My Friend Ray

When I received a call about Ray, an old friend, dying in the hospital, I immediately went to see him.  While in route to Shelby Baptist Hospital, my mind raced with all kinds of scenarios concerning his demise.  I had not heard from Ray in a while.  You, as well as I, sometimes let valuable time slip away without talking with old friends.  You do not mean for it to happen, but it does.  We get busy and time flies.

Ray and I made friends when his wife, Jodi, and he started attending my home church.  We were the same age and our children were the same age.  Jodi was a childhood friend of mine.  Ray accepted Christ as his savior because of a revival that started with a study of the Book of Revelation.  Brother Cecil Swell, pastor of West End Baptist Church in Clanton led the study.  I wish I had his notes because it was a wonderful study.

Someone had invited Ray’s brother-in-law and Jodi’s brother, Bobby, to the study.  When Bobby heard the teaching of Brother Cecil, he was scared to death.  Bobby was one of those guys that was scared into the kingdom of God. 

Because of Bobby’s salvation, most of his family became Christians.  It was reminiscent of the Philippian jailer in the Book of Acts were the jailer and his whole family were saved and baptized.  Ray was one of Bobby’s family members, but the range of Revelation spread well beyond Bobby’s extended family.

Ray was eager to hear, study, and learn God’s Word.  I remember spending hours in Bible study with Jodi and him.  Our friendship grew as he grew in the Lord.  He lived nearby so we jogged together; lifted weights together, ate meals together, and visited together.

I never will forget a Thursday night visitation.  Ray and Gary (Scooby) went on visitation with me.  Ray witnessed Scooby as they worked together, and Scooby became a believer.  Both of them were what we term “on fire” for the Lord and they could not wait to share their new faith.

I led them to the house of a fellow that we all knew.  I had been there for several visitations but had no luck.  I thought that these “new boys” might have a great influence knowing that they used to drink together.  When our acquaintance opened the door, he started cussing, ripping, and tearing into us.  I knew he meant no harm, but Ray and Scooby ran as if they met the boogieman.  Suddenly, I found myself all alone.  Our friend had been snorting a few ounces of alcohol, so I said I would come back later and went to retrieve my two new converts who were hiding behind a car.  I reminded them that they were like that at one time.

This was before I surrendered the call into the ministry.  I firmly believed that Scooby and Ray were being called into the ministry, not me.  They had wonderful testimonies and were growing spiritually by leaps and bounds.  I could see God at work in their lives.  Even their wives expressed that they did not know if they could be “preacher wives.” 

I did become a deacon and I realized later that I was the one being called into full time ministry.  Scooby later became our Sunday School director and Ray became a deacon.

Ray eagerly learned and understood the ministry of being a deacon.

Ray and Jodi’s marriage had started on shaky ground having divorced and remarrying about the time of their salvation.  Their commitment to the Lord temporary healed a strained relationship.

As time slipped away, about ten years, the pressure of marriage, kids, and ministry increased.  Ray and Jodi separated a second time.  Ray volunteered to resign as deacon.

With the divorce final, Jodi married another man and Ray started drinking and slowly slipped back into his old ways.  He dated a younger woman, and she became pregnant.  Ray unfortunately chose alcohol for relief and overdosed trying to escape.  With no one to help him, Jodi, with the encouragement of her new husband, stood by Ray’s side in the hospital until he died.  Jodi is the one who called me thinking I could encourage Ray.

Jodi met me and gave me the bad news that he would not live very long.  I will never forget the look in Ray’s eyes as I tried to communicate with him.  He acknowledged me with a penetrating stare from his lifeless body.  He was dying with alcoholic chronic pancreatitis or alcohol poising.  His body could not digest the excessive overdose of alcohol.

I spent as much time allowed by the hospital that afternoon with Ray and Jodi.  Jodi lost the father of her children, and I lost a dear brother in Christ.  There was some much that Ray and I needed to catch up on.  I do not know how much Ray comprehended, but one last time our eyes focused on each other as I told him I loved him.  I thank God for having known Ray and regret I could not help him.

It has been almost thirty years since Ray died the way he did and I have been asked, “Do you think Ray was saved?”  I know he was, but he lost his vision and gave up.  Eugene Peterson expresses it in The Message, “If people can’t see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves; but when they attend to what God reveals; they are most blessed.”

The King James Version says, “Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he” (Proverbs 29:18).

That Bunch From Mars Hill

I never will forget the first time I heard the phrase “Below the Bogue” which I learned is the same as “South of the Bogue.”  I think I understood its meaning before anyone told me.  I am from across the tracks myself.  I grew up in rural Alabama in a community called Mars Hill.  While in school, Jemison folks called those who lived across the tracks “that bunch from Mars Hill.”

Most of us from Mars Hill lived in shacks, used outdoor toilets, and wore hand-me-down clothes.  We went to school Monday through Friday, to town on Saturday and church on Sundays.  Our dads hauled pulpwood and our mammas stayed at home. 

The best thing about being from Mars Hill was most were great athletes.  A picture of the 1917 Mars Hill baseball team crowns the cover of A Pictorial History of Chilton County.  Jemison High school state championships in baseball, basketball, football, softball, tennis, and volleyball all have Mars Hill athletes as their all-states, all conferences, and captains. 

It was in Sunday school that I learned that the Apostle Paul preached at Mars Hill, not the one in Chilton County, but the one in the Bible.  He had a difficult time preaching there.  They were a tough bunch in Mars Hill.  Mars Hill people are always tough.  If the Bible mentioned Mars Hill, I knew that being from Mars Hill was prophetic and had its advantages.

I have always had to defend my Mars Hill roots.  A church I pastored was one of the places I felt the bias.  A church member confronted me about the issue of prayer for one of our mission programs.  I wanted the leaders to teach our children and youth how to pray.  We had a wonderful mission's program, and it was a model for the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions in Montgomery.  Two of our RA’s were pages at the Southern Baptist Convention in Salt Lake City one year.  One of the two got a scholarship to Samford University through our RA program. 

I did not want to sidetrack mission ministries but wanted incorporate prayer and teach the importance of prayer in concert and in support of missions.  The response I received knocked the wind from my sails.  The sin of sanctifying geography and the sin of sanctifying size reared its ugly head.  The church member said, “I know that you pastored a little old church in the sticks of Bibb County, and you did not have many members, so you know nothing of missions.  You need to leave the missions to us.” 

The truth was that I served as vice-moderator, moderator, and the Associational Brotherhood director for Bibb Baptist Association.  My Bibb church was a mission church.  I had been a Royal (RA) Ambassador since boyhood and understood the value of missions very much.  The Bibb church lead Bibb Association churches in giving eight percent of its money to the Association. 

I did not take his statement as personal attack, but it did affront me because he offended the kind, generous, and saintly members of that little church.  I felt as though this church member had slapped little churches and pastors of little churches in the face by such a diabolical statement.

I have learned that it is more important where the Lord takes you than where you have been.  Jesus’ teachings speak volumes about geography and size when He calls us to follow Him.  Let me use this paraphrase:  “Give me who you are and forget where you came” is the call to follow Jesus.  Wow, I wish I had known back then what I know today.

Are we guilty of the sin of sanctifying geography when we refer to “that bunch from Mars Hill” or “South of the Bogue?”  Where the Lord takes us is more important that where we have been.  Are we guilty of the sin of sanctifying size when we compare churches or say we are too small to do anything?  God has no small churches.

The day following Jesus would go forth into Galilee, and findeth Philip, and saith unto him, Follow me.  Now Philip was of Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter.  Philip findeth Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.  And Nathanael said unto him, Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? Philip saith unto him, Come and see (John 1:43-46 KJV).

 

 

EXPECTATION

Today is the start of the new Millennium.  School at Beeson starts at eight o’clock Monday morning.  I expect it will be a great class.  Much will be expected of us.  There is always uncertainty of trying to do what the professor expects. My whole community, family, and church expect me to do well.  There is hope for everyone if a poor country boy does well.  That’s expected though! January 1, 2000.

I wrote this paragraph in a devotional book, Front Porch Tales, that I got for Christmas from our eldest son Andy in 1999.  This book became an inspiration for the articles you read.  The devotion was titled Expectation.  It is the expectation of John the Baptist’s birth and the song, which his father sang.  Philip Gulley writes, “. . . that expectation is a blessing, not a curse.  It is a beautiful thing when people expect something decent of you.”

At the time I was meditating on this probing thought, the world was breathing an inkling of relief after being in panic mode for several months.  Remember Y2K.  Corporations, businesses, banks, and utilities spent mega bucks trying to avert a major meltdown of the civilized world of the computer its massive web of control.

I remember bank presidents in Clanton asking the preachers to tell congregations not to make large withdrawals from the banks.  One Clanton resident withdrew $150 thousand dollars.  One banker said that if certain people knew the man’s name, that that man’s life would be worthless.

One member of the church I pastored worked on a power company’s building in downtown Birmingham trying to update the computer infrastructure to avoid meltdown, as electrical outage would be catastrophe.  Expectation of calamity controlled the minds of people around the world during the Y2K scare.  Mass panic was imminent.

Fast forward twenty-two years and we discover that most people laugh at the folly of Y2K, remember the awfulness of 911, dread the terror of COVID as the panic of world destruction looms even greater today.  If one listens to the media, it is DOOM, DESPAIR, and AGONY on me.  We hear about the financial collapse of nations around the world and the expectation that America is ripe for financial collapse clouds our judgment.  We see the moral decay of Europe and witness the deterioration of our great nation with each new song, video, commercial, or fashion design and wonder how low we can sink in moral degradation.

I believe that God created you and me for these times.  I revisit my calling from time to time.  I remember sitting at the dinner table studying the Bible when God directed to preach the truth.  Most people do not believe me, but I am by nature a shy introvert.  God is the reason that I do not appear that way today.

I never expected to be a preacher, especially a director of missions.  I knew that the Lord expected me to use the talents and gifts that He blessed me.  I never expected that I would be a writer of articles that have become a blessing and inspiration to those who read them.

I wanted to quit the University of Montevallo, especially after I made an F ++ over a C-- on my first English 101 paper.  The F was for grammar and the C for content.  I even had to attend the Harbert Writing Center just to learn how to write.

Every Monday I wanted to quit but I was reminded that the family had too much money invested in me.  It made me realize that too many people depended on me.  Remember what I said about expectation.  Many times, I did not believe that I could make it, but I knew the Lord kept providing my every need and increased my abilities.

Along about the time I began to feel a “burnout” bearing down on me, I realized that I expected more from myself than God, family, my church, and the community did.  After my freshman year, I made the dean’s list.  I expected to graduate sigma cum laude, but a geography class and European history class crushed that expectation.  I thought about it.  I was working full time at the cement plant, taking twelve hours of classes, pastoring a church, and trying to raise a family and I was expecting to make straight A’s.  Then I realized who cares if I make straight A’s.  It was my expectations, no one else’s.  I made straight B’s that term, which is not shabby since I only attend one computer class and took tests for the others.  I got a reprieve from the University because the cement plant would not work around my schedule.  I had a high enough grade average that I did not have to attend classes. That’s another story!

When the Lord reminded me of my long-term goals, I started enjoying school and making better grades.  The Lord increased my belief, and my expectations became a blessing.

It is this attitude I need when facing the uncertainty of the world and the certainty of God.  When I think about COVID and the threat of government control, I am reminded of the father of the child with a foul spirit that the Disciples could not help.  Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.  And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief (Mark 9:23-24 KJV).

I believe, no I expect, believers to make a difference.  “It is a beautiful thing when people expect something decent of you.”

 

 

I Heard It In A Love Song

As a minister people assume that Gospel music is my favorite.  I love to sing old hymns; I enjoy listening to Southern Gospel and I think there is not anything more beautiful to hear than a lady’s ensemble.  Some contemporary Christian music is okay.  I look for sound doctrine and theological truths.  The chorus I Exalt Thee and Ray Boltz’s Thank You have some of the best praise words ever written.

I enjoy all kinds of music, but much I can live without listening. I tell people all the time that music died after 1969.  Hank Williams’ I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry and Calijah are two country songs I like. Elvis’ Don’t Be Cruel is another favorite.  My personal favorite music has to be Rock and Roll oldies. 

I remember living in Beloit, Illinois from 1957-1960.  My sister and I had a room on the second floor of an apartment in which we lived.  From our windows, we watched and listened as the teenagers played 45 rpm records.

The teenagers blocked the drive, lined up tables with record players, and piled what seemed to be hundreds of records.  Bill Haley’s See Later Alligator, After While Crocodile was one that they played over and over.

Dressed in poodle dresses, bobbiesocks, and black and white saddle oxfords girls would dance with their boyfriends for hours.  The boys wore their hair slicked back in ducktails, white T-shirts, blue jeans with a rolled cuff, and black and white saddle oxfords.  These impressed this six-year-old boy and his four-year old sister.

As these teenagers graduated and new songs appeared, my sister and I were lucky recipients of many of those 45 rpm records.  We played them over and over.  Only a few exist today.

As a teenager one of my favorite songs was Dion’s A Teenager in Love.  I love listening to it now.  Now you know why people call me a hopeless romantic.  During these years, radio stations had stopped playing the music of the fifties and early sixties and were playing songs by groups named for insects and the hard rock bands of the late sixties and early seventies.

History teaches that the invasion of these foreign insect music groups introduced the drug culture to the United States.  Many of the love songs gave way to antiwar and protest songs. 

Coupled with strong rhythm beats and creative musical instruments, we forget the message a song conveys.  Many radio stations due to what it suggested banned the Everly Brothers song, Wake Up Little Suzie.  That is tame compared to the lyrics of some of today’s music.

Our minds are remarkable recording devices.  Our children sang Bill and Gloria Gaiter’s song that said, “Input, Output, What Goes In Is What Comes Out.”  That is why my Oldies are more nostalgic than anything.  They remind of the time that I almost became a Yankee and time of innocence long ago and far away.

Each Sunday that I visited the wonderful churches of Bethel Baptist Association, we sing the songs from Baptist and Broadman Hymnals, Stamps-Baxter’s, Inspiration Hymnal # 12, and the many praise songs and choruses. These songs remind me of the wonderful Victory in Jesus on The Old Rugged Cross God’s demonstration of Amazing Grace. 

When we have been there ten thousand years, we will have just begun singing the new songs of heaven.  Gone will be Rock of Ages and When the Roll Is Called Up Yonder.

And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation. . .Revelation 5:9