Start Where You Are

Start where you are

                      Use what you have

                                           Do what you can

                                                                 It will be enough

                                                                                                           --Arthur Ashe

Arthur Ashe was a professional tennis player--in spite of being told he wasn't "tennis pro material."  In the 1960's, it was unheard of for a black man to wear tennis whites--and yet Ashe continued to train and compete.  Arthur Ashe was the first black player selected to be on the United States Davis Cup team.  He is the only African-American man to ever win the singles title at Wimbledon, the U.S. Open, and the Australian Open.  Arthur Ashe was a trailblazer.

After his retirement from professional tennis competition, Mr. Ashe underwent heart bypass surgery and received a blood transfusion.  The blood was infected with the AIDS virus.  Arthur announced his illness publicly in 1992 and began working to educate others about HIV and AIDS.  He founded the Arthur Ashe Foundation for the Defeat of AIDS and the Arthur Ashe Institute for Urban Health.  And in the midst of all this philanthropic work, Ashe still found time to teach tennis lessons to inner city young people.

Arthur Ashe died on February 6, 1993.  He was 49.  Later that year, he was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Bill Clinton.

It is said by people who knew him well that Arthur Ashe carried his fame and achievements lightly.  While proud of his accomplishments, Arthur saw his success as an opportunity to make a difference in the world.  He focused on young people of color--inner city youth--and was an unfailing encourager.  He was a powerful advocate for research into HIV-AIDS and for treating HIV-AIDS patients with dignity and understanding.  Arthur Ashe was a great tennis player, a tireless advocate, and a good man.

I am most grateful to Mr. Ashe for the quote that resides on the door of my office:  "Start where you are.  Use what you have.  Do what you can.  It will be enough."

When we feel helpless in the face of calamity--this quote provides the map for how we deal with whatever mess we're in.  Start where you are.  Take stock of the situation.  What is needed?  Who do we need to focus on?  What difference will we try to make?  Who will we try to help?  My personal focus is on Food Insecurity in our community and trying to provide resources for both Hope's Kitchen--which is currently well-funded--and Good Samaritan Food Pantry--which is currently stretched far beyond their resources (demand is up 300%.  You can make financial donations through our church if you wish to help)

Use what you have.  Identify resources.  What do I have to work with?  Do I have the gift of TIME?  or MONEY?  or SPIRITUAL STRENGTH?  or PHYSICAL SUPPLIES?

Do what you can.  Put your resources to work!  We so often wish we could wave a wand and change the world as we know it.  I'm guessing that any magic wand you or I can locate would not be helpful--decorative, maybe--but not helpful.  We may also wish that we had unlimited strength, stamina and know-how with which to attack the problem.  The gift that Arthur Ashe gives us is the realization that even someone like him--elite athlete, wealthy citizen, brilliant mind, compassionate heart--even someone as gifted as Arthur Ashe has his limits of what he can do and what change he can effect.  Do what you can is permission to know our limits and not try to be super-human.

It will be enough is one of the greatest statements of faith that I know.  Trust that when we have done all that we can--God will work with whatever we have been able to do and give.  A difference will be made.  One or more lives will be touched.  The world will be a better place because of the love and care we have shown.  It will be enough.

Many of you have expressed to me:  "I wish there was something I could do to help people!  Just praying doesn't seem like enough."  Closed up in our own hidey-holes, it's hard to identify ways to make a difference.   After all these days and weeks, just calling people on the phone doesn't seem like "enough."  Praying doesn't seem like "enough."   I believe that prayer, when entered into with time and focus and depth, is definitely "enough" in response to what's going on within us and around us.  My mother gave me a keepsake from her childhood Sunday School days that reads:  "Prayer Changes Things."  You could also say "Prayer Changes Me--and How I Look at Things."  Never doubt that time spent in conversation with the Spirit is time very well spent!

Whatever you choose to do at this time, in response to the suffering in the world around us--know that God knows what you're doing--and God is blessing every effort and every prayer--and God is working in each of our lives, in our community, and in our world.  Trust God.  It Will Be Enough.

Prayer Requests:  for all of the front-line folks and the unseen workers that are making it possible for most people to be safely at home;  for Sharon Porter and her family while they are on this journey of both grief and isolation; for Connie White (our church custodian) who is hospitalized with presumed COVID-19 (test results pending); for the Dineh people and everyone working to contain the terrible outbreak on the Navajo Nation.

Please send additional prayer requests...

Psalm 61:1-4

God, listen to my cry;  pay attention to my prayer!
2 When my heart is weak, I cry out to you from the very ends of the earth.
Lead me to the rock that is higher than I am 
3     because you have been my refuge, a tower of strength in the face of the enemy.
4 Please let me live in your tent forever!
    Please let me take refuge in the shelter of your wings!

Peace and all good,

Pastor Jean