

There’s nothing but the night.”

And so, Epiphany with its promised light is behind us. And now—again—we stand in the glimmering darkness. We hold all this heavy stuff in our hands. Rage, shame, fury, grief, disappointment, regret, hopelessness or just boredom. And some of us have been stuck here for a long time. Paul knew that when he wrote: it just goes on and on--these things I wish I did not do.

So on this first day of Lent we stand in a long line. Do we think we are the only ones who carry so much? No. Each one of us is really the same. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And these ashes we mark on our brows remind us once again of our finitude, our failures but also our common humanity.  We Republicans and Democrats, we white folk or people of color, we rich and poor, we Christians and Muslims and atheists too.  We really are all the same. The labels just don’t stick.

We shuffle away from the Ash Wednesday altar knowing full well our own burdens and sins. And yet—Paul says some amazing words which follow his litany of shame and regret.“ Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks are to God through Jesus Christ our Lord”. In the next chapter he will then give his readers a further word of comfort: “The spirit helps us in our weakness...” And if that were not enough he added with a flourish: “No, in all things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.”

Gracie Allen was right. We should never, ever place a period where God has placed a comma. So let us, this Lenten season remember the mark on our foreheads. It is a comma—thank God—and this is not the end of our story.

So maybe this would be a good time to pray the prayer of the old slave:

“Lord I ain’t what I ought to be,

And I ain’t what I want to be—

But thank God I ain’t what I used to be.”

photo by Bowsk / flickr


--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

President's Day--Is it Out of Date?

photo by jeFRE Gilyen / flickr

I don't know about you but in the forties and fifties where I grew up the Press-i-dent was larger than life. Most of my early years there was a picture of Franklin Roosevelt in our school right next to George Washington. Not only did George Washington not tell a lie but how you you possibly be President of the United States and tell a lie? We, the people, had spoken. We had elected our leaders. Surely there were those that hated each President--but not in my neighborhood. The President was the President. Case dismissed.

So you can imagine my horror when I saw this bumper sticker just this week. "My Dog is Smarter Than the President." Must be quite a show dog. This dumb President grew up without a father. He only saw him once in his life. Raised by a single mother. Lived with his white grandparents in Hawaii--wherever that is. He graduated from Harvard and was recognized for his gifts which were many. And when I saw this ugly bumper sticker I wish I could have found the owner of that dog--surely this animal would be front and center on Sixty Minutes. Not to speak of the owner who must have taught him all his smarts.

Haven't we dragged the office of the President through the mud long enough? The other day I heard a U.S. Senator talking about how stupid this President is. Well, a whole lot of stupid people elected him twice. Remember the South Carolina Congressman that screamed: "You lied!" to the President during the State of the Union address. Republican leaders turn down invitations to the White House. One nationally recognized ball team had one player that would not come to the White House recognition ceremony--he despised the President. I've even heard one South Carolina Senator say that President Obama  lied about just about everything. When as a little boy and said preposterous things my Mother would say: "Boy you ought to have your mouth washed out with soap.

photo by arimoore / flickr

If we read much US history we will see that there have always been that cadre of people that hated the President whoever that was.  Many people have tried to kill our different Presidents. Republican or Democrat we need to respect the office of the Presidency. We know that social media has changed a great deal of our communication. And any fool can spew whatever poison he or she chooses and there after many people that believe if it was on the Internet it had to be true. These are the same folk that used to think if it was on the telly it was the God's truth.

Maybe you despise the direction our President is trying to take us. Maybe you disagree with his war policy. Maybe you just want to holler. This is certainly your right. But there is a right way to protest and wrong ways. Let's turn down the thermostat. Let's give this man whom we have elected twice the benefit of the doubt. Do you seriously think he really is trying to destroy the country? Leave his wife and kids alone.

We're talking about a human being. We are in a big mess in this country and it was this way a long time before Barack Obama came to office. But why don't we learn just a little civility. You don't have to be a Democrat to embrace any of his policies. That's the American way. But to demean and call names and make absolutely ridiculous accusations helps no one. Remember how people called Abraham Lincoln a monkey or a ape? Remember when President Andrew Jackson's wife was called a whore? Remember when President Bush was overseas speaking somewhere and a journalist threw a shoe at him? Remember President Kennedy and that terrible day in Dallas?  Was this right? I can remember the old Evangelist in my hometown that preached sermons on: "Why Eisenhower is a Communist." And I can remember how many wanted to impeach President Truman because he cursed.

This is President's Day. A time when we pause and thank God that we have someone who is trying to lead us. If you look at our Presidents they all had clay feet. There were peccadillo's and affairs and financial scandals and poor leadership. And on this day--let us pledge that whoever is President now or in the future--we will respect whether we agree or not.

I remember the old story of Moses, the fledgling leader of the chosen people. Those forty years of wandering must have been something. But there was a time when the people were at war with their enemies. Moses stood on top of the high hill and was exhausted. If he held his hands up his people could see their leader and they would win the battle. And when he was too tired to lift his hands they began to lose the battle. And so Caleb and Joshua, I think, scurried up the mountain. They held up the hands of old tried Moses--and the battle was won. When they let those hands down--the battle was lost.

Maybe if we hold up the hands of whoever it is that leads us--we might discover than we can do a great many positive things we never thought we could do. Maybe we need to keep President's Day after all. But maybe peeling off a few bumper stickers might be a good first step,  

photo b chapstickaddict / flickr

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Gotcha Time

photo by Grey World / flckr

I think we are living in a Gotcha time. Something goes wrong and we yell: “Gotcha.” And these days it seems like we are yelling this word a lot. Maybe it’s the social media—Facebook and Twitter and the Internet and these 24-hour news stations. We are deluged with TMI—too much information. It seems like we know everything about everybody and this knowledge is making a great many of us self-righteous judges. We thank God we are not like____and you can fill in the blanks.

Anybody who has served as Pastor knows the word: Gotcha. We have a bad week and the sermon is poor. Gotcha. We miss someone in the hospital. Gotcha. Sometimes our temperature rise and our tempers show. Gotcha! Sometimes our clay feet make public tracks. Gotcha. Sometimes we preach sermons that go against the grain. Gotcha.

But it isn’t just preachers. Most of us have been victim to this Gotcha mentality. It seems like our poor President is the king of receiving Gotcha’s. The man can do nothing without someone out there screaming this lousy word. Every public figure knows at one time or another he or she will be caught in the Gotcha web. Ask any public school teacher or postman.

Weeks ago a young Pastor of a mega-church (I hate that word) down the road preached a foolish sermon on Christmas Eve about revising the Ten Commandments. Even though I think he should have stuck with baby Jesus and the manger—that is beside the point. The Gotcha's have rained down on his head. And right or wrong the Gotcha’s always hurt.

The Brian Williams sage of late has nudged me to think again about Gotcha. Mr. Williams, prominent NBC nightly news anchor has told a war story that is obviously not true. The information gremlins are frantically trying to discover some of his foibles. And probably if they look hard enough they will self-righteously pursed their lips and say: Gotcha.

Mr. Williams will probably lose his job. He has been put on a six-month suspension without pay. But David Books’ column in the New York Times has said something we all ought to read. He writes: of course Mr. Williams has done harm, mostly to himself. But also to his network. He goes on to say the semi-apology Williams has publicly made is probably not enough. But the columnist reminds us though we can never slough off untruths and human failures—if we human beings are to live together in community we have to find some way of dealing with wrongs in some more healthy way.

Whatever happened to forgiveness? Must Mr. Williams suffer for the rest of his  life for what he has mis-stated?  We saw this happen to Dan Rather—and we lost one of our great news people. The old book says: “Vengeance is mine says the Lord—I will repay.”  Jesus said: “Let him that is without sin cast the first stone.” The sobbing woman at Jesus’ feet—probably a whore—was not stoned that day. I have a hunch that she went away a changed woman.

Destruction of people is not the bottom line whoever they are. When the Prodigal in Jesus’ story limped back home—his old father opened his arms and took him in. But someone has observed that the lines on the old man’s face and the hair that had turned white--tell us something of the consequences of a child’s wrongdoing.  And that does not even touch the destruction the young man had caused to himself or the years that he had lost.

Let’s give each other the benefit of the doubt. Plato, I think it was that said, Be kind everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. This challenge is not to sweep wrongdoing under the rug—but it is a chance to say us and not them.

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

The-Not-So-Sweet-Hour-of-Prayer

Daily Kos which sends out some pretty interesting stuff included in their February 3rd email what they called: "one of the strangest ... prayers you will ever see."

The Prayer was offered before yesterday morning's opening prayer for the Tennessee Senate before they transacted the state's business.The prayer was given by June Griffith, "a longtime crusader for Christian values." After taking special prayer requests she bowed her head and prayed that God would end any effort to expand Medicaid in Tennessee.

 If I had false teeth I'd probably have dropped them. Read at your own risk:

"I pray for the people of Tennessee who have been so downtrodden by the wicked courts from on high that they have been subject to tyrannical judiciary. And I pray that you would save Tennessee from the edicts of Washington DC that would go against the plain wishes of the people of Tennessee, particularly pertaining to the 9th and 10th Amendment.

I prayer that you would sanctify this state, that it would be holy and would be a leader among the other states. That they would see that there is a God that lives, that you love the people of Tennessee. That you gave your life that we might be saved from our sins. I pray that you would forgive the many sins of carelessness or lethargy or desperation. The compromises.

Oh Lord save Tennessee for Jesus' sake.  And I pray that your will would be done that you would  be our coverage, that we would not be forced into these edicts from Washington DC or any other quarter, but let the people know that our coverage is the same as with Moses and the children of Israel when they went through the wilderness with only the divine providence of almighty God.

So I pray that everywhere there are meetings, and there is considerations and deliberations, that you would give these men and women who you have elected, give them the backbone and the remembrance of the Tennessee Declaration of Rights, Article 1, Section 2--we are ordered to resist arbitrary power. Amen."

This reminds me of the words from a Boston paper years ago reporting on a prayer by a prominent Minister: "He delivered a prayer which was the finest ever delivered to a Massachusetts' audience." Enough said.

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Church--Who's Missing?

flickr

 Working out—trying to keep my mind off my pain—I listen to NPR. I heard a wise woman interviewed say: “When it comes to church I want to ask: ‘Who’s missing?’”  Ouch. That hurts. As I look around at my church and the churches I served for over 40 years I've been thinking about who was missing.

Who’s missing?

flickr

The Poor. You won’t find many of them in church. They don’t have the right clothes. Maybe they feel uncomfortable with those kind of people. When the offering plate is passed  they would be tempted to take something out instead of put something in. They don’t—but they have little or nothing monetarily to give. They don’t feel like they would be welcomed—even though they would be in many churches. But they would squirm when some well-heeled Pastor with moussed hair talks about his success, his trip to England, his speedboat, his high school graduate who cried when he wouldn’t buy her a new car for graduation.  Just something used.

The Broken. Most of the broken ones stay away. They would look around at all those happy 

families, sitting there in their finery, smiling like they don’t have a care in the world, and they would feel like they had landed on Mars. Life has dealt them a bad hand. One of their children is in jail. They sure don’t want anyone asking: “Where’s Mary?” Often they finger their food stamps at the Grocery store hoping nobody would see them. After the divorce when he left her and the children with nothing—she was desperate. Sam doesn’t come because he has panic attacks and he wouldn’t sit there without breaking into a cold sweat. Some don’t come because if they looked around at their once-high-school-buddies that had made it—they couldn’t stand it. They feel like they were on the wrong side of the stained glass windows.

The Doubters. Why go to a place where the music is jazzy and everybody seems to believe all that stuff?The doubters just aren’t sure. Some had a bad experience in church—some preacher or staff member gave them a hard time or simply ignored them.  They don’t believe every word of the Bible is true. They wonder if all those other folk around the world: the Muslims, the Buddhists, the Hindus—and all those others—are they all left out? They wonder. If God is good why all the pain and suffering in the world ?

The Not-So-White. Some are undocumented immigrants. Some can’t even get a driver’s license and live in fear they will be deported at any time. Some find English hard to understand. Some feel like they would not fit in. They feel like strangers just about everywhere. Far from home—homesick and often desperate—they don’t think the Anglos would understand. They have heard some Catholic churches welcome people like them—but they wonder if it is true.

The Addicted. Sometimes it’s drugs that got hold of them or one of their children. Sometimes it’s another addiction—alcohol or hoarding or something else. These are the desperate. Some have landed in jail. Some have had their pictures in the paper. Some live under a dark cloud of self-hatred. What church would really want a loser like they think they are?

The Young. Look around you. Most of the faces are older. My buddy described his church: “Rows and rows of grey hairs.” Not many High School or College kids. Some go to the with-it place down the street with strobe lights and a preacher that calls them: “Dude.” Most just don’t go. It seems downright boring. Why go to a place and talk about heaven and hell and stuff like that?  Most sleep in.

The Headline Worriers. These are the Letters-to-the Editor types who write, again and again, that the sky is falling. That the president is an imposter—that if we could just go back to the golden days of Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton or anybody but who holds the office today. They desperately need a sense of history—to dust off the old black book their mama gave them when they were eleven years old. They need a word from the Lord—desperately. But they are starving. Wonder how we can reach them?

blue velcro / flickr

The Gays.  Of course we will find a smattering of closeted ones. Maybe a few that grew up in the church and everybody knows. But most gays wouldn’t be found in church on any Sunday. They’ve heard the judgment, the old Leviticus texts—they know by heart those sermons that broke their hearts when they were hanging on by their fingernails and trying to just be. In Youth groups--they are afraid somebody will find out they are different. They get laughed at a lot. They are not there.

The Blacks. Look around—it mostly a white outfit. Years ago somebody said that Church worship was the most segregated hour of the week. And it still is. Once in a while when some black family wander in we swoop down on them and are so nice it makes them nervous. They just want to be treated like everybody else. Reckon this will ever change?

We send money over there. Or we pack our suitcases and head for some mission trip for a week. And   back home—here--on Sunday—look around you—who’s missing? This is our primary mission field. Not that we ignore all those others—but let’s put love at long distance on the back burner and reach out to all those who need but do not feel welcomed in most of our churches.

It’s a tall order—but it has always been a challenge and a seemingly impossible reach. But the book really does say: “Come ye...all ye...and I will give you rest.”

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com