OUR CHANGING WORLD

 

The Westbury Church of Christ in Houston had a carnival recently to raise money for their school. It had all the trimmings. with games to play and things to eat and buy, including an auction. Among the items auctioned was Earl Campbell’s (the football star) old shoes, which went for 360.00 for the pair. Whenever white folks in a Texas Church of Christ will fork over that kind of money for a black man’s worn out shoes it has to be conceded that we are changing!

I think the most unique Church of Christ, perhaps in the entire world, can now be identified—in Wichita Falls. Texas. It is non-instrumental music like the rest, but it is also one-cup, non-located preacher, mutual ministry, non-Sunday School, and premillennial!

Being premillennial along with all the other really makes it unique, and this also makes it freer and more open, as well as turned on to God’s grace and mercy, as premill churches usually are. It just shows how “narrow” folk can be in freedom, which is to say that they are actually “broader” than those who are much less narrow!

G, B. Shelburne, Jr. is what I call “the patriarch of the non-Sunday School Churches of Christ.” For a generation he has been training preachers and others in what they call “Bible Training Work” in Amarillo and now Houston. This is conducted by the Main Street Church of Christ in South Houston, which also has an ambitious missionary program in Malawi, Africa, one of the missionaries being one of brother Shelburne’s sons. The missionary staff also includes our dear friend Margaret Williams, who is not of the non-SS background. Brother Shelburne has a beautiful irenic spirit, which he has shared in some of our “line-crossing” unity meetings. It is his leadership that is largely responsible for the contribution the non-SS churches are making in our struggle against partyism. Brother Shelburne has four sons and they are all preachers and they all fellowship each other! How’s that for a well-lived life? In a visit with him recently reference was made to my far-ranging ministry. When I told him, “I go among them all but don’t agree with any of them,” he laughed heartily. As I see it the non-SS churches are the most encouraging part of the present-day Churches of Christ. When a leading non-SS brother in Lubbock, a college professor, “left” and began meeting with a charismatic group, his old church, where he had been an elder, did not withdraw from him, but continued to love and accept him. In fact he was recently invited to speak at one of their churches in Amarillo. Compare this with the way other of our Churches of Christ responded to Pat Boone. See why I am encouraged?

Another Houston visit was not all that encouraging, but it shows that I like to visit all my sisters and brothers. John and Margaret O’Dowd are longtime friends. John claims credit for getting me in jail, back in the old days, but that’s another story. So is Margaret another story, who published a book about her liberation from an oppressive religion in the Church of Christ, which is one of the most unique and dramatic books ever written by one of our folk. She has long since left us, forever, for she’s had it. But I still love her, and I drop by occasionally to tell her so. I even love old John, which shows that the Spirit is still at work in our lives. He told me this story of bygone days. He was conducting a revival in a small southern town and was invited to address the local high school. He first rebuked the principal for introducing him as Reverand, then proceeded to blast the Catholics and Baptists as infidels, proving it from their creeds from which he read. The principal stopped him while he yet spoke, dismissed the students, and left him standing in an empty auditorium. That night in his meeting he excoriated the school for its lack of southern hospitality! When Margaret responded negatively to this story, I tried to get old John off the hook by reminding her that the years have made some difference and that John wouldn’t do that the same way today. “Oh yes I would!” he said, correcting me, “if I had the chance.” At this his wife said with resignation, “Some people can and do change,” looking at me, and then added, as she measured her husband, “and some people can’t and won’t!” But I think I know a secret. Down deep inside old John would like to change. When I told this story to Ouida, she remembered a Baptist minister who spoke to her high school and told the story of Queen Esther, and it was so exciting she has never forgotten it. Our old beloved bruisers, who are playing some kind of game, would really like to be a blessing to people, But the shell has to break before they can get out. I never give up on them, even when their wives have!