Freedom-Seekers

It is no secret that I love Alabama. It was the place I began my post-graduate ministry career, the place where my girls were reared and where my closest and dearest friends reside. I love the people. I love the football (Roll Tide Roll!!). I love the food, culture and landscape of the state. But recently, my heart has ached and been saddened by the events, statements and lack of action among its faith communities regarding HB 56 that focuses on immigration policies.

HB 56 is getting the rap of being the toughest immigration policy to be enacted and recently upheld within the borders of the United States. Just last week, I received a press release from the Immigration Policy Center that I thought summed up HB 56 well:

Local police, for example, are required to act as federal immigration enforcement agents by demanding proof of legal status from anyone who appears to be foreign. Other provisions--that go further than Arizona's law--insist public school administrators check the legal status of students and their parents and create confusing and burdensome new restrictions on contracts between the state government and immigrants and between private citizens and immigrants. It's unclear how far the restrictions on contracts will go, but an a minimum they will limit access to housing and utilities for anyone who cannot produce the proper documentation.

Although supporters claim the law will solve the state's economic problems and reduce crime, HB 56 will inflict greater economic damage to Alabama, costing the state millions to implement and defend. And the crime argument simply doesn't hold water. Since 1990, Alabama's unauthorized population has risen from five thousand to 120 thousand. Yet the violent crime rate in the state has fallen by more than a third. Restrictive immigration laws have proven to reduce, no maximize, law enforcement effectiveness.

These kinds of laws also tend to have a chilling effect on state businesses that depend heavily on foreign talent and investments, such as Alabama's automotive and emerging biotechnology and aerospace industries. The Korean automaker, Hyundai, for example, has brought thousands of jobs to Montgomery. The German company, ThyssenKrupp, has build a $3.7 billion steel mill north of Mobile, that will employ 2,700 workers when it is running at full capacity. HB 56 sends a clear and decidedly un-American message that many of these foreign workers who live and work in Alabama are illegal until proven legal; guilty until proven innocent.

Meanwhile, Alabama's law enforcement agencies are struggling to fulfill current mandates in tough fiscal times. The additional burdens imposed by this law will hurt, not help, in fighting crime. Reports show the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department has already cut 20% or more of its budget this year, eliminating 145 deputy positions in order to make up the $3 million mission in this quarter's budget. According to Tuscaloosa's Police Chief, Steve Anderson, the new law will require officer's to spend more time on basic traffic stops, not to mention potential court appearances, taking time away from solving crimes and protecting communities.

Local schools and administrators will also have to bear the burden of enforcing Alabama's draconian immigration law. The Principal of Crossville Elementary School in northeastern Alabama reportedly said, "We don't have the personnel to do all the work that is needed to find out which parents are legal. That's my biggest concern--putting it off on the schools to police illegal immigration. I don't think school is the place to do that; we don't have the resources."

Alabama has just entered dangerous new territory and, in the process, dragged the rest of the country along for the ride. Those out-of-state politicians and organizations behind these state-level experiments with immigration laws will not lose anything more than a court battle. Sadly, it's the people of Alabama--being used by anti-immigration crusaders--who have the most to lose.

Immigration reform is a tough issue and must be put in proper perspective. At one time or another, we all immigrated to this country; some by choice, some by force and some because of life circumstances. Regardless of the mitigating circumstance, we all fought for and sought the same thing...freedom.

Those who came by choice sought freedom of religion, thought, and governance. Those who came by the forced act of slavery eventually amassed enough support and leverage to lead their journey toward freedom. Those who came because of life circumstances sought freedom from oppression or economic hardship/exploitation and believed that their solutions lay in the land of the United States.

Let us remember that the ONLY natives of this land are those indigenous to the continent of North America. In the European's search for a free land, once found ultimately resulted in the oppression, slaughter of a people and seizing by force the desired property. So, why today are we so intimidated by folks who want to come to this nation seeking the same freedoms and opportunities our ancestor's sought and that we love so dearly? Could it be that our love for what we have is self-centered that we don't want to share or have anyone else experience for fear of losing it? Why are the people of God so silent on issues like this that concern freedom, dignity and respect for all of His creation? Baptists in Alabama, I can't hear you?

Some Baptist groups have stated that immigration reform is needed, but their interpretation of reform is very restrictive, supported by immigration myths and elitist thoughts. What makes those who want to live amongst us less deserving? Some say it is because "it is the law and we as a people of faith must abide by the law." Point well-taken, but could it be an unjust law?

People of faith have made their voices known when it came to laws on gambling, alcohol, abortion, slavery, and other issues of ethics and/or morality. Is the search for freedom, the search for opportunity, the search for a better life any less valuable today than when those on the Mayflower landed without an invitation? We love to cite the laws of the land when they promote our personal, biased/prejudiced or religious agenda but we become fierce advocates when they don't. I wonder what the Church silence in Alabama says to the rest of the world? I know what it says to me and I am saddened.

Just last month, Baptist Ethics Daily, released a DVD documentary entitled "Gospel Without Borders." It is a well-produced work that debunks myths and gives a wake-up call to the Church. I viewed it. I viewed it again. It made me confront my own prejudices. It reminded me that sometimes I have to paddle upstream against the current as a servant of the Kingdom. It is neither a popular nor a comfortable journey, but is demanded at times. Church leaders and teachers should purchase a copy of this DVD, begin dialogue around the issue and seek to discern how God can use you in welcoming the stranger.

The Church needs an awakening. Awakened to realize that the Church has always been given the mandate to be a freedom-fighter and and advocate for justice among the least, lost, lonely and left out. We are willing to send our military to other countries to fight for the freedom of strangers, but her on the home front we want to deny anyone who knocks on our door. If by chance they sneak through a cracked window along the border, we desire prosecution. "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me..." (Revelation 3:20). May the Lord have mercy upon our souls.

Faith

Faith is a way of looking at what is seen and understanding it in a new way. Faith is a way of looking at what there is to be seen in the world and in ourselves by hoping, trusting and believing against all evidence to the contrary that beneath the surface there is much more that we cannot see.

Faith is the eye of the heart and by faith we see deep beneath the surface of things—by faith we struggle against all odds to be able to see—that the world is God’s creation. It is He who made us and not we ourselves. He made us out of peace to live in peace, out of light to dwell in light, out of His love to be above all things loved and loving. That is the last truth about the world.

Seeing but not seeing, understanding by not understanding, we all stand somewhere between the Yes and the No, the way Noah, Abraham and Sarah, Moses, Joshua, Deborah and Isaiah stood there before us…all of them. The truth of God as the last and deepest truth—none of them saw Him in the fullness any more than we have, but they spent their lives homesick for it—seeking it like a homeland, like home, and their story is our story because we too have seen at some point what peace is, light is and love is.

For years we have been talking about the changed landscape across our nation and lately of the change that will continue to come to our communities of faith. Within arm’s reach of the DC Baptist Convention campus and the campus of your congregation are those hungry ones, lonely ones, sick ones, all the strangers who turn out not to be strangers after all because we are all seeking the same homeland together. Whether we know it or not, even the mad ones and lost ones, who scare us half to death, in so many ways are so much like ourselves.

Maybe in time we will even be able to love them a little—to feed them when they are hungry and maybe no farther away than our own street; to visit them when they are sick and lonely; maybe hardest of all, to let them come serve us when the hunger and sickness and loneliness are not theirs but ours. But it will require taking risks, not knowing exactly why we are doing what we are doing other than God told us. It may even mean other people of faith may ridicule or laugh at what we are trying to build in this community. But when that happens, our faith-talking has become faith-walking. Who knows, maybe our faith-walking will be the Ark we build to rescue those from the perishing flood-waters of life.

Taking Risks

I just completed six months with the DC Baptist Convention and my biggest surprise is how fast time flies.  My Grandmother Wood always said, “the older you get the faster time flies.” Maybe she was right, I am older and some of my get up and go has gone!  Then again, it could be the workload, “a busy day passeth the time away.”  A more soothing rationale would be the pace of life. Life in DC is fast and furious, definitely not the lifestyle found in “Kansas.” Regardless of the reason, the fact remains that my time flies and I must be intentional with every moment of my day.

Another lesson that I have learned in these fleeting six months is that the DC Baptist Convention is marked with historical figures that not only impacted the Convention in remarkable ways but impacted the world for the cause of Christ. From Anna Johenning, James Langley, Jere Allen to Jeffrey Haggray, the footprints of ministry are deep and wide. In all of their ministries, their love for Christ, passion for His Kingdom and commitment to historical Baptist principles are evident.  Another mark of their leadership is the remnants of their willingness to take risks and blaze a trail of cutting-edge ministry that is unique and contextual to this region of the Kingdom.

Since a group of Baptists got together in the late 1800’s to form a group of cooperating Baptists, which eventually transformed into the DC Baptist Convention, each generation of leaders embraced the waves of changes and morphed the organization into what it needed to be for that moment in time.

Today, our Convention is faced with another call to change and transition into an organization that embraces the challenges of cooperative future work among Baptists and the communities in which we have been given to serve.

More than ever,  leaders are needed who are willing to take risks, risk failure, exhibit a spirit of humility, walk more by faith and create ways for emerging thoughts.  No longer can denominational entities maintain the status quo and seek to keep the institution afloat.  The status quo and institutions are not the future.

Without leaders willing to take a risk, risk failure, paddle against the current, journey in faith and live in the shadow of being doubted, questioned and misunderstood by those who gather in the crowd…

• Noah would never have built the Ark
• Abraham would never have left Haran
• Moses would never have left Pharaoh's Court
• Joshua and Caleb would never have battled the giants
• Deborah would have never become a judge
• Jeremiah would never have wept
• The disciples would never have left their "all"
• Jesus would never have suffered the cross
• Stephen would never have been stoned
• Paul would never have been converted
• There would never have been any missionary journeys
• Priscilla would never have preached
• Phoebe would never have been a deaconness
• Religious freedom seekers would have never ushered in the Reformation and
• The District of Columbia Baptist Convention would never have been birthed

Now I am far from the caliber of faith these women and men exhibited, but I am a fellow pilgrim on the same journey.  I have had the opportunity to relish in success by decisions I made in leadership. In Montgomery and Birmingham, I surrounded myself with a ministry team that was willing to take risks and create new ministries to meet the needs of those hurting. Were all of the decisions I made understood?  No.  Did all the decisions garner overwhelming support?  No.  But we had the foresight and fortitude to make them and because of that some neat things happened.

 I have had the opportunity to fail due to bad decision-making.  Just as important as success, failure due to a bad decision or ill-informed choice left me with many valuable lessons and served to hone my skills, attitude and spirit. To be honest, I believe the failures taught me more and made me a better leader than all of the successes.  Did I want to fail?  No.  Did I like the feeling of failure?  No.  Do I want to experience failure again?  No, but I do acknowledge that failure is a part of life, especially part of a leader’s life.

As I continue this journey with the heart and spirit of a servant leader, I move forward each day with the legacy and inspiration of our past leaders, the support and challenge of our present leaders, pastors and staff team whose goal is to honor the Gospel of Jesus Christ through our cooperative witness and ministry, so at the end of my day, I will be found faithful.

Blank Note Pads

While attending a conference, I sat at a table with several others. When the guest speaker began, the person across from me took out a note pad, a pen and placed them on the table to take notes. When the speaker was finished, not a word had been written on the pad.

Was the speaker dull? Not really, though frankly he would not have won an oratorical contest. Was his subject uninteresting? No, in fact because of the timeliness of the matter there were a lot of questions.

What happened, it seemed to me, that the participant, with good intentions, actually went into neutral. He was bodily present, but his mind was elsewhere. Perhaps fatigue made him inattentive to what was going on. Or maybe he was still mulling over some problem he had encountered before coming to the meeting. I understand, because on another occasion, that might have been me.

That blank note pad however, reminded me of something. A person has to put something into a meeting in order to get something out of it. I am thinking about the worship services of the church. Sometimes the speaker may be dull. Sometimes the subject matter may be uninteresting. But if a person goes away from church with a “blank note pad” it probably is because little or nothing was done to prepare for the service.

Meaningful worship rarely just happens. A moving worship experience usually doesn’t occur just because somebody does something great or designs a proper format. It happens when a person actively seeks the Lord, gives full attention to what is going on, and exercises his/her thinking capacities. In short, the person puts “self” into it. When a person comes to church, but stays in neutral, he or she misses a golden opportunity to be fed, to be challenged, and to be strengthened for the exercise of faith that begins after the service ends.

To carry away something from a church experience, one must put something into that experience...self. It is remarkably easy to sit and let the hour go by. It is often easier to go into neutral than to be actively involved, but not much learning takes place in neutral.

At the end of worship service how often is your note pad blank?

Would your church experience be more meaningful if you worked at it? I think so.

Repost: The Memory Book

My daughters were just preschoolers when I realized they would never remember the early days of their life and what is sad about the things they remembered, according to research, would be the negative experiences that brought trauma into their young lives. Fortunately, our family has been blessed but those experiences do exist and if not put in proper perspective may overshadow the more positive experiences.

Moments that inflated my heart to near-rupture would be tucked away in their past, a building block perhaps, but buried by countless others and impossible for them to recall. Snuggling on the couch watching The Little Mermaid or Barney while nursing a cough, ache or pain, late-night play-time, living room dress up sessions, back yard romps on the four-wheeler, their first fishing and hunting trip, camping in a tent–the very things that filled my days with joy would fade from their recollection as life inevitably moved forward.

An ache materialized that day, but it was nearly a year before I had an answer. It took me–one who loves to write–the better part of 365 days to figure out how to capture what little I could so my girls could reflect on those moments later.

The week Ashley started Kindergarten at Fraser United Methodist Church in Montgomery, Alabama; I decided to keep a memory book for my daughters that they would inherit upon my death. I also decided that this diary would tell the story through my lens, including the good, bad, and ugly and my personal thoughts of those experiences.

I do my best to convey how the experience felt, what an incident taught, and the blessings received. I wrote to Ashley reminding her of her love for Bugsy, the rabbit that Papa gave, how she loved being read to by Nanny and how she inspired her two younger cousins, Christopher and Stephen dress up in women’s clothing and put on plays for the family.

I wrote to Sarah how scared I was when we had to lock-down the Mall because she went missing (she slipped away from us to go find the Easter Bunny), how painful it was when she got her tooth knocked out while at a skating party and how she led her mom to pray when she saw her crying and grieving over the death of Beth (Donna’s sister) to breast cancer.

I wrote to Stephanie about her twin that we lost in-utero and how I believe that God packed the happiness of her twin into her because of her constant state of happiness, how she got in trouble for sliding in the bathroom in Elementary School and how her mouth never stopped  talking (well, that has never stopped).

I wrote to all how much I love their mother. It’s important for a child to see and know their parents love one another and witness how a couple works together for the good of the whole. I told them about the good and bad times and emphasized how relationships take commitment, sacrifice, grace, time and a willingness to mature individually and as a couple with a challenge to never give up on one whom you love.

As in my penning’s about their mom, in each experience and with each girl, I try to capture something beautiful that shows each just how loved she was on that day. I tell them now but I know it will mean much more when they find it in print and can longer hear my voice.

It wasn’t long ago that I realized just how similar the Bible is to this memory book of mine. Without the Bible I would never understand God’s love as revealed in creation, or His love as revealed in redemption. I’d never know all His works in Israel or Egypt. Without the Bible I’d never know of the mighty men and women of faith who lived in generations past. Without the words recorded in scripture I’d be left to piece things together on my own.

Without the Word of God, I’d be lost.

Because our Heavenly Father knew just how frail and forgetful His children would be, He saw fit to leave us a memory book. He gave us the highlights. He gave us a record of His love and His character extending back to days we have no way of remembering.

As a parent, I have some idea of how important that record is to Him. There are lessons to be learned, lives to be studied, and chapter upon chapter of God’s love written down for us by a hand that needed us to know. As we read His memory book to us we find how committed He is to each of His children, how much He has sacrificed, how wide His grace extends and that He will never give up on us.

As tempting as it is to assume the Bible was written for somebody else, I pray that the words of this hastily written blog would have you consider this simple truth:

God’s Word is a record of His love… And it was written for you.

Repost: My Dream Came True

I remember like it was yesterday….

Growing up the rural Low Country of SC was my entire world, but something deep inside me told me there was more…I just didn’t know how to attain it. So like most children around the age of ten, I dreamed of my “other” world. It was a place different than my experiences in the rural south. Now don’t get me wrong, I love the Low Country, her culture and what she gave to me but I dreamed of experiencing a different world.

It was a place where my parents didn’t have to work in the textile plant and live paycheck to paycheck. It was a place where I didn’t have to punch a clock for an hourly wage and my future family wouldn’t have to worry about our finances. I knew a world like this existed, I would see glimpses of it each time I watched TV for any amount of time.

The place where people lived fast, made decisions that impacted the world, seemingly cared about people, would fight for the rights of others, and seemingly everyone knew them by their first name…yes, that is the place….it’s on TV every night…Washington, DC.

So for a period of time I dreamed of this city and told my mom “you just wait and see, one day I will be in Washington, DC.” Her response was always a smile and a comment on the order of “Son, I believe you can do anything you put your mind to.” I carried this dream for a while and even remember fantasizing just what it would really feel like to sit in the Oval Office or stand before the Senate to address them on behalf of my constituency.

Needless to say, that dream faded along with many others. I found myself stuck in the “cycle.” But somewhere along the journey, the path shifted and I became the recipient of blessings I never thought imaginable. I have been the recipient of traveling globally to help other people of faith and cultures. I have visited cities during their best days of celebration and have responded to communities experiencing the worst because of a disaster.

I was recently reminded of my dream as a ten year old and I want to weep. Weep with joy because I have discovered once again that dreams come true. They come true when you just release them and walk steadily upon the path that is before you, letting His Light illumine the next steps. One step at a time…walking in faith, devotion and a spirit of humility will eventually get you to your destination.

Momma, guess what? I am in Washington, DC. No, it’s not the job I dreamed of as a child but it’s the job God has given and His vote is the one that counts. Oh by the way mom, I’ve been invited to the White House for a meeting tomorrow!

So to all I say, Keep dreaming.