Category: Theology

Christianity, Culture, Justice, Modern Life, Ten Commandments, Theology, Theology and Life4 Comments

A Primer on Idolatry

Gary Furr

“WELCOME TO THE MUSEUM OF PRIMITIVE RELIGIONS!  Step this way and now look at the peculiar display on the subject of idolatry.  We modern people cannot comprehend how superstitious were the ancients, such that the Hebrews prohibited carving little statues and bowing down to them…” Since we religious folk have a 3,000 year old tradition and an ancient story crossing several cultures of the ancient world, I thought I would try to explain a word that seems so outdated and dull: idolatry.  The prohibition of it is one of the Ten Commandments, and so it would seem rather quaint for … Continue reading A Primer on Idolatry

Faith, Forgiveness, Hope, Love, Prayer, Reinhold Niebuhr, Theology2 Comments

Saved by Faith, Hope and Love

Gary Furr

For many years, I have pursued various ways of feeding mind, heart and soul early in the day, mostly to keep myself out of the very large ditches that erode the shoulders where I tend to drive.  This summer, free at last of a ton of outside pulls, I am undertaking a small daily discipline of a prayerful reflection on a quote, thought or scripture.  They’ll be short, and to be good to myself, I’ll do it every day unless I don’t, in which case, you’re on your own 🙂

It can be found at facebook, but thought I’d let my friends here know, and I’ll be back to the blog now, also.  My writing soul is starving from “doing.”    The daily quotes can be found on facebook.  Click HERE

Today’s reflection to kick it off is from Reinhold Niebuhr, about faith hope and love.  Thanks.

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Saved by Faith, Hope and Love

“Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. 
Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. 

Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we must be saved by love. 

No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness.” 
― Reinhold Niebuhr, The Irony of American History

I first heard this wonderful quotation from my friend Fisher Humphreys, Continue reading “Saved by Faith, Hope and Love”

Anger, Baptist life, Calling, Conflict, Disappointment, Grief, Holly Week, Jesus, Ministry, Spirituality6 Comments

Disappointing Others for God: A Reply to Elizabeth

Gary Furr

the One whom we follow disappointed every false expectation placed on Him, and purposefully, for the larger call of what God wanted of Him.  That is and always will be enough. Associated Baptist Press carried a piece Monday by Elizabeth Hagan entitled,“I Left the Church.  Don’t Hate Me.”  I recognized all the responses she received when she left the pulpit that five years before had become hers with such celebration.  I do think in the Baptist world that women in senior pastorates must face some pressures that a man in his 50s can’t comprehend.  Then again, I think we live … Continue reading Disappointing Others for God: A Reply to Elizabeth

Cancer, Faith, The Dillards, Theology, worldview

Pat Terry and the Eye of the Artist

Gary Furr

 If we learn to look at life with the eyes of the artist, we

will see an entire universe that is “a gift of mercy.”

Workshop
Pat pondering how to help a workshop participants song

It’s odd that a musical preacher who writes songs, cut his teeth and got called to ministry during the Jesus Movement of the 1970s would have met Pat Terry so late in life, but that’s the way life winds sometimes.  I had heard of the Pat Terry group back when he was starting out—Pat is just a bit older than me.  I heard his songs, but my musical journey got put on hold for a long time as marriage and children and years in graduate education and pastoral ministry took me in different directions.  I continued listening to music and playing and singing, sometimes in church and mostly by myself for my own pleasure.

Pat Terry, meanwhile, was on a journey of his own, too.  After many years, first in the very spontaneous and joyful Jesus Movement musical world, and then for a while in the increasingly industry-captivated contemporary Christian musical world, he moved on.  He had a good, long run as a commercial songwriter in Nashville, with a string of songs for many well-known artists like John Anderson, Travis Tritt, Kenny Chesney, Alan Jackson, Tanya Tucker and the Oak Ridge Boys.  He learned the Nashville craft and all the while continuing his own inner journey of writing from the heart.

So it was that a few years ago, Greg Womble, my friend and bandmate who plays the banjo publicly, and I, who play it out of earshot but love it, went to Atlanta to Continue reading “Pat Terry and the Eye of the Artist”

Bluegrass, Children, Christianity, Conflict, Culture, Forgiveness, Gospel music, Holly Week, Hope, humanity, Justice, Leadership, Love, Modern Life, Politics, Poverty, Race, Theology and Life7 Comments

Standing Up for Children in Birmingham, Alabama

Gary Furr

Several years ago, Dr. Penny Marler approached me about participating in a program where pastors might become

Rev. Arthur Price
Rev. Arthur Price

friends across differences—race, age, denomination—and learn from each other.  Rev. Arthur Price and I decided to make that journey together.  He is the pastor of historic Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, where, 50 years ago this fall, people driven by hate and fear set off a bomb that killed four little girls who had just prayed together.  The episode set off a national revulsion to the radical racists and helped put America in a new direction.

kthompson_PKDHAZ6R
Rev. Keith Thompson

Over the course of that few years, we became friends, Arthur much younger, a different personality, a native of the North, me a son of the South.  It was one of the richest experiences of my life, and it is documented on the website of the Resource Center for Pastoral Excellence.   (For more information about the project Rev. Price and I did together, click HERE)

One of the side blessings of that friendship was connecting our churches.  We visited each others’ deacons meetings, had our congregations together for fellowship, and continued our friendship by having breakfast together regularly over the years.  Last year, we began to talk together about doing something positive that would mark this anniversary by affirming that we are in a new day and that the faith community is part of that.  We were joined by another friend, Rev. Keith Thompson of First United Methodist Church downtown.

After the massacre at Newtown in December, our sense of commitment was heightened.  Whatever strikes at our Continue reading “Standing Up for Children in Birmingham, Alabama”