Behind the voice in the pulpit there really is a human being.
July 11, 2007 (Wednesday) – I hope you don’t mind my inserting blogs about
my childhood and personal life into these little essays. I never talked about
myself much in the past, but I’m making up for it now in my old age. I think
there are a few people out there who would like to know a little bit more about
me. Behind the voice in the pulpit there really is a human being.
I said in yesterday’s blog that perhaps the reason my parents divorced was
that their upbringing was so different. And then I got to thinking about the
way Wanda and I were each raised. Our original homes were very different
from each other, yet we were married more than 48 years when she went
home to be with the Lord. People can learn how to adjust to each other, and
the main reason we were able to do so was the presence and power of the
Lord.
Wanda came from a family in which education was a priority. All the children
were given the opportunity to go to college. Wanda’s parents were school
teachers and her father was in administration as well. Wanda was a country
girl who knew the value of chores, hard work and family cooperation. She was
raised in church, and understood who the Lord is and how we live out our lives
with dignity and devotion to duty.
On the other hand, I was born and raised in the heart of the city, and, with my
sisters, spent childhood learning to cope with ever-changing home situations.
By the time I left for college, I had lived in 18 different locations, raised by
parents, step parents, grandparents, and sometimes aunts and uncles, all of
whom we loved very much. Church was not included in our upbringing for the
most part, but we learned something about the Lord anyway.
When Wanda and I met, I was singing and preaching in churches near her
home, and she and I both were attending Baylor University. It was our faith
that we shared, and our faith made the difference for us. Because of the
different ways were were raised, there were a lot of differences in the way we
approached many things, but as the years went by, the Lord brought us closer
together.
When a well-known evangelist started traveling the country years ago, he had
a truck, loaded with equipment that he took everywhere he went. On the side,
in huge, colorful letters, was inscribed, “Christ is the Answer!” For Wanda
and me, the slogan really fits and reveals the reason we could be successfully
married for so long, in spite of our differences.
A lively little chorus we used to sing, goes like this: “God can do anything,
anything, anything. God can do anything…..but fail!”