Evangelical Churches Producing Healthy Family Contexts

Thanks to Pat Graham who recently sent along a review of a new book that looks like it would be worth the reading.

From a Michael Cromartie interview with W. Bradford Wilcox, whose Soft Patriarchs, New Men: How Christianity Shapes Fathers and Husbands has just been published by the University of Chicago Press here are some notable quotes by Wilcox:

"Married men with children who are affiliated with conservative Protestant churches are in some ways traditional family patriarchs but theirs is a very soft patriarchy. These family men are consistently the most active and emotionally engaged group of fathers and the most emotionally engaged group of husbands in this entire study."

"Conservative Protestants, on the other hand, actually have a higher percentage of single parents, step-parents, single adults among them. I think there is a higher percentage of non-traditional families in evangelical congregations for a number of reasons. But one reason is that the kind of intensive experience and community they offer is attractive to people who are in a difficult family situation and are looking for a community that will help them get through their life. And often they're also looking for an ideal model of the family, which they haven't necessarily encountered in their own lives—the ideal that is held up in a pastoral way in the evangelical context. There's a certain irony here: evangelicalism holds up a traditional ideal of the family and yet has more non-traditional families, whereas mainline Protestantism holds up a more liberal ideal and yet has more traditional families in their pews."

Now Serving A605

By some standards 90 minutes is not a long time to stand in line to transact some business at a government agency. However, we had planned ahead, got all our documents ready, arrived before the doors opened (well, okay we did take a wrong turn and arrived one minute before the doors opened).

The only flaw in our plan was that 250 other people had the same plan and apparently made the right turn because they were already in line. So we resigned ourselves to the realities of bureaucratic quests and patiently made our way through the maize of lines, forms, and noise.

Yes, noise. In an effort to streamline the process the Georgia Department of Motor Vehicles has a very efficient way of queuing people. They give you a special number upon your first interview and then direct you to the next line by calling your number over the intercom with a computerized system. With hundreds of people milling about what happens is the nearly nonstop robotic voice stating, "Now serving B230 at window 6, now serivng F317 at window 12, now serving A605 at window 4." Helpful yes, but also quite irritating. Good planners, Vickie, Leslie, and I had things to read. But alas, no reading in the middle of the din.

Declaring all those intentions to serve began to make me wonder about whether service was really been rendered. Just saying that you serve may or may not mean anything.

We made it out of the building in 90 minutes. The usual results occurred. My photo looked like I had been incarcerated for ten years on the charge of stealing paper clips, while Vickie and Leslie looked like a pair of glamour shots.

Oh well, I will get another chance in four years. I can hardly wait.

A Good Mattress

Furniture arrived at the Reeds one week ago today and I can tell you that sleeping on a good mattress is a good thing. After a month of spending nights on a old futon, the "ahhh" experience is still reverberating each night. That "ahhh" continued when Friday evening we found enough stuff to actually fire up the grill and have what to the Reed family is high spiritual experience--a sit down dinner around our own oak table!

Moving has brought alot of changes for every member of our clan, but I am noting that what we enjoy the most is the recreating special things that we have enjoyed doing together--fixing meals, watching a good movie, or making oatmeal chocolate chip cookies! Yes, Leslie looked for a half hour through various boxes until she found all she needed to pull it off. The smell of cookies in the oven is great therapy.

So is the communion of saints. I relish the vital connections that we enjoyed in Indianapolis and now, in Atlanta. What makes our family glow is not so much a burning grill as it is the pleasure of being with each other. Thanks Lord, for you people everywhere--it's better than a good mattress!

Rainy Nights and Days in Georgia

Back this afternoon from Indiana. Our furniture on its way to Atlanta; however it is an impatient wait until Monday before we will sit at our old oak table or crawl unto my bed. Funny as it sounds, I've almost got used to that old futon mattress Vickie and I have been sleeping on!

Well as I blew from the north, the Ivan's early advance guard blew in from the south. Already 12 have lost their lives in Florida and it gives one pause about the massive strength and power and sheer mass of this storm. Rain, wind, and floods are predicted locally; tree limbs are already on lawns and streets.

How easily we take for granted power and lights and a dry place to live and work!

Back Home Again

Leaving Atlanta at 5 am in order to clear work traffic was apparently a good idea. The only slow down was a truck off the road on 285 at 85.

Anyway, I made my way back to Indianapolis today to see about closing out all our affairs here and to meed with packers and movers. Undoubtedly, it is not the most encouraging thing to come back to your old neighborhood after three weeks. Your new place gets compared with the old. You become nostalgic and wistful. You think about all the memories here.

Leaving the old person behind and embracing the new creation we find in Jesus Christ not only is theologically correct; it simply works better too!

I do look forward to seeing dear friends over the next couple of days--but I know I had better clear out of Indianapolis quickly. God calls us to live in the present and with our eyes on the future.

The past must be left--well, in the past.

Engage

Like a motor that has been running but sitting in neutral, I've been eager to preach again. Yesterday was the day to engage. What a wonderful day it was! It was good to preach and it was good to see people listening, nodding their heads, reading Bibles, and allowing for God to work in hearts.

I'm so grateful to be at Northlake. Northlake has a great tradition of loving people and Vickie and I have really felt that love and welcoming spirit over the past few weeks. God has blessed us and we are grateful!

Atlanta or Bust

Arriving in Atlanta at 5pm is not the smartest thing in the world to do, but who says I always do smart things! In fact, when smart things occur in my life it is usually a sign of God’s providence or dumb luck.

At any rate we were warmly welcomed by Jo Anne Stubblefield and ushered into our temporary lodgings in a small cottage on the church’s property—Love Cottage. Although rather Spartan (the only way I could describe without alluding to some of the places I lived in when I was in college), the cottage served us well over the next couple of days while we closed on our new home and began the work of clearing the dirt and making repairs.

I don’t really know how to describe our house in Stone Mountain. A two-story brick on a wooded lot on the side of hill would be a start. Yet the condition of the house has been rather daunting. Over the past 10 days, we have scrubbed, cleaned, and painted floors, walls, ceilings. We have laid tile, regrouted tile, and looked at kitchen tile. I’m on a first name basis with the paint guy at Lowe’s and with the flooring guy at Home Depot. The home had set vacant for a year and had been smoked in we have been doing a lot of fixing up on our fixer-upper.

But we love the location and we are falling in love with the beauty of the hills and trees. Its Saturday night and Vickie and I are setting out on the back porch just taking in the sounds of the evening. The fireworks from the Laser Show at Stone Mountain just went off, but other than the tree frogs and crickets, we are enjoying the quiet of the woods.

The move has brought many transitions and we are obviously missing the sweet relationships of many people in Indiana. However, we are already making friends with folks at Northlake. Certainly, we feel blessed by the many welcoming demonstrations of care that we have experienced over the past few days. We are indeed blessed.

May God be praised.

Carson Surfaces

Well, it’s about time that I surfaced. Through the night last night I keep waking up and thinking that I needed to recount the various goings-on of the Reed family. So I got up this morning early, fired up the computer—and couldn’t get online!

So I’m writing this out now and will post it when ever I figure out what is happening with our friends at Earthlink.

The Reeds have moved. After nearly twenty years in Indianapolis I now wake up looking at Georgia magnolias and pines on the east side of Atlanta. On Sunday, August 22, we said our farewells to the Westlake congregation. What a day of love and memory! From the whole congregation gathering around us to pray to the many hugs and embraces from young and old our Indianapolis friends will always be joyfully in our hearts.

And it is good to know that after nearly 12 years of ministry my love of ice cream made its mark at an evening social gathering Sunday night! What fun to gather and talk. And perhaps the highlight of that evening was when Ben asked everyone to stand around the perimeter of the sanctuary and hold hands. There is much that I will remember fondly about my many associations with Westlake; but one of those things will be gathering on Christmas eve and singing Silent Night in dark stillness of a candlelit sanctuary. Thanks to so many who made that Sunday a special one to us!

We went home that night and stayed up too late talking of our memories and love for Westlake and then, at 4am, with the clock alarm ringing in our ears, were up and out of the house for the drive to Atlanta.

As usual, we always seem to time our arrival in Atlanta so that we hit 285 at five o’clock rush hour. More later.