KOH2RVA: Day 253

Yesterday was a long day at First Baptist. I got to church a little after eight in the morning and left a little after eight at night. But it was a great day, and in so many ways it lived up to the promise of Pentecost. This morning my mind is a kaleidoscope of images. Here are a few of them:

• The joy of sitting on the steps with the children during worship, telling them the Holy Spirit is like “the best babysitter you’ve ever had.”
• Watching the congregation rise to its feet to thank David Powers for twenty years of dedicated service as Minister of Communications.
• Seeing a young man whose name I don’t even know leap to his feet to push Danny Taylor’s wheelchair out of the sanctuary during the fire drill.
• Rick Belflower getting tears in his eyes as he talked about the crime of human trafficking and how it robs children of their childhood.
• Hearing Bart Dalton praise Skyler Cumbia at her graduation ceremony for the way she inspired other youth to engage in selfless service.
• Sitting in the chapel at the healing service, watching Shawnae Lacy fight back the tears as she told the story of losing her foster daughter to cancer.
• Sitting in the sanctuary later, looking up toward heaven (and feeling it) as the youth and adult choirs ringed the balcony and sang, “In this Very Room.”
• Clapping my hands, laughing, and singing along as they finished last night’s concert with “If You’re Happy and You Know It Say ‘Amen.’”

I was happy, and I knew it.

At some point in yesterday’s sermon I said that there was good news in the story of Pentecost because it wasn’t so much about going to church as it was about being the church. Yesterday I watched the members and friends of First Baptist being the church all day long, but I wouldn’t have seen it if I hadn’t gone. While heaven has been touching down all over the greater Richmond metropolitan area in the last 252 days, one of the most reliable places to see it happen is in that building at the corner of Monument and the Boulevard on Sundays. I saw it happen yesterday,

Over and over again.

Read Full Post »

KOH2RVA: Day 250

I had lunch with Rodney Waller this week.

Rodney is the pastor of First African Baptist Church, a church that, at one time, was part of First Baptist. It’s an interesting story, and much depends on who gets to tell it.

I brought a copy of the church history with me—First Baptist Church, that is—where it says that back in 1838 pastor Jeremiah Bell Jeter was having trouble figuring out how to minister to his large, bi-racial congregation. He was convinced that ”neither group in the church would achieve its maximum effectiveness under existing conditions.” Eventually he suggested that the white members build a new building just up the street, and leave the existing building to the “colored” members. And in 1841, that’s what happened. According to the church history it was a very amicable parting of the ways.

I asked Rodney if that’s the way they remembered it at First African.

He said the way he heard the story was that First Baptist had grown to nearly 3,000 members at that time—the first “megachurch”—but most of those were the slaves of white members. As Rodney talked I could almost picture them in a balcony that creaked and groaned under the strain of their enthusiastic worship as a much smaller number of white congregants sat on the main level, below, glancing upward nervously. When the 387 white members moved into their beautiful new building two blocks up the street there may have been an audible sigh of relief–on both sides.

I tend to romanticize that time when “we all worshiped together,” as if what Paul said in Galatians 3:28 was true even then, that in Christ Jesus there is “neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free, neither male nor female.” But Rodney helped me understand it may not have felt that way at all. 

We ended up talking about bringing the Kingdom of Heaven to Richmond, Virginia, and how our two churches might work together on some big project. It was a very hopeful conversation, and Rodney has been in touch with me since, asking if some of our church leaders can meet to discuss it further. At some point the word reconciliation was used and I told Rodney that my favorite definition of that word was “to make friendly again.” And then there was an awkward silence as we realized that for our churches it might not be a matter of becoming friendly again, but becoming friendly for the first time ever, recognizing at last that in Christ Jesus there is neither slave nor free, but instead:

“You are all one.”

Read Full Post »

KOH2RVA: Day 248

I can’t imagine a more beautiful day has ever dawned on the city of Richmond than this one. I’ve just come in from a run on Monument Avenue, where the light was golden, the world was in bloom, and the love of God was in the air I breathed.

Last night was a different story.

Because of some confusion among our members about the intent of my April 28 sermon, I stood before the deacons last night to explain that I am not on a crusade to turn First Baptist into a gay church, that I am not planning to ordain a gay minister, and that I am not hoping to perform a gay wedding. What I am is a pastor, and because I am I often sit in my study and listen to people pour their hearts out, often through tears, and sometimes what they tell me is this: “I’m gay.”

But here’s the problem: because I am a pastor I can’t share that secret with anybody else. I can’t talk about the person; I have to talk about the issue. And when I talk about the issue people sometimes assume that I have a gay agenda—that I’m trying to turn First Baptist into a gay church, or that I plan to ordain a gay minister, or that I hope to perform a gay wedding, when the truth is that I’m thinking about _______________, who sat in my study with tears in her eyes, wondering if the church would still love her if they knew the truth about her.

I wanted to say, “Of course they would!” because I know the people of First Baptist Church. I’ve never known a more loving congregation. If I told her story from the pulpit they would rush to put their arms around her and reassure her of their love and our deacons would lead the charge.   But homophobia cuts both ways. It makes people afraid of homosexuals and it makes homosexuals afraid of people. They keep their secret to themselves.

Because not everybody is so loving.

I tried to explain all this to the deacons last night. I don’t think I did a very good job. During the question and answer period someone asked me if I were planning to do a gay wedding. I said no. He told me later that it wasn’t really his quesion.  He doesn’t have a problem with gay people.  He needed to ask, he said, simply because so many people had been asking him. He wanted to have an answer for them. “Tell them this,” I said. “Tell them I’m a pastor. Tell them that I care about people, and that some of the people I care about are gay.”

But they aren’t the only ones I care about.

I care about the ones who have a real problem with this issue, the ones who have been sitting in my study nearly every day in the last few weeks telling me they just can’t ignore what the Bible says about homosexuality. I tell them I can’t ignore it either, and that this is what makes it so hard for me. I would love to tell homosexuals they can do whatever they want, but I can’t, not anymore than I can tell heterosexuals to do whatever they want. The Bible won’t let me. But the Bible also won’t let me hate. I have to love. I have to love people who are gay and I have to love people who flinch at the very mention of the word.

I’m a pastor.

Read Full Post »

KOH2RVA: Day 247

I prayed for the City Council last night.

I don’t know who’s on the selection committee, or how the selection is made, but several months ago I was asked if I would be willing to say the opening prayer at the City Council meeting at 6:00 p.m. on Monday, May 13.

Often I say no to those kinds of invitations. I had an embarrassing experience with the invocation at a football game once that has made me reluctant to say yes ever since. But this was the Richmond City Council, and First Baptist Church is on this year-long, every-member mission trip to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to Richmond, Virginia, and so I swallowed hard and agreed to come.

I got there well before 6:00, since I wasn’t sure about the parking arrangements. There was something in the invitation about parking in the underground lot at City Hall but when I showed up at 5:25 the parking attendant didn’t seem to know any more about it than I did. He asked my name and called upstairs but nobody seemed to be expecting a Jim Somerville. I began to wonder if I had come on the right night. Finally he suggested that I just park in the loading dock, especially since I wasn’t going to be there long.

I made my way into the building and since it was still only 5:30 I took the elevator all the way to the observation deck on the 18th floor. It was breezy up there, and cool, but the views were incredible. It was a clear day, and I could see for miles in every direction. And since I had come to pray I began to pray for everything I could see: the city of Richmond there at my feet but then, looking up and away, the counties of Chesterfield, Henrico, and Hanover. I could see even farther than that, and so I prayed for all of Central Virginia, asking God to pour out his blessing upon it. It looked as if he already had, with the distant landscape and the downtown buildings all bathed in the golden light of the late afternoon sun.

At 5:45 I headed down to the second floor and the council chamber where I found my seat and waited to be introduced. There wasn’t a big crowd in the room. People were still gathering. I saw a Boy Scout troop file in; policemen chatting with each other near the back wall. I looked over the prayer I had written and made a few edits. It was short. It wasn’t supposed to be more than sixty seconds long. Mine was going to come in well under that. At 6:00 the president called the meeting to order, banged his gavel on the rostrum, and introduced Dr. Jim Somerville, Pastor of Richmond’s First Baptist Church, for the invocation. I stood and said, “Let us pray,” and then I said this:

“Lord, you know that the members and friends of First Baptist Church are on a mission to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to Richmond, Virginia. I don’t need to tell you that. But I pray that the City Council might join us on that mission, and that as they deliberate and decide they would consider how their actions might be good news for the poor, how they might set the captives free, how they might open the eyes of the blind and set at liberty those who are oppressed (Luke 4:18), in other words, Lord, how through their deliberations and decisions your kingdom might come, and your will be done, in Richmond, as it is in heaven. Amen.”

And that was it.

I joined the council in the pledge of allegiance to the flag, and then turned and left the podium, walked up the side aisle, and out of the room. I don’t know what happened next. But I have this hope that some of those words fell on good soil, and that some of those council members considered how they might join us on this mission, and that, yes—even in their deliberations over zoning restrictions—they thought about how they might bring good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and how they might set at liberty those who are oppressed, because really,

What good is power if you don’t use it on behalf of the powerless?

Read Full Post »

KOH2RVA: Day 246

Yesterday was Mother’s Day, and a glorious one here in Richmond, with a high of 72 degrees and sunny skies, and children of all ages accompanying their mothers to church and taking them out to brunch afterward. I knew it was Mother’s Day. I even knew it was the fifth anniversary of my ministry at First Baptist Church. But I didn’t know Lee Hilbert was going to acknowledge that publicly.

Lee is the chair of our personnel team, and at the end of the 8:30 service he asked if he could make an announcement but he didn’t tell me what it was. That kind of thing can make a pastor nervous, especially if he’s preached on sensitive topics recently. But Lee quickly made it obvious that he was doing what First Baptist has been doing for decades: recognizing staff members on significant anniversaries.

He read a letter he had written that included this paragraph: “We are thankful that you love the Lord Jesus and that you have a heart for sharing the Word of God with others. Creating a new awareness within the congregation by emphasizing bringing the Kingdom of Heaven to Richmond, Virginia (KOH2RVA) has been a wonderful way to encourage all of us to put the words of our Lord into action. It is also something that is easily understood by both members of the church and seekers beyond the walls of First Baptist Church.”

Now, Lee didn’t have to say that, but he did, and I’m grateful. And the congregation didn’t have to stand and applaud, but they did, and a lump rose in my throat that made it hard for me to say thank you. As Lee pointed out at the 11:00 service, it’s one of the few times he’s known me to be at a loss for words. But what do you say to people like that, who forgive you for preaching on sensitive topics, and join you in the joyful work of bringing heaven to earth, and give you a bonus check just for being with them for five years?

I think I know, now, how some of those mothers felt yesterday, when their children tried to thank them for their motherhood. “I should be thanking you!” they might have said. Because being a mother is both a joy and an honor.

Just like being a pastor.

Read Full Post »