Sunday, June 3, 2018

My Final Four Sermons: Floyd

"My Last Four Sermons:  Floyd"
Acts 4:36; 9:26-27

Most of the people I've met over my 40 years of ministry, who had the most  Godly personalities, had no idea they had it.  Floyd was one of those people.

Floyd was one of the members of the first church I served.  He was 82 when I arrived on the scene.  He was a little wisp of a man.  Maybe 5'8".  Probably 130 pounds dripping wet.  His clothes hung on him like they were hand-me-downs from an older, much bigger brother.  A 10 MPH wind would have blown him over.

Floyd's last name was Hogg—H o g g.  Floyd Hogg.  Floyd had a son, Dale, who lived in Rolla, Missouri.  Dale was embarrassed by that last name, and when he was old enough, he had Hogg legally changed to Hoge—H o g e.  Floyd was disappointed in his son for making the change.  Floyd had grown up with that name his whole life.  And, sure he had heard all the taunts as a kid.  But he was proud of it, nonetheless.  Floyd just kept that disappointment to himself.  I was the only one Floyd told about his disappointment in his son for changing his name.

One of Floyd's dreams was getting to see the Grand Canyon.  For his 83rd birthday, one of his sons took Floyd to fulfill that life long dream.  When Floyd got back, I asked, "So, Floyd, what did you think?"
Floyd said, "Steve, that's some ditch!  That's some ditch!"

Floyd was a retired mail man.  The stories told about Floyd were that he carried more candy and milkbones than he did mail in his mail bag.  He'd go up and down the streets of that small town like a parade leader, with kids and dogs in procession.  In fact, some dogs would wait at the mailbox for him everyday, as if they had a built-in Floyd clock for his delivery.  Once they got their milkbone, off they'd go about their dog-day's business, tail wagging.

Floyd, walking his mail route, was better than the ice cream man for the kids.  Floyd didn't even need to play any hurdy gurdy music to attract attention.  He just had to walk by and there were kids with eager hands for a piece of candy.  Then the kids would walk in step with Floyd a couple of blocks and Floyd would let them put the mail in the mail boxes.

Floyd sang in the church choir.  The only problem was, he was tone deaf.  And true to people who are tone deaf and don't realize it, he sang louder than anyone else.  You could definitely hear him, and pick out the ambling tune he was singing that had nothing to do with the song the choir was singing.

When I arrived, the choir director had evidently had enough with Floyd's tuneless bucket carrying.  She asked me to ask Floyd to not sing in the choir anymore.  One of the things I discovered about Floyd was that he was a man of the Bible.  He had been Bible reading and Bible studying his whole 82 years.  So in a stroke of pastoral genius—one of my only strokes of genius in 40 years of ministry—I told Floyd I needed him to teach the adult Sunday School class.  The only problem was, he'd have to give up the choir.  Without a second thought, he took me up on my offer.  Choir problem solved.  And I gained one of the best Bible teachers I've known.

One of the guilty pleasures Floyd and I shared was root beer floats.  He loved root beer floats.  So do I.  So Floyd and I would get together, often, and quaff our floats while we played Chinese Checkers.  He loved Chinese Checkers.  I'm not sure how many evenings we got together for that ritual of friendship.  And I’ll never forget the conversations Floyd and I had, and how much they meant to me, how much I learned from him, and he had no idea.

It's one of the reasons I have been teaching the CREW night kids how to play Chinese Checkers.  It brings back those great memories of Floyd and I sitting at either of our kitchen tables.  Maybe I'm hopefully passing a little bit of Floyd along to these current day kids.  It has also been a fun way to bring my ministry to a full circle—starting out playing Chinese Checkers with Floyd, and ending with playing that same game with the kids.

Towards the end of my second year in that church, I took a week of study leave in St. Louis.  During that week, Floyd suddenly came down with pneumonia, and they took him by ambulance to Asbury hospital in Salina.  I kept in touch with Dale, Floyd's son, who said Floyd was holding his own.  I stopped in Salina on my way back from study leave, anxious to see how Floyd was doing, and got to the hospital just in time before Floyd died.

Sunday morning, I could barely talk.  I didn't preach.  I didn't lead worship.  I just sat on the steps in the front of the sanctuary and talked and cried about Floyd and asked them to share memories of Floyd.  They all looked at me, as they usually did, with stupid expressions on their faces, not knowing why I was crying, and what the big deal was.

I left that worship service so angry.  Those stupid and blind and calloused people had no idea who Floyd was.  How powerful he was in his abject humility.  How he was like that congregation's guardian angel and they had no clue.  I wanted to strangle every one of their stiff necks.

I decided, that Sunday, that I couldn't make it in that church without Floyd.  The next day I started the process of getting the heck out of there.  I ended up moving out to California, to get as far away from that church in these United States as possible.  Three years later, the presbytery went in and closed that Godforsaken church.


I'm telling you about Floyd because I learned in that church, with Floyd by my side, I wasn't going to be able to do ministry alone.  I needed someone to lean on.  I needed a go-to person, who would tell me the truth, who would pat me on the back when I was down, who would kick me in the butt when I was too far down.  In a word, I the pastor needed a pastor.

Most ministers have a person like that, but they are more often than not another pastor.  I've had one person like that who is another pastor.  But mostly I would chose a person in my congregation to be my pastor.  A solidly planted, humble leaning post I needed to keep going on doing what I was trying to do in the ministry.

Floyd was my first pastor in the ministry.  He never knew it.  I never told him.  I did the same in every church I've served.  Someone has been my pastor, holding me up, keeping me going, even at times when I felt like giving up.  None of them have ever known what they meant and continue to mean to me.  The pivotal role I gave them in my life.

In another church it was Clara Stevens.  In another, Nan Swanson.  In another, Mabel Kuster.  In another, it was Byron Walker.  (The first time I drove to Wichita from here, and went by the Byron Walker Wildlife Refuge, I broke down crying.  The two Byron Walker's weren't the same person, of course, but just seeing his name, and remembering how the Byron Walker I knew tied on with me and kept my ship from going down in the darkest time of my ministry, was too much.  But that part of my story I will tell in the last sermon of these four.)


What I learned, in my short time with Floyd, was what I've already said.  I was going to need someone like Floyd in every church I served if I was going to make it out of the church business alive.  I was going to need a Floyd, a Mabel, a Byron.

But not just me.  All of you need a Floyd.  Not just a person.  Not just a friend.  A Floyd.  A powerfully Christian person, who has their head on straight, who knows God intimately, who, as the writer of the book of Hebrews says, is one of those angels we entertain unawares.  A humble person whose humility shields their eyes to their own greatness and power and Godliness.

A Barnabas.  Barnabas was that for the Apostle Paul.  Paul was a first class jerk.  A tormentor of Christians.  Anne Lammot wrote in one of her recent books, "The opposite of faith is not doubt.  The opposite of faith is surety."  She described what she meant was that it's the people who are so arrogantly sure of themselves, so sure they are right, so sure they carry the right opinions about everything—they are the ones who do most harm to the church and the rest of the faithful.

That's the kind of person Paul was.  One of those people who knew for sure his way was the right way, and everyone else needs to get on board with him.  People like the early Christian leader Stephen paid with his life at the hands of Paul's surety.

It wasn't until the risen Jesus literally knocked Paul off his high horse of surety, that he finally realized he had been totally wrong all along.  What a terrible realization to come to.  That you spent your whole life up to that point doing the exact wrong thing with your life.

But after Paul had given his life to Jesus, nobody trusted him.  Not the Christians he had been persecuting.  And not the Jewish leaders Paul had been serving and now turned his back upon.  The only thing Paul knew at that point in his life was that Jesus had given him a second chance.  But how was he going to take advantage of that if no one in the church was going to give him a chance?

Enter Barnabas.
Then Barnabas took Paul under his wing. He introduced Paul to the apostles and stood up for him, told them how Paul had seen and spoken to the Master on the Damascus Road and how in Damascus itself he had laid his life on the line with his bold preaching in Jesus’ name.

Without Barnabas, Paul would have never made it into the church and into the ministry.  It took someone who believed in Paul, who saw what God was doing, who was not just in tune with Paul but in tune with God to recognize what was needed.

Barnabas' name means, "son of encouragement."  That's what he was for Paul, and so many others in the early church.

And that's my point.  That's what I learned from God in my very first, but disastrous church as pastor.  I needed a Barnabas.  I needed Floyd.  And Mabel.  And Byron.  And all the others.  I needed a humbly strong person, and I needed to allow that person to shepherd me, to teach me, to lead me, to be my pastor.

Don't we all need a Barnabas?  A Floyd.  Some one who gets it.  Someone who has a life long relationship with the Lord.  Someone who sees with God's eyes.  Someone who feels with God's heart.  And they'll never know.  They'll never know what they mean to you, because you never tell them, because if you do it'll ruin it.  You just smile a thank you to God for putting them in your path and making them a part of your journey.

And who knows.  Maybe, unbeknownst to you, you are Floyd for someone else.

No comments:

Post a Comment