George C. Ladd - We Are Created To Be The Hands & Feet
Exploring faith journeys and inspiring ministries that embody the good news of God, this is the Cumberland Road. I'm your host, TJ Malinoski. Today's guest is George C. Ladd. George is the stated clerk of Columbia Presbytery in Tennessee. He is a member of Swan Cumberland Presbyterian Church in Hickman County. And he is also the spouse of Reverend Sherry Ladd. In today's episode of Cumberland Road, George talks about being a religious hybrid. And over the course of his years exploring many spiritual paths that have led him to the Christian faith. He believes that we are all called to use our gifts and talents in service to God. Let's listen as George joins me via Zoom from the historic Masonic Lodge in Franklin, Tennessee.
T.J.:Hello, George Ladd. Thank you for joining me. Hello. George, I appreciate your time.
T.J.:And, sharing, now do you want to just briefly say who you are and introduce yourself? You want me to do that later?
George:Well, I can say that I am George Ladd. I am currently the stated clerk of Columbia Presbytery and I am married to Reverend Sherry Whitaker Ladd who pastors the Swan and Santa Fe Cumberland Presbyterian churches and That's me.
T.J.:All right. All right. Thank you, George. Let's talk about an early experience, an early encounter with God. Do you have one?
George:I was thinking about my very first encounter of God, and I remember having a dream when I was about four or five years old and there was some kind of threat and this figure showed up and made the threat disappear. It was a male in a white robe and it was kind of a little bit like a cartoon figure. It was an outline drawing. It wasn't like I was looking at a at a at a person, but it was a white robed figure seemed like he had a small beard and it was, it was a man and that was a dream I had four or five years old and, I'd have to say that was my first personal I don't know if it was a genuine encounter, but it was a dream I had about God.
T.J.:So you at that moment or at the moment of awakening attributed that presence to god.
George:Yeah. At the age of four or five, I assumed that's who it was. Yeah.
T.J.:Well, good grief. That's pretty earth shaking to to experience that and and, obviously, to remember this many years later to be able to connect that too. So let let's move forward a little bit. So you had that encounter at a very young age. What other happenings have shaped your faith?
George:Well, the challenges that confront, the youngest child away from home for the first time with all the freedoms that that provides and the opportunities to make bad decisions. But, rebounding from those those bad decisions For me, it wasn't a sudden come to Jesus moment. It was a process and I had the opportunity to study religion in in college and another influence as I look back on it is I was made aware of Ram Dass if you know who he is. Doctor. Richard Alpert worked with Timothy Leary in their researches on LSD at Harvard back in the 50s and then they all got fired and Richard Alpert went to India, found a guru, and became Ram Dass and he wrote a book called Be Here Now which was very creative, had a lot of art and comic art in it, but, the thing he, focused on was the importance of of mindfulness, the importance of the present moment, and the fact that there is God, the fact that you can have a connection to him, the fact that our actions matter, the fact that karma, the results of your actions, you reap what you sow.
George:I began to comprehend those teachings and that lesson. Albeit from a non Christian source, truth and wisdom are universal.
T.J.:Got ahold of this book. Were you still in college?
George:Yes. Yes. And I I suppose as they say, even a blind hog founds an acorn in the woods.
T.J.:Where'd you go to school at George?
George:Well, I started out at, Rice University, was, infected with a motivational syndrome in my sophomore year and, transferred to the University of Texas at Austin for a year and decided that I needed to to save my parents money paying for tuition. So at that point I transferred to the University of Tennessee at Knoxville from which I graduated.
T.J.:Okay. Now, are you originally from Texas or from Tennessee?
George:No, my brother, graduated from Rice University. So that's what put the thought, the thought in my mind. And I wanted to go to the best university that I could get admitted to and I got admitted to Rice, so so I went there started there.
T.J.:Oh, what school did you find this book at that got you thinking more deeply about your faith?
George:Somewhere between Rice and Texas, I think. That was might might have been might have been at the University of Texas when I got that one.
T.J.:Alright. So from there, from the book, you said the blind hog occasionally finds the acorn. How did that acorn begin to grow from there?
George:Well, I guess it put the desire in me to loam to to to know more and to pursue more and probably to pursue more of Eastern religion and philosophy. As, as I told you previously, I, I was majoring in computer science at the University of Tennessee and I would have been required to take differential equations. I had to have a year of that in order to to get that degree in computer science and I saw that that wasn't going to happen. Now, Tennessee had this nice feature back then where you could cop out from learning a foreign language. You could study the culture of a place instead of the language.
George:So I was doing ancient Mediterranean culture in lieu of Greek and Latin which I had taken some religious studies courses in the course of that ancient Mediterranean religion. We studied religion of Egypt and Mesopotamia and I thought well gee I can leverage these courses get a major in religious studies get out of here get a job with a minor in computer science and and get out of college fast so but I can also learn the collected wisdom of the world, the most important wisdom teachings in the world that will have made it into the religions of the world. So I changed my major to religious studies and I studied Eastern religion and one of the most important things I took away from that is a work in Hinduism called the Advaita Vedanta. It's like one of the most advanced works on philosophy that they have and in there they say Atman is Brahman, which means that the inner self, the core self is has a connection with God and this is one of my core beliefs. Every one of us is a creation of God.
George:We have a connection to God. We are an emanation of of God. As Rabbi I can't remember the name of the author of God is a verb, but his point is that God is a verb not a noun because God is emanating the world we see at all times and God is more a verb than a noun and I really like that. And so those studies planted that thought that has grown in me over my years. It was also a blessing to study, the history of Israel and how Judaism came to be and in later years I would come back to that in the the Masonic degrees that talk about the building of the Second Temple and whatnot.
George:And, so I didn't know foundations were being laid at that time, but foundations were being laid at that time.
T.J.:So really even at an early age, young adult, you had this desire of seeking and exploring faith not only for yourself, but faith in others historically and and and currently through the books that you read, seeking for understanding in-depth. I'm putting words in your mouth, but this is what I'm gathering.
George:I think I wanted to know metaphysically how the world worked. Spiritually, how the world worked. So, I studied a variety of paths and Christianity works extremely well for the individual.
T.J.:So let's talk about that for a few minutes. With this exploration and this knowledge and this study, what brought you to the Christian faith? What makes it stand out for you above all the other organized religions?
George:Prayer and the Holy Spirit.
T.J.:Now prayer is present in in other religions. What helps make those two things distinctive and meaningful for you?
George:The image of God as father who has a filial love for his son and I apologize I don't know the latin equivalent of filial for the the ladies they're god's daughters but jesus and christianity teaches the love of God is like the love of your own loving parent. The the person who raised you, the person who you look to for for parental affection, and and I say it like that because I know there's people out there who didn't have good childhoods, who didn't have loving mother and father like I did, but, the fact that Jesus was thought ill of because he said Abba for father that he was he used that close affectionate a term. I think that's that's one thing that sets us apart and the the Holy Spirit seeking the Holy Spirit, seeking to be guided by the Holy Spirit and the experience of the Holy Spirit I can't speak for others Well, that's what's kept me That's what makes me a Christian right now and I I would think all the most of all the other good Christians I know have a relationship with Holy Spirit, so I think it is, I think we have a principle here and whereas other religions well, in Nashville for a time, I was invited to do a meditation class at the Theravada Buddhist temple in East it was in East Nashville at that time.
George:Theravada Buddhists there there was, you know, your your Vietnamese immigrants, your Laotian immigrants, so they would go to that temple which happened to be an old church and so they were doing a meditation class there and the people in the meditation class were all American white people and so it was a festival date and the the immigrants were there for that festival date and and observing the festival date and it it struck me that it was the Americans that wanted to learn how to meditate but, the the others just seemed to if I do this good things will happen and if I show up on this date good things will happen as opposed to being engaged and want to learn the practices and I'm probably being too judgmental and and they're probably not all like that but but that was the impression I got that why aren't Laotians and Vietnamese in here learning meditation from this monk like us?
T.J.:So what did you take from that?
George:What from that meditation class? What did I what did I take forward from it?
T.J.:Yeah, we were talking about kind of the distinctions between maybe, you know, the the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, and then the the meditation course.
George:Well, mindfulness is a good thing and I think Christians if a Christian practices mindfulness that's a good thing. If a Christian learns to meditate and watch his or her breath and become aware of what's going on that's a good thing. I need to do more of that because I'm distracted all the time I'm all the time worrying about getting the minutes out and worried about preparing for the next meeting and all the all the little things and and I need to be I need to be preparing a dish for supper and things and that needs to be where my mind is but it's not it's distracted. So yeah, it's good to practice mindfulness and meditation, but ultimately that's not the same as praying to your Creator. I guess there's more to it than just mindfulness and awareness.
George:More to it than just mindfulness and awareness. Buddha says that'll help you get enlightened just to be mindful and aware and present all the time and but me, I'm gonna plug into the Holy Spirit and find out what God wants me to do Mhmm. While I'm being mindful. As mindful as I can be.
T.J.:You brought it all the way back around. This is really fascinating because, you know, he I've known you for ten plus years. We've never had these conversations before. And so I didn't know this about your faith journey. So I am just soaking this up.
T.J.:I'm just going, wow. And maybe I I didn't know your background. I didn't know your faith journey. I've just known you in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church and in settings of a meeting. So this is really neat.
T.J.:So let's talk for a few minutes about some of the individuals that have had a great impact on your Christian faith journey. I know you've alluded to the study and the practices in some some books that you've read. Let's talk about some individuals that have helped shape your Christian faith.
George:Well, primary is Reverend Sherry Ladd. I feel like a little bit of seminary rubbed off on me as I watched her, not much, just a little fragment, you know how dust can kick up and land on somebody, but I watched her journey through seminary and well Sherry and I have journeyed together since 1982. We met in a house church and we became Episcopals in 1987 and then I built a we built a house on some land my father gave me near where I grew up and so we moved to Columbia or to the Columbia area in 1990 and Sherry was raised Church of Christ and went to the local Church of Christ for a while and that that wouldn't that wouldn't working. And so, she went to the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, which happened to be the church my grandmother belonged to. And, she got involved in that, started printing the bulletins for them they were paying to have them printed she said I can do that printed the bulletin started teaching Sunday school and I guess they liked her Sunday school teaching so much they made her an elder.
George:Now at that time I we had obviously we had stopped going to the Episcopal Church and so I was focusing more on Buddhist practices, Buddhist meditation myself. But anyway, she gets more and more involved in the church. She goes to she was a commissioner to general assembly when it was out in West Texas sometime in the in the late 90s so she's doing that and but I'm practicing my Buddhism and things and and we we took a vacation to Scotland took a vacation to Scotland and we're staying in Edinburgh and this man from South Africa brings up the topic of Freemasonry and I said, Well, I've been fascinated by Freemasonry all my life, and he said, Well, let me take you to Rosslyn Chapel. So we went to Rosslyn Chapel and things, talked about Masonry, and Sherry encouraged me to join the local Masonic Lodge, so I did that there in Santa Fe went through the three degrees of Masonry and and, I said to myself, you know if I'm gonna, be involved in these degrees I need to fully appreciate the biblical scriptures that they're based on and the old testament history that they're based on things so I'm gonna I'm gonna go to church with sherry and and and deepen and reignite and deepen my understanding of these things so so I went to that sanofi church and I started saying you know if I make a habit of this if I can go every sunday for two months I want to join this church So so I did that and joined the church in late two thousand And come to find out Sherry had a call to the ministry Which she said to the Lord How can I be a minister when my husband doesn't go to church?
George:So When I when I found that out Things came together and I saw what my calling was my calling was support her calling. So that's a really long way of saying that Sherry has been my spiritual advisor and guide. Sherry has an intuition that is second to none. If sherry has an intuitive feeling if I don't do what that intuitive feeling is I always regret it because it is spot on I I feel like she has a a connection to the Holy Spirit and I'm fortunate to be fed by her sermons every every Sunday. It was, it was a joy to go with her all over, well to Mississippi and West Tennessee and Alabama different churches she would fill in as she was going through seminary learning learning to preach watching her develop as a speaker now she's an outstanding speaker and and and minister and she is my primary spiritual guide.
T.J.:I get it. Alright. So your faith is deepening as Sherry grows also in preparation for the ministry.
George:Yes.
T.J.:That's pretty amazing.
George:So so during that time, I get made a deacon at the Santa Fe Church, then I get made an elder at the Santa Fe Church. You know, reverend Charlie Seton was the pastor when I joined the church, and then he, he he died unexpectedly, and I had just learned how to do the masonic funeral service and I got to do his, his masonic funeral because he was a member of the Santa Fe Lodge. Then, Keith Johnson became the pastor at Santa Fe. Keith is a Methodist now, but he was good, he was good pastor and he gave me, the basic Christian practice which is read the Bible, study the Bible, and pray. Read and study the Bible so that you can will know what a Christian is to do, how a Christian is to behave, and pray, and that's the Christian practice.
George:Keith also took a series of Sundays and went through the confession of faith section by section and so that was good orientation of building my foundation and things.
T.J.:Another
George:influence that I mentioned to you before is back when I was in college at the University of Tennessee an instructor I had named Doctor. David Dungun, Harvard educated professor. He taught a course called Images of Jesus in which we got to study the progression of the portrayal of Jesus in art and and literature through the ages beginning from Jesus's portrayal as king to Jesus's portrayal of suffering in the the middle ages to the enlightenment Jesus and so forth down to our own skeptical age and that was a fascinating course and I think Doctor. Dungan was a great influence on me. It was a great influence on how we how cultures see themselves in Jesus and how cultures see Jesus as a part of their culture.
T.J.:That can get kind of blurry at times historically.
George:Yes. So as I then progressed as a Cumberland Presbyterian, I start going to Presbytery with Sherry every meeting of Presbytery and started on the Pastoral Care Committee and spent nine years on that on that committee but I got to know Reverend Bill Roman, Reverend Larry Gewen, Reverend John Etherly, he was a POS graduate but the just getting to hang out with the senior ministers of the presbytery and benefit from their their knowledge and their stories, has been a blessing to me and has no doubt contributed to my my faith and my understanding and and whatnot. And now that I'm the clerk of the presbytery, I get by with a little help from my friends.
T.J.:Yeah. So you are the stated clerk of Columbia Presbytery. You serve on a couple of boards or committees within the presbytery. One of those being a new church development. And you're active in really two different congregations.
T.J.:Right?
George:Yeah.
T.J.:Santa Santa Fe. And what is the other one? I even asked you before we started recording. Swan. Swan.
T.J.:Okay. Both of those Cumberland Presbyterian churches. So with all all these opportunities for leadership, George, where do you see God working in your life? How would you describe that to someone someone else that you encounter?
George:Well you're ideally everybody is created to be the hands and feet of Christ on this earth. First you have to come to Christ accept Him as your Savior. You learn and follow His His teachings and what when you when you have a decent foundation you're called to be his hands and feet when when God puts something before you that you have the ability to do think you do it and when you get asked to do something I mean sometimes you get your plateful and you can't do everything and I think Sherry will tell you my plate was full my plate was full of six or eight years ago but but it's things I think I have the ability to do people and and my Christian brothers or my Masonic brothers and sisters asked me to do it and if I've got if I think I've got the ability to do it I'll say and the time to do it, I'll say yes.
T.J.:I I see, you know, working alongside you, church development. I see God working in your life as an example and these have been in more official settings but, you know, as an example, in the openness of trying new things especially when it comes to new church development, that's something I've I've admired about you is and seeing god working through your life is, okay, let's give it a go and and I think that does leave room for what you mentioned earlier for movements of the Holy Spirit as as opposed to being kind of closed and the parameters are clearly drawn. I've always appreciated your your openness to the workings of god, to the workings of the Holy Spirit. That's something that I've noticed in in you and I've appreciated. Well, looking beyond yourself, George, where out in the world do you see god working in the world today?
George:Sherry has made me aware that the gospel is being spread in creative ways in places that are hostile to Christianity. She talks about how they somebody will take an iPod and give it to somebody and anybody looking at that would think there's music on it when in fact there's the translation of the gospel on it.
T.J.:Things
George:like that. So with internet and technology advancing to where it is, are creative ways that the gospel is being spread. I think that God is challenging us to maintain his creation now that we have mastered using it and transforming it for our desires and comfort. Created in His image we have the ability to create. We have now that we understand more and more of his laws and how to transform the resources of our creation into things that we need and enjoy and make modern life possible, There's a stewardship that goes with that and I think God is going to I fear God is going to confront us with the need to be proper stewards of his creation.
T.J.:That will be a big transformation for a lot of us. We may be transformed yet again, born yet again.
George:Yeah, and and and what what I see how he transformed the people of ancient Israel who after centuries of second chances just would not act right. So they lost the first temple and got sent into exile. I hope we don't need that tough of a love that way.
T.J.:To shape us into stewards that we're called to be. Well, let's hone down our conversation to specifically the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. And, George, I'm really interested to know what ideas do you have for this church that you serve and that you love? And where would you like it to be in the future? We
George:are going to have to figure out how to evangelize to the millennial and younger community. Surveys are showing that though many of those folks consider themselves spiritual but not religious. We're gonna need to find a way to communicate to them the value of worship and the value of community and the value of worshiping in community. Now I don't know if all worship is going to be online in fifty years, if that's going to be the primary way that you worship on Sunday, I would sort of hope not but because one of my joys of the week is getting to come together with other Christians and thank God for the wonderful blessings that He has given me and to express that by singing the hymns and praying and participating in corporate worship and we've got to figure out a way to show the youngest folks that this has value. Now when I was their age I didn't appreciate it any more than they did because I wasn't going to church then, But, but worship has value and community has value and we need to find a way to communicate that and if we can succeed, we should have no concerns about our future.
T.J.:Yeah. The Christian worship Christian community is unique and I think we can show not just one particular age group, but anyone, a neighbor, a friend, a coworker that this is a community that is unique, and this is a worship that is unique because it's it's embraced in love and it's an offering and it can include others even if you don't know the elements of what that worship looks like. There's a there's an openness there for the neighbor sitting next to you or close to you. I'd be glad to to nudge you and kind of help guide. So, it it's a place to learn.
T.J.:It's a place to grow and I think it has an appeal, not in a way that's an attractive, like consumerism, but it can fill another person's life in ways that other areas and other activities cannot. That's what makes it a unique offering to me. I think our Christian community and our Christian worship, that oneness that comes with it. That's a great challenge, George, of sharing that good news and showing what worship in Christian community can look like with a generation that we are not a part of. It's a it's a great challenge.
T.J.:But look at the different places and and here in your faith journey of where you where you drew closer to the Christian faith in an unique ways. Pretty fascinating. I did not know about that about you. Any other ideas, dreams that you have specifically for the Cumberland Presbyterian Church?
George:Well, I have high hopes for the work that, you and, Johan Daza have done on worshiping community and as we come out of the pandemic I'll be interested to see, where that goes. I I think it may blossom into, vehicles that can bring folks to Christ that aren't ready for full on church but are ready for a worshiping community.
T.J.:Yeah. I may feel much more comfortable being invited to your home for study, for meal, for prayer, for fellowship, for worship than I ever would be in the context of an auditorium, a sanctuary, a large room. And even the invite in and of itself is very different. And I think worshiping communities make that distinctive. And and their purposes are distinctive as well.
T.J.:That's another conversation that I want to take away from from your faith journey, but thank you. Thank you. George, how can we continue to follow you on your faith journey?
George:Well, I am inactive on Facebook, so you can follow me vicariously by following Reverend Sherry Ladd on her Facebook page.
T.J.:She's gonna filter. Reaching out to George Ladd.
George:And you can follow Columbia Presbytery at our website, columbiapresbytery.org.
T.J.:Okay. And you've been the clerk for how many years now? The clerk of? Columbia Presbytery. State of Clerk.
George:Let's see. I have been the clerk for point zero point four years. I started that started in January.
T.J.:Okay. Oh, okay. So before you were the associate?
George:I was the assistant clerk for three years prior to that. Yes.
T.J.:Okay. All right.
George:Learning the ropes. Congratulations. From one of the best, Reverend doctor Roger Reed, very knowledgeable.
T.J.:Mhmm. Mhmm.
George:George. Very knowledgeable clerk.
T.J.:George, thank you for your time. Thank you for sharing. Thank you for opening up your life to me. I got to learn more about you and be amazed how god is working through your life and has been for a long time. And I appreciate it, George.
T.J.:Appreciate your time.
George:Well, you for inviting me to be on and I have really enjoyed these podcasts and learning learning more about folks that I know and folks that I don't know. This is been helpful to me and I appreciate your efforts with this.
T.J.:Alright. George, thank you. And thank you for listening to today's podcast. Grab a friend and travel with us on the next journey down Cumberland Road.
