The obligatory quasi-thanksgiving post

So, it's Thanksgiving. This is the time when family from all over the country and for some the world (not me, but some people I'm sure) get together and pretend to be close for the sake of a dead bird and some rolls. Did that sound hateful to anyone besides me? Digression stops now...

So, I'm in Florida visiting my mother. To be honest, I was not initially excited about the prospect of spending several days in the Sunshine State. It has nothing to do with being around my mother (no hidden stories there), it was more so the lack of most of the rest of my family. I mean, both sisters declined to come for different reasons, and as far as I knew it would be me, my mom, and a bunch of people from her church. That meant there would be a lot of, "oh you're Leslie's son- you look just like her," and "what do you do" statements and questions that would get annoying after a while. Why? Because the answers to the questions of what I'm doing are difficult at best. By most standards I am not doing much right now. Especially not in comparison to the rest of my family. I have one sister faithfully serving her country in the Navy, having just finished her first tour of duty on board the USS Ronald Reagan, one sister who is a successful Personal Assistant to the CEO and project manager for one of the best creative services firms in the world with several very well known and world renowned clients, one brother who is a director of development for a museum in Connecticut, and one brother who no one seems to be able to track down. In all, I sometimes feel black sheepish.

The irony of that is the fact that I was always looked at as if I would be the breakout kid from the family. It was never questioned that I'd be successful (whatever that actually means), speaking in front of many and starting something sure to stand the test of time. But, instead I find myself working at a restaurant, selling entertainment services, and still not sure what I want to do with my life at 27 years old. Some might call it a desert, I just call it life right now.

So, where is grace in the midst of this? Grace is in its pursuit . That sounds cyclical and confusing, I know- let me explain. These past several years have taught me to appreciate the smaller things and ways God chooses to smile on me and to not always look for the most exorbitant expressions of God's favor or His grace. A beautiful day is proof that God is still on the throne, rain while driving with my top down is proof that God still has a sense of humor, and the girl God has placed in my life is a sure sign that we do so often get what we don't deserve. Though I am still very much in pursuit of purpose, the fact that I have the wherewithal to be in that pursuit is a regular expression of God's grace, strength, and joy to me. I have no idea what tomorrow holds for me, or what I'll do 5 weeks from now, but somehow that is strangely liberating. It gives me the ability to really grab ahold of the scripture that tells me to not worry about tomorrow because it will take care of itself. And though sometimes it doesn't seem as if tomorrow is taking care of itself there is still the peace in seeing God's faithfulness when I think it shouldn't be there. It is very easy to get lost in the idea that success is measured by status and what we do, but the ability to see God's hand at work is more a sign of success than any accolade I could achieve or any career path I could follow because it hopefully means that others are being touched along the way, and that is ultimately what it's all about.

Happy Thanksgiving folks. I hope that made sense to people besides me.

Burning Grace

There is a line in the movie I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry where the two fire fighters say to each other on the way into a burning building, "Going in alive and coming out the same." I love that line!

Today, after almost 3 weeks without a legitimate fire call (there were medical and other calls), our department got paged out to a structure fire. Being in a small town (322 people to be exact) and it being the middle of the work day during the week, there was only a captain and myself that originally responded to that structure fire.

The bunker gear was on, the sirens were blaring, and I was somewhere deep in my mind repeating that line...o.k. God, going in alive and coming out the same. It is a little culturally relevant prayer ritual that has become standard in my approaches to these very serious fires.

The captain and I were the first on the scene, but because there were only two of us we could not mount an interior attack on the fire. So we dropped a 1.5" line and began to protect the exposure of the house and fight the fire that had crept into the roof (a trash fire had burned a shed to the ground and had started the house on fire).

We had put 500 gallons of water on the fire when the hose began to drizzle and an engine arrived with another 500 gallons from another department. One truck got hooked up to the other and we continued pumping. When that truck was out, it went back to the station to get more water (in the mean time, the captain had been paging out for additional personnel and water). Well into our endeavors, other trucks and departments started showing up. I moved from the engine to a grass rig to get the fire under control in the surrounding wooded area, then returned to the engine that had been filled once again to put more water on the house and begin to eliminate the remaining hot spots.

Additional personnel showed up all through the second hour and they mounted an inside attack and a roof attack. Within the next 30 minutes the crews were doing overhaul and I was off the front lines after over 2 hours of fire fighting (except for a very brief earlier break where I had a bottle of water and tweeted---mainly to let my wife in California know that I was alright).

Maybe it is a bit naive on my part (or quirky, or idealistic), but today God's grace was a burning grace where we went in alive and came back the same!

This fire was more than 10 miles from our nearest station and there was no loss of life, no injury (fire fighter nor resident), and while the shed next to the house burned to the ground, more than 70% of the house was saved (the bedroom that caught first from the shed was toast---as was the roof above it, but save some smoke and water damage, the living, dining, kitchen, and master bed and bath areas were saved). Insurance may or may not agree with our success, but we chalk this one up as a win...and just for today, I am grateful for that burning grace!

Grace for Church Leaders

Sometimes being a pastor is not all it is cracked up to be. We get the opportunity to see people at their very best and at their very worst. Likewise, we live in fish bowls where others get to see our very best and very worst (especially when the parsonage - preacher's house) is in the church parking lot!

There are hours, days, weeks and even months sometimes that are trying and frustrating, when it can appear that nothing good is coming from your work. Our church is currently going through such a time. We have reorganized the leadership of the church, rewritten our mission, vision and core values. We have sought to live into our relationship with Jesus and in that process have encountered resistance to some of the changes.

Some days feel like I am running into a brick wall with nothing to show for our efforts but bruises and scratches. And it is in those places that grace shows up in the strangest ways.

The other evening was just such an occasion. We had just finished an evangelism meeting and the chair came up to me and told me that she was going to miss me when I was gone (the Methodist church moves their pastors around and I will most likely be moving in June)...she continued to tell me that I am ornery, passionate, and energetic and that I have been exactly what this congregation has needed (you take those to mean what you think, I take them as very high complements). These words are a great comfort...especially after times for people questioning vision and direction of the church.

I say all this to say that grace isn't just a one time saving event. Often in my life the grace that sustains me...the grace that gives me the perseverance and strength to go on...comes from the people that God places in my life (even if only for a moment).

How has God used people in your life to reveal grace?

Lunch

I don't know that any of this will make sense...you have been warned. lalb (laughing a little bit)

Grace for me - today - is a grilled chicken caesar salad and an iced caramel latte, extra sweet with whipped cream.

What I mean is, grace is given to me in the form of free time I have to passively do things I like while actively thinking about things I don't understand.

Seminary is trying to rip me ya'll. Not even nicely or neatly - like in halves or something manageable like that. Seminary is trying to gruesomely dismember me with the intent of making my entrance into heaven questionable - like into so many misshapen pieces that God won't recognize me. Sorry if that's graphic...I was a Frank Miller fan in a former chapter of my life (a really short chapter though, so you can read the rest of the blog with no worries).

But this is why I went, right? To be challenged? Accursed masochistic tendencies!!! I'm having a lot of things trimmed away and I find myself struggling to hold on to the 1 or 2 essential immovable objects of my faith. I feel a little pathetic at times - beaten, even traitorous - that of all the things I've been told over the course of my Christian life, I cannot state them ALL with confidence and conviction.

Let me not give school that much authority...if it were all that I had to do, I would kick its tail in all manner of ways that are unbecoming for a Christian to detail aka the sort that would make Frank Miller fans shudder. It's really just the focal point of a web of influences that are stretching and prodding me. 25, pastor, Black man, dating, man of the house, example, and all around "it" guy. I mean, I have communities watching me to see what I will become...people that need me to be okay in order for them to be...and young folks who only have one more time in their heart to be let down by a leader, and I'm it. It's a whole 'nother ball game to HAVE to learn to give things to God because there's no other choice - when there are words of struggle and uncertainty that could never pass from my lips to the ears of people around me, who need me to be something solid.

So now we come back to seminary, the fortunate beast that gets to battle me in a weakened and distracted state. If it wins, I become more uncertain, and so discouraged that I'll never become what my community needs. But if I am to win, I've got to forsake some of my responsibilities to the community right now - not stretch myself as thin - for the purpose of maintaining focus and faith. My 1 or 2 essentials of faith have proven themselves incredibly powerful, able to fend off unsound doctrines and the sheer bully tactics of groupthink, so it's really a matter of pressing on and adding more essentials to my arsenal without losing the communities I'm doing all of this to, one day, be able to serve.

So, in all of these things to consider, it's my inability to turn my day off and THINK that has me all frazzled. So, for me to be at my wit's end and to be gifted with a rainy New York Thursday afternoon where I can sip an iced latte and munch on chicken, lettuce and croutons - that's my evidence of a personal savior who knows exactly what my soul is craving. I guess I'm done now. Ciao.

Initial Thoughts - Part II

...spoiler alert...If you have not yet read part one, I would invite you to wait to read this until you have read the first installment!...

I want to take the last moments that I have to tell you about today.

Let me ask you a question, who do you see in front of you? Is it a man that has succeeded? Is it a gifted teacher? Is it a decent speaker? Is it someone that you can, would or do call friend? Is it your brother? Is it a member of your family? Who is it that stands in front of you today?

The man that stands in front of you today is a man by the name of Russell Hall. And it is only in recent years that this person could be considered a man at all. You ask yourself if there is still grace for me…you ask if there is enough mercy to go around…you ask if there is enough grace not just to save but is there enough to sustain…even when I am at my lowest of lows? I am here to tell you emphatically yes!

Let me give you a few of the highlights of a life that is bathed in mercy and grace. I am a recovering alcoholic and drug addict…I am a recovering criminal…in some ways I am still recovering from my first marriage…I have recovered from being unemployable…I am daily recovering from my own pride and arrogance.

I was born in November of 1969 into a rough and sordid situation. I spent several of the first years of my life living with my grandparents in Ohio. I was sent to church with some regularity until I was given the decision on whether or not I wanted to go anymore. Since I had already started drinking and smoking pot, I figured I had better things to do on Sunday mornings than going to church. I drank alcoholically and used addictively from the word go. I left home at an early age and wouldn’t return for over a decade. At 17, I showed up to the local bus barn drunk and unable to go to the competition that I was scheduled to go to…that event cost me a four year full ride scholarship to a college of my choice. The years to come would find me in and out of jails and institutions for everything from shoplifting and hot check writing to, public intoxication and traffic violations and more. I have seen the inside of both the new and the old county jails. I have seen the inside of the cells at the U.S. Marshall’s facility and an FBI facility here in Houston. I have been a guest at the majority of the city jails including those at West Side Command, downtown, and Mykawa. I know what it is like to be hospitalized, to go through charcoal treatments and stomach pumpings. I know what it is like to live in unpowered and unwatered shacks in the middle of the wards. I know what it is like to live on the run. In spite of all of these things, I also know what it is like to succeed by the world’s definition. Though I always brought the house of cards back down around me, I always seemed to find ways to get it re-erected. I have survived car wrecks, fights and life, when many times I shouldn’t have. I have violated my moral, social, ethical and spiritual integrity in more ways than I care to recount.

Yet I stand here today and invite you to examine the Gospel Truth…I stand here today and invite you into a life of grace and mercy. What does my story have to do with God and his promise of mercy and grace through Christ? I’ll tell you. On Easter Sunday, 1998 I rededicated my life to Christ. Having never been baptized in my youth, I took a second step and was baptized a few months later. The last decade of my life has been a trip to say the very least. By God’s grace I have been clean and sober since June 5th of 1997. In the fall of 1999, I had completed all of my required obligations and was released from state observation. Two months later, I was finally off of federal paper…my time had been served. I began to get really plugged into my home church and discovered that God had placed some very special gifts in me. I have been blessed to teach and work with thousands of people both in and out of recovery and in and out of church over the last decade. At the ripe old age of 30, feeling a call into ordained ministry, I decided that it was time for me to get that college education I had lost 13 years earlier. God placed in my life a man and an organization that has help pay for my last eight years of college…giving me back the scholarship I had thrown away years before, plus much, much more. After sobering up and losing my good paying job and then being unemployed for several months, God has provided continuous employment for almost a decade. After a failed marriage and numerous other failed relationships, God has blessed me with a Godly and beautiful wife that encompasses everything I ever wanted, yet never knew to ask for. After showing up more than 10 years ago weighing in at 118 pounds when I entered treatment, I am now healthier than I have probably been in a long while and have gained 64 pounds. After frying my septum and much of my brain (so I thought), God has blessed me with the ability to still hold my own in school. After losing everything more times than I can count, my wife and I have a home and a family and everything that we need. After almost 15 years of separation from my step dad, we now have a relationship that we always wanted, but couldn’t seem to develop when I was younger. Instead of a family of origin, God has blessed me with a family of choice. Where once I had marks I now have friends. Where once I had utility, I now have love.

None of this happened with out the grace and mercy of God. By all accounts I should have received death, but God had mercy on me, a sinner. By all accounts I should have been lost, but God relentlessly pursued me to the ends of the earth.

I tell you this because God is still God. He is still in the business of grace and mercy. There is enough grace and mercy not only to save, but also to sustain. The Gospel is the same for each of us today as it was for the adulterous woman long ago. And that is the Gospel Truth!

I share all this with you because this is the way that God has shown me just how scandalous mercy and grace are. I share all this (here and with those I minister to) because I once heard my story in someone else's and once found hope for mercy and grace in my life by witnessing God's mercy and grace at work in others. I share this because my experience with God is the only authority I have to witness to others. I share this because it is imperative for my own authenticity and integrity.

I hope and pray that in sharing this with you, I have somehow opened a door for authentic conversations, searching with integrity, and radical transformation. I look forward to this journey together as we seek mercy and grace in the most unexpected places.

Thanks D-Man for the opportunity and the privilege!

Shalom,

Russell

Some Intitial Thoughts - Part One

Perhaps the best insight that I have ever had regarding mercy and grace came to me one of the first times I was asked to preach at my home church almost 10 years ago. I preached a sermon entitled The Gospel Truth. In order that you might get to know the real me, and more fully understand why I do what I do and why I am who I am, I thought that as an introduction to this blog, I would share that sermon with you.

I have done this in two parts to help break up the length just a little (whatever you do, read both parts!). I hope and pray that these contributions will speak to you in the deepest part of your being about grace and mercy.

Title: The Gospel Truth

Scripture: John 8:1-11

It has been said that Christianity is predominately a religion of mercy and grace. And while I believe this to be true, I also think that these terms are over-used, not well understood and sometimes not really believed. We use the words with great regularity, but rarely think about what they mean.

In his book, What’s so Amazing About Grace, Phillip Yancy points out that part of our problem is in the nature of grace itself. Grace is scandalous. Grace is hard to accept, hard to believe, and even harder to receive. Grace shocks us at what it has to offer. Grace is truly not of this world. It frightens us with what it does for sinners.

Grace teaches us that God does for others what we would never do for them. We would maybe save the not-so-bad, but God starts with the prostitutes and works downward from there. Simply put, grace is a gift that costs everything to the giver and nothing to the receiver. It is given to those who don’t deserve it, barely recognize it, and hardly appreciate it. That is why God alone gets the glory in our salvation, we didn’t do anything to get it…Jesus did all of the work on the cross.

In the end grace means that no one is too bad to be saved. You might even say that God specializes in saving bad people. God’s grace is always greater than our sin.

Grace can also make it difficult for some to be saved. While God’s grace is available to everyone, we must recognize our need for it and respond to him with acceptance of it.

But what about mercy? I think that mercy is just as scandalous as grace. In fact I would go so far as to say that you can’t have one without the other. They are fraternal twins, if you will.

The best explanation that I have ever seen or heard about the distinction between mercy and grace actually comes out of my wife’s study bible. Simply put, to receive grace is to receive a gift that we can not earn and do not deserve. Mercy is not receiving what we do deserve.

Think about that for a minute, while I repeat it: Grace is a gift that we cannot earn and do not deserve; while mercy is not receiving what we do deserve.

With these things in mind, I want to turn back to our scripture lesson this morning. What do you think of when you hear today’s scripture? What questions come to mind?

My first question is how many sins did the Pharisees and the teachers of the law have to commit in order to catch this woman red-handed in adultery?

My second question is where is the man?

A third question might be what was Jesus writing in the dirt?

As interesting as these questions may be to me and to others, I am not sure that the answers to these questions would shed a great deal more light on the story.

Before we go much further, let me be sure that we are on the same page. I want you to rethink the scene that is being described for us. However the accusers came about their information, they have discovered this woman and pulled her away from her affair. If she was able to replace any clothing, it was probably torn and tattered in her removal from the scene. With her garments ripped and dangling at her waist, she is pushed and shoved with staffs and forearms toward the place where Jesus is teaching. She is led into broad daylight naked and humiliated. Onlookers begin to shout out criticisms and names. She is spat on and has dirt thrown at her. She has been publicly shamed while tears of regret stream down her face. She is led through the street to the temple courts where the other women are left outside and she is placed on display in front of a group made up entirely of men.

Now the accusers state their case to Jesus. They insist that stoning is the proper thing to do based on the Law of Moses. After all, there were at least 11 offenses---adultery included---that were punishable by death---even by stoning. It is at this point that one of the most remarkable things in scripture happens. Right now, at this very moment, Jesus changes his position. He steps down, if you will, from his place of teaching and his place of judgment, taking on the poster of a servant, and writes in the dirt. He doesn’t look at the woman, but instead continues to write. The accusers are persistent. When Jesus finally does change his position again, when he goes from servant to teacher and from slave to judge, it is not the woman that he addresses. Instead it is the accusers.

He tells them if there is even one among you that may have not sinned, go ahead throw the first stone…then the rest will be free to follow. Once Jesus has said his peace, he returns to his more servant like position and resumes writing in the dirt. A teacher and judge that has risen to the occasion not by judging the hurt, the broken and the lost, but has instead passed judgment on the accusers.

The crowd of men, that had been standing there poised with stones in hand ready to act, began to drop their stones and leave. One by one the crowd thins. First the wise elders are convicted of their own sin and are forced to recognize their inadequacy to punish the woman. Then slowly everyone else disappears until there is no one left except Jesus and the woman. Jesus stands again, taking his rightful position as teacher and judge. It is at this point that he addresses the woman for the first time. “Where are your accusers? Have none condemned you?”

Not believing her eyes or her ears she whimpers, “No one, sir.”

Then Jesus says to her, “then neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more”

It is at this place in Scripture that we come face to face with the Gospel Truth. After all, here is a woman that according to law should have received death by stoning. But Jesus grants her mercy in that she did not receive what she really deserved. Here is a woman that has done everything to un-earn the right to stand before God by disobeying his commandments, yet Jesus has granted her grace...she is granted redemption and restoration…gifts of grace that she did not earn, but received nonetheless.

You see, the Gospel Truth is not about judgment, it is about mercy. The Gospel Truth is not about condemnation, it is about grace. The Gospel Truth is not about legalism and the following of rules, it is about relationship. The Gospel Truth is not about information, it is about transformation.

Time and time again, scripture tells us of this truth. Time and time again, scripture cries out the good news.

We read of toll collectors and fisherman with tempers becoming disciples. We read of a religious persecutor by the name of Saul becoming God’s messenger to the gentiles. We read of men and women that have been cast aside because of illnesses or life choices that have been restored in their relationship with God and those around them. And the list goes on.

For many of us this is not new news. When we came to acknowledge Christ as the Lord of our lives, we understood about the mercy and the saving grace of the cross. For others of us, it might have been good to hear this story…for we have found ourselves in similar trouble. Hounded by our accusers, convicted of sin, desperate with no where to turn…and now, out of no where comes real hope. That hope is the promise that this same mercy and this same grace is still available for all of us today.

But what about those of us that may not remember…maybe we are too far removed from that saving grace experience. Maybe we are facing trouble and turmoil in our lives…maybe we are facing uncertainty or loss. What about grace and what about mercy for people like us?

Maybe you are in a place where you can relate to Paul’s words in Romans 7:15-17 which say, “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.”

We must remember that even with Paul’s thorn, he still believed in the Gospel Truth…he still believed in mercy and grace. In Romans 8:38-39 he wrote, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

The adulterous woman understood the Gospel Truth. Paul understood the Gospel Truth. But what about us? What do we understand about the Gospel Truth? You may be thinking, that this is all fine and dandy…these are some great stories and some great points, but the information that you have presented to us thus far is almost 2000 years old. What about today? What about the struggles that I am having? What about the loss that I am facing? What about today?

Stay tuned for the second part of the sermon and the answers to some of these questions!

Peace,

Russell