Voices In My Head Podcast Episode 262 - Guest William Willimon: Who Lynched Willie Earle? Preaching

Have you ever thought to yourself, man, I'd like to host my own podcast? Well, guess what? You can go to podbean.com/voices and get everything you need to create, manage, and promote your podcast. I use Podbean every week for Voices in My Head. There's easy uploading and publishing tools, stunning templates, custom domains, social and promotional tools, an embeddable podcast player, monetization tools, and more. It is your all-in-one podcasting solution. With Podbean, you can create professional podcasts in minutes without any programming knowledge. Best of all, everything is mobile ready right from the start. So go to podbean.com/voices, and when you sign up, use the code "voices" and you'll get a sizable discount. Podbean, for your home podcasting. Thank you for listening to Voices in My Head. Welcome to Voices in My Head, the official podcast of me, Rick Lee James. I'm a recording artist, a singer-songwriter, an author, a worship leader, and an ordained minister in the Church of the Nazarene. The Voices in My Head podcast is your source for discussions on music, literature, movies, pop culture, theology, and more. Now sit back, relax, and listen to the latest episode of the Voices in My Head podcast. And don't forget to let the voices in your head be heard by following me on Twitter @RickLeeJames and sharing your thoughts about today's show. Hello friends, and welcome back to Voices in My Head, the official podcast of Rick Lee James. As always, I am your host Rick Lee James, and I'm really glad that you are here with us this week. Ahead today, we have a really great conversation with just my favorite author, I think, of all time, especially when it comes to pastoral theology, Dr. William Willimon. You're going to hear more about that in just a moment. We really had a great conversation today, and it was such an honor to have him on my show. Just before we begin though, at the time of recording this podcast, which today is the 18th of April, we've got about 8 days left of my Indiegogo campaign where I am raising money to pay for my new album, which is already finished recording. The new album is called Thunder, and there's a couple different ways that you can go about actually donating to that album if you would like. And don't think of it as a donation as much as a pre-order of the album. We need to still raise about $4,000 for the album, and I'm trying to do that by asking you to pre-order the album in advance. It's in the process of being mixed and mastered, which means in the next several months here, hopefully before summer is over, I will be able to release the new album. You can go to rickleejames.com/thunder and find out all the information about that. It's very easy easy to give online. If you don't want to go through indiegogo.com, which you will find links for at rickleejames.com/thunder, there are ways on the site to show you how you can actually send a text message to 555-888. You can send the word "thunder," and from there you have an option to give as much or as little as you would like to the new album simply by sending a text. So I hope to have you with me on this project. It would be great to have you along. I think you're really going to enjoy the music that we recorded. It was such a pleasure to go to New York and record it in Old Bear Studios. Well, with that being said, we are going to get into our episode today. Such a thrill to have Dr. William Willimon on the show to talk about his book, Who Lynched Willie Earl: Preaching to Confront Racism, a book that I highly recommend to all of you, especially if you are a preacher or do any sort of work in ministry. And it is an insightful and very helpful book, and I actually would recommend any of William Willimon's books. Books to you. So go out there, hit Amazon or wherever it is you buy books from, and enjoy. All right, God bless you. Here's my interview with William Willimon. My guest today on Voices in My Head is the Reverend Dr. William H. Willimon. He is the professor of the practice of of Christian Ministry at the Divinity School of Duke University. He served 8 years as Bishop of the North Alabama Conference of the United Methodist Church, where he led 150,000— sorry, 157,000 Methodists and 792 pastors in North Alabama. For 20 years prior to the episcopacy, he was the Dean of the Chapel and Professor of Christian Ministry at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina. He is the author of over 60 books, including Resident Aliens, Thank God It's Friday, Word, Water, Bread and Wine, Worship as Pastoral Care, which was selected as one of the 10 most useful books for pastors by the Academy of Parish Clergy, and my personal favorite, What's Right with the Church? In 1996, an international survey conducted by Baylor University named him one of the 12 most effective preachers in the English-speaking world. Today I am so pleased to be welcoming Dr. William Willimon to the Voices in My Head podcast. Dr. William Willimon, welcome.

Thank you, great to be here.

Well, I have to admit, I don't get nervous often. I've done a lot of these podcasts, but you are one of my personal heroes when it comes to writers, and so I'm just, I'm just slightly nervous today.

Oh, don't be, don't be.

Well, I wanted to talk to you today about your very timely book, Who Lynched Willie Earle? Preaching to Confront Racism. But just before we go too far into that today, I want to thank you for what your ministry has meant to me personally as I've worked in the church over the last 20 years. The very first book that I ever read by you was What's Right with the Church? and it was assigned to me at Trevecca Nazarene University by my church history professor, and it's not an exaggeration to say that it completely changed my view of the church for the better. And your book— gosh— in many ways a big reason why I'm still in the ministry.

So I just— oh my goodness—

to thank you at the outset for that.

Thank you at the outset for your kind words. Thank you.

Well, this has been an interesting journey, I'm sure, for you as you have written this book, and I'm sure it's been fraught with dangers in many ways for a white person. And here we are in sort of another dangerous place today to white people talking about racism. And I almost feel like, wow, what, what would I ever really have to say in the midst of this? And you talk about in your book, the danger of speaking up as a white person, but also the dangers of not speaking up. And so it's— I'm sure it's been a very interesting journey for you. So what has sort of been— I think the book was released about a year ago, maybe a year and a half. What is that journey kind of been like for you as you've released a book like this? I'm sure that you've had both positive and negative feedback as you've kind of journeyed with this new book.

You know, um, the book is, is very personal in that it's, it's sort of part of it is a personal journey that I've made myself as a native South Carolinian born into a world of legal segregation watching and participating, at least in a minor way, in the dismantling of that world. And then to be from where I am and with my background, race is something one continues to deal with and grow through and learn from. And so that— so, so it's, you know, someone asked me how long did I work on this book, and I said, well, I think 70 years, uh, Salon. And, uh, however, it is ironic. Here I'm a white male Southerner, uh, writing on issues of race, and yet I try to make the case in the book who, who better to understand, uh, some of the ravages of racism, uh, to understand how pervasive it is in American life and mentality, and also to show people the way through some of that. I refer to myself not as someone who's been cured, delivered entirely of all racialized thinking, but as a recovering racist, which I think, like recovering alcoholics, I understand, you know, are always busy recovering. And that's me. When I did the book, I was sort of prepared for people to say— I had the help of some African-American friends in writing the book, and they saw it, and I said, come on, help me and give me a critique and all. Basically, I was prepared for, you know, some African Americans to say, hey, what is this old guy doing writing about this? Uh, old Southern white guy. Um, I, I didn't really have— I haven't received much of that. I haven't received hardly any of it. Um, rather, I've received encouragement. Uh, I've received expressions of, um, saying, I'm glad you said it. I'm glad you used your opportunity to get a book published and all to, to say these things. So that's been gratifying, and I tried real hard to admit to my own limitations as a white male in writing about these issues. On the other hand, having been a person of privilege, and part of my privilege was that I got to be in situations where I got to be delivered of some of my racism, uh, I felt a responsibility. I think that's what Christians kind of feel. If you're given something, that also means that you have an assignment to, uh, use that for the good of others. So I hope that's what I've done to some degree here.

Well, well, good. I'm glad to hear that. I, I actually listened to a podcast this week that you were on, and it was a long podcast, and, uh, it was, uh, I believe it was C-O-W-S, the Context of White Supremacy. And, and they got a pretty good raking over the coals for a couple hours on that show.

Uh, yeah, that, that was, that was my one experience there. I, I, at the end of the interview, couldn't quite figure out why they wanted to interview me because, um, the interviewer kind of dismissed me and the book in the beginning. Sure. And yeah, but it did show me that there's a huge amount of distrust. There's a huge— I tried to write this book as a Christian and I tried to address the book to fellow Christians unashamedly. In that particular interview, I— that didn't seem to play— the Christian faith didn't seem to play any role in how they read the book or how they read me or were thinking with me. So in a way, after an interview like that, you kind of walk away thinking, wow, Christians really are weird.

Yeah.

And we think about things differently and we're badly misunderstood by people who don't hold our commitments. It's true.

And it's true. And I remember thinking as I was listening to it, I thought, wow, you really held your composure very well throughout that whole time, because it was a very hostile podcast. But there was a real distinctive difference that I saw very clearly. And as you've written so many times, that the church, it really is this peculiar place in the world. And at the same time, while it was a little bit hard to listen to in some ways, because it seems so vitriolic in some ways towards you, it really in some ways gave me great hope for the gospel in the world, that the gospel really does bring about change in people's lives, and maybe it can cure us all of our racism. God, please help us, you know. And so, um, it was, it was interesting to hear that perspective on there, but I'm glad that every experience hasn't been that way.

Uh, yeah, in fact, uh, you're the only person I have met, uh, that I've heard from that actually listened to that interview. Uh, and I, uh, uh Yeah, I wondered, gee, did I waste 2 hours on a program that nobody listens to? But, uh, so I'm glad, glad that you listened to it.

Well, you know, I had a similar experience recently. I was invited onto, uh, like a far-right extremist talk show.

Oh my.

And I was kind of, uh, kind of ambushed and didn't realize what I was getting into until I got onto it. So I kind of, I kind of was like, boy, I, my interview only lasted for about 15 minutes. I can't imagine what you were going through for that.

Well, you know, um, In moments like that, I think, you know, being from South Carolina, I sort of knew from day one in my career as a Methodist preacher that you get talking about race, expect some conflict. And usually I expect the conflict to come from fellow whites who are having trouble talking about race, but sometimes conflict comes from from African Americans who have been so wounded in this discussion that it is really hard for them to have a conversation about it.

Sure, yeah, and that's very— something that all of us white Christians really need to take into account. And with that being in mind, let's just get into your book a little bit. For those who haven't read it, maybe you could start by just explaining for us a little bit who was Willie Earle and what drew you to his story.

Yeah. Uh, Willie Earle was a young man, uh, from Greenville, South Carolina, my hometown, who, uh, was implicated in a murder of a cab driver, a robbery, and then the cab driver later died of his stab wounds. Thomas Brown, uh, in a little town outside of Greenville, uh, South Carolina, uh, and he, Willie Earl, was going to visit his mother who lived over in Liberty, South Carolina, uh, and, uh, he was, uh, jailed the day after Thomas Brown's, uh, stabbing and all, and put in jail. He wasn't charged with anything. He was jailed and awaiting charges. And while he was in jail, the first night he was in jail, a group of predominantly cab drivers in Greenville, South Carolina got to drinking, and they gathered, and they saw themselves as avenging the death of their mate. And so they— a caravan of taxis went from Greenville, South Carolina to Pickens, South Carolina, where Willie Earl was being held in the jail. They, they brought him out of jail with no resistance on the part of the jailer, and they took him a few miles outside of Pickens, between Pickens and Greenville, and they horribly tortured him and murdered him. And then someone called the African American funeral home and said there's a body out on Bramlett Road. And that began the story of the lynching of Willie Earl. South Carolina, the South Carolina white establishment— of course, the establishment was all white— reacted about, "This is a terrible event. We're going to bring these people to trial." The people sort of bragged about— the lynchers bragged about their role in it, and very quickly, 20-something confessions were gotten from the lynchers. To make the story of that shorter, they were tried a couple of months later., and an all-white jury exonerated all of them. Uh, and it was an international event. This was right after— this was in 1947, the year I was 1 year old in Greenville. And, uh, it was an international event. Uh, America having fought a war against the Nazis, uh, you know, it was embarrassing that here we had this racial extrajudicial and violence, uh, right here at home. And so, uh, that, uh, my story is that I never heard of the lynching of Willie Earl, uh, even though it occurred from a group in my hometown and the trial was held in my hometown. I never heard of it till I was a sophomore at Wofford College. And that, that was how my story with Willie Earl began.

Hmm, that's fascinating. And, and, you know, I wasn't thinking about it earlier, and I read the book a while back, but just reminded me of it just now thinking of we're coming out of that World War II era where, you know, we were fighting against what appeared to be this amazing form of racism against the Jews. And, and to think that we had this own, uh, sort of— it's still really stitched into the fabric of our nation from the very beginning.

Deeply, deeply.

And, uh, and it really is— it makes it so difficult at times to have the conversation because of that.

Yeah.

Yes, sir.

And the narrative that was told in Greenville, uh, as I asked questions and uncovered it and all, was, uh, Oh, that, that was done by these taxi drivers, these poor, uneducated redneck people. They did that. That really wasn't Greenville. That was a group of hicks who did this. And, you know, there was some truth to that. However, in the subsequent trial, which was conducted by some of the great legal luminaries in the town of Greenville, Uh, in the subsequent trial and the acquittal of all these confessed lynchers, uh, the lie was sort of given to that reasoning. Uh, no, uh, the, the racism that produced the lynching was the racism that also acquitted the lynchers. And so, like you say, this is deep in the fabric. And the fact that it was hushed up in Greenville history and lore. You know, it is a continuing working out of— I agree with my friend Jim Wallace, who calls race our America's original sin, and that continues.

Well, with that being the backdrop of the story, We enter in an unlikely character maybe for many, and especially with the conversation we just talked about that you had, someone that may seem irrelevant, but there's this preacher named Holly Lynn that is in the Greenfield community. I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about his role in this story.

Well, that was the role that I focused most on. One, I'm a Methodist preacher. There was a young preacher in the town of Pickens who woke up the morning after the lynching to news of that right here in little Pickens, South Carolina, a prisoner was taken out of the jail and tortured to death. He woke up to that and he was appalled. And he was also appalled at the reaction of some of his fellow citizens who said, Well, that wasn't done by people in Pickens, that was done by some Greenville taxi drivers. Uh, Hawley Lynn was, uh, this was really his first church that he had served in the little town of Pickens, population of about 4,000 people. Uh, his church, Grace United Methodist, Grace Methodist Church, wasn't United Methodist then, but Grace Methodist Church, the building burned 3 months after he was sent there. So they were meeting in the agricultural classroom of the local high school. Uh, on top of that, Hawley Lynn's wife, uh, died giving birth to their first child that fall. So here's a young preacher, his first church, uh, the church had burned down, his wife had died in childbirth. Well, uh, on— in that February, he woke up and to a a lynching. And Hawley Lynn immediately— and I think it's all the more amazing because of his circumstances— Hawley Lynn, who was a white man, grew up poor white in South Carolina, a recent graduate of Yale Divinity School— Hawley Lynn immediately organized a meeting of public spirited citizens for the purpose of drawing up a statement to roundly condemn the lynching. And, you know, sadly, in 1947, the public-spirited citizens who were convened were all white. But he convened a group of people, and it was a well-attended meeting. But about 15 minutes into the meeting, a group of whites from a nearby town of Dacusville barged into the meeting and started shouting racial epithets and saying the county ought to give these men an award for getting rid of a criminal. And so very hastily the meeting was disbanded, and Hawley was advised, hey, you tried, you did your best. These are long-term attitudes that won't be eradicated overnight. And you, you— well, Hawley went right back home to his little daughter who was asleep in her crib, uh, watched over by some church women. And, um, Hawley began work on a sermon, and he preached that sermon a week or so later. And the title of the sermon was 'Who Lynched Willie Earl?', and it was preached in the agriculture room of the high school. And in the sermon, Hawley begins— he begins by thanking the church for their wonderful freedom of the pulpit and how he thinks this is a great thing about being a Methodist, that we can disagree but we cherish our freedom of the pulpit. And I have to laugh a little bit as a preacher because that's often the way we preachers get into a tough sermon. And then he said, Now the question for today is, who lynched Willie Earl? Who did this terrible deed? And then he said— he paused for effect and said, oh, we know who lynched Willie Earl. They've made confessions. It's a group of citizens from another county. Uh, and then Holly Lynn says, uh, no, who lynched Willie Earl? We You and I, the white people who have put up with racial segregation, the people who've turned away Africa, uh, Black people, uh, Negroes was the word he used, from the ballot box, the people who have looked the other way, the people who've told racial jokes. And in that way, it was a remarkable sermon, a remarkable Homiletical display. And, uh, I took that as the title of my book because, uh, as far as I could tell, a precious few sermons were preached by white preachers that week about the lynching. I could only find one, a Baptist preacher in nearby Spartanburg, South Carolina, uh, and, uh Even though very just about no white Christians spoke out, there were a lot of white people who, like Strom Thurmond, the governor and all, who said things like, "Well, this lynching has marred our beautiful record of race relations, and we want to bring these people to trial and see that justice is done." But very few people were like Holly, who said, uh, this lynching is horrible and it's part of a whole social fabric. It is part of our history. Uh, this— it's part of us and we need to acknowledge that.

So it was rather remarkable. Yeah, and maybe we could step out of the book for just a second, just even hearing about what you just addressed there, because I, um, I did a sort of an informal poll this last week, knowing that I was getting ready for this conversation. And I just went on social media into a couple of different groups. One of them was a pastor's group. One of them was just a group of laypeople who I trusted, who are pretty well read. And but I came away with a few different conclusions of this poll. I asked a few questions that were about, you know, how many times over the last year would you estimate your pastor has preached on addressing racism in some way or another? And the first thing that I learned from this experience was, wow, do I have a lot of white friends, you know, because, because even the, the, the ones who even would answer, and most of them in this these rooms on Facebook, and most of them who I'm even acquainted with online, and even in my real life, if I'm going to be perfectly honest, the vast majority of them are people like me. They're white people. Yeah. And so it kind of confronted me with that because I, you know, I want to consider myself— I'm a pretty woke person, you know. I need to be thinking more deeply about that. But that was the first thing. So I wondered, in asking these people who I realize, you know, we're all a bunch of white folks. How many of you had sermons over this past year? And let's see if I can find my numbers real quick. It was a real quick poll, but I think I found, just looking at like the numbers of people in one group in particular, it seemed like churches with pastors over 45 the age 45, didn't mention race at all or very little. But many of the churches, if not most of the churches under 40, did. And I tallied a group of sermons from, from 28 people in one particular group, and it seemed like about over a year of those 28 people, which would be Sundays, you know, over, over 1,000 Sundays, there were only about 31 sermons. That had to do with this. So all that is to say, as I'm thinking through this— and there were some people that even just in my asking the question got very combative about it, it seemed like— um, I started thinking, I wonder how we measure up today, all these years later. Are we better? Are we worse? Are we just the same? And so I guess the question I'm leading to, to ask you, comparing what you're seeing in preachers that you work with and— and preachers that, as you were a bishop, and so you got to interact with a lot of different ministers there too. How do you think the white preachers of today are measuring up on this compared to Willie Earle as far as addressing racism, which seems to be becoming more and more clear all the time in our nation again?

Well, first of all, commend you for your initiative. I say in the book that white people get nervous when the talk turns to race and preachers, the studies show, and I've quoted a couple of studies, what you found out in your sampling seems to be very typical. This is a social sin that very few white preachers tackle. Much more typical would be for a preacher to talk about world hunger or to talk about gun violence. Race is down the list. So it continues to be a conversation very difficult for us to have, and I think it I was asked recently in a presentation at Clemson University, "Don't you think we've made progress in this area?" And I quoted Obama as saying, "Yeah, of course we've made progress." And in fact, to deny that we've made progress is to deny the witness, the work that has been done by a lot of courageous people. Good people. On the other hand, racism is— I say in the book, it's kind of like toxic waste. You clean it up and then you cover it up, only to have it bubble up from time to time in unlikely places and infect the water supply, etc. Racism, white racism, is resilient, and It is a factor in just about everything we do. So I think we've made progress, but it still requires an amazing amount of courage and skill to talk about race today. One of the reasons I wrote the book was after the Charleston massacres, at Mother Emanuel Church, I sent emails out to some of my former students at Duke Divinity School and I asked them, "Hey, what did you preach on the Sunday after the massacre? Could you send me a copy of your sermon?" And I wrote about 12 or 13. I was really gratified that like 8 to 10 of them definitely explicitly dealt with that horrible event in their sermon the next Sunday. So that— I was impressed by that. I mean, one would wonder how in the world you could avoid, but a lot of preachers did avoid. And another thing I was impressed with was the wonderful resourcefulness in dealing with this. A number of the preachers confessed, "Hey, I was brought up in a house where I heard the N-word used at least every day." "Hey, I was brought up among people who didn't think they were racist, but if you looked at who our friends were and where we were," and all, and they found a way to talk about it. So I thought, well, Gee, I'd like to write a book that would give particularly white preachers the means, some insights, and the courage to speak up and speak out on race, and particularly to give a witness that says Jesus Christ makes possible, even for people with our racial history and with our racial biases and all, even for people like us to tell the truth. About race. Jesus Christ is that good.

Wow. And you know what, I, I think you're right on that. And I do want to ask you a couple of preaching questions while we're here. But, you know, I think you're right that Jesus Christ is that good. And it kind of gives me chills in this moment that we're talking about it. And if someone ever asked me anymore how I know or why I believe I believe that Jesus is resurrected and why I believe he's actually broken out into the world and is doing things in our midst. I have to look at people like John Perkins or James Cohen, Michael Eric Dyson, and people like that who have every right in the world to be the most bitter, angry, and honestly, um, they could be, uh, quite hateful and, and could cause a lot of harm. In the world because of things that had been done to them in the name of race. And yet, as I, as I read them, as I listen to them, as I see what, what these amazing Black men have experienced in their life, to me they are evidence of Jesus in the world because of the way that they confront this with such grace, with such love, with such mercy, and the way that they really are about healing reconciliation.. And, um, I, I think to me there's no greater evidence of Christ being set loose in the world and that Easter is real than what we preach about in these words of truth. And it's, it's no thanks to us, as you say. It's, it's Jesus who's that good. And I, I really appreciate the way you stated that a moment ago. Well, I'm—

I love the way you say that. I, um, this is a prejudiced Christian statement. I mean, the only kind you'd expect me to make, but, uh If you don't believe in a God who forgives, if you don't believe Jesus Christ is Lord and the truth about God, that is reality, I just don't know what you're gonna do about race because I think it is so deep and pervasive and infects everything we do.— and is such a part of all of our histories, I just, I don't know there's any hope. And I can understand somebody looking into our racial truth and becoming pessimistic and despairing. Coates comes to mind, Ta-Nehisi Coates. He's very pessimistic, and I can understand that. He's not a Christian. And, um, however, what I don't understand is the fact that you meet African Americans who are not despairing and who are not so embittered that they cannot function. I think that's amazing, and it's often a tribute to a gracious God that enables us to be more than we could be on our own. And so again, in my book, I really tried to think like a Christian about it and to say that here's how Christians think about this, and also to realize the gift You know, if you're a white Southerner, uh, male like me, uh, uh, at my age, uh, I, I don't know how you go on on this subject. Uh, you can lie, you can get into denial, you can get upset when people bring it up, you can beg people not to mention it, which is what a lot of my fellow white people do. Uh, or you can believe Jesus Christ is Lord. And that he enables us to tell the truth about ourselves, and we don't have to lie, and we don't have to hide and deceive.

So, well, in many ways, this book is a book about preaching and the power of preaching, and I just love to ask you this question: What role do you think preaching can play in changing hearts and creating change when it comes to race-related issues?

I think preaching, uh, one, it can, it can keep pointing to Jesus Christ, uh, as in a sense the solution to our problems. It, it can keep letting people know God is not who maybe you thought were taught God was. God is not a God of white supremacy, of white privilege. God is not a God that where racial signifiers mean anything to this God and to this God's kingdom. But I think you can say more than that, to say that God is power, God is power of forgiveness, God is the God of resurrection, new beginnings, that there's just all sorts of reasons why Black and white people should not be talking to each other or working together. Yet we believe Jesus Christ enables that. In fact, the church has a kind of mandate, responsibility to confess our sin when 11 o'clock is the most segregated hour of the week, and to look for ways to see Jesus Christ at work in our gatherings. And all. But back to preaching. I think preaching can help people rethink things. I mean, one of the reasons I think what I think about race is I've had privileges of hearing people explain to me things. I quote from one preacher who in his sermon gave his congregation a little history lesson in white and black and how structures like the VA loans, Social Security, etc., from the very beginning were set up racially. And how— and you wonder what effect that has on people. I can imagine people saying, gosh, I never heard that. Hmm, I'll have to rethink that. Then I think it's important for preachers and sermons to find ways to reiterate that the United States of America is not the kingdom of God. There's a difference. And the ways we've set up things and the ways we've organized the economy and structures, that's what we did. That's not God-ordained. And so, so reminders like that can occur in preaching. One more thing. Preaching can be a time of confession, a time of testimony. And in my book, uh, there's a good bit in my book about me, even though I don't think preachers ought to talk about themselves in sermons too much, uh, but my story of how I once was blind but now I see, uh, I once was, uh, uh, uh, complicit in these structures and in ways I didn't even know. And, uh, but I've been free. And so you become kind of an illustration of what God can do.

So yeah, well, that's, that's powerful. And as I think about it, there are ways that we are complicit, things we don't even think of. One of my good friends, uh, he lives here locally. His name is Randy Smoot. He might listen, so I'm going to say his name But he's a Black friend that has taught me a lot and has helped me see a lot that I didn't see before. Things like, he said, you know, it's interesting, you can't even buy a Crayola box of crayons without in some ways being complicit, because what do they have in there? Flesh-colored crayons. Yeah, it's the color of a white person. Or a Band-Aid, it doesn't look like your— my skin, it looks like your skin, you know. So there's all kinds of things that I would just never have even considered before. And, and I, I think you're right. I think the preaching can awaken us to that. With that being— oh, sorry.

No, I'm— and I think I say in the book that I think for most of us, friendship is one of the best ways to, uh, that we've been delivered of some of this, uh, in churches that want to do something about it. I said, if you're an all-white church It's not good enough to read a book and have a conversation among yourselves. You got to get some African American bodies in the room. Sure. Uh, uh, people who can give testimonial and help you see things that we can't see on our own. It's part of the nature of white— whiteness that we don't think we're raced. We don't think we're white. I mean, that's just part of the name. We think kind of we're the standard, we're normal. And everybody else is African American or Asian American or, you know, well, it sometimes good friends can help us see that things we take for granted as kind of quote normal are not the norm. They're the way, their privileges and all that we have been given that we didn't earn that need to be acknowledged.

Sure, yeah, definitely. And I come at this at a bit different angle. I appreciate good preaching, and I feel like it can be very transformative in our lives, but I'm a music pastor, and most of what I do is proclaiming through music. And you've taught me a lot through your writing. You're probably one of the first to bring to my attention years ago that worship is way more than just music. And one thing that I have really taken from, from you and writers like you and people who have been faithful as ministers over the years is the importance of the communion table and the sacrament. And as I think about what might be a path forward, I know I try to write a lot of music that is very sacramental in nature so that we can have things to sing about that are worth singing around the table. And I wanted to to ask you, not just preaching as a mode that I think can be transformative, but how do you think the sacrament of communion in itself, do you think that can play a role in the healing of race divisions in the church, and if so, how?

You know, I do. May I just before then though say, The fact that you're a music pastor, music minister, and that you're interested in this subject, I think that says a lot. I remember a study I read of multiracial congregations, and they were talking about all the factors— openness and good communication and all being important— but music is the most important. In fact, I remember noting that in, in most predominantly white churches, the only connection with African Americans is music. The choir will sing a spiritual every now and then or something. I know of a church in South Carolina that a former student of mine was sent to try to resurrect and all. Well, they had me down there and I said, gosh, it looks like you're really doing a turnaround here. And he said, well, you're gonna find out the key to that turnaround. They hired an African-American woman, musician, piano player, singer, who performed in bars and nightclubs and things. She— they have her in the middle of the chancel area and with a piano. And she just starts playing the piano on Sunday morning, a little before 11, plays at 9 and 11, and then starts singing. And then we'll say, y'all know this one, join in with me on this one. And she basically runs the whole service, conducts it. And the preacher at a certain point stands up and preaches. But he said, uh, we were a totally white congregation, we're now about 20% African-American. We're going to keep moving on that. She is the key. And so music for that was a bond there. Music was a door in. Uh, so, uh, I think it's interesting that you as a— and, and you as a choir director, I mean, uh, when you're directing a band or a choir, uh, orchestra, uh, what's your job? Your job is to get everybody on the same notes. And everybody playing together. And so I'd like to claim, name that and claim it as a great gift that church musicians have.

If you don't mind me interrupting just a moment too, when you talk about getting everybody on the same note together, I also think it's interesting that music actually does provide a way for us to speak about diversity too, because if we only sang the same note, if we didn't have those harmony notes too in there. When we think about the different notes that we sing that actually bring some real color and life to music, right? Um, how boring would it be if it was just one note? It sounded like the whole time, but I think that there's— I think that might be also another way for us to talk about it in some ways, is the idea that we really do need each other to make this beautiful song together that we're making.

And to, um, I remember teaching in Germany one summer, and I ran into a black gospel choir from an American Air Force base. And the chaplain was telling me, he said, I tell you, we could be in a different German church every Sunday. These Germans just eat up gospel music sung by African-Americans. And he said, he said, it just feels like people are starved. And, and, and they say, you know, after our concerts, I've been taken to a spiritual depth here in this music that I have never been to before. And by the way, I'm a classical violinist. And so, yeah, I bet we could spin out all kinds of analogies and insights from music back to preaching. No, you're talking about the Lord's Supper. Uh, it is interesting, Paul in 1 Corinthians, where he gets into the Lord's Supper, uh, he's obviously dealing with a church that has got terrible divisions. Uh, reading between the lines, I think probably divisions are due to kind of, uh, economic differences and all, uh those who get off work early like rich people do, um, they, they start the Lord's Supper early and then all the food's consumed. So, but when the poor members get there, it's all gone. So in 1 Corinthians, he, he, he gives some meals for etiquette, and, but he says there, don't, don't you know that all of you, uh, even though you're different, many, you become one. It's, it's one loaf we all eat from. It's one table, one Lord. Uh, so the Lord's Supper, by its very nature, maybe like any meal, uh, is, is, is unifying. I've got a sermon saying, uh, white segregationists were absolutely right to segregate, uh, dime store lunch counters because they knew if you invite somebody to your table, if you sit down and have a meal with them, you got to recognize their humanity. They're just like you. They're a, they're an animal. They're a creature. And so I've heard that in multiracial churches there's great stress on music as a unifying factor. But I've also seen a factor being the Lord's Supper, the Eucharistic worship, as being a unifying factor. And In fact, I wouldn't want to make this case in a book on preaching and racism, but in fact, I think one could make a good case, hey, if you really want to minister to our racial divides, go with music, or go with Eucharistic sacramental worship before you go with reasoning and ideas and intellectual discourse in a sermon. And I think there'd be a lot of truth in that.

Hmm. Well, and I think the table— there are so many analogies to draw from that, but I found it especially helpful in music to write songs. I've even made a music video with a song called The Invitation. And I think Wesley is unique, and you would probably know better than I would if I need correction on it, but I think Wesley was unique in the sense that he really believed that the communion table could be a place of spiritual awakening too, and a place of conversion. Absolutely. And I think it's a beautiful thing if we can hold out this idea of come to the table that our Lord is hosting, and come and be a part of this meal together where we all are on equal ground. We come with empty hands, we come with open hearts, and we come together to have this hideous monster called racism torn away from us so that we can sit at a table together. So I think there's so many tools, whether it's preaching, whether it's music, whether it's the table altogether. I just think there's so much that the church has that is, as you've said before, peculiar to offer in this conversation about race that, that I think we, we really could be a voice for change in the world if we would just take advantage of the power that's there at our disposal.

You know, absolutely. And it is the power of the Holy Spirit. And, uh, the passing of the peace on Sunday morning, uh, uh, can— you know, I mean, Jesus says if, if you're headed toward the altar and got your gift and Remember, there's a division between you and your brother or sister. Put your gift down. You're not ready to come to the altar. You go make peace, then you can come back. Well, that's an amazing requirement for faithful worship. And so in a sense, in worship on Sunday morning, in making peace with one another, passing the peace, in gathering around the Lord's table, We're making believe. I mean, we're acting our way into a different way of living. We're, we're, we're trying out some new patterns that can bring fruit in everyday life. So, yeah, it, it, it is key. I do think preaching has— keeps pointing to that mystery and that wonder and keeps holding out to people You can be different. One of the things I encountered, a lot of preachers who have their heart in the right place and care about these issues, they don't talk about race from the pulpit because they're frightened about saying the wrong thing. And I say to those preachers, well, get you an African-American preacher friend who can— and you can say, I'm thinking about preaching this. What do you think? And I'm thinking about a student of mine who thought I had the best sermon based on the Good Samaritan about race and how we've got to be the Good Samaritan. We've got to take a risk. We've got to reach out. We've got to use our resources to help people. Well, he tried that out on an African-American friend, and his friend said, Uh, you know, Black people, we get tired of being portrayed as the wounded, helpless, bleeding person in the ditch. Uh, Martin Luther King said the American church is the wounded one dying in the ditch, and the African-American church, uh, has the opportunity to be the salvation of the American white church in the ditch. We got to risk, we got to reach it. Well, and he said, I completely flipped the sermon and I portrayed African Americans as, you know, we're going down for the third time in our country. We seem helpless to be able to help ourselves on race. And we look down that Jericho Road and here comes that African American that you work with in your office. Sit down with them. Say to them, "I would love to hear your story. Tell it to me. I have struggled with this, and I was raised this way, and I am trying to get free of that. Can you kind of help me?" And so, I think I would say God has given us what we need to address this issue, but it often requires reaching out and asking for help. And if white Christians can see ourselves not as the strong, resourceful givers of aid, but the ones who are in desperate need of receiving some aid, uh, so—

Yeah, and that's a powerful thought. And just in case any pastors are listening to this and you're thinking, well, I don't know what I'd say, there's nothing relevant to talk about— well, even this week we had You know, the incident at the Starbucks in Philadelphia where two men who were black were arrested because they were waiting on a friend to come. And I could probably point to 100 other examples even just locally around me in Ohio where I live. And I just think that there's so much for us as Christians to speak into the world. And I think if we're even just faithful biblically to try to, you know, as you've said before, hide behind a big Bible, you know, there's enough there to help us confront these things in the world. I really do believe that. Well, me too. You've sat with me today for nearly an hour, and I have so appreciated it.

And well, thank you.

And I feel like this is, this is such an important book, Who Lynched Willie Earle: Preaching to Confront Racism. So I want to recommend it to all my listeners. And really, I'd recommend any book you've ever written. I've never been disappointed by one.

Oh, thank you. Thank you.

And I wonder if, first of all, before I read my closing statement today, is there anything that you feel like I haven't touched on in this conversation that maybe you feel like is important that maybe we should? I always want to ask my guests that before we kind of shut our time down. Or is there any new project that you're working on right now you'd like people to know about or anything like that?

Um, no, this has been a great wide-ranging interview. Uh, now I'm working on a, uh, a preacher's memoir of, of my time as preacher and some of the things I think I've learned. And, and so that's kind of what I'm working on now. But, uh, again, I think kind of the most interesting thing about me is what God has managed to do with someone with my limitations and my background and my— I feel like a kind of testimonial to the transformative grace of God, but I'm still in process, still moving on to perfection, as Wesley would say. Yeah.

Well, I know that we all are, but I thank you for your time today. I just want to read this closing thought, and I hope you won't be offended, it's not from your book, it's actually from John Perkins, but I think it—

Oh, you can never quote too much John Perkins.

I think it has a lot of relevancy to what we're talking about. And so if listeners are wondering, this is from a book I'm almost finished reading by him right now called Dream With Me. And he says in that book, he says, 1 John 3:18 reads, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth. We can pass lofty sounding laws and give speeches about tolerance all day long. We can boast about how we have black or white, Native American or Persian friends, but as long as we do not worship together, it is only talk. Segregation in the church inhibits love, which is the gospel. How can we expect God to break down walls and be present among us when we will not do the same and be present among one another? That was John Perkins from Dream With Me. Powerful stuff. Well, Dr. William Willimon, thank you so much for your generosity and your time today, and thank you for being one of the voices Voices in My Head this week.

Well, thank you.

Thank you for joining me here this week on The Voices in My Head podcast. I hope you'll visit me on my website at rickleejames.com. Follow me on Twitter @RickLeeJames. Like my artist page on Facebook at facebook.com/rickleejames. And keep up to date on what I'm writing at my author page on amazon.com. Make sure to follow my calendar on the website, and if you would like to have me I come to your town to do a concert, a speaking engagement, or a book event, you can book me through my website by clicking on the link for Pare Booking Agency. That's P-A-R-E Booking. And finally, it would mean the world to me if you were to leave me a review of this podcast on iTunes. The more positive reviews that we receive, the more visible this podcast is on the internet. And now the benediction: May the God of peace who raised Christ from the dead, strengthen your inner being for every good work, and may the blessing of God Almighty, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, rest upon you and dwell within you this day and forevermore. Amen.