The Curious History of James Millikin and My Childhood Home

My sandbox stood on property once owned by James Millikin. I was standing on his property in my backyard, and most of the familiar streets and residences I remember from my childhood and youth.

The original owner, who purchased it with 629 acres in at the Federal Land Office in Danville, Illinois, was then future founder (along with Anna, or Annie, as he liked to call her), of Millikin University. The federal patent could take some time to receive in those days, Franklin Pierce was President, but purchased on May 10, 1854 was duly recorded, and patent was issued on March 1, 1855. Purchased for 1.25 per acre. He had already sold a 73-acre portion of his near $800 purchase to Josiah Hunt, Chief Engineer for the Great Western Railroad, on October 30, 1854, for $300 cash and a stipulation that "provided the Great Western Rail Road Company shall establish a depot near the center of the south line of the premises herein conveyed.” Bement's first railroad station was built as his location specified. Mr. Millikin sold an additional 80 acres for $1 to the railroad. 

Mr. Millikin was just one of several investors who were able to purchase property along the former Northern Cross Railroad, the bold (but ultimately doomed) attempt to develop infrastructure through the Internal Improvements Act of 1837. A railroad was proposed to begin at Quincy and proceed west to the Indiana state line. The railroad line route was surveyed in 1838-39. A twelve-mile line between Meredosia was built, but the economic panic of 1837 stopped progress. By 1842, the state had built the line from Springfield to Jacksonville. After 10 years of woeful operation, the state sold the original line to Nicholas H. Ridgley, who paid $21,000 for it, which had cost the state $750,000 to build. Ridgley and his partner, Thomas Mather, would rename the railroad the Sangamon and Morgan Railroad Company, and it would connect Springfield to Decatur in 1854. By 1853 the road was renamed the Great Western Railway. 

Land purchased by Lucius Wing of Charlemont, Massachusetts, Joseph Bodman and Henry Little of Williamsburg, Massachusetts, and James Millikin was purchased by Josiah Hunt to form the original town of Bement. Hunt was also involved in the development of other towns along the railroads, including Mattoon, Litchfield, Fairmont, Catlin, and Cerro Gordo. Each sold portions to Hunt between October 1854-January 1855. It was Hunt who laid out the streets, alleys and gave the public park property for church or school. Since each landowner negotiated with Hunt at different times, it is probable that the four "founders" never met face-to-face beyond with Hunt himself negotiating on behalf of the Great Western Railroad. Only the Bodman family remained in the area.

 Anecdotal stories have a tendency to become "fact" while the historical record is filed away in government offices. The lore of Mr. Millikin's investment in Bement's development as a railroad town, including the placement of its first railroad station, became "history" in which a portion of his later fortune had been acquired from his land purchase of (or near) Bement. 

There is no record of James Millikin visiting Bement. In 1856, he arrives in Decatur, as Anna Aston has settled with her father and mother, Rev. Samuel Aston and Hetty (Bartlett) Aston on a farm that stood at the northeast corner of Harryland and Turpin roads. Samuel would die at the farm in November 1856 of "lung fever," an old description for pneumonia. James, age 30, would ride out with Rev. E. W. Thayer, pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Decatur, to marry Anna on January 1, 1857, at the farm. As part of their honeymoon, the Millikin's traveled from Decatur to Council Bluffs, Iowa, as Mr. Millikin later recalled, where the couple stayed with various families just setting out farms in western Iowa, and inspected and surveyed his other federal land purchases in the area. It is during this trip that Anna Millikin ties her handkerchief to the wheel of the buggy and counts the revolutions to measure the land while James Millikin watched a compass to keep the wagon going straight north. After opening the bank on Merchant Street in 1860, Mr. Millikin gradually sold his land holdings, acquiring the fortune of $75,000. 

I never knew as a child that my childhood home was once part of a federal patent received by James Millikin of Danville, Vermillion County, Illinois. I did not know of this connection even while attending Millikin University! The original street names given by Josiah Hunt on his village of Bement plat filed January 1, 1855, still include "Bodman" and "Wing" today. But not Millikin, or even James. The railroad station was later built at another location, west of town where the Chicago and Paducah Railroad ran along. Village historians would recall Wing, Bodman, and Little as "founders" of Bement. They would recall Edward Bement's promise to donate a bell to the first organized church in the village. A pledge left unfulfilled due to Edward Bement's death but redeemed by the Wabash Railroad for the village's centennial in 1955. 

I now wonder if there are other communities in Iowa and Illinois that James Millikin once had property. Is he mentioned as part of their history? Or is he, like the village lore of Bement, a silent "founder" who saw what the railroads could do for a village, invested along its surveyed route, and received a due profit in selling land for another man's dreams?

Thirty years on...

 

Richard Wayne Butterick, 1963

When you died, George H.W. Bush was President of the United States. We had completed Operation Desert Storm in February. The Soviet Union still existed. The Dow Jones Industrial 30 topped 3,000 for the first time. Something called the World Wide Web was launched and Microsoft.com. Many people said when gasoline prices get over $1.50 per gallon, they were going to walk!

I could not even drive. Nathan was in 7th grade. Brian was in his first apartment, I think. 

I still struggle whenever Mothers' Day weekend arrives, because it is always around this date. Our family day of infamy. Followed by seasons of grief, anger, guilt, and regret.

Life moves at the same pace, yet it is hard to believe that this coming weekend one of your grandsons will graduate from high school. You did not get to meet any of your grandchildren on this side of life. You live for them whenever we recall you to life, and every once in a while, whether it is a gleam in the eye, a particular physical gesture or response, we see a little bit of you in them.

The dark clouds of your unexpected passing have faded towards the horizon as we moved through other seasons of our lives. The feeling of absence has never left us, but the reality of life pushed us forward, onward into what felt like a distant future now present today. I have lived twice as much time without you as I was able to have with you. In those first days, weeks, months, and years, I wondered if I could.

Absent from us in body, present with us in our hearts. From time to time finding ourselves wondering how you would have responded, what you would have said and whether you would be pleased with our life choices and responses. We suspect some paths we would have not followed or gone. We suspect other paths could or would have been. 

We have had other joys as well as sorrows. Other worries as well as peace. A few hellos and a few goodbyes. Comedy and tragedy. Life experience in all of its sunshine and shades. We still live, laugh, and love, even with the hole in our hearts your leaving all too soon opened. 

How can it be thirty years since we heard your laugh, your voice, or felt your hand or see you coming to us? The glasses off-center, as you sat napping in the recliner, still clutching the remote that Nathan and I could never retrieve from your firm hand. That annoyed look when Mom was trying to talk to you while you read the afternoon Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette. The short pants and t-shirt dripping with sweat as you have put up the weed-wacker and enjoying a cold one (Michelob, if I remember correctly...) after a few hours of yard work. You popping a tape cassette with your distinctive handwriting declaring "Who Else? Big "O" on the label. Making the greyest shredded potatoes for breakfast, along with corned beef hash in the muffin tins. That weird habit of making lime jello with shredded carrots in it. Or the kidney bean salad. Wondering why I wanted to be a lawyer instead of a musician when I got done with high school. 

And yet it is true. It has been thirty years. And I can still remember you. And those thirty years now distant fall away, and I am back in the family room at 248 E Franklin, Bement, Illinois, impressed with the picture-in-picture on our new 30-inch Magnavox in the entertainment cabinet, listening to the dryer run and the patio door open to let the springtime air into the home again.

You are dozing off in the recliner again. And this time I will get that remote....

 

Remembering William Stuart Hudspeth (October 19, 1921 - May 4, 2019)

The William & Helen Hudspeth Legacy: Daughter- Georgina Zeuner, Great-Grandson-Jonathan Clemens, Grandson-Nels Dale, Daughter-Judy Dale, Granddaughter-Laura Clemens, Son-in-Law-Larry Dale

You have to be a little bit of everything to be a minister. The qualities, character, personality, ambition, compassion, empathy, sympathy, and presence required for the position can be daunting and at times, near impossible to fulfill under ordinary human skills or talents.  It is a sad truth today that many who graduate from seminary studies are often no longer serving as pastors just five years later.

Bill Hudspeth had everything needed to be a pastor, a messenger of the gospel of Jesus Christ, a presence of faithfulness, a deliverer of compassion, empathy, sympathy and presence. Of course there were times of trials, toils, and troubles, but these were also opportunities to draw closer to God, to seek guidance, to pray and to receive.

God would have been disappointed in Bill Hudspeth, Chemist.

For that was what he was thinking of doing when he was about to finish high school. Away from the chicken hatchery of his parents, away from Bridgeport, Illinois, and a few years of college, then professional work experience in some corporation laboratory.

His high school church pastor saw something more than a Chemist’s life in Bill Hudspeth. A Minister of the Gospel, handling congregation members rather than chemist tools and substances. The ability to remember formulas could just as well be used in the ability to memorize and preach scripture.

Bill wasn’t too sure about this alternate route his high school pastor was proposing.Then a near-brush with death and a Grandmother's earnest prayers that if God would save her grandson, she would see to it that he became a minister.

Recovering from this experience, Bill had no choice but consider ministry as his vocation. And the more he was talking it, praying and reading scripture for guidance and answers, the more appealing it became. And soon Bill Hudspeth was walking around the campus of Cincinnati Bible College and pursuing his degree of Bachelor of Arts.

There was also another pursuit. A pursuit of love. Helen May Bushey, a co-ed attendee of Cincinnati Bible College. They married soon, and the start of their shared life as husband and wife also had the expectations and duties of Pastor and Pastor’s wife.

And I’m not sure we can completely list everywhere that Rev. & Mrs. Hudspeth went in their pastoral duties. Of course, at the time, Bill was what those who are familiar with the various divisions of the Stone/Campbell movement would call an “independent” minister. These were congregations who rarely contributed to what was a unified effort to support missionaries and work of the church greater than local congregations, the United Christian Missionary Society. Indiana and Southern Illinois churches became places of residence, often literally living in church-provided parsonages as Georgina and a little later Judy was added to the family.

But there was something about the “independent” movement that started to bother Bill and his ministry. There was little, if any, accountability for ministerial misconduct, which he soon discovered was more common and kept quiet than he felt it should be. Reaching out to what was then state secretaries among churches who cooperated with the United Christian Missionary Society, Bill was persuaded to change his status from “independent” to a member of the clergy for the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).

About the time the International Assemblies of the Christian Churches (Disciples of Christ) were discussing formerly becoming a denomination, rather than a brotherhood, the Hudspeths moved to Bement. Bill has a distinct honor in the history of the Bement Christian Church: he served two different times as its minister, much like Grover Cleveland served two non-consecutive terms as President of the United States.

By the time they returned again to Bement, Bill had been serving as minister to congregations for over thirty years, and approaching retirement. They also had a new chapter in parenting; as foster parents.

As he was always fond of telling stories, it may be best to share one of his favorites; my family coming to this church. Georgia Mulvaney had befriended a young mother who was married with two sons under 10, and invited them to come and see where she and her husband went to church. She thought if they did come to the church it would be good if he would stop by and visit them after they visited.

I was 8 or 9. Nathan was 6 or 7. But we went one Sunday, and probably Sunday afternoon, Rev. Bill and Helen Hudspeth came visiting. Helen was my first Sunday School teacher. He was my first youth group leader and pastor. Saturday afternoons at the parsonage, about 2 pm, hanging out in the basement and making willow tree flutes, or bullet casing knives.  Overstuffing their little Chevette automobile for a nature walk in Allerton Park. Meeting in his office, with the lamp made from an electric meter than spun as it was turned on.

And on August 26, 1985, with Ward Dare as Elder, accepting Jesus Christ as my Lord and savior and being baptized, along with the rest of my family.

And in 1987, Rev. Bill Hudspeth retired as minister of Bement Christian Church.

But that was not the end of his or Helen’s ministry. He did pulpit supply, driving to Humbolt in that same Chevette for a few more years.  And didn’t stop serving churches in need until he could no longer drive.

They settled into their retirement home near the water tower for a few years, and I still have stamps he gave us for helping with the move, including those interesting typewriters that he could talk about whenever someone asked about them.

Ever the journalist, he continued typewriting a newsletter, even when they moved from their home into a nursing home. I recognize that my articles bear a strong resemblance to the interesting subjects my first pastor would often write about in the Bement Christian newsletter.

My life, like his, moved from Bement to the city of Decatur. And occasionally I would meet them at events and activities, and often he would ask what I was planning to do after college.

Ministry was the furthest thing from my mind, but it kept pursuing me.

But when Bill heard I was finally going to accept the “call,” he was delighted.

And started calling me “his Timothy.”

Just about three years ago, Georgina or Judy, or both, or one, tracked me down and talked about me visiting their parents regularly, and how much Dad would enjoy catching up with me and talking.

And so began my journey of “Fridays with Bill.” Mitch Albom had his Tuesdays with Morrie, talking about life and its meaning.

He would ask what I was preaching. Then often quote the passage from memory.

He would keep the details of my young family straight and remember them.

He would ask about my mother, my brother, and all their happenings.

And he would remember where we left off from our previous meeting.

At 95 years old…

But he would always ask the same question, “Jason, do you have your Timothy?”

Now those unfamiliar with this “Timothy” thing, it’s the Bible reference of the Apostle Paul giving advice to a young follower by the name of Timothy. Often churches recognize members who have entered ministry as their “Timothy.”

Bill said I was his Timothy, and that he was his High School minister’s Timothy, who was the Timothy of the minister who baptized him, who was a Timothy of a minister…

An unbroken chain of Elders passing the faith to their students, Ministers to congregation members.

Except Bill remembered each name better than I can.

But I will always remember that I am one of several people whose lives are better, whose faith was developed and strengthened, who saw integrity, honesty, trustworthiness expressed in the actions, prayers, and spoken or written words of this servant of God.

I am Bill Hudspeth’s Timothy. And many will be blessed because of his testimony of faith.

And our lives are richer because we were able to be part of one or many of his 35, 626 days he lived and moved, breathed and prayed, spoke and prepared to share the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Let us continue the work, treasure the days, and hold fast to the faith as Bill Hudspeth has now joined that great cloud of witnesses. Thanks be to God.

Welcome to the family, Lupus...

From the moment Patrick came into our lives, he has always brought sunshine, a large and generous heart, a sensitive soul, and an upbeat disposition in the midst of struggles and difficulties.

His passion for all things history, especially the specific knowledge of weaponry of the World War II combatants, is nearly legendary. His consideration of other's feelings and their situations reveals my limitations in compassion and generosity. There is the innate sense of seeking justice for others and coming to the side of those who are unjustly treated. Fairness is a necessity in life.

He brought new experiences to us. Some were scary, like unexpected febrile seizures around 2 years old. A little asthma, and ear infections until tubes widened his narrow infection-prone passageways. Every time he faced threats to health, he rallied (and we prayed) and came through unscathed.

And every challenge had no impact on his optimistic, cheerful embrace of life and the wonders of living and growing in this still young 21st century.

His most recent battle began with his legs.

He started to move slower, shuffling rather than striding. It seemed an effort to cross the school parking lot to our car.

Being a fourteen-year-old boy also meant the beginning of a height climb, passing his mother's height and sneaking up on his father: 5ft 6 1/2 to Dad's 5ft 8 1/2 in just six months. Then the acne appeared. No problem, just a prescribed cream will clear up the inevitable teenager scourge.

But it didn't. It became a beautifully inflamed red nose and cheeks under the eyes. A steroid began to work, but the rash still was present, though faded.

Then the long-lasting winter of 2018 brought its last hurrah; a series of nasty head colds to the Butterick homestead on Prairie. An examination revealed enlarged lymph nodes and the symptoms of pneumonia present.

So on May 1, Patrick was admitted to Decatur Memorial for treatment of pneumonia. It didn't respond to available antibiotics, and since pleurisy and fluids were still present, transfer to St. Johns Springfield was necessary for a possible chest tube and drain.  At St. John's, it stopped with a different set of antibiotics. The rash was treated with some zinc cream, making it fade a little more. Two viruses and a bacterial had been identified, but it seemed the bacterial was responding well and of course, viruses just need to fade on their own.

Then blood test results revealed markers. Markers leaving no room for dispute: lupus. And the nearest pediatric rheumatologist?  St. Louis Children's Hospital.

"Am I going to have to be transferred AGAIN?" said Patrick. Another ambulance ride. Another round of tests, but a proper introduction to our new live-in: lupus in our teenage son. A lifetime occupant who will challenge us and not pay any of its associated living expenses. Yes, lupus is more prevalent in women, but it can appear anywhere, anytime, and to anyone.

But you have chosen a hell of a fighter in my son, Lupus. He will not take this lying down. Patrick will study the battleground, maintain his defenses, and force a retreat no matter what the cost.

Welcome to the family, Lupus. We plan to make your stay as unpleasant and uncomfortable as possible. Prepare for battle.

Remembering Robert Dean Day

Most of the time our full Christian names are used in ceremonies and legal work.

You were first known to me as Bobby Day. And I probably first met you in first grade. Sure, you were in Kindergarten class, but in those ancient early 1980s, there was still Morning Kindergarten and Afternoon Kindergarten at Bement School District No. 5. Morning was for "townies" and Afternoon was for "country." I was one of those "townies" and you were one of those "country."

I'm sure if I could track down all of the class group photographs through our Elementary and Middle School years I would remember when we had the same grade school or middle school teachers. I know we shared many field trips.

Even in those early years, I can recall you being between our emerging class athletes and our emerging scholars. Sure, there was a little scholarship among the athletes as there was a little athletic prowess among the scholars. You didn't shun either, and seem to move freely between both worlds, often laughing and sharing those invaluable tokens of friendship that seem to radiate from your positive, if a little shy, developing personality.

Whatever you seem to focus upon, you did well. No, some academic subjects were not your best, but no one would doubt your tenacity in trying. Some excelled while others struggled. You may have barely crossed it, but you finished all the same.

As those children of the eighties became the awkward young adults of the early nineties, you changed from Bobby to Bob. The event that I will always recall involving you and I in those early adulthood days was both of us struggling a bit in Mr. Hensley's biology class Freshman year. And so we agreed to cheat. I would allow just enough of my test answers to show and you would somehow arrive at the same answers.

But having the exact same answers gave away our cheating conspiracy. We were both summoned into Mr. Hensley's office in the Chemistry lab and were informed that the next time we planned to do that, one of us should at least change one of our answers so they would not be exactly the same.

And we never cheated in science classes again.

Our 1994 Bement High School yearbook makes a good gateway back to those memories long forgotten. Of course my high school activities centered around music; your activities were athletics. But if Bement High School had a Future Farmers of America chapter in the early 1990s, there would be no doubt in anyone's mind who would be involved. You. That calling into agriculture was present early and impossible for you to resist.

Being fellow classmates in a small town school forms unbreakable bonds of friendship. We completed our studies together, and each moved into other chapters, other places to start new life, form new relationships, find loving partners, and raise our own children. Many of those small town values of faith, community service, and helping others remain as markers of our identity. Your legacy is a rich tapestry of those values loved and lived.

In the busyness of life, we often believe that we will always have time to reconnect, to reminisce, and perhaps naively, live long into our healthy, seeming invincible lives.

But mortality has already brushed near to our 1994 class. Strokes and heart attacks have touched a few of our classmates, me included

And then came the tragic news of you passing from us. Suddenly the fragile nature of life came into our everyday, seemingly invincible middle ages.We knew someday the common fate of all living things would begin its painful harvest. We did not know that you would be the first to cross the threshold of eternity.

We were all given a special person to share our lives with in just forty-one years.

We are shocked, upset, angry, and grieving at your passing from our lives.

We will feel your absence every time we gather again as the Bement High School Class of 1994.

There will be that empty chair, that silence where there used to be the sounds of your contagious laughter and gregarious personality.

We will keep vigil and share our stories of you and our love with your grieving widow Kristina and your beloved son Lukus Dean.

Bobby, Bob, Robert Dean Day, you will be carried in our hearts, in our thoughts, until each of us cross the threshold.

And when we do, I know the first sound we will each hear.

The sound of your laugh.

Twenty-five Years Later

Richard Wayne Butterick, graduation 1963

"You left, just as you were becoming interesting."
Sunday, May 12, 1991, my own personal day of infamy. My childhood was suddenly, and in a sense deliberately attacked, by a combination of forces and powers that have had a long history in my family tree. Your heart, from birth given a murmur, and unknown to us at the time, already suffering from previous cardiovascular "incidents," stopped its work. You apparently suffered very little in the end, but those who have survived these last twenty-five years have suffered the unreachable separation created in a moment one early Sunday morning.

You were only 46 years old.
Mom was 35.
Brian was 23.
I was 15.
Nathan was 12, turning 13 in just 3 days.
Our lives had only just begun their journey from childhood into adulthood. And now my adulthood has its own birthday: May 12, 1991.

Standing shell-shocked in the sanctuary of First Christian Church of Bement as both Nathan's and my own classmates visited. Emotionally numb sitting next to Mom at your graveside. Forever altering how I respond to the Mother's Day holiday, since it was on Sunday, May 12, 1991. Casting a long shadow on Nathan's birthday, even though Mom was careful to not have any of your funeral or graveside service on the day.

Each significant event to come into our lives had a felt absence. Learning to drive your beloved 1991 Ford Ranger truck with its stick shift. Graduating high school. You would probably be happy to see the son who wanted to be an attorney on May 11, 1991 transformed his career path towards music instead, keeping up the talent you were so proud to watch and grow. And then into ministry, which at an early age you also explored as a possible career, but hesitated when you thought about the necessity of speaking in public and at funerals.

You loved each of your sons as the individuals they were, and never had a favorite one. Each one of us were your favorite in our own way. Since your high school prophecy predicted a career in automobile repair, you would be delighted that Nathan has his own business doing something he loves; fixing automobiles. But he probably wouldn't be able to finish any jobs with you sitting or standing next to him while he worked! Brian acquired your love-hate talents in home repair and remodeling.

And you always desired a bit of the country as a place to live. Mom and Nathan live into that dream.

But these twenty five years without you have not been without unexpected blessings. Mom met a remarkable man to be another companion for her and a fatherly figure for your teenage and twenty-something sons. Norman Harpster was the best fit we could have asked for in a step father. He never put himself into your shoes, because he knew he could never fill them anyway. He believed what you believed: each of your sons were a unique bundle of talent and skills, and he encouraged us to be whatever our talents and skills took us. I hope you two have already met and traded stories.

Richard Wayne Butterick, around 13 years old

Your fondness for redheads probably unduly influenced my preferences and I married one.
Both of your grandsons carry parts of your name as part of theirs.
Our musical tastes were greatly influenced by the massive record collection you took such joy in setting upon the turntable. And yes, we all have Roy Orbison in our own collections.

The same icy finger which stilled your heart at last has touched one of your son's hearts. It now has a lifetime injury upon it, but it still beats. There are much better outcomes in cardiovascular health and treatment than in 1991. And I benefited from these improvements.

Each of us catches a glimpse of you in our bathroom mirrors every day. There are certain behaviors, both good and bad, that are clearly drawn from you as their source. Sometimes we are consciously aware of your presence, other times we subconsciously respond.

And as long as each one of your survivors live, share your stories, share our memories of you, in a sense, you never leave us. We still talk to you from time to time. There are times when I find myself repeating my first written sentence to you: IMADATYOUDAD. Our day of mortality is yet concealed from us, when we will also separate our life from living on this blessed earthly home. I only hope that my custody of your rich legacy has been adequate, and passes into the third, fourth, fifth generation of those who will forever claim you as their common ancestor.

And you are still proud of your widow and your sons.

Building Site - 1 Corinthians 3:10-23

We move to another metaphor this week: God’s building. Not only God’s building, but God’s temple. From babies, to field, and now to the holiest of places. Paul places his work at Corinth as a wise master builder, setting a foundation based on the cross of Christ. The foundation was crafted by Christ crucified, the edifice built above the foundation will be crafted by the giftedness of leadership and the shared life of the community, bringing both wood and precious stone, straw and gold, hay and silver. Some parts of the structure will be refined by the cleansing fire of Judgment Day. Some parts will stand tall in the midst of those very fires.

A temple in those days was more than a building. It was a place where whatever god it was dedicated for was thought to live. It was a place where those who wanted to declare their trust and offer their best gifts shared in the rituals and life of the god.

We may think of ourselves as more advanced in our knowledge of the physical world than our ancient ancestors. Yet, we still love beautiful and pleasing buildings, spending energy and resources into all kinds of institutions. We are also turf conscious. The structures we build also include fences, storage and space. Oftentimes structures can divide and separate. Fences cordon off our land from our neighbors, and often are called “good neighbors.” We build larger barns and bigger bedrooms to give us a sense of security. The size of our city lots has become larger in order to keep strangers at a distance.

All of these fences, large residences, and acres of open space between neighbors prohibit us from venturing out, taking risks, or breaking away from our self-built mausoleums of self-interest better known as comfort zones. Rather than build relationships, we build empires. Instead of living in faith, we find more reasons and arguments to live in fear; afraid to meet new people, resisting opportunities that stretch us, and living in our own little worlds that we have created, thus forgetting the source of everything.

To truly be the church where the Spirit of God is in our midst we have to take some risks and not be consumed with being successful. Paul wanted his listeners to realize that everyone has talent and their talents need to be included in the building of the church.

It should come to us as comforting words that Paul draws Corinth from babies, these fighting members within the church that are yet still the very place where the Spirit of God lives, God’s temple.

I sometimes wish that all the you’s in the Bible would be clearer in meaning. Sometimes you means you only, as in not me. Other times you means you all, or you plural. When Paul writes “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?,” he is referring to you-all, the people of God, the community of faith, the congregation of Corinth. Paul uses this again in chapter 6, and often it is that later passage that is quoted to talk about taking care of your physical body by avoiding alcohol, tobacco, and other “sins.” In the shared life of the community, God lives.

Think about it. In the shared life of our community here at Prairie Avenue, God lives. Whenever we treat each other poorly, God lives. Whenever we share with our neighbors, God lives. In whatever we do, in whatever circumstances we confront, God lives, moves, and reside in our shared life. Our community is more than the building surrounding us, protecting us from real physical threats, whether heat, cold, wind, or water. Our building is not the temple of God; we are. And if the temple of God is found wherever there are a faithful people, God’s presence can be found anywhere. It is that presence alone that gives life to the church.

We are building a temple of God at this place. We bring both perishable and imperishable materials. We can only offer ourselves, both good and bad.  Often we also bring our own barriers and obstructions to the building site, gating off our time, talents, and treasure from being used, or, allowing usage only according to our preferences. For Corinth, their divisions over preferred leaders was actually tearing God’s temple down, halting the construction work of any leader and prohibiting their materials from being used.  Is the construction work of God’s temple at Prairie Avenue suffering from the same work stoppage? Are you stopping God’s work in your life, barricading certain aspects of your lifestyle and living for your own selfish desires? How many fences, storage units, and wide spaces are you using to separate yourself from the will of God?

There are some things we do today that will not stand the test of time, or the fires of judgment. Hopefully we come to realize what things do not ultimately matter nor help spread the good news of God’s grace to everyone and remove it.  

Too often we revere furnishings in a church parlor more than our own members needs.

Too often we are more concerned about our fragile reputations and egos than sharing the good news with someone with a checkered past.

Too often we look longingly into a misremembered past instead of responding to the present needs around us.

Too often we are already pre-approving of God’s disapproval of others not like ourselves, and pre-approving God’s approval with our own flawed character and sinful nature.

The building materials of judgment, intolerance, holier-than-thou, us against them, reputation and bloated self-importance cannot be build on a foundation placed on the truth of Christ crucified.

Let us gather instead the ability to respect and value all persons, regardless of reputation and status, and love them as much as Jesus Christ already has loved them.

Let us not be the probation officers of God’s laws and rules, but rather see any sin as forces opposing God’s will and intent and do all things possible to lift someone out of the living hell they may already experience each and every day.

If we commit ourselves to building our lives on the foundation of Jesus Christ, we cannot fail. If we refuse to provide the necessary time, talents, and treasure to build ourselves and others on this foundation, we will fail. Whatever fences, secured storage, or measured space we withhold from God will ultimately be taken from us and given to another in God’s realm of justice and righteousness.

The building site is ready for construction. Are you ready to build lives for God? Bring the best materials you can to the construction site. Stop halting the work of God in self-serving ways. Let us build together a community of faith in Jesus Christ in such a way that all who look upon our lives and living may declare, “I was glad when they said to me let us go to the house of the Lord.”