Message by Herman Kauffman
Council of District Executives
Daytona Beach, FL
February 1, 2004

A Call to Leadership

February 1, 1968: Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke at Manchester College on the topic:
"The Future of Integration." Some of us were there: Randy, Craig, Jim....

Two weeks ago, The Fort Wayne Journal Gazette carried an article, picked up by other newspapers through the Associated Press, recalling King's visit to North Manchester. In reading the article, I learned some things I had not known as a first-year student at Manchester - or had forgotten.

I had not known how much hatred had been directed toward the College and President Helman over King's visit to campus. Numerous residents sent letters voicing strong disapproval.

I had not remembered the signs posted around the campus stating, "Crucify the King," and certainly did not know that FBI agents had reported death threats made against King.

I had not known that President Helman drove his own car to the Fort Wayne airport to pick up Dr. King, nor did I know that the FBI and state police had cars at every intersection from Fort Wayne to North Manchester.

I had not remembered that the auditorium was locked for 36 hours preceding King's speech, that lights in the gym were kept on all night, that faculty and staff spent the night walking outside the auditorium as a security precaution.

I had not known that during Dr. King's speech there were plain-clothes officers spread throughout the auditorium, police officers were stationed at every door and window, and buses filled with troops were seconds away in case of a disturbance.

There are a lot of details that get past a first-year college student. What I knew was that a black Baptist preacher, a well-known and controversial national figure, was coming to campus. I don't even remember what Dr. King said or my reaction to it. Which is why last week I found the printed copy of his speech that had been transcribed and made available to students for a nickel. Reading the speech in January 2004, it seemed boring and out-of-date. But looking back some 36 years now, the speech was both a history lesson and a prophetic message.

Sixty-four days later, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, Tenn. on April 4.

The years I spent at Manchester from 1967 - 1971 were troubled years in our nation. President Kennedy had been assassinated the year before and Bobby Kennedy would be killed during a political campaign two months after Martin Luther King, Jr. Shortly before his death, Kennedy had stated: "We've had difficult times in the past. We will have difficult times in the future. It is not the end of violence; it is not the end of lawlessness; it is not the end of disorder."

The words were prophetic as 4 students were killed and 9 wound in May 1970 by Ohio State National Guardsmen during a Vietnam War protest.

This walk down Memory Lane is not without purpose.
For in the midst of troubled times, some of us heard our Call to Ministry.

I was in my senior year at Manchester, an accounting major, when I heard God's call to ministry. The call came by an unseen voice on a quiet night in the dorm - and I will tell you (with Randy as my witness) I thought God had made a mistake. But with the support of Randy and Kaydo Petry and my home congregation, I ended up at Bethany Seminary the next fall. It was more a testing of God than anything. I did not believe I was ministry material. My response was closer to Jeremiah's, "Ah, Lord God! Truly I do not how to speak...." than to Isaiah's, "Here am I, send me!"

But I went to Bethany and found myself learning in the classroom and enjoying the fellowship of the seminary community. I spent the next summer at Gifford State Park in So. Pennsylvania visiting with hundreds of campers who had dropped out of church, spending 1 day a week shadowing pastors, leading worship, and even doing disaster response work following Hurricane Agnes. I think back now and wonder if those very first sermons could ever have encouraged the church drop-outs to go back to church.

After returning to Bethany in the Fall of 1972, I decided to drop out for a year - to again test the call. I was back the following year for another year in the classroom and a field ministry working with youth (what did I know about youth work?)! The call to ministry seemed stronger now - to the point I felt if pastoral ministry is where I'm headed, I'd better find out what it's all about. I was fortunate to leave Bethany for another year for a 15-month internship at the Lincolnshire congregation in Fort Wayne.

I'm convinced God has a sense of humor. I remember the evening I walked in for an interview with the committee, though I didn't know for another 15 months the first impression of the church moderator who shared at my going-away dinner that he had taken one look at my beard and said to himself, "Oh no! Not one of those!"

But I have said that it was this congregation that affirmed my gifts and my call in ways no one else could have done. Four congregations and one district ministry later, I continue to hear God's call to ministry. But that is different than saying I always understand what God is calling me to do.

I read Jeremiah 1:10 and I wonder what it means for God to say to me, to us:

"...today I appoint you over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up and to pull down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant."

I think God is reminding us that it is no longer February 1, 1968 but it is today, February 1, 2004.

Our nation is no longer at war in Vietnam, but in Iraq.

It is Howard Dean rather than Dr. King speaking out against the war.

Hatred is centered more around sexual orientation than racial issues.

Recent years have been troubled ones with terrorist actions around the world in the Middle East, Iraq, the United States, and around the globe.

And in the midst of these troubled times, as in decades and centuries before, God continues to call out prophetic leaders to love and to serve in Jesus' name. The roles played by President Helman and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1968 must be carried by other church leaders today.

I don't believe it is my role to pluck up and pull down nations and kingdoms ... but then I didn't believe it was my role to be a pastor back in 1968 or even 1971 and later. Perhaps, I think, God has appointed me over congregations and a district ... but I'm still not comfortable with plucking up, pulling down, to destroy and to overthrow! Maybe God today, as in Jeremiah's day, understands what I fail to comprehend: that plucking and pulling down is sometimes the only way to build up and plant.

I hear a lot today about tough love in dealing with individuals you love who have a problem. It may be necessary to destroy the old life in order to plant and build up a new life. Tough love requires plucking and pulling down old support habits and structures that lead to destructive behavior, so that seeds of true love may be planted that will lead to a new and valued lifestyle.

I read 1 Corinthian 13, the Apostle Paul's thoughts on love, and I struggle with how to undergird leadership with love.

The love that Paul describes in 1 Corinthians is tough love. It cost God, Jesus. It cost Jesus, his life. It costs the church, our individualism. It costs you and I, time and gifts and energy.

 

There remains the Gospel Text [Luke 4:16-30] for Today's Council of District Executives.
It has to do with vision, rejection, and survival to serve another day.

Jesus came to Nazareth where he had been brought up. Think about that for a moment. Jesus comes to preach deliverance in the place where he had lived as a teenager, he came to share his dreams, his vision echoing in the words of Isaiah, to those who had taught him in Synagogue School.

Now hear again the vision Jesus shares with his hometown synagogue:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has

Anointed me to bring good news to the poor

Sent me to proclaim release to the captives

And recovery of sight to the blind

To let the oppressed go free

To proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

How does Jesus' vision statement measure up to yours? It's briefer than mine and a whole lot more global and all-inclusive than mine ... but then he's Jesus, Lord and Savior of the World, and I'm not!

But I've noticed something Jesus and I have in common - not everyone buys into the vision.

Jesus is rejected! As he reminds those in the synagogue through the story of Elijah, "no prophet is accepted in the prophet's hometown." This may be one reason we have so many short-term pastorates and turnover among district executives. To provide a vision is to risk rejection.

Martin Luther King, Jr. had a dream, and he came to Manchester College 36 years ago with a vision of the future of integration in this land. But within weeks his dream and his vision would cost him his life.

Jesus also had a dream and he came to Nazareth some 2,000 years ago with a vision of the future kingdom of God in this world, a vision recorded in the words of the prophet Isaiah. But Jesus' dream and vision would within a few short years cost him his life as well.

But it is the closing verses of this passage that I would ask us to hang on to. Following the rage that fills the synagogue, after the hometown boy is driven out of town and threatened with death; Jesus passed through the midst of them and went on his way.

Death would come to Jesus, to Martin Luther King Jr., as it will come to each of us; but that reality need not keep us from the ministry and mission at hand. We need to keep on keepin' on! To move through the midst of them, on the way to new ministry opportunities.

What if Jesus had said, "Woe is me, my message has been rejected at home. I may as well quit."

What if Martin Luther King, Jr. had said, "I have a dream.... but since you all don't understand it, I guess I'll go home and be an ordinary pastor to my congregation."

What if Alexander Mack had said, "I know what the Bible says, but I'm not counting the cost - I've got a family to think about."

Brothers and sisters, this is not 1968 and that generation of church leadership have passed the leadership responsibilities to a new generation - and we are among those church leaders in 2004.

We are called to cast the vision and dream the dreams, even at the risk of rejection. We are called to count the cost and keep on keepin' on, or in more typical Brethren language, we are called to Continue the work of Jesus. Peacefully, Simply, Together.

But one more word from 1968 before we leave it. Guy West was Annual Conference Moderator in 1968 with an Annual Conference theme: God loves the world so ... He makes all things new. In the Annual Conference booklet that year, West writes: "...this theme affirms that God is not satisfied with the world as it is today." He concludes with these two questions that are still relevant to you and I as church leaders today: "Are we ready to accept the changes which this faith makes inevitable? Are we committed to be instruments of God's will as God continues to make all things new?"

May the God who led Jesus to pass through the midst of them, guide us as we also go on our way. Amen.