Tri-City Baptist Church

          No I’m not talking about my color deficiency that causes me to show up in some unusual combinations if Melissa doesn’t lay out my clothes for me.  “I don’t see color” is a quote from an unforgettable gentleman that we met today here in Indianapolis.

          Our good friend and kin, Tom Elliff, was being honored as one of three distinguished alumni of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (SWBTS).  That would have been thrill enough just to be there with Tom and hear his gracious (and funny) acceptance speech.

           But then there was Rev. Eugene Florence, who along with Gary Moore was the other of the three honorees.  Brother Florence is an African American preacher who is 104 years of age.  That’s right; he was born when Theodore Roosevelt was President. He is an alumnus of Southwestern all right, but not as you would expect.  Some of us have short memories.

          It embarrasses me as a “white folk” to remember that there was a time when Brother Florence could not attend classes with us because of the color of his skin.  SWBTS is where I received my MDiv and by the time I got there in the 1960s the “color barrier” had just been broken in public schools. Actually in the 1930s and 40s, Southwestern at least made a provision that some denominations frowned upon as being too “liberal” (can you believe it) when the school held little known Negro Extensions at night, in the basement of the school.  Those who completed the course of study, although equivalent to a Bachelor of Divinity, were given a diploma, but not a degree.

          Eugene Florence simply knew that God had called him to the ministry, he loved Jesus, a call to serve was and is a call to prepare and for eight years he worked construction and then at an iron company, while pastoring a Baptist church in Decatur, Texas, being a faithful husband and father of four children, and attending classes at night at the Southwestern Negro Extension.  What a man!  What a Savior!

          I wish each of you could meet this great man of God.  He is totally without any inkling of rancor or bitterness.  Most of his generation of preachers is gone on to Heaven now.  And most of you know that the Southern Baptist Convention has publicly and unanimously apologized and asked forgiveness for our racial transgressions, both of our generation and those before us.   Several years back it was determined that the credits completed by Eugene Florence in the Negro Extension, which included both Hebrew and Greek, were sufficient to merit the Master of Divinity degree.  That degree was conferred upon him with all pursuant rights and privileges.  At the age of 102 he was the featured preacher in seminary chapel.

          Now Rev. Eugene Florence is honored as distinguished alumnus and I heard him say, “I don’t see color.  I just see God’s people.”  I thought they would have to wheel him up onto the platform, but no, he walked right up the steps.  He said, “You know, I don’t get as many opportunities to preach these days.  I’m starting to get a little older…” Then he said something about if any of us wanted to schedule him to preach in our churches we might want to do it right away.  “However many years I have left, I just want to be a blessing.”

          Now there’s a man who knows how to live.  He is a walking documentation of that most Christ-like quality… forgiveness and its attendant benefit: the joy of the Lord.  When I grow up, Brother Florence, I don’t just want to be as old as you, I want to be as BIG as you!

         
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   (This entry was begun in Indy, but posted upon our return)

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