He always stood at the right front of the church after worship. I watched him handing out hugs like Halloween candy. All you had to do was just stand within grabbing distance of his long arms and you would be gathered in and gently held or gustily hugged, whatever you needed he seemed to instinctively know.
I was newly widowed, moved to a big city where I knew two people, and enrolled in the seminary. This church, Crescent Hill Baptist Church, was the largest one I had ever attended. Every Sunday I sat in the center, three rows back and cried discretely all the way through worship. As I gathered myself together after the benediction, I could never get by Grady without a hug. As a non-hugger, this was a frightening exercise at first even though he was careful to only give me gentle, one arm sideways hugs. Slowly I began to relax and look forward to the welcome blessing of touch that he offered. I was seen, welcomed, important enough to be hugged and the warmth of that hug often sustained me through the lonely week to come. As I wandered in the wilderness of widowhood, Grady’s hugs once a week after worship became a part of my new growth towards connection and wholeness.
Grady was an "humorist", an observer of the human condition, much like Will Rogers. He entertained at churches, conventions, companies and was a regular on the t.v. show Hee Haw. His humor was rooted in the church and his religious upbringing. By laughing at himself, he taught us how to laugh at ourselves. He was a big man, tall in stature and extra large in presence. There was no way to ignore Grady, even when you wanted to. This time of the year I always remember Grady. He was killed in a plane crash in Alabama not far from where we were visiting family during the Thanksgiving holiday . His funeral in our church was full to overflowing... little children, starchy old ladies, friends from his youth, country music stars, grizzled old men, young adults who had been in the Sunday School class he and Eleanor taught, friends from far and near gathered to mourn and laugh together, remembering Grady. We sang the Crescent Hill hymn, our theme song as a community of faith, that he had co-authored for our church. One little girl, at the end of the service, turned to the pastor and asked, "Who will hug us now?"
Our Minister of Music has set up an Afrinda (an altar for mementos, pictures and other items) to help us prepare for All Saints Sunday. I will carry a picture of Grady to set up there, tell his story and give thanks for this exuberant man who taught me how to give and receive hugs. Because of him, I now can offer hugs that connect body and soul, heart and mind, with gusto and gentleness, holy hugs. I now watch at our church to see who the holy huggers are. Ed Torrance always has a hearty holy hug. Ninety some odd years of living has not dimmed his hugability. The McMahon kids, Caleb and Katy, are wonderful huggers. Ben Herman, Stan Harris, Leslie Boyd, and Dianne Harper are huggers. After Celebrations and Concerns are shared in worship I see many of us reach out and hug those who are hurting, those of us who are flying high. I see Grady’s face and feel his arms reaching out to me once again, becoming the loving arms of God, holding me close in an embrace that welcomes and heals. Thanks be to God for loving arms that hug us and draw us closer to the Loved One that is waiting to be hugged back.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Monday, October 22, 2007
Bane or Benediction?
Friday morning we went to the back field to do some fence repair and re-hang a gate. A soft rain was falling and our drought parched fields soaked up the water as soon as it hit the ground. Like most farm tasks, it took longer than expected. The multiflora rose had run wild and had to be cut back. Somewhere there was poison ivy mixed in. Since I was wearing short sleeves I now have those pesky bumps on my arms. It was hard work, stretching wire, putting in posts, cutting back the thorny roses but it was a sweet work, too. We were together, Michael and I. When we were finished, there was a gate where we needed, a fence repaired and we were soaked with the gentle rain mixed with our sweat.
Saturday morning we went to eat breakfast at Poppy’s, a local hangout for locals, before we went to buy fencing supplies. By noon we were working on Junie B.’s fence in back of our house, once again putting in posts with the help of friends. It was interesting work. I learned how to drive our neighbor’s tractor so we could have two tractors working. One tractor was drilling holes for the posts and I drove the tractor that pushed the posts down into the ground. At the end of the day all the wooden posts were in. We had discovered how thin the layer of dirt is on the back side of our hill after we bent four metal posts trying to get them in the ground... something to think about as we headed down the hill for supper at mama’s. She cooked a meal like I remember as a child. We had pork roast, potato salad, squash from the freezer, greasy beans we had canned, sweet potatoes, spoon bread, peas and brownies. We sat around the table, talking and laughing and groaning with our tired muscles creaking when we got up for seconds.
Sunday morning we left early for church. The youth group leaders (Michael is one) had a quick meeting before worship. Choir practice at ten was fun as usual. I made my stream of consciousness announcement about the church retreat with Eli’s help. The children’s choir sang and I leaked tears as I watched and heard those young un’s sing. After worship on our way home Megan called to let Matthew talk to us. It was Children’s Sabbath at their church and Miss Maria, their Children’s Minister, had called out the names of all the children in church. He was so excited to hear his name called from the pulpit. The children’s sermon became the adult’s sermon done by a child. He felt so important and included in church yesterday. Sunday evening we dropped by a friend’s party before dropping Michael off at youth group. I went to the hospital to visit a friend before going home to watch Andy Griffith on T.V. with mama.
It was a weekend full of bane and benediction... poison ivy, multiflora rose and a gate well hung... solid wooden posts deep in good dirt and bent metal posts six inches on top of rock... hard sweaty work in sweet rain... not enough done and just the right amount done... work alone and work together... good food and good friends and good farm... sore muscles and ibuprofen... not enough time and farm time... cussin’ and laughing... a good end to the week.
My son Adam does not remember any of the sermons our pastor preached as he was growing up but he does remember the benediction. Every Sunday Steve repeated the same words, gave us the same blessing as we left for life outside the church building, and those words are branded into our souls. I offer this benediction to you, adapted from William Sloane Coffin by Steve Shoemaker, as my prayer for the coming week.
May God give us grace not to sell ourselves short, grace to risk something big for something good, grace to remember that the world is now too dangerous for anything but truth and too small for anything but love. So may God take our minds and think through them. May God take our lips and speak through them. May God take our hearts and set them on fire.
Saturday morning we went to eat breakfast at Poppy’s, a local hangout for locals, before we went to buy fencing supplies. By noon we were working on Junie B.’s fence in back of our house, once again putting in posts with the help of friends. It was interesting work. I learned how to drive our neighbor’s tractor so we could have two tractors working. One tractor was drilling holes for the posts and I drove the tractor that pushed the posts down into the ground. At the end of the day all the wooden posts were in. We had discovered how thin the layer of dirt is on the back side of our hill after we bent four metal posts trying to get them in the ground... something to think about as we headed down the hill for supper at mama’s. She cooked a meal like I remember as a child. We had pork roast, potato salad, squash from the freezer, greasy beans we had canned, sweet potatoes, spoon bread, peas and brownies. We sat around the table, talking and laughing and groaning with our tired muscles creaking when we got up for seconds.
Sunday morning we left early for church. The youth group leaders (Michael is one) had a quick meeting before worship. Choir practice at ten was fun as usual. I made my stream of consciousness announcement about the church retreat with Eli’s help. The children’s choir sang and I leaked tears as I watched and heard those young un’s sing. After worship on our way home Megan called to let Matthew talk to us. It was Children’s Sabbath at their church and Miss Maria, their Children’s Minister, had called out the names of all the children in church. He was so excited to hear his name called from the pulpit. The children’s sermon became the adult’s sermon done by a child. He felt so important and included in church yesterday. Sunday evening we dropped by a friend’s party before dropping Michael off at youth group. I went to the hospital to visit a friend before going home to watch Andy Griffith on T.V. with mama.
It was a weekend full of bane and benediction... poison ivy, multiflora rose and a gate well hung... solid wooden posts deep in good dirt and bent metal posts six inches on top of rock... hard sweaty work in sweet rain... not enough done and just the right amount done... work alone and work together... good food and good friends and good farm... sore muscles and ibuprofen... not enough time and farm time... cussin’ and laughing... a good end to the week.
My son Adam does not remember any of the sermons our pastor preached as he was growing up but he does remember the benediction. Every Sunday Steve repeated the same words, gave us the same blessing as we left for life outside the church building, and those words are branded into our souls. I offer this benediction to you, adapted from William Sloane Coffin by Steve Shoemaker, as my prayer for the coming week.
May God give us grace not to sell ourselves short, grace to risk something big for something good, grace to remember that the world is now too dangerous for anything but truth and too small for anything but love. So may God take our minds and think through them. May God take our lips and speak through them. May God take our hearts and set them on fire.
Friday, October 19, 2007
You (fill in the blank) child of God...
When my sister Gayle and I would get mad at each other, we would call each other names. After a time of yelling classic epithets like, "You doo-doo head", we would retire from the field of battle in the war of words, each convinced victory was ours. No muss, a great deal of fuss and the satisfaction of righteousness were the spoils of those long ago wars. I still play those word wars as an adult even though I should know better by now. I find it easier to label people, categorize them, put them in neat containers and dismiss them. Here are some of the names I use now... liberal, fundamentalist, moderate, mountain native, outlander, Floridiot, new ager, knot head (oops... left over word from my childhood battles), city boy or girl, Democrat, Republican, INFP or ESTJ, a four (Enneagram numerology), Christian, pagan. And I have been labeled myself... drawling southerner, conservative, unchristian, naive, farm girl, snappy dresser, liberal, lazy, ADD. All of these are true and untrue at the same time. That is the problem for me with labels and naming.
In the picture framing class I teach at our local community college, there will often be a mix of newcomers to our area, natives and those of us who have lived here for some time. I get to watch as people choose to transcend the word definitions of who they are as they connect heart to heart. In my morning class this rotation, three people have become very good friends even though their labels would make this seem unlikely. One woman, a stylish, educated career African American woman who has just moved here from California... another woman, a mountain native, difficult personal life, business owner, well dressed and high school graduate... her cousin and best friend, a man (bet you thought it was going to be a woman), mountain native, shy and careful in his interpersonal relationships... have just taught me once again to appreciate the power of friendship. Yesterday they were laughing about visiting each others’ homes... telling stories of their time together, joking, hugging, admiring each others’ work, making suggestions about mat colors, checking their math figures. As they walked out to the parking lot together lugging their load of pictures and mat board, the sound of laughter trailed in their wake.
Their friendship, like the relationship between David and Jonathon in the Old Testament, reminds me that God often works in the relationships of opposites. David, a shepherd boy, and Jonathon, the son of a king, would appear to have little in common but the story of their friendship has survived the passage of time. Ruth, the daughter-in-law, from a different country and younger, begged her mother-in-law, Naomi, to let her stay with her after the death of her husband. Her words, "Entreat me not to leave thee", have been sung and spoken at weddings for generations. Paul and Barnabas, Jesus, Mary and Martha, Aurelia and me, Mickey and Johnny... all were friendships that transcended the barriers of names and culture and religion.
I find a sense of God’s presence in the friendships of the unlikely in my life and I am blessed with a wealth of them. So today I give thanks for all my friends and their labels that both define and separate them from me. I give thanks for the power of friendship that makes these labels transparent, lets us see into each others hearts and for the steadfast love that flows between us as we live our lives, separately and together, children of a God whose name for us is "Beloved".
In the picture framing class I teach at our local community college, there will often be a mix of newcomers to our area, natives and those of us who have lived here for some time. I get to watch as people choose to transcend the word definitions of who they are as they connect heart to heart. In my morning class this rotation, three people have become very good friends even though their labels would make this seem unlikely. One woman, a stylish, educated career African American woman who has just moved here from California... another woman, a mountain native, difficult personal life, business owner, well dressed and high school graduate... her cousin and best friend, a man (bet you thought it was going to be a woman), mountain native, shy and careful in his interpersonal relationships... have just taught me once again to appreciate the power of friendship. Yesterday they were laughing about visiting each others’ homes... telling stories of their time together, joking, hugging, admiring each others’ work, making suggestions about mat colors, checking their math figures. As they walked out to the parking lot together lugging their load of pictures and mat board, the sound of laughter trailed in their wake.
Their friendship, like the relationship between David and Jonathon in the Old Testament, reminds me that God often works in the relationships of opposites. David, a shepherd boy, and Jonathon, the son of a king, would appear to have little in common but the story of their friendship has survived the passage of time. Ruth, the daughter-in-law, from a different country and younger, begged her mother-in-law, Naomi, to let her stay with her after the death of her husband. Her words, "Entreat me not to leave thee", have been sung and spoken at weddings for generations. Paul and Barnabas, Jesus, Mary and Martha, Aurelia and me, Mickey and Johnny... all were friendships that transcended the barriers of names and culture and religion.
I find a sense of God’s presence in the friendships of the unlikely in my life and I am blessed with a wealth of them. So today I give thanks for all my friends and their labels that both define and separate them from me. I give thanks for the power of friendship that makes these labels transparent, lets us see into each others hearts and for the steadfast love that flows between us as we live our lives, separately and together, children of a God whose name for us is "Beloved".
Thursday, October 18, 2007
faith faces
I saw myself in the mirror yesterday and didn’t know the face looking back at me. As a teenager, I spent hours mapping my face and certain truths settled in my mind about my outward appearance. My nose had a funny wide spot on the bridge that looked like I broke it. If freckles are indeed angel kisses, somebody up there really loved me a lot. My eyes were too small and my face was too round. My hair was too straight and didn’t flip on the ends. On the plus side, my hair was a pretty color and I didn’t get zits. It is time to update my image memory.
Now my face is no longer the smooth, unbroken, polished face of youth with life stretching out in front of my too small eyes. It is a face that bears the marks of a life filled with love, laughter, grief, disappointments, celebration, hope, joy, despair and depression. Tear tracks and laugh lines have carved a face that is a map showing the roads I have traveled. My eyes are settling down, just like my grandma and my mother. My funny nose is taking on the shape of my father’s nose and my pretty dark hair stays that way thanks to good dye jobs. When I finally turn all over grey, the dye will go but I cannot abide the four natural and different colors... dark brown, yellow brown, grey and red ... that have shown up to replace my ash brown/black hair. A new creation is at work in my soul and mirrored in my face.
I am grateful for all the love that has been given to me in this life. My parents, grandparents, sister, sisters and brothers of choice, friends, husbands and children have loved me for no rational reason... just because. God loved me first and loves me still, imperfect and perfect child that I am. Love created many of the lines and softened the edges of my face.
I am grateful for all the laughter in my life. The sense of the absurd that keeps me snickering under my breath and laughing out loud at myself and others... the jokes told (not sent via e-mail) by Mabel Calder (at church and always risque’), Hardy Clemmons ( slowly and with a Texas accent), Thad Timmon’s perfectly awful puns, Nina Pollard and Judy who always had at least one good one to tell every Sunday at Crescent Hill Baptist Church, Grady Nutt whose sly, raucous humor helped keep a generation of Southern Baptists laughing at themselves... the merry hearts of children whom I have loved and been loved by... animals who tickle my funnybone... all these have made laugh lines at the corners of my mouth and eyes.
I am grateful for all the grief in my life. Death of a husband before I was twenty one taught me to value life. My sister’s suicide and the grief of that sharp death taught me the value of family. My friends Judy and Kerry taught me how to face a slowly approaching death unseasonably young and still live. My daddy’s death and dying set us both free as we held each other that long last week of his life. The lines in my face reflect the grace of life lived with a certain end coming.
I am grateful for the depression that has been a cello accompaniment to my piano playing life. It has kept me grounded, taught me how to weep with others and not be ashamed, how to keep on keeping on, kept me humble (now there’s a word you don’t hear much anymore) by forcing me to rely on God and Prozac instead of my own self. The sad shadows in my eyes balance the sharp edge of my tongue and help me see my own limits more clearly.
My faith face lines are invisible and cannot be seen in any mirror but they are there nonetheless. I have gratitude lines around the mouth, lines around eyes that have strained to see the Unseen, forehead lines from amazement and hope and joy, a soft edged chin that can snuggle up next to you, and skin that is still covered with angel kisses.
I look at the pictures of myself when I was young and see how beautiful I was and did not know it. Now I see my wrinkled, funny face and I know it is beautiful, full of a life lived with love, joy, faith and hope. Thanks be to God for faces. I wonder how God’s face has changed through the years? I hope there are laugh lines and love lines from me.
Now my face is no longer the smooth, unbroken, polished face of youth with life stretching out in front of my too small eyes. It is a face that bears the marks of a life filled with love, laughter, grief, disappointments, celebration, hope, joy, despair and depression. Tear tracks and laugh lines have carved a face that is a map showing the roads I have traveled. My eyes are settling down, just like my grandma and my mother. My funny nose is taking on the shape of my father’s nose and my pretty dark hair stays that way thanks to good dye jobs. When I finally turn all over grey, the dye will go but I cannot abide the four natural and different colors... dark brown, yellow brown, grey and red ... that have shown up to replace my ash brown/black hair. A new creation is at work in my soul and mirrored in my face.
I am grateful for all the love that has been given to me in this life. My parents, grandparents, sister, sisters and brothers of choice, friends, husbands and children have loved me for no rational reason... just because. God loved me first and loves me still, imperfect and perfect child that I am. Love created many of the lines and softened the edges of my face.
I am grateful for all the laughter in my life. The sense of the absurd that keeps me snickering under my breath and laughing out loud at myself and others... the jokes told (not sent via e-mail) by Mabel Calder (at church and always risque’), Hardy Clemmons ( slowly and with a Texas accent), Thad Timmon’s perfectly awful puns, Nina Pollard and Judy who always had at least one good one to tell every Sunday at Crescent Hill Baptist Church, Grady Nutt whose sly, raucous humor helped keep a generation of Southern Baptists laughing at themselves... the merry hearts of children whom I have loved and been loved by... animals who tickle my funnybone... all these have made laugh lines at the corners of my mouth and eyes.
I am grateful for all the grief in my life. Death of a husband before I was twenty one taught me to value life. My sister’s suicide and the grief of that sharp death taught me the value of family. My friends Judy and Kerry taught me how to face a slowly approaching death unseasonably young and still live. My daddy’s death and dying set us both free as we held each other that long last week of his life. The lines in my face reflect the grace of life lived with a certain end coming.
I am grateful for the depression that has been a cello accompaniment to my piano playing life. It has kept me grounded, taught me how to weep with others and not be ashamed, how to keep on keeping on, kept me humble (now there’s a word you don’t hear much anymore) by forcing me to rely on God and Prozac instead of my own self. The sad shadows in my eyes balance the sharp edge of my tongue and help me see my own limits more clearly.
My faith face lines are invisible and cannot be seen in any mirror but they are there nonetheless. I have gratitude lines around the mouth, lines around eyes that have strained to see the Unseen, forehead lines from amazement and hope and joy, a soft edged chin that can snuggle up next to you, and skin that is still covered with angel kisses.
I look at the pictures of myself when I was young and see how beautiful I was and did not know it. Now I see my wrinkled, funny face and I know it is beautiful, full of a life lived with love, joy, faith and hope. Thanks be to God for faces. I wonder how God’s face has changed through the years? I hope there are laugh lines and love lines from me.
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