It's All Saints Day--A Time to Remember

"Someone I loved once gave me

a box full of darkness.  

It took me years to understand

that this, too was a gift."

                             --Mary Oliver

photo by Reji / flickr

It's All Saints time. And today I remember William Armstrong's wonderful book, Through Troubled Waters. It is an old book but on this day I want to share a story with you. 

He wrote that one morning his wife had some pain and she went to the Doctor while he took their children to school. Hours later the phone rang. "Your wife is dead," the Doctor said. Out of the dark a hurricane struck his little family and they were all devastated. He had three children to raise by himself. He wondered, again and again, how could he possibly get through this ordeal. He likened his situation to the flood story that old Noah and his family faced in the ark. It rained and rained. The water covered everything. But one day the rain stopped. Bored and desperate Noah sent a dove out to see if somewhere there might be dry land. The dove did not come back. Days later--Noah sent a second dove out and the bird came back with an olive leaf in her beak. For Noah and his family it was a sign that the water had gone down and life would begin again. The writer, Armstrong likened the death of his wife to the flood that came and swept almost everything away.

He felt he could not go on. Weeks, months later--he said little Mary, his four-year-old-daughter

came bearing an olive leaf. He would write, she would be the dove for him. Hugging him and saying in her own little way the message he needed most. Hope. Their water was going down and life would begin again.

On this day the church comes to remember the dove-bringers in all our lives. We all have them.  And All Saints Day provides for us with time to look back and around us and remember the doves that came when we needed them most.

I remember that all-too-typical church that surrounded me and taught me the wonder and magic of faith. Teachers all along the way that nudged me on. High School...College and Seminary. They showed me what I just might do. I still remember many of their names and faces, who held my hand as our first child was being born. All those who believed in me when I did not believe in myself. They opened the doors.

And that starry night when my girl friend said yes. And 61 anniversaries later I know she brought so many doves when I was desperate. She pushed me. She loved me. She believed in me and thank God she stayed when the days were bad and I was sure I could not go on.

My children, Leslie and Matthew have brought hope as they let me be their Daddy. One Sunday morning I stepped up to the pulpit and there was a note in my son's childish handwriting: "Dear Daddy tell everybody out there today that I love you."

I remember Churches, some wild and wooly that brought us casseroles and endured those Sunday night sermons and took care of our kids and loved and accepted them. And those deacons that fought fiercely for those fifteen dollar raises.

My daughter leaves a hard week as a teacher and drives a long drive to check on us, She keeps us going. And the friends that came to my rescue so often. One friend was going through a terrible divorce and week after week I would send him those crazy off-the-wall Far Side cartoons. Like two deer stood talking and one says to the other: "Now don't forget to eat the roses!" A couple of years later I was going through my own hard time and in the mail there fell out all those Far Side cartoons I had sent him.

Back to Armstrong's story. He said little Mary, his four-year-old daughter, would be his dove and help him step out on his own dry land. This says to me we have to keep our eyes open because those dove-bringers that keep us going sometimes come from the unlikely of places.

I could go on and on remembering my own unlikely saints that cheered me on and brought me hope and faith and love. I hope I have not bored you too much. But maybe reading the names that came to me in hope will nudge something deep inside you and on this All Saints Day you will remember and remember and remember.

But as I close I fall back on the words of Paul: "He has comforted us in our afflictions that we might comfort someone else in their hard times." So let us open our bird cages and take out that fragile dove and set her free for all those whose lives we touch.

"And when the strife is fierce, the warfare long,

steals on the ear the distant triumph song,

And hearts are brave again, and arms are strong,

Alleluia!  Alleluia!" 

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Looking for Loopholes

Someone saw W.C. Fields reading the Bible. The man asked him, “Why are you doing that?” And Fields said “I’m looking for loopholes.” Almost everybody I know have read page after page of the Bible searching for loopholes.

The whole history of the church shows God’s people looking for loopholes. 

Abraham almost sacrificing his son, Isaac. Moses murdering an enemy. Killing millions of people—didn’t the Bible say so? And David committing murder and adultery. His son, Solomon splitting the kingdom over-spending the coffers of the Temple not to speak of all those wives and concubines.

We can search high and wide today hoping to find some loophole in the Holy Bible that will let us off the hook.

There is no loophole about lying. Check the Commandments.

There are no loopholes about the treatments of our enemies.

There are no loopholes about accountability. 

There are no loopholes about immigrants and strangers.

There is no loophole about loving God and neighbor.

There is no loophole about the lust for power.

There is no loophole about disagreement of others.

There is no loop hole about hatred of our enemies.

There is no loophole dealing with the poor. 

'There is no loophole dealing with Blacks and those different than us.

There is no loophole for the church to be silent as the world convulses.

There is no loophole about adultery and lusting after someone else.

There is no loophole that can ignore character.

There’d is no loophole about the treatment of children ours and others.

There is no loophole about the fidelity of marriage.

No loopholes in treating everyone the same—including gays.

There is no loophole about greed and materialism.

There is no loophole for prejudice.

There is no loophole about whittling down the charge to love. 

There are no loopholes for a silent church.

I could go on and on. And you can too. You might want to study some of the loopholes of your own life and the destructive chaos that surrounds us all.  

Jim Wallis said when he saw so many loopholes in Christians and churches today he was appalled. He found over 2,000 verses about taking care of the poor and challenging the inequities of society. So he took scissors and cut out all these verses in Old and New Testaments. When he finished he stepped back in amazement. The holes dealing with peace and justice were everywhere. He would hold up that Bible as he spoke and say, “This is an American Bible today.” But hopefully he said, he had seen many signs

of Christians determined not to leave the Scriptures on the floor. He tried to live and act in ways that would restore the integrity of the Word of God—in our lives, our families, communities, nation and world.  This is the challenge for us and our churches. No loopholes just hard sayings that stretch us more than we cannot even envision. 

—Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Post Birthday Musings

My birthday was this past week. Most of the year I would wake up saying: "I can't believe I am 86!" But not this morning. I opened my eyes and muttered: "I am 87. What happened?" I do not rightly know. 

I think twice this year at funerals I have told the story. It was an NFL Banquet years ago. The speaker said, "If you visit many cemeteries you will see a birth date and a death date and in between a dash. And what matters for all of us is what are we going to do with our dash." Those in-between times. From the day I got here in that little mill house October 15, 1935 my dash began.

My Dash

What happened? A whole lot happened not just to me but to all of us. Growing up across from the mill was Mama and Daddy and my brother and me. It has taken me years and years to reckon with those early shaping beginnings. I never ever dreamed how my journey would take me. I was loved unreservedly by my Mama. It was not quite that way with my Father. Almosy deaf he could not understand me or me him. But I have made peace with that. But he and my Mother were there and worked and worked for a pittance in that cotton mill until they both retired. And that little boy let the growing up years passed--first grade...all grades. High School and there are still momernts that I can still remember. I never did knock the grades out back there but I had a lot of fun. Friends...Church...teachers and friends. And tiny trips and laughter and the dark days.  Churchill called his depressions the black dog. That old dog never really let me go. But his power has lessened. Thank God.

College and a Bigger World

College was wonderland in many ways. Our college was not considered a very good school but I got a great education there. We had teachers who stretched me and were as good as you could find. I looked around and wondered why all our classmates were white. But the friends from those years helped, as much as my teachers. I took mission trips as far away as Utah and Idaho. Toward the end of those college days a group of us spent the summer in New Jersey at a boy's camp. I had never been anywhere and suddenly I discovered New York and plays like My Fair Lady and Inherit the Wind and just the wonder of a great city. 

I had felt the stirrings of my calling. No Damascus Road but just a strong pull toward something bigger than all I knew. So there was Seminary where I worked  with poor kids at the Y for four years. They taught me a lot. I still wonder where they might be. But early in Louisville I met this girl. Music major at U of L. Beautiful and smart and independent and in love with me. Me? Talk about the magic of the dash. We were married toward the tail end of my Seminary days and her college graduation. 

Church and Church and Church

Where would I go? I had no ministerial experience and few connections and I was called to a rural church in Western Kentucky. This city boy and this city girl scared and wondering why God called people to out of the way places like Highway Alternate 54. We were there for over 3 years and our first child was born there. A beautiful red-headed girl. I would travel down that country road every week-day morning and sit in my make-shift office and sometimes used the outdoor toilet. I read and prayed and wrote sermon after sermon. And whispered to God, "God don't let me be boring."  I don't think I taught them much but they were some of the finest teachers I ever had. Not even knowing it then but later those rememberings leave me breathless.

We moved from there to Southside Virginia to a semi-rural church. It was there our second red-head was born. A boy. The froiends we made there and they way they reached out to those two green parents was a blessing. After four years we picked up our belongings, piled them in our little green Volkswagen with two kids and Pooch the dog and made our way to Georgetown, Kentucky where I was Pastor for six years in a small college church. It was small and experimental and sheer fun.

 I discovered the Minister's Summer Institute at Princeton Seminary and spent 30 years everey summer  learning and just having fun with friends. Talk about stretching. Those were rich years and they became my first Camelot. 

After six years Pooch and a cat named Jennifer and us moved to Clemson, South Carolina. My son looked out and said, "They have nailed-down seats!" For 13 years we celebrated the Tigers as they played and tried to minister to the College and the town. This became our second Camelot. And while there our daughter was married there.

Then our next stop was Memphis where I learned so much more than I gave. Looking back I should have stayed there. We mooved to Birmingham to a little church called The Baptist Church of the Covenant. They had come out of the Birmingham racial struggle in the sixties. We had all kinds of folks that came every Sunday. And in the middle of the AIDS crisis gay folk began to join. More than a few. Some members wanted to turn them away. Not many. But we kept saying we open the doors and welcome all who come. These gay men and women shared their stories and helped us see a whole new definition of Church. In the middle of the mean streets in Birmingham we built a church on the postage stamp of a lot and people began to come. As you walked into that new sanctuary you could feel the energy. One Episcopal minister visited one Sunday and whispered to a friend, "There is no way this church can make it." And the church is still known as a place of love and safety and aceptance. kinds of I retired from there in 2000 and they gave us a glorious send off. People came from all six churches I had served.

Retirement--Hah

Where to next? Eight interims all over the South--most a year at a time. They were good years until my wife said: "OK. It is time to close up shop and stay home. I am tired of apartmernts and condos and aging parsonages. And I want to go home to my house." For once I said,"Yes Ma'm." 

Not too many years later we moved back to Clemson where we still had so many friends. I laughed and said we are five minutes from everything. So about 11 years later we are still here.

Still the Dash

Looking back I still ask where did it all go. That dash is filled with so much. Not all good. Some heart-brteaks but the silver tghread of grace running gthrough even thost times I wondered where was good. Highlights: preaching at Princeton Seminary...Preaching to the national audience of Day One. All those places I preached. The books I wrote that so few people read. Articles I wrote for newspapers. Blogs. Family and friends...oh, the friends. I wish I could write all their names. Trips and trips. England as Exchange Preacher...Oxford...Oxford and Italy. The Passion play in Oberammergau and Spain and Portugal and Norway and Sweden. And more. I have already bored you enough--so I will shut up.

Buechner wrote that he opened his own journey hoping someone just might read his words and open up their own stories and their own dashes. Which is my wish too. And if that might happen as you read these words hopefully this will be more than a peculiar brag sheet. 

Mary Oliver prayed: I hope when it is over I will have done more than just visited the world. And I have piled up many visits half-hearing and preoccupied and missing so much. But looking back so many places I moved in and tried to do what could. I don't know how many Octobers I have left. But this I know--looking out the window at the colored leaves-- my, my despite it all it really is a beautiful world.

Sorry to keep writing and writing. But these are some of many things I cannot leave out of my dash. (And if you think this is only a "How Great Thou Art" piece that was my intention I don't think.)

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com