FORTY YEARS OF REFORMATION
At Oakhurst Baptist Church, Decatur, GA

October 29, 2006

By John Nichol

The last Sunday in October each year marks an important event in church history. On October 31, 1517 . . . 489 years ago Martin Luther, an Augustinian monk, nailed his 95 Theses or arguments to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. This act signaled the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. Church historian, Robert McAfee Brown has characterized the Reformation in these words: "Consider the Christian Church as a ship that had been sailing on the sea of history for a long time. (In the course of its journey) It had picked up a great many barnacles, which made it hard to keep it on course. It had been through such severe storms that some of its equipment had been washed overboard. What the Reformers did was to take the ship into dry dock, chip off the barnacles, and restore the lost equipment, so that the same ship could be launched again and fulfill its proper task." In that last phrase . . . the same ship . . . Dr. Brown makes a critical point for our understanding of the Reformation. The Reformers did not invent the message which they proclaimed. They were not creating something new . . . they were calling for the recovery of something old. They were "struggling for integrity" . . . trying to re-establish continuity with their authentic past, and once again root the life of the Church in the Biblical tradition.

In my judgment it would be difficult to find a more accurate description of what has been happening here in the life of this church for the past forty years. Your effort to recover an authentic line of continuity between the life of this church and what scripture reveals about the meaning, message and mission of the early church has been properly characterized as "a struggle for integrity" . . . a struggle to live out of, and in consistency with, our Biblical rootage..

As many of you know Walker Knight chose this very phrase, "Struggle For Integrity" as the title for his book about Oakhurst. What you may not know is that the idea for that title originated from a poem by the Russian dissident Yevgeny Yevtushenko. As an outspoken critic of Russian oppression . . . sometimes at peril to his own life . . . Yevtushenko was often heralded as a man of great courage. Unwilling to wear that badge of honor he wrote a poem entitled: "Talk." It goes like this:

Talk

You're a brave man they tell me.

I'm not

Courage has never been my quality.

Only I thought it disproportionate

So to degrade myself as others did.

No foundations trembled.

My voice No more than laughed at pompous falsity;

I did no more than write, never denounced,

I left out nothing I had thought about,

Defended who deserved it, put a brand on

The untalented, the ersatz writers

(doing what anyhow had to be done)

And now they press to tell me that I'm brave.

How sharply our children will be ashamed

Taking at last their vengeance for these horrors

Remembering how in so strange a time

Common integrity could look like courage.

It is indeed a strange time in the life of the Church . . . certainly a time when common integrity is often called courage. An old Baptist preacher by the name of Vance Havner once described the situation this way: "Christians have lived sub-normally for so long that normal Christianity appears to be abnormal." Another has suggested that we are more shocked to see the gospel practiced than we are to see it denied. In such a time . . . when people are quick to praise this church for its witness . . . I believe it would be a mistake for Oakhurst to take its press clippings too seriously. Much has been said in the way of commendation . . . as well as condemnation . . . about the ministry of this church. No doubt there is some truth at both ends of that spectrum. What we can say with certainty, and should say with humility, is that the story of Oakhurst is not a success story . . . we remain a people in process . . . and we are, at best, engaged in a modest effort to live our life together with a larger measure of integrity.

This word of caution is prompted by a remark I heard from an acquaintance of mine in another state who happens to have a friend who has been a member here for the past ten years or so. Her friend made this observation, "I love Oakhurst, the only problem I have is that sometime the air of self righteousness there is almost palpable." I would simply remind you this morning that the arrogance of liberalism can be just as offensive as the arrogance of fundamentalism. We. like Christians everywhere, need grace for our failures, modesty about our successes, and gratitude for the privilege of being part of such a fellowship.

It is entirely accurate to say that for the last forty years Oakhurst has been committed to the continuing process of reformation. This commitment is implicit in the very first paragraph of our church covenant . . . . "We are together only to be the church of God in Christ. We are not here by chance, but God in his grace is making of us a fellowship to embody and express the spirit of Christ." The covenant says we exist to become something we are not vet . . . and in that process of becoming we've had to scrape off a lot of barnacles and restore a good deal of lost equipment to this ship. What we have endeavored to do is not to create a new theology, but to discover the radical dimensions of the theology we already possess . . . and create structures consistent with it.

When you consider the clear implications of the text alluded to in our church covenant: In Christ's family there can be no division into Jew and non-Jew, slave and free, male and female. Among us you are all equal. That is. we are all in a common relationship with Jesus Christ . . . you have to wonder how Southern Baptists managed to construct an all white, male dominated denomination where "whosoever will may come" meant "as long as you are white middle class like we are . . . .and are willing, if you happen to be a woman, to be regarded as incapable of leadership." While we may not have contributed directly to the creation of these prejudicial structures we certainly acquiesced to them for decades.

The reformation decision which welcomed African Americans to membership in this church and invited women into places of leadership was simply the recovery of what had always been an immediate implicate of our professed commitment to Christ. I remember how surprised I was when Jack Clarke, the first African American member of this congregation, expressed to me his reservations about having white Christians teaching his children about the love of Christ. He had every right to be concerned about the way we had prostituted the gospel of God's inclusive grace.

The presence of female leadership in this church from Amy Greene and Terri Canzoneri on through to Kathy Swint, Louise Griffis, and Alverta Wright, has enriched and empowered its ministry beyond measure. Their contribution reminds me of the story of the little boy who came into the house crying after being out playing with the neighbor's children. His father asked him, "what's the matter, are you hurt?" The little boy said, "Yes I'm hurt, Betsy beat me up." When his father asked, "You mean to tell me that you let a mere girl beat you up?" he replied, "Dad, girls aren't so mere anymore!"

That truth was brought home to me by a fairy tale someone sent me last week. "Once upon a time in a land far away, a beautiful, independent, self-assured princess happened upon a frog as she sat by a pond in a verdant meadow near her castle. The frog hopped into the princess' lap and said: "Elegant Lady I was once a handsome prince, until an evil witch cast a spell upon me. One kiss from you, however, and I will turn back into the dapper, young prince that I am and then, my sweet, we can marry and set up housekeeping in your castle with my mother, where you can prepare my meals, clean my clothes, bear my children, and forever feel grateful and happy doing so." That night as the princess dined sumptuously on lightly sauteed frog legs seasoned in white wine, she chuckled and thought to herself: I don't freakin think so!** Oakhurst has gratefully rediscovered that girls are not so mere anymore.

There is no way within the time constraints of this service to adequately allude to all the areas in the life of this church where you have manifested your determination to be a reformation congregation. I remember speaking here on the morning we moved out permanently from the new buildings on College Ave. back into this building. I said, "By your decision to make this move you have in effect said that you seek not merely to go to church . . . you seriously want to try and be the church . . . that you are not content merely to study Christ's ministry but wish to extend and continue it." That was a reformation decision.

From the moment you decided to make membership in this fellowship the product of thoughtful and informed commitment through delayed membership you declared your intention to take discipleship to a deeper level. You were not creating something new . . . you were trying to recover something old . . . integrity of membership. The adoption of a new policy on baptism represented a broadened appreciation for our brothers and sisters in Christ who come to us from other denominational traditions seeking fellowship with us at the Kingdom table. While that change may not have been consistent with the position of the Southern Baptist Convention it is certainly reflective of the spirit of Christ. It was a Reformation decision.

By changing the church covenant to reflect your commitment to making this church an inclusive fellowship, welcoming those who had been marginalized because of their sexual orientation, along with those who have mental or physical disabilities, you aligned yourself more fully with the God of unconditional love revealed in Jesus Christ. You manifested your freedom in Christ to value truth more highly than popularity, faithfulness over success. Biblical authority over communitv consensus. You asked the right question . . . not, "will it work" but "is it right" . . . and you dared to act upon the answer. That was a Reformation decision.

Very early in my ministry here at Oakhurst I discovered that what I felt constrained to say to this congregation wasn't going to be universally appreciated. Some folks told me so very directly . . . others just folded their tents and left for other churches. Because I am insecure enough to need universal affirmation I found the tension created by my preaching to be very painful. However, I believe I can honestly say that my determination to articulate the conviction that the rejection of our new African American neighbors would be tantamount to the rejection of Jesus Christ was rooted not in my desire for conflict or martyrdom, but rather, in a sense of divine constraint. The issue certainly wasn't my courage, it was clear to me that it was our integrity as a church of Jesus Christ which was at stake.

I wish I could tell you this morning that my struggle for integrity is over . . . that my personal summons to reformation is complete. Instead, I have a confession to make. I find myself in an ongoing lover's quarrel with the church. Let me try to explain it to you. I go to church and listen to the words the preacher speaks . . . .but the thing behind the words is hard to find. He preaches what we have been taught all our lives, that God loves us and sent Christ to suffer and die to redeem us from our sins. He urges us to receive His gift of eternal life, and be saved from the judgment of a God who will punish eternally those who do not respond to His grace. Most of those who sit around me listen and seem to agree . . . and the more animated the preacher becomes in urging us to choose Christ, and avoid God's impending judgment, the more pleased they are to hear it. Of course their pleasure is rooted in the fact that they have already made this decision and are comfortably secure in their own salvation.

For me, however, it is an incredibly painful experience because I feel the whole thing borders on being a charade devoid of integrity. These people around me who are nodding their heads in agreement with the preacher all have friends and loved ones, even their own children, who haven't given a thought to Christ and His church for twenty years . . . .but nobody is weeping . . . nobody will rush home in a desperate attempt to rescue the perishing, and urge upon the lost the claims of Christ. It would seem that they don't really believe what they are hearing . . . or, if they do believe it, there is a serious loss of integrity in their failure to act upon it I suspect that these folks, who are professing, card carrying evangelicals, are in fact, practicing, closet universalists..

So, I am troubled personally by a number of unanswered questions. Is it possible that we have underestimated the scope and determination of God's unconditional love and His pursuing grace? Is His desire to redeem creation, His unwillingness that any should perish, truly thwarted by death? Are judgment and punishment the only remaining alternative for our friends and neighbors who die without having experienced God's grace? Are the Jews, Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists of the world condemned to an eternity without God and without hope because they have sought God outside the Christian tradition? Is God's redeeming purpose really going to be defeated by our willfulness?

Clarence Jordan was struggling with these very questions when he wrote these words: "I just can't stick my God into a little time-space relationship (I can't restrict His work to what happens here before death) . . . .Maybe God is in hot pursuit of us; we've been thinking of giving our heart to Christ. We're thinking so hard on it we're driving along and we don't hear the whistle of a freight train. And bam.. .it just smashes us to pieces. And God said, "you know, I almost had him." What kind of God is that? A God whose purposes can be voided by a freight train? I can't fit that in." A great Baptist theologian, A.T. Robinson spoke to the same issue when he said, "Judgment can never be God's last word, because if it were, it would be the word that would speak his failure."

One more word from Clarence Jordan. Commenting on the Biblical parable of the lost coin and the widow's diligent search to find it, Clarence asks: "What does she do? She gets a broom. She sweeps and sweeps and sweeps. She lights a lamp and sweeps until what? Until she wore the broom out? No. Until the lamp went out? No. Until her husband came home and said, "Hey, get my supper, what are you doing with that broom?" No. How long did she sweep? Until she found it. How long was that? As long as necessary."

So, I find myself in a continuing struggle for integrity, and a growing belief that God wants to redeem the whole world, and in spite of our persistent willfulness His grace and determination will pursue us as long as is necessary. While I believe there is nothing we can do that will make God love us more . . . I also believe there is nothing we can do that will make

God love us less. So, I don't believe that God's love and grace is some kind of temporary offer taken off the table when we die. I believe He will pursue the whole of His creation in love until every seat at His table is filled … that eventually every knee will bow in grateful acknowledgment of His love and grace.

Jim Fowler, an Emory University professor, came here in 1982 to lead you in a study seminar . . . he was so impressed by your life together that he wrote a poem about your Covenant Stone and this covenant community. He called it

“Oakhurst—First Impressions”

That stone

That improbable protruding side-edged monolith

Struck me the first time I came and arrested me again.

We are here, it says we are here to stay.

Amidst locked parking lots, behind the railroad,

Next to Southern Bell

Surrounded by old poverty and re-gentry

We are here to stay.

No idolatry of building caught my eye.

Care and maintenance are in evidence

But as means to end, not ends in themselves.

No physical stuff here that can't be risked.

Hall floors hard as a gym, easy to clean, hard to damage.

More money in library books than in all the desks together

(Except for those high-tech desks which make the lifeline

of communication to a wider world)

Covenant, vocation, gifts put at God's disposal

For the neighbor: It says the kind of church I hunger for.

The ghosts that haunt this place are recent ghosts

Last night, this morning, last Sunday

And, by God, they just may be holy.

Yes, the ghosts that haunt this place are recent ghosts . . . even holy ghosts . . . because the Reformation continues. God is at work making you a fellowship to embody and express the spirit of Christ . . . Thanks be to God.