A Gift for Sarah

The moment my three girls were born, I was born as well. Their entry in the universe was transformative for me, as they turned me from a person into a parent — a permanent alteration, a complete reconfiguration of all one knows to be true in the world. These tiny, spectacular creatures who have, at different times, kept me up at night, sent me running and chasing, challenged some of my most basic beliefs and completely unhinged me, have also taught me how to love unconditionally, how to stretch beyond the limitations of my experience, and how to imagine a different world.

All three of my girls are different. While sharing the same parents, household and values, God uniquely infused each with their own set of intellectual, spiritual, and physical DNA that sets apart each from the other. Only God can do this and I wouldn’t have it any other way. The diversity within our own family has brought intrigue, growth, surprise and strength.

My second-born daughter, Sarah Elizabeth, graduated this past December from the University of Alabama’s Capstone School of Nursing. This was a huge moment in life — probably more for her than for me, although I’m not sure — and the mass of thoughts and emotions are a bit overwhelming.

Sarah is completely her own person. From the earliest of life, she sought to carve her own way. Strong-willed was an understatement. One Easter we lost her in the Mall while visiting Donna’s sister in South Georgia. The Mall had to go on lock-down to discover that she “slipped away” from us to go sit in the lap of the Easter Bunny. She rebelled from day one on having to ride in a car seat. On long trips, we had to rely on the calming and sedating effects of Dramamine in order to keep her belted and secure in the protective seat.

Early on, we discovered her passion for care-giving. She was always an advocate for the least, lost, lonely and left-out. She loves church and especially missions. She spent a summer in Brasilia, Brazil at the age of 15 and since then has served in Peru, Ecuador and Zambia. She always tell the truth, whether you like it or not. She bears and lives out her convictions even if it costs her opportunities and friends.

Today, she still hasn’t wavered. Her vision of life is completely her own, her identity proudly independent and strong. I am in awe of her entire person, and her continued presence, the blessed intertwining of our journeys for mission, which has been nothing short of a divine gift.

There is something profoundly sad for me, too.

Being her dad flew by too quickly. When she was born, those sleepless nights made me feel as though I would have forever to be with her, teach her and model a positive life for her. But “forever” turned in to be just a moment in time. I feel as though I my mistakes over-powered the good decisions and actions I sought to model. I cannot redo her childhood, go back to when she was 3, 5, 7, 11 or 17 and speak to that part of her mind. I cannot help but feel like I have been profoundly inadequate.

At the same time, she’s off on this monumental transition and the possibilities are spectacular. What a fantastic moment in life! I want her to see the world, meet interesting people and experience all the abundance of connections and awareness and humanity that the world has to offer. I want her to live boundlessly, to feel the sky, the earth and the wind, to run, jump and fly through life, to let her spirit stretch beyond what is perceived as possible.

Mostly, at this moment, I want to give her something to take with her on her journey, some kind of great wisdom. I feel like my job right now as a parent is to adequately arm her as she takes these first steps into the wide world. I want to be her protector and her enabler, her grounding and her springboard, her home and her entire galaxy. I want to be there with her, but I want her to be free of me. I want to be in her heart, but I want her heart to go further than what I can offer her. I want to give her a piece of my own spirit to always have with her — so I will always have a piece of hers in me — but I don’t want her to be bound by my own limitations.

I don’t really know how to do all this. I know fatherhood never really ends, and yet it feels like the scenes in which I have lines in this production are over.

All that remains, I think, is love. All I can equip her with in this life is the knowledge — complete, uncompromising and uninhibited — that she is loved. It seems to me that there are two types of people in this world, those who know that they are loved and those who don’t. The former are the ones who live fully, without fear and inhibition. That’s what I want for my daughter. I want her to go through life with the unquestioning knowledge that she is fully loved, that she can go and do anything and there will be people behind her — her mother, her father, and her siblings— who always have her back, support her, trust her and believe in her no matter what. I think that such knowledge combats fear, the kind of fear that keeps people from living fully. That is what I have to give her.

So this is my gift to you, Sarah, as you embark on this remarkable journey called life. I am no longer the father who will hold your hand at the mall, buckle you into the car seat, pick you up from school, approve your friends, set a curfew or tell you whether or not you can do something or see someone. But I am and will continue to be the father who loves you with my whole heart and soul. I am your greatest cheerleader in life, the one in the stands watching as you go and fly. Take my love, and live.

Living Between the Tides

I grew up along the coast and knew much of the low and high tides. The type, time and flow of the tides spoke to us of the potential for success…catching fish, shrimp, crab and harvesting oysters. During some seasons it was the high tide you wanted to journey with and during other seasons it was the low tide.

Every journey our Convention leadership has set out upon has yielded fruit. No journey was in vain. Every wave of leadership throughout our history traveled down currents that were appropriate for the time. So like my predecessors, I began to set us toward continued forward movement through a process called the Journey of 180.

The events of our last Dream Team meeting halted the forward movement process by asking the question “How can we really and authentically move forward and enact change when we sense a lack of community, understanding, identity and mission between our member congregations?” At that point, we were at a stand-still.

It was not until I started agonizing over this exit from fast-paced forward movement that I remembered my Granddaddy Wood teaching me about the stand-stills or Stillwater. The stand-still is a moment between the journeying tides. It is a moment when the water stops its movement, when the ecological system pauses to embrace a directional change and the biological community prepares for any cultural shifts that may occur with the change of direction. Without a stand-still between the tides, the sudden shift in the movement of water would be so traumatic that it would damage the ecosystem.

So I started to study this phenomenon in more detail and what I uncovered blew me away! Intertidal ecology is the study of intertidal ecosystems, where organisms live between the low and high water lines. At low tide, the intertidal is exposed whereas at high tide the intertidal is underwater.

Intertidal organisms experience a highly variable and often hostile environment and have adapted to cope with and even exploit these conditions and produce what is called the Edge Effect.

During low tide, places become dry with puddles, it is where fish have laid eggs, fiddler crabs surface from their mud-homes and all sort of edge creatures move around. Birds come to feed and leave droppings.

During high tide, this once dry place is now covered with water, fish are swimming over what used to be dry and is now rich with the garbage low tide life left behind.

There is much life that moves with the movement of the tide over the changing bottom which is wet for a time and then dry. This community that lives on the edge, scientists say is the most intense place in the world. This is the edge and edges are the most abundant places for life.

Water and land edges are the richest as opposed to forest and prairie edges and the sea edge is the richest of all because of the tides.

Now I wonder is it questionable why Jesus called us to be fishers, is it any wonder he modeled a life that was lived on the edge. Is it any wonder that our greatest thinkers, theologians and changers of the world were men and women who camped on the edge?

Maybe the journey thus far was to be just that…to discover that the destination is not as near as important as the journey itself. Perhaps our calling to community is to learn how to slow down and embrace the Edge Effect…to exploit our diversity, to adapt to the ebb and flow of the currents around us, create spaces for many things to happen in many different places and to embrace life in Jesus Christ.

Writing A Future Story

I believe that a solid organizational strategic plan requires more than a Chief Executive Officer. For an organization to center its envisioned future in the hands of one leader is short-sighted, temporal and detrimental to organizational success. CEO’s come and go but institutions that have a long history stay afloat, regardless of their viability and vitality and management of resources rule the day. More important than the leadership of the CEO is the formal and informal leadership pool of the organization. In my world, the Church hasn’t adopted these philosophical thoughts on leadership well.

Too often, communities of faith and faith-based nonprofits center their strategic focus on the directives of a single person or small group of leaders who are centered on the pastor’s or CEO’s strategic desires and dreams. Understanding sound leadership principles would assist churches and faith-based organizations in creating solid pathways for organizational viability, vitality and value.

Since January, the D.C. Baptist Convention has been involved in a strategic initiative called The Journey of 180. This initiative involved 60 days of discernment, 60 days of dialogue and 60 days of dreaming— all with the end product being an envisioned future story. All throughout this journey, the questions I am most often asked are, “Where do you want the Convention to go? What do you think we should be doing? What is our future story?”

While those questions feed my ego and temptation to answer, I have sought to refrain and reframe the questions. It not about me but an organization that has been the collective witness of the Kingdom of God here in the national capital region and throughout the nation for over 130 years. It’s not about my direction but God’s direction. It’s not about my story but about God’s story.  A great mentor of mine in Alabama once told me, “Ricky, you are called to a job. The job is a job, not your life. Your life is much bigger than your job. So, when you consult as a strategist, lead people to see beyond themselves and see God. People come and go. Leaders leave and leaders die but the vision of an organization must live on. It will die if it is centered on you, so do everything in your power to lead people to connect their future with God.”

Discerning the will of God for an organization is hard. It’s a whole lot easier just to have someone dream for us and tell us where to go and what to do. A leader that has succeeded is a leader who has connected the future story with God so that when the leader is gone, the story continues to be written.

In October, the envisioned future of D.C. Baptist Convention will be unveiled to the delegates to decide if indeed what has been revealed during The Journey of 180 is their future story. It will be a story that has been envisioned through prayer, discussions with member churches, community leaders and leaders and dreamers within our Convention family. It will be a story that is not centered on a person but on God and His discerned pathway. Will it be an easy decision? No. Will it be an easy path to walk? No. Will it be like the convention of yesteryear? No.

The envisioned future will be God-sized and written only if we are willing to write the story as He leads. If we are not willing to faithfully follow God without knowing all the details and relying on our own strengths, then it becomes just another example of functional atheism. Believing and supporting things we can see, hear, feel, touch and accomplish without a god.

I have faith in God. I have faith in the D.C. Baptist Convention. I have faith that they will indeed embrace and write their future story.

MissionServeDC

They came from Tennessee, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Missouri and Maryland to enhance the work and ministry of D.C. Baptist Convention's churches by helping eliminate substandard housing.

This past Saturday, 350 teenagers and their chaperones pulled up to their new week-long home, Washington Christian Academy, to kick-off a pilot project that had been in the making for a year. As they pulled up, they realized that they, like another half a million residences across the capital region, had no power. Did they complain? No. They came to be an extension of DC churches and they were sold out to their commitment.

Without power and little sleep, most trekked-off to worship with their host church Sunday morning but sixty of the volunteers could not because their host churches had lost power and cancelled services. So what did they do for worship? Serve! Accompanying the group were several disaster relief volunteers who had been trained in chainsaw operation and with a quick orientation to debris removal, this group took the D.C. Baptist Convention's Chainsaw and Debris Removal Unit on its maiden voyage to respond to down trees in the City of Takoma Park.

On Monday, the teams were given a big send-off from the school and they began a week-long project of renovating 25 homes in the City of Takoma Park and conduct ministry events in cooperation with City Gate Ministries, another partner of the D.C. Baptist Convention. Even amid the sweltering heat, these volunteers could not be hampered. As of this writing, all projects are ahead of schedule.

I have the opportunity of visiting the sites each day, talk to the homeowners, host the media in the telling of this story and see our countless DCBC churches providing lunches and building relationships. It is a blessing to witness young women and men serving others, especially strangers. It is refreshing to see Christians from other parts of our nation come to be an extension of a local church they have never met or been in contact prior to their arrival. It's comforting to see our churches embrace their week-long missionaries and make them a part of the local faith family. It is proof that faith-based organizations can work hand in hand with local municipalities to address issues that affect humanity without either having to compromise their mission and purpose.

Partnerships like this transforms relationships, individuals and communities. Partnerships between DCBC, Serve Management and the City of Takoma Park takes Community Development Block Grants to purchase building materials needed to renovate the home and the free labor provided by the volunteers lessens the cost. When the costs are lessened, the municipality can renovate more homes. Therefore, the municipality wins.

The residents win because they get immediate results. Their home is renovated within four days! But the real reward comes in getting to know the volunteer team and local church that is assigned to their home for the week. On Friday, there will be many tears shed by those who came as strangers leaving now as friends.

The volunteers win because they get to see the fruit of their labor, make new friends, worship with another part of God's Kingdom and hopefully, leave with being challenged to put serving others as a daily part of their walk with the Lord.

DCBC churches win because they get "missionaries" working on their behalf for a week. Get to enlarge their faith family tent by getting to know their missionaries and develop a relationship with a homeowner that perhaps may lead to involvement in their community of faith.

Service is a large part of our walk with the Lord. I wonder, "What would happen if every church took on as part of its mission the goal of eliminating substandard housing in the communities they are located?" Transformed lives, transformed communities and transformed churches!

Thanks to the churches of DC that served as hosts: Alafia, Southern Bethany, Chevy Chase, Clifton Park, Covenant Community, DaySpring Community, FBC Georgetown, FBC Hyattsville, Holy Comforter, Metropolitan Outreach Ministries, Montgomery Hills, Mount Jezreel, Mt. Carmel, Mt. Gilead, Nations United, New Creation, Olive Branch, Pennsylvania Avenue, River City, Streams of Hope, Takoma Park and West Hyattsville.

ObamaCare and the Church

Twitter is overloaded. Facebook posts are going wild. Many celebrating, many shaking their heads, many say "victory", many say "wait 'til the election", others say this is "right" and others say this is not "USA anymore."

I didn't weigh in my thoughts on the Trayvon Martin case, the scandal at Penn State, Amendment 1 of NC, or any others however, this healthcare issue hits a little too close to the Church so here are some thoughts: We, who profess to be Christians or people of faith, must be careful of our witness and the manner in which we conduct ourselves...personally and in the media (Twitter, Facebook, Blogs, TV Interviews, etc) because there is much more at stake than our individual feelings, interpretations and theological beliefs. We are Ambassadors for a Kingdom that has only been given to us by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ but unfortunately many us talk and act as if we are the keepers of the Kingdom keys and hold the pattern of the clothes of righteousness. I got news folk....you neither have the keys nor the pattern!

The Gospel of Mark tells a story of when the opponents of Jesus were trying to trip him up by finding some issue, some doctrine, some law or some political heresy that he could be accused of that would lead to his arrest and death. So they asked him a question about the role of government in relation to being a follower of God. They wanted to know if it was lawful for them as Pharisees and Herodians to pay taxes to Caesar? But he knew it was a trap so he worded his answer wisely, "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." They left his presence marveled.

Perhaps today our focus should not be so much on Obamacare but on us as a community of faith. What led us to this day? Have we, as a Church done all we could do to avoid such government involvement in the lives of our people?

When is the last time you healed the sick? Start a free health clinic in your church.

When is the last time you fed someone that was hungry? Don't debate their work ethic, just feed them. Start a food closet, share garden crops, become a partner with your local food bank, start a summer feeding program for children, or start a Backpack Buddies program during the school year.

Immigration reform? When is the last time you welcomed the stranger in your midst? Do you really know the story they left behind and why they gave all to come to the USA?

Prison reform? When is the last time you talked with an offender or ex-offender? Do you have a prison ministry?

What about victims of crime? Do you know there is a tremendous need for someone to help crime victims recover from their trauma?

Many of the issues that government is having to face today was once the responsibility of the Church and somewhere along the way we gave our Great Commandment away. I say it is time to take it back by not focusing on those around us in what they do or don't do but by focusing on what we, as His Church are suppose to be doing. Until that time, we will be forever stuck in the dungeon of debate while those around us in need will perish.

The Journey of 180: Part II

As you read this, the Journey of 180 is in the second phase, 60 Days of Dialogue. In my last Blog, I explained that for the last year I have regularly used words such as journey, paradigm, rebirth, geopolitan, and community stakeholder. In part one, I discussed the meanings for the particular use of the words journey, paradigm and rebirth. In this BLOG, I will address the concept of “geopolitan” and offer some thoughts about the importance of community stakeholders.

Geopolitan is a word and concept of the future. I was given this word by Dr. Bob Dale, who has discussed the meaning and implications of such a word at length with his son, Cass. Since you will not be able to find a definition of the word—not even using Google—let me offer one. Geo- is a prefix taken from the Greek word γη or γαια meaning “earth.” Politan- is a term taken from the Greek root word polis (pɒlɨs) or πόλις meaning “city.” Combined the literal translation gives us the term “earth city.” Driving through the D.C. metropolitan area, it is easy to see how this term “earth city” or “geopolitan” could describe our unique setting, especially since we are the home to someone from nearly every nation and culture in the world. While our geographic location defines us as the nation’s capital, we also know that our region is where the world comes to meet. It is the place where every action has worldwide impact, like a pebble hitting the proverbial global waters. No less should be the mindset and attitude of D.C. Baptists. Everything we do impacts the world and everything the world does impacts us because the world resides here in our backyard.

Unlike most conventions across the nation, our region is far from homogenous. As a result of being an “earth city,” people who migrate here bring their culture, language, beliefs and mores with them. Our member churches often help to meet the needs of the people who move here and we must continue to equip them to effectively minister to all who walk into our churches. In addition, we must work to build deeper relationships with international leaders and embassy personnel to further support our churches as well as to advance God’s kingdom in our area. As D.C. Baptists journey these 180 days, we are mindful of the fact that the traditional geographical boundaries that once existed no longer do. We are beginning to discern, dialogue and dream about how our future story might be impacted as we explore what it would mean to become an "earth city" convention with an international focus.

As you probably know, a community stakeholder is a generic term for a person or an entity that takes a legitimate interest in the well-being of a community as a whole and those who live there. Community stakeholders are also concerned about the issues that affect the community it serves. We know that the community of D.C. Baptists is large and complex. Our community includes: the Baptist community, the Christian community, the religious community, the national capital region and its sub-communities, the local governmental community, the federal government, human service providers and the distant global community. The interests we have are of freedom, faith and life dignity for all humankind.

All of our community relationships are important and provide an opportunity for us to become a geopolitan convention, one whose boundaries are nonexistent.  Partnerships help us to leverage our diversity, collaborate on issues of mutual concern and share resources to address the issues that haunt our communities both locally as well as on an international level. By breaking through a traditional mindset of “convention work,” we will be able to propel D.C. Baptists into a world arena of involvement among groups that are making a difference in the daily lives of people around the globe. The challenge for D.C. Baptists as we continue to dream about our future is to go beyond the trappings of what we “should” do as a Convention to keep an institution and denomination alive into a mindset that partners our convention with the communities that we serve—including the global community. We must not fear sitting at the table with those who are not Baptist, not of like faith or not of faith at all.

The Journey of 180 holds a lot of promise for the D.C. Baptist Convention and the only question left to be answered is “Will we join the emerging work of God that we discover and travel to the new land of mission that He has prepared?”

The Journey of 180: Part I

For the last year, I have been speaking in the language of journey as I seek to lead the DC Baptist Convention to a new land. As you read this, the long talked about and anticipated Journey of 180 has begun. I have been a minister for over 29 years and have used a lot of words…probably more than I should have. Some of my language has been blunt, bottomed-lined, filled with grammatical errors but nonetheless just raw honesty. Then there are those times when I use a language to convey a meaning larger than me, whose scope is outside of myself and only can be realized by a people united in heart through the divine power of God. The language of journey is one of those times.

If you have been keeping up with my writings, blog, Facebook page, reports to Convention leadership or public presentations you have come across words like journey, paradigm, rebirth, geopolitan, community stakeholder, and service (these are not all, but a few key ones). Permit me a moment to simply flesh-out the use of these words in my journey language in my next several Blogs.

Journey: defined as ―an act or instance of traveling from one place to another. Beginning with my very first conversation with the Search Committee, the Committee wanted to know about my vision for DCBC and where I thought the next destination for Baptist Conventions would lead. My answer was very simple; I do not know the future story or destination of DCBC or any other Convention. If DCBC were to hire an Executive Director/Minister based on his or her vision/destination then failure would surely follow. The future of DCBC or any organization rests in the hands, hearts and minds of the stakeholders. The stakeholders for DCBC are the elected leadership, clergy, congregational leaders AND community. In order to get from our present reality to our envisioned future we have to be willing to take a journey…to travel from one place to another, travelling in caravan (together) and travelling forward. We also have to be willing to embark knowing that some will not go on this journey, others will get tired and sit along the way, others will take an exit and the committed will eventually reach the destination. It is in journeying together that we learn more about ourselves and where God is calling us. So as we travel…we continue to expand our capacity to create the results we truly desire, we find that new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, we see collective aspiration set free, and witness individuals begin to see the preferred destination as a whole.

Paradigm: I think Albert Einstein said it best; No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it. Thus, conventional formulations and solutions based on the current environment are inadequate to deal with future change. Although most organizational leaders recognize this to be an issue, few have a paradigm that would assist them with organizational transformation. The template we have for being and doing as a Baptist convention is based largely on a paradigm developed in the 1950s and guess what? It isn‘t working anymore—for us or any other Baptist convention. 

Our present structure (staff, bylaws, programs, services) also needs to be updated. And, DCBC‘s presence as a corporate body in the community at-large is virtually non-existent. Yet, the responsibilities of Convention staff and elected leadership have increased! Why? Because we are stuck in a paradigm that causes us to keep doing what we have been doing for years with less staff and less financial support. A new movement, a new way must develop or we will continue to focus on keeping an institution on life support until someone decides to pull the plug. Through the Journey of 180 we will spend time discerning and dialoguing about the emerging possible paradigms. 

Rebirth: basic and bottom-lined…the day is over for re-tweaking, re-organizing, re-arranging, re-shuffling and resurrecting. The Convention has experienced the re‘s for 135 years and they have served us well. However, the environment, culture, needs and expectations have reached a point that now calls for something totally and drastically new. The journey calls for a rebirth.

Our future is not found in past successes but in future realizations of concepts and direction conceived during the Journey of 180. We have to ask the right questions, not the easy ones, and seek solutions, not responses that sound politically correct. My questions are: If you had the opportunity to create a cooperative organization of Baptists uniting in mission and service, what would the organization look like, be doing and be focused upon? What Baptists would be invited to the partnership table? Would we partner with non-Baptists? What core values will guide the Mission and Vision of the rebirth?

I am blessed to be with the District of Columbia Baptist Convention during this most important time of their history. My primary objective when I accepted the call to be the Executive Director/Minister was to facilitate this journey. What will be the end result, the final destination? I have no idea but I am looking forward to getting there with DC Baptists and finding that place together! Part II and Part III to follow soon.