Searcy Memories
A post from five years ago (as I remember 25 years ago!):
Yesterday I wrote about my trip to Searcy 30 years ago to begin my freshman year.
But later, there was another trip to Searcy. This was the summer of 1984. I was still 27, and I was “trying out” for the preaching job at the College Church. As I heard the story later, the tape I’d sent to the search committee (now I almost can’t believe I had the courage — or audacity — to send one) got put in a junk pile when they saw my age. But later, after several didn’t seem to fit and after a couple sniffed at the salary, they had to return to the pile.
So the call came, inviting me to come speak on a Sunday morning and evening. At the time, I didn’t even own a suit. So my dad bought me one so I could try out in appropriate attire. (I know, I know . . . some of you at Highland are wanting to ask, “So whatever happened to those suits and ties you used to wear while preaching?” Hey, they were never “me”!)
Shortly after that, Neale Pryor called me at home in Wilmington, NC, to say the elders would like to invite me to become their minister. It was a bittersweet evening, as we rejoiced over the new ministry but grieved over having to tell the people in Wilmington we were leaving.
In the following couple months I turned 28, Megan was born, and we endured the 110 mph winds of Hurricane Diana (for seven hours).
Then, in October 1984, Diane and I returned to Searcy with our two year old and our newborn. Now I was back with all of those people I mentioned yesterday whom I revered (along with many others). Only now, I wasn’t their student; I was their preacher.
What was I–what were we–thinking?
But people were gracious. The seven years were, for the most part, wonderful. The four services every Sunday wore me out, but, hey, I was young! (Besides, Diane had the really hard job, as those of you who were around Megan in her healthy years know.) My life was blessed by older mentors, by deep friendships, and by lots of students to teach and train.
The memories wash over me now: Jimmy Allen’s and Neale Pryor’s gospel meetings, laughing until I fell on the floor at Christmas parties at Dwight and Barby’s house (I’m especially thinking of those moments today, because Barby’s battle with cancer ended yesterday, and this wonderful woman went to be with the Lord), running every day with Leon, watching out the windows of my office as hundreds of students crossed Race Street, listening to J. D. Bales as he tried to talk some sense into me (he was always very gracious with me, though I frustrated him at times), sitting in on Ray Muncy’s upper level history classes, going to Hunan’s (the only Chinese restaurant I’ve ever been to that included a taco bar in the buffet line) with the Coxes and Cochrans, playing ball on Monday mornings in the old gym with Matt before he started kindergarten, taking Megan to her special speech classes on campus, crying as we learned more about her challenges, holding each other as we wondered how we could survive without sleep, wrestling matches on the floor with Matt and Megan, “the house” (was it on Center or Market? Anyway, it’s where a bunch of college guys lived whom I had mentored and who, in turn, took Matt into their inner circle . . . it was a house of laughs and love . . . but should probably have been condemned for health reasons.), calling James to ask exegetical questions, crawling into Tom’s office in the Bible department when I was upset, speaking in chapel and at club devotionals and at the lily pool devotionals, “Peak of the Week” in the Administration Auditorium and then in the Benson Auditorium (it was a bigger crowd, but never felt quite the same as our first few years crammed into the admin), being asked by David Burks to speak at the first graduation ceremony of his presidency, playing pick-up basketball games with Avon Malone and Jimmy Allen, and having an asthma attack from laughing so hard at Craig’s imitations of Harding and College Church people. I remember Diane and me dressing in leather and chains, dying our hair purple and pink, and going onto campus to trick-or-treat on Halloween. (I was 29, and she was 28! Students who figured out who it was nearly passed out. I think they were thinking that a preacher’s wife should not be THAT HOT.)
We left Searcy in the summer of 1991. It was the last year I spoke at Harding or the College Church (other than three funerals). Eleven years of my life–four as a student and seven as a minister–have been spent there. What a blessing! I wish I could go back in time and do some things more maturely, but unfortunately maturity usually only comes after failures, forgiveness, and the passing of a few years.
We’ve returned to Searcy a few times since then. Maybe the most memorable was in May, 1992, when we went back for Diane’s graduation. She attended from 1976-78, then took a class or two a semester from 1987-1991. After doing her student teaching in Abilene in the fall of 1991, she was ready for graduation.
Mike, those years you and Diane spent in Searcy changed the lives and faith stories of many people. I can never thank God enough for sending you to be our minister at College church while I was in high school and college. I remember when I turned 28 and realized that I was older than you were when you took the pulpit at my home congregation. I remember when you came and spoke during the hiring process. You said something about our communion services and how they should be more of a joyful celebration than a funeral dirge. My friend and I looked at each other with our eyebrows RAISED. We’d heard something different and new.
Your time as an XEA sponsor was also great. I’ll never forget the time you and Diane opened your home to a bunch of college students and I heard –gasp! — INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC playing on your stereo. CONTEMPORARY CHRISTIAN at that.
You changed us. You changed me. God used you in big ways during those years. Thanks for spending them with us.
Unless you have experienced a Searcy (or similar) “bubble” it is hard to explain the insistent pull of a place you love dearly but do not want to return to permanently.
I am weeping & stomping my feet (what I do when I’m upset)…..and I don’t have to explain this, because I feel that there are many who are reading this post who feel the exact same way as me. You are so loved by so many in the HU community, & I can’t tell you how often you are thought of, spoken of, desperately missed, & SO THANKFUL TO GOD that he placed you there for a time.
The “house” was probably the one on Center that Mrs. Neal had lived in for many years…it was beautiful at one time (b/4 college guys began living in it!)…had a lovely sunroom on the front…she owned The Ideal Shop.
I’ll never forget seeing Megan as a toddler running down the hall…Diane chasing her…and hearing people ask how in the world that child could have so much energy. I’d taught special ed in NY, but seeing Megan as an infant/toddler/young child…seeing the difficulties progress…and seeing the joy she brought in spite of problems…gave me a different perspective from my classroom experience…and I’m thankful for it.
Me too, Annie. Maybe one of these days…
Mike, this “comment” page doesn’t have enough space to hold all of my thoughts, joys, frustrations, and memories involving you and your time here in Searcy as the pulpit minister at College church. It’s getting close to 20 years now since you left, and I STILL hear people talk very often about your impact and influence on the community, the church, and the University……over 18 years LATER! That is a powerful testimony in itself. You and Diane and your whole family were and ARE a BLESSING to us !
You’ve been here in spirit every day since the summer of 91. Every day.
And remember: “To everything there is a season”. I’m thinking there are still many seasons ahead !
Love ya’ll,
DU
Add me to the list of people thankful for your time at College Church and Harding. I didn’t realize that you were so young when you came! I do remember one of the girls in our class that Diane and Vicky taught telling Diane, “I think your husband is SO CUTE!” And Diane, a little shocked, saying, “Me, too!”
I also remember listening and even *relating* to your sermons as a young girl. God laid a foundation in my heart during those years. Thank you, Mike, and thank you to Diane, too.
Well, as the years have rolled on, speaking there has lost its importance to me. But the memories and the continued friendships are golden. Thanks so much.
Once upon a time, in a “church meeting” — not to be confused, in any way, with a meeting for worship — a beloved old sister turned to me and said, “What I want is the church I grew up in.”
i thought, “Arkansas. 1939.” What i said was, “Sister, i love that church. i’ve studied it closely, and i am always learning something from it. i enjoy remembering it and reading about it and listening to the stories that others remember — but i can’t be a member of that church, and neither can you, because it doesn’t exist any more. We have to be Christians where we are, with the sisters and brothers that God has given us, in the place where we are, and we have to follow Jesus here and now.”
“Precious memories . . . how they linger.” When i was young, i had what i have called a “pornographic memory” — i remembered everything. In some circumstances, encyclopaedic recall can be a blessing, but there is a reason why memory is, for most of us,
selective and fallible. We do not truly want to remember “everything.” There were many things that i had to petition God for the grace to forget, and i did forget them, mostly, once i had done the forgiving that i had to do. By the time, in the middle of life, when i truly “went to college” and then to graduate school, the prodigious memory of my youth was greatly diminished, and i was wishing for more recall than i then had. Now, in my age, my short-term memory is a sieve, yet i can still remember some things — but not “everything” — from 50 or 60 or more years ago with great clarity, and with some joy amid the rue.
In memory and in history there are people in places that we may visit, but we cannot live there with them — and, in truth, we could not. In their very “pastness” those people and places are frozen in time, beyond our reach. We, meanwhile, are moving on. We are not the same people that we were in 1939 or 1959 or 1969 or 1989. Thanks to be God!
Our experience, and the “wisdom” we may have derived from it, is cumulative and immensely useful, but it is not infallible. Were it possible, could we, “knowing what we know now,” revisit 1959 and rectify our mistakes or prevent some tragedy? Many people have thought so, and some have explored such a possibility in fiction, but no one has been permitted to try it out “on the ground.” The greater likelihood is that in revisiting what we’d like to fix we should cause something worse to happen. Memory can revive our pleasure and renew our grief; memory can make us wish for another place and time; yet if we attend to it memory can also teach us something about how to live in the here and now, one day at a time, continuing to learn.
God’s Peace to you.
d
Mike, remember what happened to Mosses when he had given up on speaking to his people.
Ditto, and Amen to the above statements of blessings and memories, and how you continue to impact us still. Love you, friend and brother.
Mike,
I have followed you silently for a number of years via your blog. I have Abilene, ACU connections which have also helped keep me informed on your journey. I just listened to the intro of your Heartbeat project with Landon and was pleased with what I heard.
I wanted to recommend a book. (I hate it when someone says “You just have to read …” but despite that!) I recently read “Hear Comes Everybody” by Clay Shirky. I was deeply impressed by the ideas he sets forth. I believe they relate well to your work and can inform and have application to church and outreach. Perhaps you have already read it.
Thanks for your faithfulness and courage.
George E
Paul’s early ministries in Damascus and Tarsus were, I’m sure impactful and special, as well as developmental–essential in the apostle’s growth and preparation for his larger impact via the Antiochian missions. So also your role in N.C. and Searcy were vital and special as the Spirit (rightfully) led you to Abilene, and now Heartbeat.
Perhaps our Lord will allow a pilgrimage back to “the holy land” near the foothills of the Ozarks some day. If not, welcome to an exile of grace “until the times of restoration and refreshment” arrive, and I believe those days are not far away.
Blessings and peace to you from our Lord. From a former HU contemporary….
Here’s how deep my Harding roots go: a close friend just texted me from Dallas saying he’d just met Jerry Jones at a hotel. And my first thought was NOT about the owner of the Cowboys!
Add me to the list of grateful people for your time in Searcy.
Mike, I was at Harding during your time at College church, although I was always out preaching at one of the little congregations in the area. The first time I heard you speak a young doctor from the congregation had just died. I had never been to the College church before, but could sense the sadness as I interacted with the people. I don’t remember much about the service, but I remember you giving a short sermon from one of the Psalms and feeling that God had given you just the right words for that particular moment and could sense that those words had impacted those around me as well. Of course that was only the first of many moments that I would feel that way. You made such a great impact on that church and the Harding community during your seven years and I am thankful that you and your family came to Searcy.
John
I am so thankful that you were there for my freshman year at HU – your last in Searcy. Peak of the Week and hearing you on Sundays was a lifeline for me. Thank you and amen to Annie’s statement as well.
Well, I’m certainly glad you came to Searcy!! What would our lives be without you and Diane? You’ve both been a blessing to both of us and we treasure our friendship. and oh yeah — Amen to Freda’s comment! Very well put.
I so understand you, Annie. btw-that thundering stomping you hear is those of us at Highland that are going through the same emotions and all the while, thanksgiving too for Mike, Diane and their kids!!!
OK–I just have to ask—for those of us not privy to HU “stuff”, why does it sound as if Mike will never go back there to teach, preach,inspire???
Beats me–I’m out of the loop.