I tread carefully with the words I am about to lay down, but
not so cautiously that I can stand by any longer.
Monday marks only the 14th year that a holiday in King's name has been
observed by all 50 states. Not surprisingly, some of my home states’
politicians tried to stand in the way of celebrating this saint. But, the world
moves on, dare I say progresses, and since the year 2000, all 50 states have recognized the day. As of
late, it has become a day of service. The greatest service the church can
provide for the world is to prayand that is what we invite you to do on Monday on
the American Tobacco Trail from Morehead Avenue to roughly the one mile marker
at Scott Street.
My caution comes from my whiteness, but if I am
misunderstood or thought of as treading on ground that is not my own, well, I’m
going to risk it, because too many have been hurt and terrorized the last year
on the land I call church. I believe that Dr. King and those who marched in the 1950s and 1960s would stand up for safety today, on Durham's American Tobacco Trail. Maybe I am wrong. Some in The Movement wanted King to be done once segregation had legally come to an end, but he went on fighting against war, for the rights of garbage collectors and other issues of civil rights. Such extended fights, probably led to his death.
If I could go down so that others could be safe on the trail, I would gladly lay myself down. Call me a racist, a bigot, I don't really care. If I speak out of turn on behalf of the legacy of Dr. King, and you disagree with my stance, well come out tomorrow and tell me why I am wrong, but while we are at it, let's both secure the safety of those who use the trail by our very presence, by our dialogue, by our conversation.
My civil rights and those of my neighbors,
regardless of color, have been compromised. And I will not stand for the
wretched behavior that has gone on this past year on the American Tobacco Trail
and what our small community calls The Tobacco Trail Church. My wife doesn’t
want to worship in all the locations we once did. She is scared for herself and
for her children. She is far from alone.
In this country we have taken seriously the freedom of
religion or the right to assemble and worship as individuals and groups see fit. Violence
on the American Tobacco Trail has compromised that freedom—that particular
civil right. I am embarrassed by those in south Durham who enact violence on citizens who use the trail. What is GOING ON??? Why all the violence? If you want a forum to lodge your complaints, as to why certain folks should not get to use the trail, then bring them tomorrow. There will be ears to hear.
I cry out to the land and the people of the American Tobacco
Trail—NO MORE VIOLENCE. No more blood. Help your neighbor. Clean up the corner of the trail littered with trash. Fall on your knees and pray to your Father in Heaven that no one be harmed on this trail.
I've spoken to friends in the hotspots of violence like Fayetteville Street and behind Hillside High School. They want it to stop. This is their home and their neighbors are desecrating the trail with acts of violence.
We must be able to walk and run and bike on this sacred
pathway. We must be able to carry home our groceries. We must be able to meet our friends for fellowship at a sunset. We must be able to connect to Rocky Creek and Third Fork Creek and Cornwallis and Cook and Fayetteville and MLK and United and Pearson, Juliette, Scott and all the intersecting paths. And yes, I speak on behalf of our little Christian community--we must be allowed to worship on the trail.
This has to go down.
I demand a collaborative effort by all interested parties to
make this space safe.
Tomorrow begins another step in the journey. Some will say that prayer cannot do a thing, or change a thing. But all evidence in my life scoffs at such claims and I will continue to pray for a safe Durham and believe that God intends to make this thoroughfare, the American Tobacco Trail, a place of light, not darkness for the Triangle of North Carolina. I'm not giving up. I'm not moving. I'm not being intimidated. I won't arm myself with a gun, but only the prayers of my people and those that have come before me. My sword is the Word of God and the prayers that the Father has placed upon our hearts. Are we waging spiritual warfare? YES, WE ARE.
Join us on the northern part of the trail, near the American Tobacco District, January 21, 2013 between 10am and 4pm.
So many Cat Stevens songs to choose from. The first song of his I ever knew was Morning Has Broken as a hymn in church and at camp. The movie Almost Famous brought The Wind to life as Kate Hudson danced and twirled soaking up the concert from the night before of the Allman Brothers like creation from the minds of Cameron Crowe and Nancy Heart. Moonshadow and Wild World--I don't know exactly. I guess I just picked them up somewhere in my hippy summer upbringing at Eagle's Nest Camp. Where Do The Children Play struck as a protest against the nuclear age. Peace Train--another call for peace. The First Cut Is the Deepest was brought to the 21st century by Sheryl Crow. Here Comes My Baby was brillantly woven into the cult classic, Rushmore.
I'm sure you have others that come to mind and other stories for some of these songs. Cat Stevens is timeless in his song writing and he speaks to more than just his own audience.
The song that strikes a chord with me of late is Don't Be Shy:
Don't be shy just let your feelings roll on by
Don't wear fear or nobody will know you're there
Just lift your head, and let your feelings out instead
And don't be shy, just let your feeling roll on by
On by
You know love is better than a song
Love is where all of us belong
So don't be shy just let your feelings roll on by
Don't wear fear or nobody will know you're there
You're there
Don't be shy just let your feelings roll on by
Don't wear fear or nobody will know you're there
Just lift your head, and let your feelings out instead
And don't be shy, just let your feeling roll on by
On by, on by, etc.
Chapel Hill
Main and Morris
each pointing
to a dream
to bus stations and train stations
Mutual Life and Toast
even towards Whiskey
Beyu
Sure
Chicken, Waffles, Bull McCabe's
All the players and their dreams
Two runners stride up Corcoran and right
on Main and straight on northwest til Brightleaf
then right at Watts
Later against the laws of Morris
But no matter for their not driving
and bank hard right on West Chapel Hill
to buses and the big ballpark
Still later, repeating steps on Main but now right on Morris and on toward the old diamond with its Field of Dreams
As the sun comes up and the mercury rises one reflects over joe and dreams on what this day may hold
The run and the coffee are as good as the day may get
and these are good enough
all in collars
one in a tie
Limpin'
Sippin'
Jawin' but in sort of a nice way
Holdin' court
Greetin'
Judgin' but they been around
seen a thing
or four
young people saggin'
that's what they say
need a belt
cover up them drawers
a dispersion
'fore it gets too hot
and that drip coffee's talkin'
fixed black
as if there were another way to take it
well
joe's doin' its' thing
time to be movin' along
SERMON FOR ADVENT FOUR 12/23/12
PREACHER MAN (written on 12/19/12)
One of my favorite songs begins: The preacher man says it's the end of
time.
I received one of my most cherished gifts today--a t-shirt with
"Preacher Man" on the back.
What does it mean to be a Preacher Man? What do I announce from week to
week? Good news or just a bunch of downer-drab-millenial raptured hooey? Are
they ever the same? Is the good news of the gospel ever that someday the world
will end and we had better be ready?
What does it mean on 12/19/12 to say that it's the end of time or at
the least Repent, God has come near? Somewhere in these sort of
statements is the concept of Advent and Emmanuel. God has come near and things
are not as they seem. A great change is upon us. If you are sleeping, wake the
hell up and stand at attention.
Do I mean what I think Hank Williams Jr. intended? Should we all run to the
gun store to form our own personal militia and defend ourselves? No, I just
love the song, A Country Boy Can Survive, even if the lyrics scare me to death.
It's true, I'd like to spit some beechnut in that dudes eye, I just don't
because I am child of God and obedient to the God of PEACE.
I don't endorse guns as an ongoing response to violence, though I sure do
love the concept of self-reliance and personal accountability. For me these
come through repentance not retribution. I just am sure that God means for our
swords to be draped in ribbons of peace--useless for shedding blood. We must
shower one another with the Word of God not bullets, even if it means that we
will die in a violent world that absolutely hates, hates, hates PEACE.
Seeking the Word of God
Tom Skeritt plays the role of a Presbyterian Minister in a River Runs Through It, and he and his
son, Norman, describes a teaching moment with these gems, a moment when the
preacher is teaching his boys about the river, fishing, and all the rest:
Long ago rain fell on mud and became
rock. Half a billion years ago. But even before that, beneath the rocks...are
the words of God. Listen.
And if Paul and I listened very carefully
all our lives...we might hear those words.
Thinking Apocalyptically
Keep in mind I sketched this out four days ago—context is everything. I
guess if I were of a Mayan persuasion then I might think the world is ending in
two days. Though to the Mayans credit, from what I have been reading, they
seemed to know that the beginning of one calendar means the start of something
new. This is not lost on me. With destruction comes the birth of something new
and vice versa.
I do think, preach, and pray in some particularly apocalyptic flows this
time of year where apocalyptic refers to a season of great prophecy and
revelation. On the 25th day of December I am persuaded, as many of you are, to
celebrate the birth of a KING—a king that never seems to be what the world
would expect of a king. He's not the world's kind of king. He's God's kind of
king.
All parents know something apocalyptic comes with child birth. There is a BK
and an AK. The choices we make and the reality we experience are
apocalyptically, cataclysmically different Before Kids and After Kids. The
world is revealed to us in a way, quite frankly, unimaginable previously. We try
to prepare the way, but we don’t know what it is going to be like until we are
waist deep in it and surviving all our dreams having come true. The world even
smells different. And so it was different for Mary.
Whenever I utter such statements about the differences before and after
children it seems to be heard with despair like I am announcing the end of the
world. NO WAY. It's great news, it is just hard to mask the exhaustion that
comes from remembering what happened at the hospital or in Mary and Joseph's
case, in what was likely more of a cave or an alley-way than a barn. But
wherever He was born, it was low down and humble. Those present and those who
came to pay homage would not soon forget what they saw, what they felt, how
they cried, and how they sang songs of praise. It is to this point that we
re-enact Nativity scenes throughout the course of history trying to catch a
glimpse of what they saw, and heard, and smelled and sang.
I remember with the birth of each of my children, I prayed that everyone
make it out alive. I bet Joseph prayed first for Mother Mary, as I prayed for Kristen.
Even if our motives were selfish, scared out of our skins that we could not
raise a baby alone, this is a good prayer, a natural place to begin with the
partner he knew best.
Dear Lord, let Mother Mary survive, thrive, and continue on in her
journey as mother which she has embraced in a way that I admire, envy, and dare
not dream that I could do. Let her labor in a way that brings glory to you and
brings her safely on the other side of this most sacred event in all our lives.
If someone is to perish so that she can live, I gladly offer my life for hers.
Work: Gift via Sin
The men’s group is reading in Genesis and I have found that all of Genesis, perhaps all
of the Bible, point back to Creation and Fall in the first three chapters. We
might gloss over Genesis 3:16, but what’s the point, if we listen carefully, we
might hear the word of God under the rocks:
I will greatly increase your pangs,
your toil, your work, in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children.
Tough stuff. And true for all who have been there. What it means to be human
is to work, to toil, and Mary was working hard to bear this child and Joseph
was praying hard that everybody make it out alive. Humanity is offered WORK in
labor, for food, to communicate, to relate to animals, but all have moments not
just of toil and hardship, but of revelatory perfection. Look at Isaiah11:6—and what will happen and is happening as God’s Word comes true in the
world. Not only does God's Word show signs of the redemption of our sinful ways, but right when we go astray God makes the necessary concessions so that we can go on as humanity. Work sometimes feels like a heavy burden, but it also a great gift that produces so much bounty.
Bitter to the Stomach
Even upon survival and thriving life, praise God, it was tough for Joseph
and Mary to stomach—to even accept their baby born healthy into the world. It
still is. Children cry and we are reminded their life means that some of the
time they will suffer and we can’t stop all of it—sometimes we can’t stop any
of it. It’s hard to get what you want. As recounted in Chariots of Fire, Harold
Abrams finally wins the Olympic gold medal for the 100 meters, and after his
triumph cowers into a corner unable to celebrate outwardly with his mates when
his goal has been realized. His friend, Lindsey, protects the fragile victor
and says to the well-meaning, Aubrey who wants to toast the victor with
champagne, Old chap, one day soon, you are going to win, and it is pretty
hard to take.
Maybe this is why I have such trouble during the Christmas season. Maybe
it's not the light or lack thereof. Maybe it's not the consumerism. I don't
have a particular problem with buying stuff and giving it to those whom we love
and certainly not in the name of and on behalf of Jesus. Heck, I sell running stuff
every day and am proud to do it. I am as consumerist as the next person and
these goods and services when rightly ordered and administered are part of
God's bounty.
I think every year, I struggle because it's pretty hard to take that
year after year, God comes into the world in human form and wrecks my entire
life by saving it. He enters the world just like I did in June of 1975 and just
like you did in the month and year on the tip of your tongue. Of no particular
consequence and without huge headlines, and then on the other hand, so earth
shattering, volcano erupting, tsunami breaking that your world and those around
you, some of whom might be in this room has never been the same since. God laid
down his life right then and there, when you were born, and said to the whole
world, all those living in that time and all the times before and after:
I come calling whenever any, ANY, of
you are in need. I'm your parent, your sister, your brother, your best friend.
I will defend you when no one else even cares or knows your hurts. You and I are
fused together inseparably from now on and you will GIVE GLORY TO ME IN THE
HIGHEST. All of your mountains are made low, and I've raised up the low places,
and I've cut a river through the city and the tree that grows on its banks is
watered perpetually.
Zechariah screams it from the mountaintop after his silence is broken, after
his son is born, John, a preacher among preachers, the one who will show the
way:
the dawn from on high will break upon
us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to
guide our feet into the way of peace.
And it's pretty hard to take.
One of my deepest Christmas memories is as a teenager, 16 or 17 years old and
my family was leaving one church and finding another. We had been to the
downtown church for Christmas Eve services, probably at 7:00pm, but I yearned
for more, so I went alone to the midnight service at First Presbyterian Church
of Maitland, Florida. In truth, it was a nothing special sort of church.
Looking back, the preaching was not that great by homiletic standards, but
that’s never stopped God from getting it done. The budget struggled. The place
smelled musty and looked totally Florida, circa 1960, though it was 25 years later.
Not much majestic and awesome and refined and godly was there. It was kind of
like Bethlehem, I guess. I was baptized there in what I didn’t think was all
that great of an event probably three years earlier, but what did I know. That day
among other days had saved my life.
I left the church in silence, with Silent
Night on my heart and lips and I felt melancholy, kind of a
pseudo-depression, not really despair, but just overwhelmed by the enormity of
what was real in my life and in the life of those who claim the name of Jesus. I
quaked like the shepherds that the chosen one of Israel has come into the world
as one of us and I have no idea how to share this with others. It is so big, so
awesome, so great, so earth-shattering. How will I give my life to him who has
given up the very right hand of God to see me through all of my trials and
tribulations? How will he ever know just how much I love him? I am paralyzed by
the work at hand. I don’t know where to begin. And strangely, beyond even the
word IRONIC, this is how I define PEACE. It’s not sedentary contentment, no, it’s
knowing that your whole life depends on a journey that you did not exactly chose,
and you do not exactly know how to navigate. And that’s IT—that’s PEACE. The
faithfulness that comes through absolute depence on a God who loves you and
promises to show you the way in the dark.
I always feel guilty when I feel heavy hearted this time of year, but it’s
like leaving Durham Regional, when Jesus is born and all my dreams come true,
and I have a savior, a redeemer, a God who is in my camp when the world does
not know my heart—well, it’s pretty hard to take.
If you are filled with outward jubilation then praise God and sing it from
the mountaintop and souls like me will catch your exuberance by the tail in our
other-liness. And try to be easy on us. Don’t say we hate Christmas. That’s too
flat a read of how we feel. We may seem burdened by the season, but just be
patient with us, and let us celebrate in our own odd way. If you are like me, and
perhaps I am a gross minority, but I know there are kindred spirit out there. If you are
like me and it’s pretty hard to take
that God has come near and made all our dreams come true, forgive yourself, go
away from here silently, and wait upon the Lord, who time after time, day after
day, year after year, will show you the way.
Scott’s right with what he put on the back of my shirt. I am a Preacher Man.
And the path to preaching was not made plain for me in moments of athletic
triumph, or a funny joke or having the upper hand in a debate. As extroverted
as I might seem and in some ways truly am, I was set apart for this work more
in the quiet nothing special worship at a Bethlehem-like church, a no-where
sort of crossroads, where all of God’s work for the world is realized. Look for
the nothing and the nowhere in your own life and don’t be surprised when God
shows up and changes everything. As Mary says for her, and this day, for me, the
mighty one has done great things to me, and holy is his name. Amen.
