nickmullis.com

October 3, 2019October 3, 2019

What makes a “house” a “home”?

I’ve lived in three houses in my life. From birth to late age five we lived on “H” street in town. Then we moved to the farm out on Highway 58. Finally, at age 26 I bought and moved into my small house back in town on 17^th street. With the exception of a couple of years in college before I became a commuter my entire life has been lived with those locations as home base.

It’s an interesting question, what makes a house a home? I have thought of each place as home for differing reasons. When I reflect on them they are all still home in a way. I’m not sure home is so much about a location as much as where I allow my heart to settle and the people with which I share the place.

In 2008 I was invited to take part in a conference in South Africa. There were some moments leading up to the trip that still leave me shaking my head. I spent a month misreading my itinerary and missed my original flight. When I got home after realizing I had the wrong departure date I discovered my house had been robbed. The next morning on my way to catch my new flight we stopped by the bank for me to grab some money and I left my debit card in the ATM and didn’t realize it until I was sitting at Dulles airport in Washington DC waiting for my connecting flight directly to Johannesburg. It was an exciting way to start a journey. I did eventually make it to the conference with no more major issues. South Africa is a beautiful country, unbelievable scenery, warm welcoming people, and cool wildlife. A favorite afternoon activity was to go walk the trails around the campground where we were staying. We were walking along a trail and one of my friends asked, “Isn’t it hard to believe that we are on the opposite side of the world? I still can’t get over it.” I said, “You know, I hadn’t even thought about it. It kind of feels a bit like home to me.” I grew up in Southern Indiana. The Hoosier State and South Africa are nothing a like. “I just kind of feel like this is where I am supposed to be right now.”

A soon as I made that statement I stopped in the middle of the trail, “Do you think maybe it’s because of how we believe that we can feel so at home so far from home?”

C.S. Lewis once wrote, “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.” If I am made for another world then anywhere I set foot in this one can become my dwelling because I know it is only a temporary place. My truest home is in the midst of God. Where I find myself now is a gift that I get to enjoy. That means whether in one of three houses, in South Africa, on a mountain, or resting on a beach I can feel at rest because it’s all a weak reflection of the place my spirit longs for and for which it was made.

In 2012 I lost a job that I loved. At that point I had spent a third of my life working for the same organization and I believed I would spend my entire life there. After the end came I was broken and that led to me being broke. I substitute taught and donated plasma and scrapped around doing what I could to literally keep the lights on. Keeping the lights on also meant that I wasn’t making mortgage payments. I limped along for several months and had lots of phone calls with the bank that held the note at the time. Each time I missed a payment my personal embarrassment grew. I was trying to launch a not-for-profit ministry at the time and for the first six months we were definitely not-for-profit. We had been meeting with students for a few months but there wasn’t money to make payroll. Between visiting a school and preparing to meet with 50 students that night I stopped by my house on 17^th street to pick up a few things. There were some papers folded and taped to the front door. I pulled them off and opened them up… I held the foreclosure notice. I was going to lose my house. I didn’t have time to think about it at that moment. There was ministry that had to be done. I pulled myself together I stood in front of a bunch of teenagers that night and told them that God loved them and he saw them where they were and they mattered to Him. In the back of my mind I knew there was a legal document sitting in my car that said in essence, “come up with a bunch of money or get out.”

I walked through the side door of my little house, and sat down in my chair and starred at a painting I have hanging above the mantel. In the silence I realized how numb I was. I didn’t know what to feel so I didn’t feel anything. I looked at the image and said, “God I don’t want to lose my home. I don’t want to lose this place.” I probably repeated it a few times then I was still. In the silence a statement crossed my mind, “Nick, this is a house not your home. I will take care of you.” I had no real reason to believe those words, other than they came from the center of all I believed and still believe. Two days later I walked into a board meeting and told my board of directors my situation and I told them about the conversation I had had sitting in my chair. I told them I was at peace, I didn’t want to lose my house but I was okay no matter what would come. A few days later all the payroll issues were resolved and a couple of significant donations came in, and I was given several months back pay. When the dust settled I had enough money in hand to catch-up the mortgage and pay the legal fees to stop the foreclosure and I still live in my little dumpy house.

What makes a “house” a ”home”? I don’t really know, but I believe it has more to do with the people that live there than it does with a material dwelling. Home is the memories. Home is the people you share it with. Home can be anywhere you set your feet, because this is just a house. My heart still longs for something it can’t experience this side of Resurrection.

August 21, 2019

The Life of a Bubble

There is much in our world that we understand and much more that we think we understand but have no clue. The other day I sat down with a new friend and she told me all about her journey.

I was sitting on a bench in park not far from the beach when a gentle young lady sat beside me. She said her life was brief compared to most, she came in and went out and not a soul noticed she was ever there. She said even the one that started her creation never knew she existed.

Here is her exciting and sad tale…

Everything that it took for me to exist was present before anyone knew I would come along. I only needed a bit of air and enough water to show the world I existed. No one in my family has a long life, but some live more exciting lives than others. Some of my cousins bring unending laughter to children. A few of us are there when people celebrate their weddings. My life was not so auspicious as that but it was exciting from start to finish.

We were sailing out in the deepest of waters on a clear, hot day, there was just enough breeze to push our little boat along. I felt like a stowaway not a person on the ship had any idea I was there. The careless Captain finished his water and without a thought for the world he tossed his bottle overboard. The open bottle floated on the surface of the sea and bit-by-bit droplets of water found their way into the mouth of the bottle. Soon there was enough water to turn the bottle on to an angle. Waves crashed over the mouth and filled the bottle all the way up except for a tiny space. In that tiny space is where I was born.

After a while the bottle began to sink. Down we went toward the depths, sunlight fading. My little bottle settled into the sand on the bottom of the sea and I sat there pressed against it’s plastic wall watching the world swim by me.

I can hardly complain, the view was remarkable. On my first day on the bottom I saw an eel swim by looking for a new hiding place. I got to know a family of Angel Fish that would swim by each morning. There was a silly little sea cucumber that would slink past the bottle every so often. It was a peaceful life, longer than most of the members of my family.

One morning as my friend the sea urchin crawled by my little home shifted. The plastic had grown weak from the pressure of the sea around it. The corner I was resting in collapsed and before I knew it I was launched from my bottle. I had been so flat and lifeless in my bottle, out in the ocean I felt alive, I took on a beautiful round form. As I admired my lovely new shape I got caught under the feather of a sea pen. I lingered there for a bit until the underwater current moved us enough I slipped out back into the open water. Things were moving so fast. I looked down and I could barely see my bottle. The eel slid past me and as he flicked his tail he tossed me side ways, and for a moment I looked like a peanut. The whip of his tale had just enough force to send me into the heart of a rip current and I was drawn far from my bottle. I took a moment to calm myself, but my bottle had disappeared entirely, and I was still traveling away, faster and faster. As I was drawn along I passed a small bale of newly hatched sea turtles they all smiled and waved their tiny flippers as they passed.

Soon, I felt a darkness approaching and I was surrounded by a school of silvery Forage Fish. Their quick movements tickled and made me smile until I saw where the darkness was coming from, the great shark burst in among us. They scattered but for some it was too late, and I had been one of those too slow to escape. I was swept into the beasts gapping maw and I assumed that my end had arrived until I saw the slits in the side of the sharks neck. I ducked for the opening and I just fit. Out I went and I continued racing away from my bottle, wherever it had gone.

The water around me started to clear and it got lighter around me. I looked toward the brighter area and there were fuzzy images there swooping around. Once in a while one would crash into the water not far from me.

A few seconds later there was a new sensation – all the weight of the ocean was gone. I still had my round shape, half in the sea and half in the new lightness. Then pop, I was no more. I became only a memory no one ever had. Until I found you I didn’t even have someone with which to share my story. It was a brief life but it was beautiful.

August 14, 2019

Forgive and Forget?

Is forgiveness forgetting? There isn’t an easy answer to this question. We have all heard the stories of the woman that offers a home to her son’s murderer. We have seen the addict and dealer that make peace with their past and work together to change a neighborhood. Most of the time these stories leave a lot of us in emotional chaos. On the outside we smile and clap (if we are in the audience). We utter things like, “That’s amazing” or “Grace is wonderful.” Inside our guilt wells up, “Why can’t I forgive and forget,” “Why do I feel like it’s such a struggle to move on from my pain?” I don’t know that forgiving is forgetting or that we understand the full story of these “ultra forgiveness” moments.

I have been fortunate to live a pretty charmed life, I have amazing parents, siblings I can put up with and generally like being around, and nieces and nephews that are the coolest kids around. I grew-up middle class on a family farm and there haven’t been many deep cuts in my life. There have been people that have attacked my character and people that have said mean things about me and I don’t understand why – I try to be a peaceable person. They have all been people that if I saw them in trouble I would offer help. There have been three times in my life (at this point) where I have been deeply hurt. Two of those I have since moved on. One though was so tangled, multi-faceted, and effected my life so deeply I still struggle with how to fully respond. I often have to remind myself that I forgive those involved. Yet, I don’t feel comfortable around the people or the organization at the center of the hurt. The relational damage was profound.

Let’s look back at the ultra forgiveness stories… Like most of us I love and struggle with these stories. I believe in the power of forgiveness, both for the forgiver and the forgiven. There are a couple of key factors in these forgiveness narratives that we miss because we don’t experience it in real time. We see the moment after the moment has happened. We join the tale after the hard work has been done.

The first factor – Time. I’m sure there are some true miracle moments out there, but in the stories I have heard and read, years have passed from offense committed to the “hug point.” We hear the story in a one hour special and lose track of the decades that pass between action and forgiveness. The old saying is that time heals all wounds. There is some truth to that but remember a healed wound still shows a scar.

Factor number two — the victim doesn’t do it alone. The mother has people around her helping her walk through the pain. The dealer and addict have recovery communities that walk with them as their lives change forever. Forgiveness at its best happens with a community.

Some honorable mentions that don’t always show up but are there a lot…

There is a sense of guilt and repentance from the one that committed the crime. The victim and offender both recognize the role they played. The victim and offender both realize that they are no longer the same people they were and they want to move on. Both parties have had an encounter with God (I think this one has the greatest impact but is in honorable mention because many would discount its importance).

Back to my struggle with forgive vs forget. At the time I had spent, almost, a third of my life as an employee of an organization. Since it was a student ministry I first became affiliated when I was in middle school, this meant that over half of my life had been spent connected to this Not-for-Profit. I was in my 7^th year of employment when the wheels started to come off. If you had asked me at year five I would have told you I would retire with them and continue to consult and teach for them until I went on to resurrection. Year seven though things began to change. No one likes change — a friend of mine once said, “People don’t like fun change let alone difficult change.” There was a lot more tension and I didn’t help matters because I didn’t fully understand myself. I was battling through depression and didn’t know – I just felt bad not realizing it had a name. At the same time I was discovering that I was an introvert by nature and I was surrounded by extroverts that couldn’t understand that and I wasn’t sure they cared. The message I was hearing (I don’t believe it was intended this way) was, “You don’t function or think the way we do and if you don’t shape up and start doing things our way there are going to be problems. There is obviously something wrong with you and you need to fix it.” I felt demeaned and disrespected as a person not as an employee. Over the course of the next three years a lot of battles ensued I had been worn down enough that I started standing my ground and wouldn’t back down and that exacerbated the problems. The final blow came when I resigned, it was genuinely one of the worst days of my life. These people I had spent a lifetime with suddenly seemed like enemies. They were confused when I said, “We aren’t having a staff party. If we’re done, we’re done.” Later that same day I emailed the national office, “I’ve lost my job, what am I supposed to do now.” The response I got was, “Be careful what you say to donors so you don’t hurt giving.” I had lost half my life and the response was don’t hurt everyone else’s income. A couple of weeks later I got a phone call from a former co-worker, he decided then was the time to let me know he would have fired me sooner. He didn’t know what had taken my bosses so long. My life and my value fell apart. Who was I? Did I even serve a purpose in this world? Was I really that difficult to work with? Had I really been that awful of a person?

There were a lot of well meaning people in my life early on that told me to forgive and forget, “Move on with your life, things will work out.” The problem was I couldn’t see that things were going to work out. I couldn’t move on because I didn’t know where to move on to. I had nothing except a faith I had to cling even tighter to. I wasn’t ready to move on because I was still shell-shocked by what had happened. Where had things gone so terribly wrong?

People were telling me that I should be praying blessings over them. I wanted to pray like King David, “God crush my enemies” “God vindicate me.” The wound was raw and deep.

For a long time my prayers were, “God this hurts,” “God help me,” “God help me find peace.” Forgiveness was something I was going to have to move to. I wasn’t against forgiving I just couldn’t get there. God knows I wanted to forgive. I knew forgiveness was the right thing to do. It required something I didn’t yet have — some healing. Eventually I would pray for forgiveness. I would pray that God would forgive me in the midst of my struggle and that I would be forgiving toward the people that hurt me and the organization. For a long time when I would drive through the town where the office was I would default into prayers of forgiveness. Over time I stopped feeling the tension I did in the beginning. I can cross the city limits and not think of those by gone days.

At the same time I can never fully forget the pain that entered my life. I’m still in recovery, years later. The relationships I had with people are shattered. I don’t expect they will be whole this side of resurrection, but I also don’t think that limits the forgiveness. I don’t believe that means I have been unforgiving towards them.

I think of it this way… If I had a recovering alcoholic come to my church, 5 years sober, it wouldn’t be a particularly loving act to put him on the ministry team that goes to bars to reach the lost. Yes, he offers a unique perspective, but the better place for him to serve is with the recovery group, where I’m not throwing him into a place he once struggled. He has been forgiven, but his mind and body haven’t forgotten.

I think this is the truth of the log and the sawdust. Am I humble enough to admit I’m still struggling and growing? If I can see the log in my own eye then I can work on removing it and maybe walk with you while you struggle with your sawdust.

I forgive them all the time, but I haven’t forgotten yet and I think that’s okay. Forgiveness is a healing process. I have moved past wanting to pray like David. In most cases unless something exterior brings it up I don’t think about any of it. I’m on a journey and I am learning. Mostly I am learning that forgiving is a process.

August 7, 2019August 7, 2019

Socks to Change Your World and The World.

Comfort… Who doesn’t want to be comfortable? We all dream of being in our favorite shirt, in baggy sweats or shorts, sitting in our favorite chair, watching our favorite show, eating our favorite food. We spend huge money finding comfortable desk chairs, and buying a car we feel comfortable driving.

Maybe the t-shirt/sweats/show/chair/food vision isn’t one you connect with, but we all search for comfort in some area or another. I do a lot of outdoor stuff… I want my bicycle to fit comfortably. I want my cycling clothes to be comfortable. I want my hiking backpack to sit just right on my hips and shoulders. I bought a super light canoe paddle to ease the strain on my shoulders during a big trip. I have a pair of shoes that I love so much as I wear out a pair I buy new ones of the same model.

I also like to do nice things for other people. I don’t have much money to throw around so I am limited in what I do financially. Periodically, the worlds of comfort and helping people collide and that is kind of a sweet spot.

First, unless Bombas somehow stumbles across this blog, they are unlikely to even know that I have a pair of their socks. With over twenty-million pairs sold they aren’t likely to notice one guy from Indiana that bought one single pair of ankle socks.

Bombas is doing a cool thing… I don’t know who came first Bombas or Toms but they function on a similar notion – 1 pair equals 1 pair. For every pair of socks (and now t-shirts) that Bombas sells they donate a pair to a person in need. I bought one pair of socks and someone in need got a pair as well. I like that model, I once told a friend that I loved the notion of being wealthy enough that for every dollar I spent on a luxury item I could give a dollar away, so this resonates with me.

I heard about Bombas a few years ago on a podcast I listened to at the time. I liked the idea but I was walking when I heard about them and forgot about the ad by the time I got someplace I could look up Bombas. A few weeks ago I was, again, reminded of them while I was near my computer, so I looked them up while I was sitting there. They were a little pricy for me (I run a young not-for-profit which means I don’t have a lot of money) but then I remembered that I was basically buying two pairs of socks. I decided to splurge and I ordered one pair of ocean blue Marls ankle socks. After I ordered them I promptly went to bed and mostly forgot I ordered them. A few days later a package was in my mailbox, “Oh, yeah. Socks.” I wasn’t expecting much from mail order socks, plus I have some merino wool ankle socks that I love and wear all the time.

I ordered them with hesitation just from reading the materials list — cotton, polyester, rubber, spandex. It seemed like an odd mix for something to wear on my feet. For most things I like polyester and spandex, I am not a fan of cotton, and rubber just seemed weird. There were a lot of strikes against the socks going in. On paper I assumed that I was throwing money away on socks that would be worn once out of obligation for having purchased them.

What happened instead of the one and done… I found some socks that are comfortable. When I took them out of the package I was surprised by the thickness. There was a lot of obvious cushion in the socks. Then I pulled them onto my feet and they fit. I wear a size 15 shoe and most of my socks are size 6-12 when I have bought socks that were for 15s they didn’t fit tightly around my foot and a sock that is too small is better than one that fits loose. The Bombas were nice. I spent a hot day in them walking around and they never got the stiff feeling that most socks I’ve worn get. By the end of the day I am usually ready to change socks or go barefoot. The Bombas hung in there all day and felt good. I was so impressed I washed them that night and wore them again a couple of days later. It was only one wash but they still felt like new socks.

I had found one of those magical places where comfort matched with my desire to help people out. Next time you are in the market for a new pair of socks give them a try. Here’s a link that will get you 25% off and also will get me some socks and only socks because again, Bombas has no idea I even wrote this and I doubt they ever will.

Use this link to get 25% off your first Bombas Order

P.S. After I wrote the above the socks went through another long day walking around Kings Island Amusement Park. They were great, my favorite socks (up till now) would have given up after a day like that.

July 30, 2019July 30, 2019

The Hen Cackles at Midnight

Oddly enough, a television show about war gave me a sense that everything was right in the world. Some of my fondest childhood memories were hearing the M*A*S*H theme song playing. By the time I was old enough to watch M*A*S*H it was in reruns that came on after Carson. I don’t think I actually saw an episode until I was into middle school but that wasn’t the point when I was a young boy. If I was hearing the theme song play it meant that I had gotten to stay up late with dad. Most of the time I was asleep before the final note played, but I still tried. I was going to cherish every second I had to stay up late. The warmth of my memories of the show meant that I did eventually start watching M*A*S*H. The show fed into my nostalgic personality and love of history. By the time I was a sophomore in high school I had seen every episode at least once and most of them multiple times. As an adult, once a year, I rewatch every episode of the TV series. Like everyone I have my favorite characters, Sidney Freedman, Father Mulcahy and my preferred era (Potter, Hunnicutt, and Winchester seasons).

One of my favorite episodes is found in season six – The Light that Failed. We find the 4077, low on supplies and morale, in the midst of a bitter winter. When the supply truck arrives it’s filled with summer gear and a small package addressed to B.J. Hunnicutt. B.J. rips open the parcel to discover he had been sent a mystery novel – The Rooster Crowed at Midnight. Over the course of the episode the book if torn apart and pages passed around so the entire camp has the chance to solve the mystery together. The problem arrises when Captain Hunnicutt finds the last page and, subsequently, the reveal of the murderer are missing. Eventually they called the, 97 year old, author Abigail Porterfield.

Though they never discovered who the villain was a noticeable change had swept through the camp. Doctors, nurses, and support staff came to life and were talking about the book. A book at the right time in the right place restored the waining spirits of a small displaced community.

A few months ago, my town had its own, “The Rooster Crowed at Midnight” moment. Except for us it wasn’t a book or a rooster. For us it was the painting of a hen named Rose.

Once upon a time ago my town was a center for the art of stone carving. We had carvers that did brilliant and beautiful things with limestone. Our stone works were famous the world over. Limestone is what put us on the map. During the years between the limestone boom and the modern era our heart for art was mostly forgotten. We still talked about it and acknowledged it, but it stirred neither passion nor excitement in the community. We had grown too familiar and too distant. Then the hen appeared. It wasn’t unexpected, the piece had been commissioned. The artist did his work in the middle of the day with onlookers watching him give life to a blank concrete block wall. When all was said and done, looking back at passers-by was a hen speaking love.

Much like the book in M*A*S*H, our hen lifted the spirits of all who saw it. It got us talking about the future again and who we could become as a community. For a moment it reminded us that we have talent and joy and life floating around in our small burg. It gave us a moment of hope that we might continue to come out of the stagnation we have lived in for more than a generation. It’s only a chicken, but it’s also a beacon of hope. We can be a source of greatness again.

I believe in my town.

July 23, 2019July 23, 2019

The Man with White Hair

I was flinging gravel everywhere as I busted down the side road around the construction zone. I had one thought in mind, “I had to get home so I could meet up with my friends for whatever we were going to do that night.” As I reached the straight section of the road there was an old farm truck moving at a snails pace in front of me. I parked my car on their bumper until they got the picture. They pulled over and let me around. I put the pedal down and a couple of hundred yards later missed the 90 degree right and went straight into the driveway across the curve.

As I backed out and let my heart calm the farm truck rolled up behind me and waited for me to get back on my way. I missed the right on Sunday night and on Wednesday the man with white hair stepped up beside me. “Nick, one of the older couples from the church said you were driving a little fast Sunday night and missed the curve. Slow down in the future.” That’s all he said, and that’s all he needed to say. I always wondered why he didn’t say more, he knew that in most things I hung on his every word.

A few years later I went go cart racing and the man with white hair, started giving me pointers on how to hit faster lap times. I reflect back now and understand why he said so little about my speed… He liked to go fast himself. He spent a lifetime building and driving, fast cars. He also spent a lifetime learning how to stay under control.

Like most things in life we don’t understand what their impact is until they are gone. The relationship that ended, but it turns out for the best… The book that changed the way we think, but we haven’t looked at since school… The man with white hair was one of those for me. He meant a lot to me, but I didn’t understand how much until he was gone. My heart hurt more than I expected. I knew I would shed tears, but I didn’t know that I would weep. I expected sadness, but not the depth of my heartache.

The man with white hair, was Ronnie. He had done it all. He built cars from scratch, fabricating the body and various parts he needed in his garage shop. As a young man he was sign-maker to pay the bills. He ran a body shop so he had something to do when there weren’t signs to be made. Moving on the ground wasn’t enough so he started designing, building, flying, crashing, and occasionally landing his own ultra-light aircraft. Why only build things that move? So he built houses as well. With the exception of houses on the coast I had never seen a dwelling built up on pylons until he built a cabin at our denominational camp grounds that way.

Most important to Ronnie, he built relationships with people. He believed in people. Ronnie may have never met you, but, I assure you the man with white hair believed in you. He knew every person had potential.

Ronnie showed up in my life when I was only 15 years old. He was the man with white hair that started attending the church in which I grew up. Until the heart attack, that ultimately defeated his physical body, if you had asked me who would leave this realm first Ronnie or me, I would have said me. As far as I was concerned he was an immortal. From the day I met him to the day I visited him in the hospital he looked the same. Milk white hair crowning his round head that was lit by one of the kindest smiles the world has known. I was sure he was a modern Melchizedek, “Without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, like the Son of God he remains a priest forever (Hebrews 7:3 NIV).” I knew he had family and he had come from someplace, but he couldn’t have an end? He was too strong, too lively to ever die.

It may have been that sense that the man with white hair was everlasting that made his death difficult for me, but I don’t think it was. It was more of what he taught me and the investment that he made in me and knowing that this investor was now gone.

With everything else Ronnie did, he was also a pastor. In all the things that he did, his truest heart was his pastors heart. He was a pastor that believed in young people and believed in us as co-laborers. I was driving home, too fast, on gravel road because I had been ministering at a church where Ronnie was, and he had asked me to come down and speak to the youth of the church. The first Sunday morning sermon I ever preached was at a small country church where Ronnie was filling in. He was hosting a revival and I was one of the “evangelist” for the series. I was sixteen and terrible, but it didn’t matter to the man with white hair, because I loved Jesus and that is all I had to do.

It wasn’t just me either… Our youth group had a praise band and a few of us that were toying with going into ministry. Ronnie had us in Baptist Churches on Sunday mornings, special services at an Assembly of God church, anywhere he could get a foot in the door he brought a couple of us or the whole crew.

A couple of us did end up in ministry and our first ministry lessons came from Ronnie. He demonstrated what it was to build relationships and how to love people well. He showed us what it was to care for people. They were lessons that still lead me today.

When I got the phone call that Ronnie wasn’t doing well and I needed to go see him I was off with 30 teenagers on a trip. Three days after saying Goodbye to my old friend I was in a van driving across the country with a group of young men, half of which didn’t know Jesus. It was maybe the greatest way to memorialize the man with white hair, because the Kingdom was always the priority. Denomination and dogma were nothing, Kingdom mattered. People knowing Jesus mattered.

The man with white hair, Ronnie, meant the world to me. He believed in me, he believed in you, and most of all he believed in Jesus. I guess he will live on for a while more because he was the first to teach me how to build the Kingdom.

Ronnie S. McLain

May 27, 1943 – June 14, 2019

February 24, 2019February 25, 2019

My Town

Thornton Wilder placed the final act of Our Town in a graveyard. The play was a progression through the life of a small fictional town in New Hampshire. Rather than ending in a cemetery My Town begins near the burial grounds. If you come into My Town from the South, you will pass a field with gravestones dating back to the early 1800s. Some are weather worn to the point the names are illegible. Others are cracked and moss covered. There are many that are works of art. At different points in life I have enjoyed walking the roads that wind among the graves. As an introvert it’s a place I can walk and think and no one is going to talk to me. If someone does start talking to me there are more immediate questions, besides what I am thinking about, that need answered.

Troubling to me… This graveyard has come to be symbolic of My Town, at least in the minds of the citizenry. If you ask the average person about My Town they will tell you, “We are dying.” Ask any given teenager, “I can’t wait to get out of here.” Ask the elderly, “It’s not what it used to be.” My Town has its problems — maybe more than its fair share. It hurts my heart, that people only see the dark spots, they only see the problems. My twentieth class reunion is this year, and I found myself in a discussion with former classmates. Instead of planning or talking about how we might celebrate growth, they spent large swathes of discussion taking shots at My Town. Their focuses were the cliques, and rivalries from nearly a generation ago. In their eyes My Town is a waste of space at the epicenter of all that is wrong with the world. I left the discussion discouraged and disillusioned. Is this all My Town can hope for? Are we merely waiting for a sinkhole to open up and swallow us?

My county has a lot to be proud of, three astronauts, record setting athletes, historic ties to the Red Cross, numerous students that attended the finest Ivy League schools, veterans of every war since the Civil War, and in many ways we built America. Our limestone is found in beautiful buildings across the country. On the North end of my county you can see the quarry that produced the building blocks of the Empire State Building.

We are not a simple backwoods people forgotten as time has progressed. We have a future. We are more than what has been and we are greater than our problems. No person wants to be defined by their failings. When you show up late – once – you don’t want to be know as the person that is never on time. No one wakes up in the morning and thinks, “I hope people remember me for the mistakes I have made.” If that person exists we assume they are struggling with depression, or some neuroses that affects their mental and emotional stability. Still in My Town, the people live in a perpetual state of despair. Most are convinced that we are nothing more than, addiction, pregnancy, and racism — forsaken by God.

As long as we only see our brokenness we will remain broken, trapped in a cycle of destructiveness.

Ronald Heifetz, Senior Lecturer in Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School, said, “You don’t change by looking in the mirror; you change by encountering differences.”(1) If we keep responding to My Town in the same way we will continue to get the same results. It is imperative that we look for the bright spots; the people, moments, and accomplishments that need to be celebrated. Yes, there is a lot of construction that is inconvenient, but what does it mean for our future? A better infrastructure? A city that is more pleasant to look at and walk through? A community that is a little safer? It could be any number of reasons, we only need to pick one and celebrate that for the slightly brighter future it brings. The best things in life take time. They don’t happen over night they keep getting better when we celebrate the victories and avoid getting bogged down in the fits and starts of life.

Will seeing My Town in a new way and a better way be scary? Of course. We are people with a negativity bias, we will have to work hard to see the better tomorrow. We will have to wrestle with our fears and confront our demons, but it will be worth it. My Town will be better for it.

“To be sure, fear of differences can keep us resolutely committed to the status quo, to rejecting what seems foreign and to circling the wagons to keep out the intruder” (2) wrote, Tod Bolsinger. My town has endured the status quo. We have circled the wagons and shunned anything that looked like an advance because it seemed too costly or inconvenient. If we are to live on, if we are to be a community that our young people claim as their home, if we are going to rise above our frailties then we must stare our fears in the face, step over them, and look for the good that is on the horizon. We will need bravery to silence the objectors. My Town is not the sum of its problems.

My Town, somewhere along the way, lost its identity. We lost who we are and a vision for who we want to become. It is time for us to redefine and rediscover who we are as a community.

In the book Switch, Chip and Dan Heath write, “Cultivate a sense of identity and instill the growth mindset.” (3) This is one of the components in changing our current reality. If we are to see a hopeful future, My Town has to decide who it is. We have to find our places of pride and stop allowing our identity to be the things that are wrong. Our weaknesses need work but they are not who we are.

Our Town closes with a discourse from the Stage Manager,

“Most everybody’s asleep in Grover’s Corners. There are a few lights on: Shorty Hawkins, down at the depot, has just watched the Albany train go by. And at the livery stable somebody’s setting up late and talking. Yes, it’s clearing up. There are the stars doing their old, old crisscross journeys in the sky. Scholars haven’t settled the matter yet, but they seem to think there are no living beings up there. Just chalk … or fire. Only this one is straining away, straining away all the time to make something of itself. The strain’s so bad that every sixteen hours everybody lies down and gets a rest. Hm . . . . Eleven o’clock in Grover’s Corners. You get a good rest, too. Good night.” (4)

My Town has mostly fallen asleep. Many are content to just let the train of life pass by, but there are some that strain on believing we can be better. The more of you that join us that believe and strain, the more likely our hope can become our reality.

My Town is beautiful. My Town is filled with wonderful people, though occasionally misguided. My Town has a rich history. My Town has a bright future.

1. Canoeing the Mountains, pg. 82, Tod Bolsinger

2. Canoeing the Mountains, pg. 82, Tod Bolsinger

3. Switch, pg. 259, Chip & Dan Heath

4. Our Town, pg.103, Thornton Wilder

February 15, 2019February 15, 2019

The Surprise of a Common Humanity

“My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together.” – Desmond Tutu

There is a certain irony in a white guy making a case for teaching about the contributions of Black Americans to literature, science, mathematics, music, theology, and the betterment of humankind. If, however, we allow the conversation to only be one-sided then it becomes stagnant and loses some of its vitality, like a spring flowing into a pond.

Far from a sense a superiority I have to honor those of varying race that have shown me a better way to live. They have treated me far better than I have deserved. I would hope that in some way I helped them become better as well because, as Bishop Tutu observed, our humanity is bound up together.

Thirty-two years after the Soweto massacre, in Apartheid South Africa, I stood in front of the school where the demonstration began. I stood humbled by the young that would give their lives for a different and better world. They would stand and march against the tyranny that would devalue them as people, though a government would march against them with tear gas and guns, they marched hand-in-hand for something deeper. They marched for humanity.

I stood at the base of the pulpit in Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, nearly fifty years after Martin Luther King Jr. preached his final sermon in that sanctuary. The passion and heart of that man can still be felt in the dust on the window sills. A passion that would speak the truth of a united humanity. He saw America better than it was and better than we deserve. He saw us for what we could be as a people that stood together.

The story of race and it’s divisions is as old as the story of humankind. We are beasts that divide and classify and sort everything we discover. It is a sad commentary that we have done the same to our fellow women and men. In dividing ourselves we have robbed ourselves of our human unity. We have stolen the richness of our species.

To regain our humanity we must find our story. We must find our commonality. To recover that which has been set aside and forgotten we must share our histories. For me to understand that we share a collective dream I need to first hear who you are and not categorize you. As a listener I must take a place of submission and serve you. It is only then that I am able to know and comprehend your value and the gift you are to all of humanity.

Henri Nouwen, a world renowned priest, gave up his fame and fortune to spend his remaining years serving a profoundly disabled man named Adam. Adam would never be able to say thank you to Nouwen and yet he had a greater impact on Father Henri than anyone else in Nouwen’s life. In the midst of his service Henri penned these words,

“Each day holds a surprise. But only if we expect it can we see, hear, or feel it when it comes to us. Let’s not be afraid to receive each day’s surprise, whether it comes to us as sorrow or as joy it will open a new place in our hearts, a place where we can welcome new friends and celebrate more fully our shared humanity.”

We pause to celebrate Black history month because it opens the doors to surprise. There are far too many moments of sorrow in American Black histroy, but there are also countless joys. When we sit together in the sorrow and the joy then we find our common story and we gain new brothers and sisters. Our family grows when we submit to the story of someone else.

We talk about the Black contribution during this month, because we all become better through the conversation. We all regain a lost piece of our humanity. We all receive the day’s surprise. As an American people we must always share each others stories if we are to maintain, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.