Mabel Tubbs, racism, and church

October 23 2011Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins. Be hospitable to one another without complaint. As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. … so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. 1 Peter 4:8-11 (NASB)She had lived a good long time before I showed up in her life, 65 years. She cast one of the votes that made me the interim pastor of the Lake Don Pedro Baptist Church, five years after she helped start it. She was a widow, independent, and very good with people. When my Mama first met her she promptly declared her my American Mom, a challenge and responsibility she gladly accepted. She was one of the best things that ever happened to me in my life, she was a gift, someone who made me richer. She opened up her checkbook of life to me and my family and deposited an incorruptible wealth into our lives, enough to last us. In that she was Christlike. She was our Mabel TubbsI am surprised she didn’t quit our church. She had plenty of opportunity and reason to do so. Mabel was the first, and for a long time the only African American/ black member of our church. When it comes to racism Southern Baptists do not have a glorious history waiting until 1995 to officially denounce racist attitudes and practices of the past. When I arrived in 1984 our church wasn’t overtly racist, our founding Pastor, Lowell Barnes, would not have put up with it. But plenty of covert racism and insensitivity remained.Once, when a deacon proposed to have a “slave for a day” auction as a youth fund raiser, Mabel stood and with patience, humility, and love educated us. When she overheard another deacon talking about his “Nigger-stick” (base ball bat) in his truck she was deeply hurt, and I was livid. But she said, ”Now Pastor, before you go out and make a bigger mess …,” and she got me hooked into a long conversation, followed by a longer time of prayer that dripped with grace, forgiveness, and compassion. She didn’t leave, she didn’t throw in the towel, she made us richer as a church. She helped put us on the right footing. We might never know how much personal pain, frustration, and disappointment she put up with in order for us to be a church that loves people without giving any thought to the color of their skin or ethnicity. Mabel Tubbs wasn’t just a charter member of this our church, she is one of the stones of its foundation.There are many of you who did not have the opportunity to know her personally since God placed you into our church family, but I want you to remember what Mabel Tubbs did for us,she made us better, she left us richer. I pray we dare to follow in her footsteps, to understand the importance of belonging to a church, to be determined to make a difference, to live out of the security of Christ, to not easily be offended, to be quick to forgive, to serve with humility and faithfulness, and to above all love people – all people.We give glory to God, for the life and work of Mabel Tubbs among us.Love you, Pastor Hans