Thursday, April 3, 2014

Leaving Neverland

Linda was the featured speaker for a Women's Ministry event at St. Andrews on March 31.  While this script can't capture her live presentation, I'm very proud of the life lessons she communicated so well.  

Leaving Never-land

    Recently, I was speaking to a member of our church and thanking him for taking on the challenge of serving St. Andrews and Christ through his volunteer work here.  He was so sweet and thanked me then asked, “Now who are you?”  I honestly dreaded telling him because I was afraid he would be embarrassed that he didn’t know me, but that experience reminded me that many people here don’t know me, or, if they know who I am, they don’t know much about me.  So when Jeanette and Kay asked me to speak this evening and said that they  wanted me to share some stories that would enable people to get to know me better, I was delighted.  It’s amazing that I would be here talking to you because, growing up, I never thought of myself as someone who people would care about knowing or who would be speaking to a group of church women.  But here I am!  Something I never thought would happen is happening.  God has often surprised me that way.   So that’s what I want to talk to you about tonight – the “I’ll nevers” in my life and the lessons that they have taught me about myself, others, and God.
First, “I’ll never be a teacher.”  I grew up in Gaffney SC one of five children.  In those days, there were no video games, computers, or round-the-clock television.  My brothers, sisters, and I made up our own games.  One of them was school.  Along with the neighborhood children, we took turns being the teacher and students and though I no longer remember the rules, we somehow managed to have a winner.  Although I played these games along with my siblings, I never thought that I could be a teacher.  Teachers, both at church and in school, were the smartest people I knew.  In my mind, I could never know enough to be a teacher.  When I went to Furman, I deliberately didn’t pursue an education degree, because I still didn’t believe that I could teach.  After graduation, Dee and I married, and he was called as the pastor of Carey Baptist Church in Henderson, NC.  One Saturday evening, a lovely senior adult Bible study teacher asked me to teach her class the next morning.  She was sick and just couldn’t be there.  Not knowing how to say “no” at the time, (I’ve since learned how to do that), I agreed and began work on the lesson.  I was terrified and didn’t know how my lesson would turn out.  Thanks to a group of very kind ladies, my first teaching experience went well, and I later agreed to teach our young couples Sunday School class.  Years later, with many Bible study classes under my belt, I found the courage to say “yes” to Greenville Technical College and began teaching GED students.  My first class was a mixture of men and women, old and young.  One of my students was a truck driver who introduced himself to the class by saying that he had five children and two ex-wives.  He was a very smart man, but just could not understand the reason he had to learn some of what I was teaching.  One day, in class, we had a discussion about the Pythagorean Theorem.  “Mrs. Vaughan, why do we have to learn this ‘pagorum theorem’? I’m never going to use it?”  Well John, even if you don’t use it, learning how to use it will help you learn to think.  It will stretch your brain.”  “I know, but that’s not enough of a reason.”  “Well, John, a lot of people do use the Pythagorean Theorem in their work.”  “How?”  “Builders, John, might have to use it in construction.” “I’m never going to be a builder.”  “Well, John, you have to learn it to pass the test.”  “Yeah, but it’s still stupid to make me learn it.”  “John, I’m going to give you the final reason that you have to learn the Pythagorean Theorem.  I call it the Mama reason.”  “Okay, what’s that, Mrs. Vaughan?”  “Because I said so!”  John learned the Pythagorean Theorem and a lot of other stuff; he earned his GED, finishing in the top five percent in the state.  When he brought his diploma and award to show me, he told me that he not only wanted that top 5 percent for himself, he wanted to do it for me.  This was humbling – I thanked God that day for sending Alice Newton to ask me to teach her class.  I learned from this “I never” that, if we will let him, God can use each one of us(even me) to help others and make a difference in this world.

Here’s a second never that happened to me.  “I’ll never date that wild man!”  The first time I saw Dee was in the Furman University dining hall.  My roommate had a crush on Dee’s roommate, and she decided that I needed to date Dee and that she would date his roommate.  Well, Dee was wearing white, bell-bottomed overalls that were out of date even then. He had a red beard, and curly blond hair.  He also had that strange “stand on his tiptoes” walk.  I took one look at Dee and told my friend, “I’ll never date that wild man.”  A few weeks later, Dee and I met for the first time, again in the Furman dining hall, and I learned that he was smart, and funny, and kind.  He loved God and he loved his family and pretty much came across as the perfect man.  Eventually, his good sense prevailed and he asked me out.  Thirty-one and a half years of marriage later, here we are.  I learned from this “I never” that first impressions aren’t always right, and sometimes, God wraps a jewel in bellbottoms.  I guess Dee led me into my next “never.”

“I’ll never be a pastor’s wife.”  My pastor’s wife when I was growing up was Beverly Morrow, wife of Bobby Morrow.  In my mind, Mrs. Morrow was kind, and smart, and she was very holy.  She would laugh really hard if she heard me say that, but I could never picture her losing her temper, telling even a little white lie, or not giving the perfect answer to struggling believers.  I could never be that kind of person.  I grew up in Gaffney (enough said), one of five children, and fighting was in my blood.  My brothers, sisters, and I fought over the TV, who was going to ride in the front seat, and who was going to get the last piece of dessert.  Even as a child, I realized that I struggled with my temper and knew that God was so disappointed with me.  I could never marry a minister.  What God has taught me over the years is that he uses imperfect people to accomplish his perfect will.  I do try to emulate Mrs. Morrow because I’ve realized that what she did so well was love people – I can do that.  I can’t achieve super holiness, I don’t always know the answer to difficult questions, and I still sometimes struggle with my temper.  But I can love people, and I try to do that as faithfully as I can.

As time went on, I became the mother to three “preacher’s kids” which knocked down another one of my “nevers.”  “I’ll never be one of those mothers who yell at her kids in public.”  We’ve all been in Wal Mart and heard a mother yelling at her kids to shut up or come here.  I bet we have all shaken our heads and said, “I can’t believe that woman is so mean to her children.  I would never treat my child that way.  There should be a law!”  I’m glad there’s not.  When Josh was in middle school, I took him to Old Navy to buy clothes.  The operative words here are “middle school.”  He was being particularly stubborn that day and uncooperative but he really needed clothes and I was determined we were going to find him something.  I had a stack of jeans, jogging pants, and shirts piled high in my arms trying to find something that would please him.  He absolutely refused to try on anything I found.  There we stood in the middle of the boy’s department of Old Navy, and I lost it.  That huge stack of clothes went flying at Josh – “fine, you put these clothes back on the racks.  We are going home!”  Just as the clothes went flying and the words flew out of my mouth, one of our church members walked by.  She taught me a big lesson that day.  She just shook her head, laughed, and said, “I have a middle school boy as well.  Good luck to you.”  What I learned that day was never to judge someone by their worst moment.  Most of us are never as good or as bad as others might think we are.  We are imperfect people just trying to navigate our way through this world as faithfully as we can.


Let me share one more “never” that life knocked down.  This is the most recent and the most personal.  “I’ll never go to church again.”  No, those words weren’t uttered by the ten-year-old me.  They were uttered by the fifty-year-old me.  Friends at church had hurt me desperately.  My mind and heart couldn’t wrap themselves around the pain, and I truly didn’t think I could ever walk through the doors of a church again.  Then, the phone rang.  A gentleman named David was calling to ask my husband if he could help their church during an interim.  Dee agreed to talk to him, and two weeks later I found myself walking through the doors of the Parisview Baptist Church in Greenville.  Inside those doors, I found kindhearted people who took it as their mission to love me, my husband, and our children and to remind us that God still had work for us to do, people for us to serve, people for us to love, and people to love us.  The retired pastor emeritus of that church told me one day that he knew how hurt Dee and I had been by all that transpired.  He then quoted the words Joseph spoke to his brothers who had sold him into slavery.  “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good.”  He said to me, “We needed you and God sent you to us.  He has used you to bless our church.”  I experienced healing that day.  I was reminded of what I should have known – that God always wants to bring good things into our lives, He always has works of service for us to do if we will do them, and He always loves us.  Some months later, in God’s time, our phone rang again.  “Dee, this is Al Walker.  I am the chairman of the search committee at St. Andrews Baptist Church and we were wondering if you would be willing to have a conversation with us.”  God brought us here to St. Andrews, he gave us a place to serve Him, people with whom to serve him, people for us to love, and people to love us.  Dee and I thank God every day for you and pray that he will allow us to bless you just a fraction of how you have blessed us.  When God knocks down a never, a great blessing appears on the other side.  May that be true for you, as it has been for me.

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