Monday July 6 2020
A daily e-mailer from
Matt Matthews
 
To Members and Friends of 
First Presbyterian Church
Champaign, Illinois
 
Dear Friends,
 
            Unimaginable.
 
            There are things in life we never want to face. We know we may. We know that no one is immune. But we don’t want to face them. 
 
            In WWII—not that long ago—my grandmother hung four stars in the front window of her house signifying that she had four men in the war: her husband (a stateside major inspecting training camps, my grandfather), both sons (my father and Uncle Jim), and a son-in-law (Aunt Mary Louise’s husband, Joe). The thought of losing a son must be unimaginable.
 
            In the Broadway smash “Hamilton,” Alexander and his wife Eliza face the death of a son. It’s “unimaginable” the chorus sings.
 
Chorus: If you see him in the street/ 
walking by her side/
talking by her side/
have pity. 

He is trying to do the unimaginable/
See them walking through the park/
long after dark/
Taking in the sights of the city.

They are trying to do the unimaginable. 
 
            That’s what dealing with loss sometimes seems: unimaginable. We can’t get our minds around it. We have nothing in our play book to help us. Our emotional tool box is empty.
 
            I love this song because it reminds us that the strangers we pass by on our walk around the park may be dealing with the unimaginable. Show pity. Be kind. You never know what they may be thinking about, suffering through, grieving. It just might be unimaginable.
 
            One of our DREAAM families is working through the death last week of a young daughter in a car accident. Laketia Thomas’s daughter Leondra Hopkins died. Melo, the brother, is a DREAAMer. Tracy Dace and his staff have responded with care and grace.
 
            And on Wednesday near midnight, Todd Ledbetter, a homeless man who sat and slept (and sometimes preached) on the park bench in front of the Episcopal Church across State Street from West Side Park was brutally beaten to death. On Friday, Damon Rowell and I sat on that bench awhile and visited his friends who grieved. We brought cold Gatorade, but they were drinking stronger stuff. We prayed. A parking lot service lead by Rev. Beth Maynard will happen soon.
 
            Unimaginable.  
 
            Your church is attempting to walk alongside those who grieve. It would be unimaginable if we didn’t. We are a part of something bigger that transcends our small lives. Your contributions matter. Thank you for your prayers. 

News
Men’s Breakfast Bible Study Tuesdays 8 am
Email zoom@firstpres.church for the link.

 
Take on Race:
 
  Racism
 
            When the wound stops bleeding,
            Will it heal?
            Will the rent flesh clot, scab, peel?
            Will the skin be as smooth to the touch,
                        as wondrous a sight,
            As Black or as Yellow,
            As Red or as White?   (C. Moore Grace)
  
* * *
 
Let America Be America Again
By Langston Hughes
 
Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.
 
(America never was America to me.)
 
Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.
 
(It never was America to me.)
 
O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.
 
(There’s never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)
 
Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?
 
I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.
 
I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one’s own greed!
 
I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.
 
Yet I’m the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That’s made America the land it has become.
O, I’m the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home—
For I’m the one who left dark Ireland’s shore,
And Poland’s plain, and England’s grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa’s strand I came
To build a “homeland of the free.”
 
The free?
 
Who said the free?  Not me?
Surely not me?  The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we’ve dreamed
And all the songs we’ve sung
And all the hopes we’ve held
And all the flags we’ve hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay—
Except the dream that’s almost dead today.
 
O, let America be America again—
The land that never has been yet—
And yet must be—the land where every man is free.
The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME—
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.
 
Sure, call me any ugly name you choose—
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!
 
O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath—
America will be!
 
Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain—
All, all the stretch of these great green states—
And make America again!
 
Good Word: 
 
Romans  7:14-25        
14 For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am of the flesh, sold into slavery under sin. 15 I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. 17 But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.
21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, 23 but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
 
So then, with my mind I am a slave to the law of God, but with my flesh I am a slave to the law of sin.
 
Let us pray 
 
From Desmond Tutu:
 
The right hand of God is writing in our land,
Writing with power and with love.
Our conflicts and our fears, our triumphs and our tears
Are recorded by the right hand of God.
The right hand of God is pointing in our land,
Pointing the way we must go.
So clouded is the way, so easily we stray,
But we’re guided by the right hand of God.
The right hand of God is striking in our land,
Striking out at envy, hate and greed.
Our selfishness and lust, our pride and unjust
Are destroyed by the right hand of God.
The right hand of God is lifting in our land,
Lifting the fallen one by one.
Each one is known by name, and rescued now from shame,
By the lifting of the right hand of God.
The right hand of God is healing in our land,
Healing broken bodies, minds and souls,
So wondrous is its touch, with love that means so much,
When we’re healed by the right hand of God.
The right hand of God is planting in our land,
Planting seeds of freedom, hope and love,
In these Caribbean lands, let his people all join hands,
And be one with the right hand of God.
 
AMEN.
 
PEACE to you all,
 
Matt Matthews
Cell: 864.386.9138
Matt@FirstPres.Church