My Letter to Brennan

My Dear Brennan, 

Years ago you spoke at Judson College for an entire week. I remember only one thing you said, "Hello." Even though, I bought The Ragamuffin Gospel and set out to read it. I started it three times. Every time I would get through about chapter three and put it down. I didn't see what the big deal was. I didn't need The Ragamuffin Gospel. I didn't need Grace. 

We have a handful of things in common. I grew up with a mother I felt I was a nuisance to and an alcoholic father. My Mother worked hard to make ends meet since the money my Father made was spent on things that made us more impoverished than his job would otherwise have provided for. Guilt and Shame were no strangers. I felt tolerated. I still feel tolerated sometimes. By others and by God. As a child, teen ager, and young adult, I learned how to "do". Your messages that week at Judson had no substance of how I could "do" something more for God or for others so I would feel more accepted. You didn't teach me how to be tolerable. 

Immediately after college I took an internship at a church I expected would be my launching pad for "successful ministry" but instead I was intolerable. I was sent home after seven weeks. No launch pad. I was now in need of Grace. Though I was sure it was worthless, I picked up The Ragamuffin Gospel one more time. I devoured the pages like the sweetest honey on the softest biscuit. Pages that were bland and gray before were now sugar and light. 

I want you to know that I treasure you, or I treasure what you taught me. You were the first person that ever, and I mean ever, taught me Grace. I was married a year after this and though our first son wouldn't be born for another three years, we decided from day one his name would be Brennan. That is why I said "My Dear Brennan" because though I have only heard you speak in person a handful of times and never spoken to you face to face, I cannot say the name Brennan without thinking how dear you are to me. We named our first son Brennan Brave so he would be marked by Grace and find a faith that requires Bravery. 

I cannot say I stay in the grace I once found. In one deep moment of regret and depression a close friend said to me, "Grace isn't something you learn only once." I don't remember his words so much because of what I was going through or because of who said it to me, but because whenever I am reminded of grace I find myself returning to the first time I was truly taught about grace, by you. So thank you. I think of you often and will do my best to shower my sons with the kind of Grace Jesus gave me, the Grace I was finally able to accept, the Grace that makes me more than tolerable, but Abba's.

GH