Learning American History in Boston

When we toured Boston last week I learned some things about the history of our nation that I should have learned in school, had I been paying attention. Fortunately, Fleda and I had our granddaughter Madison with us as we walked the “Freedom Trail”. Madison has been paying attention to her history lessons. In addition, we had our daughter-in-law Tamara leading the way to some good restaurants when she was finished with the training she was taking at Lesley University. The lobster roll at the Union Oyster House was good but even better was the pasta we ate at Mother Anna’s in “The North End,” Boston’s neighborhood of more than 90 Italian restaurants.

On the Freedom Trail we saw Paul Revere’s House, the Old North Church, Park Street Church, and the USS Constitution. The enduring fame of the Old North Church “began on the evening of April 18, 1775, when the church sexton climbed the steeple and held high two lanterns as a signal from Paul Revere that the British were marching to Lexington and Concord by sea and not by land. This fateful event ignited the American Revolution.”

Park Street Church, right across the street from the Boston Common, is known as the Evangelical Church of "firsts.” It is the location of the first Sunday school in 1818 and the first prison ministry in 1824. On July 4, 1829, William Lloyd Garrison gave his first public anti-slavery speech there. "My Country 'Tis of Thee,” was sung for the first time by the church children's choir on July 4, 1831, thanks to the leadership of Lowell Mason, Park Street’s Minister of Music. Among Mason’s more popular hymns were “Joy to the World”, “Nearer my God to Thee”, “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross”, and “My Faith Looks Up to Thee”.

What Do You Want People to Say about Your Church?

I’ve been thinking about our church’s reputation: what do you want people to say about your church: It is a friendly church? It is a church where they have exciting worship services? You can hear good music there? You can hear good Bible preaching and teaching there? They have good food there on Wednesday nights? They have nice buildings and property? All of those are important. But I haven’t gotten to what I want people to say about us yet. Here is what I want people to say about New Hope Baptist Church: “People are being changed for the better in that church.”

Now, I know that in order for people to say that about us, they are going to have to spend time with us. We don’t change and become like Jesus overnight, so it is not something that people can see if they only visit us a time or two. But the Bible says in Galatians 5:19-23, “When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God. But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”

What if someone stayed around New Hope and really got to know us for say three months? Would they see some members or regular attenders giving up such things as lustful pleasures, hatred, selfishness, and outbursts of anger and finding and sharing love, joy, and peace? I think that if they had eyes to see, they would see such change in some people’s lives here. I see it in some New Hope people. I pray to see more of it among us and believe that I will.

That is what I want people to say about New Hope. We see people becoming more like Jesus in that church, more filled with his Spirit of “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”

Cooperative Baptist Fellowship's 20th Anniversary

Fleda and I enjoyed the Annual Assembly in Tampa. It was a great time of reconnecting with old friends, attending meetings, and thinking about the history of the Fellowship. It felt right to celebrate how we came together 20 years ago.

I am glad I was there in Atlanta in 1990 for the first meeting of what we named the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship in 1991. There were three thousand of us. Our views on how the Bible ought to be interpreted, women in ministry, and theological education had been shut out of the Southern Baptist Convention. We were pastors, laymen and women, seminary presidents, missionaries, and seminary professors. We were determined to do something new.

One of the highlights of the meeting for Fleda and me was seeing and hearing the Moderator of The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship speak at a special CBF birthday party on Wednesday night. She is Christy McMillin-Goodwin, the Minister of Education at Oakland Baptist Church in Rock Hill, South Carolina. Fleda taught her in preschool Sunday School in Columbia, SC when I was the pastor of Greenlawn Baptist Church. Christy spoke of how her parents drove past other churches to be part of one where there was thoughtfulness and openness to God’s leadership in new directions. I baptized Christy when she accepted Christ as a young girl. Now she is an amazingly gifted and faithful leader in her church and in the national organization of CBF. Talk about a blessing. We saw the results of respecting the Spiritual gifts and abilities of women and of not putting limits on their role in church.

Our Language in the Immigration Debate

Have you ever thought about how the term “illegal aliens” indicates a prejudice against people who are in this country without documentation. To speak of people as “illegal” is to imply that they are out to do something to us. To call them “alien” sounds like they are totally different from us. Sometimes we talk about “aliens from outer space.”

Miguel De La Torre, in his book Trails of Hope and Terror, uses the terms "undocumented," "undocumented immigrants" and "migrants." He says, “Language discloses one's moral perspective and frames the political debate. Using the word "illegals" or the phrase "illegal immigrant" paints unauthorized or undocumented people as criminals. It's uncertain when our society started affixing the concept of criminality to Hispanic immigrants.

“What is certain is that our society does not affix illegality or criminality to other people who break the law. For example, we do not refer to those who break the speed limit as ‘illegals.’ When alumni break the ban on drinking alcohol on campus before and during college football games, we don't call them ‘illegals’ or ‘illegal alumni.’ Are jaywalkers, golf betters and underage drinkers called ‘illegals’?”

I heard a man who is half Guatemalan talk about the fact that there are many undocumented workers in America who are our fellow Christians. We need to think of them as our fellow human beings instead of thinking of them as an alien hoard that is pouring across the border. They love their families. They love their children. They want to find hope for their lives.

I know that we have an important debate going on in our nation as to what to do about people who are here without proper legal documents. I am asking us to think of them as human beings and know that many, many of them are Christians.

And I am asking us to let our thinking be shaped by the Bible and not exclusively by television and political debate. Here is what the Bible has to say in Leviticus 19: 33-34. “When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.”

Thankfulness for Small Gifts

In Life Together, Dietrich Bonheoffer wrote, “Thankfulness works in the Christian community as it usually does in the Christian life. Only those who give thanks for little things receive the great things as well. We prevent God from giving us the great spiritual gifts prepared for us because we do not give thanks for the daily gifts. We think we should not be satisfied with the small measure of spiritual knowledge, experience, and love that has been given to us, and that we must be constantly seeking the great gifts . . .. We pray for the big things and forget to give thanks for the small (and yet really not so small!) gifts we receive daily. How can God entrust great things to those who will not gratefully receive the little things from his hand?”

What “little things” should we be thankful to God for? I think of three gifts that are “really not so small!” Scotty Ford-Jones gave a powerful, honest testimony on Sunday, May 29 telling us how God has used New Hope and changed him from angry to loving. Two couples have joined us in the last three weeks. B.J. and Fred Zercher live in Summer Trees. They come to us with great appreciation for our ministry and a desire to continue to grow spiritually. John and Bonnie Roberts drive from Holly Hill to be with us. They were members of New Hope in our earliest days and remember with thankfulness the care they received from our church during their grief over losing one of their sons.

It feels like summer because wildfires are breaking out, hurricane season is being discussed, snowbirds have gone north, and our offerings are down.

This is a plea from your pastor. Remember your church when you pay your bills. Remember your church when you look into your wallet. God has given you this church. Lives are being changed by God’s grace through your church. Love your church. Help your church do its work by supporting it with ten percent of your income. Give what you can and give it consistently. Give with thankfulness for the small things you receive every day. God will entrust great things to us as we gratefully receive little things from his hand.

Choose Joy

I was using a weed eater in our back yard. At one point--as I attempted to turn my body while backing away from the area I was cutting I tripped over a root and fell flat. Humiliated, I actually yelled at the roots for tripping me. Imagine, yelling at roots for simply being what they are. In that moment, I forgot roots don't reach out to ensnare me or trip me. They just grow in the ground to bring nutrition to the trunk and leaves of the trees.

Similarly, life does not intend to make problems for us. Life just IS, and we choose how to respond to--or proactively interact with--any element of it. This is more obvious with roots, but it's still true with people, who often appear to be doing things to us. But they're not. They're just being themselves, and on occasion we happen to get close enough to feel the effects of their choices, much as I discovered the effects of roots only as I chose to clear the ground with them all around me.

The people and things around us just ARE. It's not personal. We then have the power--the privilege, really--to choose who we shall be. Will we be irritated and miserable? Will we try to change the people and things around us, which never works in the long run? Or will we choose to be loving and happy? It really is our choice.

Our Calling Is to Bless

God provides blessings through many human channels of His love. Find ways each day to be aware of how much you need your brothers and sisters. Receive and give nurture, support, and love.

The Bible challenges us to bless even those who insult us. "All of you, be like-minded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate and humble. Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing"(1 Peter 3:8-9 NIV).

As I read those words I think about how hard it can be even within the church to not repay insult with insult. But that is our calling. As the Message puts it, "No retaliation. No sharp-tongued sarcasm. Instead, bless—that's your job, to bless. You'll be a blessing and also get a blessing."