Unity News

May, 2003

THE PERFECT STORM

By Paula Hickman

(Paula Hickman is an attorney and leader in Shreveport, Louisiana ’s First Baptist Church . Our thanks go to Dr. Dick Maples, one of our Advisory Board members for starting what has become a wonderful friendship between that church and Unity Ministries.)

  In the fall of 1991 a cold front hovered off the northeast U.S. coast. Strong upper air support deepened the front into a low, and this low was soon joined by Hurricane Grace. Together these forces of nature created the Perfect Storm, a storm of such magnitude and power that the loss of lives and property caused by the storm is legend.

  Ten years later, another Perfect Storm occurred at First Baptist Church in Shreveport , Louisiana . This storm, however, was not caused by forces of nature but by a church that failed on many levels to be the church God created it to be.

  The aftermath of this storm was devastating. Our pastor resigned, as did three other senior ministers. Friends became estranged. Long time members left the church. Our youth department lost over half of its members. We were a mess! Although some members felt that we should find a new pastor as soon as possible, we elected to have an intentional interim ministry before we began to search for a pastor. As part of this process, we asked Blake Coffee to hold a three-day Unity Conference. How God blessed that time together! This conference, together with a Service of Reconciliation we held later, helped our church begin the slow process of healing the hurts that separated us from God and each other.

  Before the unity conference, many church members read Five Principles of Unity. We prayed fervently for the conference and for God’s message to us. We prayed God would have something special in store for us, and we were not disappointed! When we took a break during the first session, folks actually got up and started visiting with each other! I know that sounds like a little thing, but it was highly unusual for our church at that time. We had unfortunately gotten into the habit of coming into worship, sitting down with our friends, and not speaking to other groups around us. After just one session, we were starting to act like a church again!

  After the conference, many Sunday School classes and small groups studied Five Principles of Unity. I’m sure everyone who read the book has their favorite passage. Mine is the lesson on the church loving or the church pretending. That section struck home because our church had pretended to be church for a long time. We had operated on parallel planes, each doing “his own thing” without regard to our accountability to the community of believers and without much love for each other.    When we were ready to form our pulpit search committee, we invited Unity Ministries to lead the committee’s orientation. Ken Coffee came and provided insight and encouragement for the committee’s task. The movie he showed the group, “The Road to Abilene ,” was quoted often during the committee’s work and has almost reached cult status in some sections of our church!

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