NCNYUMC.ORG | From the Heart: Spiritual Fulfillment

What follows is brief salute to a man who was a student at Potsdam State when I was with the old Wesley Foundation there. That was 1962-1966. The man, now retired, is Bill Lewis.

Bill was in a typical undergraduate spiral downward when we met in a small seminar I ran, called The Christ College Of Lay Scholars. There, he found himself, and his God. He went on to become a teacher at the local high school, and the track coach. He produced an almost unparalleled winning track team from 1963-1974.

Much, much later, the track teams got together to celebrate their coach and the accomplishments of the team. I was invited to attend, but was in Florida at the time, and with Mrs. Halse ill, could not get there. So I was asked to write a tribute for inclusion in the book the team was producing to commemorate it all.

I called the writing, "A Quiet Ministry: In Tribute To Bill And Trish Lewis."

One can hardly miss being aware of the many theological arguments raging away in this nation (this was in 1996), much of it being carried on in an intense commitment to deliberate ignorance, and most of it treating people like spiritual robots, unable (so it is surmised) to think for themselves, and not to be trusted with anything except the Official Trust, which always seems to serve institutional purposes rather than the raw, compelling needs of authentic pilgrimage to God.

That guarantees that those who accept this approach will ever remain spiritual infants unless and until the forces of life we know so well cause major rethinking, experiences that can be as rewarding as it is catastrophic and difficult. Not many of these robots manage the experience well, if only because there's no one around to serve as authentic guide and encouragement.

The other approach to being a Christian at the end of this bloodiest century in the history of the planet is what I call a "A Quiet Ministry." It rests on little-noticed premises of the Gospel of Jesus Christ: each person is unique; each person has potentials within that wait to be fulfilled; each person, being a child of God, must be treated at all times as a person in the process of pilgrimage to God, regardless of circumstance.

These premises argue for careful thought, authentic love in all its dimensions, total commitment, prayer in all its dimensions, discipline of soul, mind, and body, personal integrity, and a passion for living.

One also must be modest (read: meek), and hence, teachable. I refer the reader to the Gospel of St. Matthew, Chapters 5, 6, and 7 for expressions of the inner character traits of such persons, and some of the remarkable things that happen when this is played out over the course of life.

In fine, I'm talking about the practised awareness of the Presence of God in life, with an emphasis on the word "practised."

All those who have been coached (and by that I mean "loved) by Bill and Trisha Lewis know exactly what I'm talking about. Their relationship in marriage exactly fits the conditions just described, so it's no surprise that those conditions would have also operated in their professional lives. We Christians have a curious, and to many people, uncomfortable way of being deliberate about making the abundant fruits of our commitment to God in Jesus Christ spill over into all the arenas of relationship in which we find ourselves: work, play, church, wherever. And it is done, above all, quietly, and modestly. As in Bill and Trisha Lewis.

For how else can such a ministry be conducted? With brass bands? Ego trips of monumental proportions? Seeking always to please, or placate? Seeking to win at the expense of the dignity of everyone involved? Win in ways which ensure that everyone involved, winners, losers, fans, families, are all losers?

Recently, in Florida, where and when we used to live in retirement before the hurricanes blew us back up north, the sports pages carried the story of a football coach who conducted his trade with foul curses, screaming and hitting at his players, insisting that the only thing in life that mattered was winning, at any cost. Any cost. He was fired from successive posts, the last being the post at a university to which he had long aspired.

All his teams were losers, no matter how grotesquely he treated them. They were abused and misused as persons, so there was no way they could win or lose with grace and poise.

So with the fountainhead of it all, the coach. When the news of his latest firing was received, he committed suicide.

In Christian terms, he worshipped the god of success at any price, and when the price became too high, his will to live collapsed. In fact, it could be said of him that he had died long before he died; or that spiritually, he was a zombie, a living dead person who never came to life in the first place.

The spiritual perspective mentioned above is lifted from a course I taught at the Wesley Foundation at Potsdam years ago. It was called, "Existence And Faith in the 20 th Century." The perspective is from the soul of a theologian named Paul Tillich, refugee from Nazi Germany in the 1930s, who came to this country. He wrote a book called, "The Dynamics Of Faith."

He presented the following statement, which is the heart of the course that Bill took, and mastered so well: your God is that to which you give your money, energy, loyalty, time, and thinking. You don't know whether that God is the Ultimate God, the God Who is above all the possible lesser gods of our making (such as winning at any price, or an ego that claims to be the center of the Universe, or any nation, official, corporation, church, armed forces, and so on), until you get into a crisis.

The word "crisis" comes to us from the ancient Greek language. There, it is spelled and pronounced KREE-SIS. It means, decision, or turning point.

When a crisis hits, if you are without energy, sprit, or strength or other resource with which to struggle with the dimensions of the crisis, that's when you know that the god to which you subscribe is less than Ultimate, and your priorities and values need reworking, re-ordering.

On the other hand, if in the crisis, you grapple readily with all its dimensions, that's when you know that the god which you subscribe is Ultimate.

In other words, when you're on the track of the Ultimate God (to Whom, incidentally, Jesus spent His entire ministry pointing), you'll have the needed resources to cope with anything life brings to your door. That's simple, but it's a lesson that's learned slowly, with good teachers, a modest sense of being a student, with experience and patience.

The fruits of all that follow as day follows night. Even the language has a way of getting turned upside down: one can lose, but win; one can win, but lose; one can lose, but lose; one can win, and win.

The reason we're gathered around the spiritual warmth known as Bill and Trisha Lewis is that they knew that winning races was hardly everything in life. It is more important to know how to lose in life, actually, because most of us, most of the time, lose. So for them, it was the integrity of the race, the full effort one gives to the experience, win or lose, that mattered.

From that point of view, when you won, you were sure not to lose; and when you lost, you were sure to win. Praise God, from Whom such blessings flow.

And now, I close this little effort with a personal note from Bill and Trisha to me. I offer the note as encouragement for those of you who are discouraged at not seeing things work out the way you had hoped when you began one project or another. I consider myself doubly blessed in that not only did I see the entire project completed; I also saw the Grace of God fully in play in infinite expressions. One can hardly hope for more in life. So to the note:

Little did we know that in 1962 when you offered to be my spiritual mentor in going through your course on "Existence And Faith In The Twentieth Century" that such a dynamic Track and Field community would evolve through 1963 - to 1974…and now a book written by one of my top athletes in those years!

This book is a testimony to the Ground on which our teams were built. Thank you for leading me to such an abundant life in both my coaching and marriage. Your guidance through that course and God's reaching out to me and touching me with His unconditional love have made it possible for me to be His coaching disciple at the Potsdam High School.

This summer's reunion brought the spirit that of that love back to me through the 75 team members from all over the country. It was a glorious event.

Frank - thanks so much for all you have given me through His grace, including the article in this book which explains it all.

Bill (and Trisha) Lewis.

Rev. Frank A. Halse, Jr. (ret)
15 Kimberly Lane
Apt. A2D
Mexico , New York 13114