A Homecoming Memory

One Homecoming Sunday I always remember took place some twenty years after I left the Tennille Church.  I went there as a very young and green preacher and when controversy arose and folks started choosing sides, I forgot all about reconciliation in favor of my side.   When I left after the second year, I left glad to be leaving and most likely there were folks in the church who were glad to see my tail lights pulling out of town.  Hard feelings were carried with me on that trip to the next appointment and it took some years to resolve the issues in my own heart.

 

So, when an invitation came to go preach Homecoming some twenty years later, I told the preacher who was new to go back and check with his leadership to make sure my coming was not going to create a lot of problems for him.  He did and called back to say the invitation was still good.  Wondering how things would go when I saw those who were antagonists, I went back to preach.  I do not remember the sermon.  What I remember are the words of reconciliation offered and received, the strong handshakes, and the awareness when I left that what needed tending had been handled in a way and at a time determined by the God we worshipped that Sunday morning.

 

It is not always true that our forays into the past come out so well.  While it took me some years to get my own heart settled about the brokenness, I never felt a need to make overt attempts at getting matters reconciled.  The peace given when I came to terms with my own need to forgive did not require the kind of face to face communication normally necessary.  It has often seemed that God had His own time schedule for this to happen.  And, when it did, it brought reconciliation in such a surprising way that it could only have been orchestrated by the One who came to join those together whose brokenness had separated them.