Lee Hollingshed - Where God Meant For Me To Be All Along
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 Reverend Lee Hollingshed, and she jumps right into the conversation Lee shares Lee shares how she has learned that there is an art to sharing the gospel without watering it down. In our conversation, Lee also shares a moment in her life where she received affirmation that this is where God has meant for her to be all along. Enjoy today's conversation on the Cumberland Road with Reverend Lee Hollingshed. Well, hello, Lee. Thank you for joining me.
Lee:Okay. Hickory Log. Officially, Hickory Log is a personal care home for men, adult men with special needs, intellectual disability, which before we were well educated enough it was called the R word. There are 2 people with brain injuries at birth which would also qualify them under Georgia State and Federal Department of Education guidelines for election facility and one gentleman had several strokes unfortunately brought on by alcohol drug use. But we are our website, heat free log dot org says that we are a safe place for men with special needs to call home.
Lee:And Hickory Log has been in existence since 1970, founded by the Munn family of Cartersville who wanted a place for their son who had dance and to live. It started out as kind of a residential kind of a vocational school and as the years have gone on it's become more of a a residential home using outside agencies such as sheltered workshops and on the job training to hopefully teach them vocational skills, personal living, personal data skills, daily living skills, and or the very few that really or have moderate and severe intellectual disability who just have a safe place to live and we have a pretty much a continuum of services and we're hoping to get better and better. We are not funded by the state or federal government because of the way the the way the laws changed when anti institutional movement started. We The men who have disability, social security can use that toward their, room boarding rent. However, the state will not pay for us because we are sort of a dormitory model rather than individual cabins or homes with, houseparents that we have complete oversight over everyone's, living arrangements and care and you know and we are completely you know we completely vet and investigate people who apply for a job with us Whereas if you have someone in a a host home, they call them.
Lee:There have been there have been cases where the the one of the better term house parents the people running you know taking care of the individuals with disability have been you know not feeding them well not housing them well taking their disability checks and using it and so while we struggle financially pretty often we still know that these folks receive 3 good meals a day, air conditioning, heat and air, indoor plumbing, you know, we've got a very good very nice building and you can visit us at hickorylog.org or check us out on our Facebook page Hickory Log Personal Care Home and find out more. Just know that is probably the worst picture I've ever made in my life.
T.J.:The picture of yourself?
Lee:Yes. They forgot about me. So one day I came in and once the pandemic started, my time for make wearing makeup has been few and far between, and it was not a good day or, you know, presentation. But every time I go to Hickory Log, I I feel that that's where God meant me to be all along. And when we and when I think back over my life from about age 9 to however old I was and I was ordained, May 28, 2017, it was all working together and I've used every part of the education and experience that God's put in front of me to wind up being the most effective, most caring chaplain for people with intellectual disabilities I can do.
Lee:And, yes, learning, learning differences, is what, you know, a lot of us want to say, people with, you know, learning differences because our folks are not like children. Our men are not like little children. Our men are like adult men who think more along the lines of children of reason and process that they know their adult men. We had a gentleman with Down syndrome named Joey and you know forgive me if I speak in you know this you know in jargon I was a special education teacher for 29 years.
T.J.:Oh wow.
Lee:And you know you have to stop saying what does that mean? Joey's differences were like moderate to severe which means Joey could not talk very much. He could you know do self care, he could pretty much go you know, well on his own. He could eat for sure. But, Joey could not read.
Lee:Joey did not always understand social situations and Joey got frustrated many times his, you know, way of expressing that would be some pretty clear cuss words. And then sometimes as he got older and started having some, dementia like problems, he would lash out. But I was only person who knew.
T.J.:Leigh, you are the chaplain at Hickory Log. And just to summarize, Hickory Log is a residential home for people with special needs, including intellectual disabilities and traumatic brain injuries.
Lee:Yes.
T.J.:And your role as a chaplain, what does that include?
Lee:I, provide worship service every Sunday at 2 o'clock for those who want to come in. Many people don't but being, you know, Cumberland Presbyterian's whoever will may come, whosoever will may come, and whoever doesn't doesn't have to, but it's, you know and I don't know why some don't except that that's a really good time for, you know, basketball, football, and soccer. But I we had the a short service. My sermon is more like a sorry. My sermon is more of a homily really.
Lee:Before I got started in 2014 I prayed and thought and paced and prayed and came up with the way I would do it if I were teaching a class in American Lit. So break it down to the bare bones what's the most important things to do. In this case since I wasn't teaching some specific learning disabled students with average or above average IQs to pass the graduation test, I broke it down to one word and I call it a word from the Lord. And then, you know, I have a verse to go with it. Well, sometimes more than 1, but I try to keep it at a very, you know, limited first, try to narrow my topic way down and develop a a sermon on that.
Lee:And especially in the last year, year and a half, I've solicited a lot more input from my men because it's it's for them. Mhmm. You know whenever you take a class from Reverend Doctor. Ann Hayes she walks in she writes on the board it's not about you and she turns around and says if you don't get anything else from me this whole time we have to get it you remember it's not about you and since it's about them you know, that's why you do it.
T.J.:Lee, what skills and experience that you drew from the special education and the classroom setting? How much and what carries over into your ministry in terms of how you relate? And you've mentioned a little bit about preparation and delivery of sermon. But what other skills and experiences just carry over in terms of sharing the gospel?
Lee:It's really important when I break it down and present it to make sure that if I use and I didn't that I use common everyday. I learned in the 1st year I really didn't need to grab strong supportents and you know the you know great big was the interpreter's bible. I did not need to be executing my topic to death and you know throwing up the Greek and Hebrew words although every now and then I do and they're used to that. They know I'm weird. But you know there is an art breaking things down into into a lower level vocabulary without dumbing it down without sounding rude and disrespectful And one thing I noticed in the classes I took on class on millennials postmodern ministry there's a whole lot of similarity.
Lee:People who grew up who were not in the church often don't know what our what our churchy jargon means. And while almost all of my gentlemen grew up in, you know, the church universal, Still, you want to make sure that you don't take for granted, that they know what the church, you know, jargon means. So you can break it down into simpler language that you, you know, you you say it with love and respect. You do you do not ever, ever, ever say, why don't you understand? You know, don't ask that.
Lee:You know, don't, you know, don't ask that question. You know? We you know, could have heard me the first. Of course, I didn't do that. I was teaching.
T.J.:Lee, what is the most rewarding aspect of working with this population? You've spent a career working in special special education and working with individuals from various age groups with intellectual disabilities. What have you drawn in terms of the most rewarding aspect in this ministry? Because it is a ministry.
Lee:Oh, yes. It's not like being the chaplain in a nursing home where you, you know, have your and I've been wincing my bible study too much the same way. You don't pop in and out, you don't preach and then we discuss with it. We discuss them with it. Most rewarding thing is when when we all send the bill, the holy spirit at the same time and seeing some of those lights come on, you know, and some of it comes from them and not so much for me.
Lee:A couple of years ago before the pandemic, the word from the Lord was prayer and I was using the you know Jesus observation of the Pharisee or a tax collector in prayer. You know you read the scripture and was talking about it You know what did you notice about maybe the difference between how the Pharisee prayed and how the tax collector prayed? This gentleman Daniel popped up with well, he was the only one who actually prayed. That, you know, that that, that is lit me up joy. That is fantastic.
T.J.:Yeah. It isn't it? It is so such a privilege to be able to be in that setting and have things kinda click or to fall into place where the message, the biblical text just comes alive, not just for us as an individual, but as a small group. And and to be able to learn from one another, it's it's amazing. Well, I Lee, thank you.
T.J.:I just I wanted us to just kinda and you jumped right in there. I I wanted the listeners to know where where you are in terms of, a chaplain at at Hickory Log and what Hickory Log is. And I thought that was a a good introduction of being able to, look at a different aspect of of ministry. So Lee, let I ask every guest this question. And I want to ask you, share a meaningful experience that you've had with God.
Lee:There have been so many, and I thought it over and tried to, you know, narrow it down. One of them is when I first started teaching, in 19 was 1982 by that time, February of 1982. I've been trained as a branch and German teacher. So I had a minor or pretty close to it in biology. And my goal at that time was to have a have small classes like, 2nd and 3rd year French for me and, you know, get very close to my students like my French teacher did, like our band director did and have a, you know, a close relationship with them.
Lee:Well in 19 I graduated December of 1980 and nobody wanted a French teacher. French was becoming out of style because Spanish was rising because you you know you were using Spanish with people a lot more often and since you know December of 1980 I've only spoken French but they made it French speaking person one time Actually it was 2 people it was 2 ladies during the Olympics and Atlanta up on Quebec who were lost and they were we were at Atlantic Square and they were trying to find some place And so I was trying to speak with them and, like, many other folks, you know, who learned the language in school, when you actually use it with native speakers, it's not not saying. I was speaking with them and in French, and I knew my accent was terrible. Your accent is beautiful. We know where to go now.
Lee:You know, here I was looking for a job and I worked in a nursing home doing reality orientation for the next 10 months because we had to eat and while I loved that kind of work, having people pass away on a regular basis was gonna rough on me. You know, it's it's not been easy to handle it when people die. So I took the job teaching special ed to get my foot in the door and within a month I knew I loved it and instead of just becoming certified, I went for master's degree at, West Georgia. But it's hard, and the paperwork is was bad back then and got worse. And so February 1982, I was at the end of my road with the Hagers and having to have all this paperwork ready for parents, much less grade papers and things like that.
Lee:And I looked out the back door, you know, the gym going to the stadium and just stood there and said, no, lord. I just don't know if I can do this. I I just don't think I can. And then I felt this piece wash over me, and I don't think anybody was there with me. I could hear an audible voice that I think is Jesus.
Lee:They said, no. You're gonna be like that. I got you. Saving that feeling for about 10 minutes and went in and kept teaching for the next 28 years.
T.J.:Wow. All you needed was assurance. Yeah.
Lee:Mhmm. Well, I never had been, you know, the queen of self esteem anyway. I grew up in the 1960s I had a name Lee that was spelled like a boy's name I've come into arguments over how to spell my name and whether or not it was a good name. It's my name. It wasn't easy getting a smart girl.
Lee:You know? Every now and then, I'd hear, well, if you're too smart, the boys won't wanna go. By high school, I thought, well, I guess I just want that. I got a kid got them making eggs.
T.J.:Sounds like sounds like you were a pretty tough chick.
Lee:Not like the not like the fighting because I was pretty shy also, but I did stand up for myself. And I found out in the 5th grade, 4th grade, 5th grade. I was never gonna make a's and everything after that. I have a specific learning disability and math calculation I reverse and rotate numbers. Nines and sixes often look the same or I'll mix them up and it's called dyscalculia if anybody wants to look it up.
Lee:And that was playing out in, you know, my faith journey also because it's kind of a mild disability compared to people having it's more like a learning difference for sure compared to people having being unable to read, unable to write, unable to move like other people, but it gives me a little humility that, you know, wasn't perfect and I never was going to be get around it or go over it or under it or something and and get good results.
T.J.:Yeah. Maybe looking at the the numbers differently allows you to have the gift of looking at the world differently.
Lee:Exactly. Exactly. I know what it feels like for something to be incredibly hot. And and I'm I was told I had to take algebra 2 and trigonometry advanced algebra to get into college and I did a lot of art projects and a lot of reports my mid seventies I mean just seventies. My middle sister would had a 110 average her last 2 years.
T.J.:Well, Lee, is there anything in your early childhood or teenage or early adult years that, brought you to the faith or made your faith in Jesus Christ stronger?
Lee:There was a pastor when I was about, we had when I was between 9 and 10. Second Baptist Church in Rockmart, whose name was Guy Johnson. He was seminary educated, and there were a few people that felt that against him, but we thought he was wonderful. He's a very kind, loving man. All of the children and youth at 2nd Baptist were not his grandchildren, and he preached more more about the love of God and the loving sacrifice of Jesus than he did about if you like to say, you go help.
Lee:And, there was another person. His last name was Paul Jackson. He was the associational missionary. They call him kind of like your, kind of like stated clerk or maybe Presbyterian Council.
T.J.:Yeah. And this is in the Southern Baptist
Lee:In the Southern Baptist church. In 19 sixties. Those people made a big impression on me. My son all my Sunday school teachers did, especially in the we had something called training, which is like Sunday night youth. Miss Admis Carroll, her son was in Vietnam, and so I don't know how in the world she managed to teach us.
Lee:Little kids, wondering if her son was gonna make it home and what kind of shape he's gonna be in or not, but she taught me taught us, John 316 and the Lord's Prayer. Of course all the you know teachers we had some wonderful really cross lot people there. We had a few who weren't quite so much like Jesus but that wasn't, you know, become evident until my church split when I was like and like you said, you know, we gotta be finished in time for you to.
T.J.:Well, Lee, how did talk about your call to ministry, to the ministry, the word, and the sacraments. And in your introduction to the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, How did all of that occur? Do they go together? What is that story like?
Lee:Well, they all work together for good. They were all together. When I was 9 years old at that church, my mother was kind of like a youth leader. We had a little girls organization, a girls auxiliary auxiliary to the boys who were royal ambassadors of course because the men were you know in charge of the church. Yeah.
Lee:You wouldn't dare to hurt a woman, you know, pastor at that time. Although I think preacher Johnson would not have been a reversal. But, anyway, I remember getting up behind the pulpit. We were getting ready to do a Christmas play or something and they had not taken the, you know, pulpit the the light turned down itself. I remember standing up there on some box and looking over the church and getting this funny feeling.
Lee:I wonder what it's like food and my mother made it and pitched a pitch to pitch get that off of there you have somebody's no singing you know there's some kind of sin. Later on through the end in vacation bible school and in the, you know, little today's group, we learned about medical mission. At that time, my mom bought us World Book Encyclopedia. Great, great expense to herself. And she you know put them out and I read World Book 1966 edition cover to cover over the next several years.
Lee:I loved it. It wound up sending me to Terry College on a academic scholarship. So I felt that feeling and I started feeling like I was called to be a medical missionary, you know, to, let's see. I think at that time it was the the sick children in the Congo And I always kept that that feeling, you know, feeling called to help people. Of course, at that time, I would know a lot more had thought I was ever be called pastor and, you know, I would have been called mathematician.
Lee:That was that was the earliest feelings I can remember. I definitely felt like after I've been teaching special ed a few weeks I was called to be a special ed feeling I mean teacher so I always had that feeling of all the whole time and, yes, I took French and German and never taught it but it was very useful when you know when I started my theological education because all those wonderful books I borrowed from Mark and Michelle Rackley, you know, Octa Myers and, you know, Kittle and all that when you have the footnotes at the bottom written in French and German, I could read that. I might have to grab my German dictionary but I could I could read that stuff. But the really big, you know, call to the ministry was on July 11th. I wrote it down July 11, 2006 at CPYC.
Lee:Stephanie Brown and some folks mentee has had come over to talk to all the kids about, you know, possibility. It's it's it's about calling you into the ordained ministry. And Reverend Elton Elton is it Paul? His name is Mary. He's a pastor in city CA in Laco, Texas, and he's also an accountant and also mayor of his small town and he was up talking about how he was also a pastoring, you know, church, Cumberland Presbyterian Church in America and I had been a Cumberland since 1981.
Lee:I married a gentleman in 1980 who was a member of MARTA, number 1 Presbyterian. I was looking for another denomination in that time between 1976 when my church split and I started seeing that a lot of the things I've grown up with in Baptist theology just really didn't hold long. And the first time I went to Bartow Church, Sunday after, Thanksgiving 1978. And I was greeted by Clara Badwell, Catherine Nor, pastor, reverend Doris and Margaret Smith, and I immediately knew I was home. Oh, this is gonna be so hard for you to edit.
Lee:I'm so sorry.
T.J.:No. Keep going. Keep going.
Lee:Okay. So I felt like I was home over the next year because I've learned never to take anything at face value. You know, I grew up in the sixties seventies. Question authority has always paid off. I researched the Cumberland Presbyterian Church and the origins I found out that you know it was loosely within a woman who was ordained you know despite being a woman and you know through all of that and I'm you know really really really jacked out the theology I felt like I couldn't go with the Methodist because I could not agree with falling from grace.
Lee:I didn't care how anybody got baptized I didn't you know I was raised baptism it was not necessary for salvation and so you know it didn't matter or or or whatever. So through all that, I joined Cumberland Presbyterian Church at Bartow. I think it was March 15, 1981. It was right before that 2nd anniversary and stuck with it and continued teaching special ed. So get back around to CPYC in, 2006.
Lee:I was musing on some of that and how in the world, Elton could manage to pastor a church, run his business, and be mayor of a small town when all of a sudden felt it happened. Then it it felt like the song showers of blessing. I felt like God's blessing was raining down on me. Elton had been saying, you know, he ran from his hall, doing, you know, this, that, and the other. Not necessarily sinful stuff.
Lee:He just didn't think he had time. And I don't know how he had time. I still don't know how he had time. Even a a part time pastor like mine, you know, takes a lot of time. But I just felt it, you know, blessing raining down on me.
Lee:And I thought, why bother? And so I went up, and I never like going up to the front of the church. Never ever. It's just like don't look at me and don't make assumptions about me, so I just don't go up to the altar at all. I went up and I talked to Stephanie, and I said, I think I'd call.
Lee:And so we talked and prayed and then later, back on back to the and on the way back to the cabin, Mary was in our cabin and, you know, for example, the young men and boys and I wouldn't tell them I said you gotta hear this because it was while you were talking that it happened. And so got back home because you can't make a phone call from, Camp Nocomy and I called up Mark Rackley. At that time, my first husband had passed away, and that's a long, long history that, you know, could come up some other time. I called Mark, and I said, I think I've been called. He said, really?
Lee:Tell me that. And so I did. And so he said, why don't you think about it and pray about it and be ready? We'll talk to the session. And so when I spoke to the session, most people look like I could have knocked them over with feather because I was not, you know, the most, you know, get up in front of everybody person, but Harris Bagwell and Alvin Richards said, oh, yeah.
Lee:Yeah. Yeah. I didn't say that. And and we just thought, oh, yeah. Yeah.
Lee:That makes sense to us. What does that stuff? And one more person that, I spoke to, John Collins. He's another friend. Also, at the time I told him, he was, bed bound.
Lee:He was. I can't remember what all John had wrong with him, but it had nothing to do with his mind. His mind is sharp as ever. My son and I went to visit him, and I told him and he said, Lee, I'm glad you're following God's law. It was no pit of yeah.
Lee:But you're a woman. You're not supposed to do that. He said, he's like, yeah. Well, we could see it come. Eventually, I wound up going before our presbytery and, you know it's by then Rhonda McGowan had been Reverend Rhonda McGowan had been paused a little while.
Lee:There we had plenty of women elders and that Susan Turner, that time was a was a woman elder on the Bartow session. It was refreshing to be in a church where because little employment, it didn't seem to make any difference with extra value. And I understand it's not like that everywhere. It is part of church in most churches in Tennessee, Georgia.
T.J.:Sounds like you had good support really early on in your calling to ministry, and, you know, God provided and placed in your life these wonderful support persons. Let's talk about today and where you see God working.
Lee:I see God working at, for sure. We've got men who have a very strong faith. Another you know, I can I can hop back for a second? So rewarding experiences. One of the rewarding experiences is that they ask for prayer.
Lee:I mean it's not like like they're oblivious to the need for prayer that's not it at all they're just like you know they are us you know but I have a praying community they'll say I say, you know, God, you have me prayer requests and a couple of them said, praying for you and Glenn. That's not always been kind of like an open book maybe too much. They know what my dad said. They were praying with us when Glenn's parents were in their home, but, God is, they got it work in bringing bringing gifts out of people, and maybe they get another.
T.J.:And you're a true testament to that.
Lee:Oh, true. Yes. I get so. All the unexpected things. I see God at work in the world even when people in groups are so opposed to each other.
Lee:Where you see people say you believe my way. It's at all or nothing. Yet there are people who kind of come out from the moon belt and say, you know, we're all in this together. You know? Jesus loved everybody.
Lee:Jesus said to the you know woman taken in adultery you know where are your accusers who have condemned you? Jesus said Lord Lord You know? So so what a mess they spiritual mess they were and dropped their rocks and left. And Jesus says, neither do I condemn the Bible. Maybe Jesus gently just smiled and said, hey.
Lee:You don't don't. Yeah. Jesus knew that she wasn't perfect. Jesus was the only one who was not gonna see him, but, I see people coming out. They're not coming out.
Lee:Well, I mean, people showing up and spreading love and saying, yes. There are consequences to all the sins we have. It's backbiting and judging and malice and causing strife and all that stuff listed in, you know, the law and in the in the province itself. And I see people say, you know, actually, if you're gonna speak the truth, actually, have some love in it. Mind.
Lee:Actually, help people who are having a whole lot of difficulty helping themselves.
T.J.:So my next question is, and you have some history here I I didn't know about. So growing up in the Southern Baptist Church and being, in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church for a few decades and then a calling to ministry. Now you're ordained Cumberland Presbyterian ministers. You've got this wonderful and rich background. What hopes do you have for the church as you look into the future?
Lee:I still have hope for the church as I look into the future. I've I've heard in, you know, classes on, you know, working with millennials. I see the news every night. I probably shouldn't watch it as much as I do, but I can ignore it. Church membership is supposedly declining.
Lee:Church attendance is declining. I had hoped that, as not just the common church, but the church universal, we will see that we don't have to necessarily give up things to be reaching people for Christ that we can add to what we're doing. I see helpers like mister Rogers was talking about. He would get upset as a child and something bad that happens. And he would say, look for the helpers.
Lee:There will always be helpers. I see people making, you know, working, looking into new church developments. I've seen, like, at the income church model going back to the early church. The, I call it, new worshiping community. I mean, new worshiping communities, which I think I have because we're just not like, bring the old folks to the, you know, dining room and the preacher will preach and somebody will sing because we get together.
Lee:We discuss our stuff. I think if we can I want to say let go of our traditional church because I mean that serves a purpose? I like to go doing it on facebook still because I'm still paying much you know very close attention to the COVID numbers. I'm double vaccinated with Moderna and I haven't grown any extra arms yet. But, so I attend Gwen and I attend every Sunday via Facebook watching Reverend Mark Rack.
Lee:Where do you get that? Our 2 permanent, Presbyterian Church. That's a new way of doing it. Do, you know, do we wanna do when you wanna go back to just you must come inside this, you know, brick and mortar building? Some people may not.
Lee:Can we not keep doing the kind of Facebook outreach? A lot of people that I've known have said you know we really it appears that we have more people listening and attending the digital devices than we did before. And who's to say that that might not somebody who really, really, really needs Christ might not come across, you know, somebody's Facebook live broadcast. It's okay. Maybe there's still hope for me here.
Lee:The churches that, particularly in the class last year, that were meeting in like pizza hut, Willie's or Moe's, a restaurant. I thought, you know, here's a worshiping community getting together and worshiping in a new and different way. Maybe, you know, they just kind of heard a little about Jesus and think, you know, Christians are just about to get and then they just happen to listen in and hear the right words that say, hey. These people these people are compassionate. These people are looking out for other folks.
Lee:Maybe I should be maybe I should pay attention to this Jesus stuff.
T.J.:Those are really strong, good hopes. And some of them aren't really hopes, Lee. They're also a reality currently happening.
Lee:Yeah. That's exciting to me. There's some folks I believe well, I know it. I believe I've heard, you know, a few people here and there talk about, you know, we need to get back to the old time religion because it's good enough for me, but it might not be good enough for some of these folks who maybe had a problem caused by things that happened in their churches. And they need to be seeing that there's a reason to come back and and join in in some kind of gathering.
Lee:I mean, gosh, you know, your home churches in the early church really didn't look like, you know, a nice big brick building with the nice stained glass windows and padded pews and, you know, pretty stuff.
T.J.:Yeah. And some of the some of the things that you've mentioned is overarching. It is a review and a reflection upon what the definition of community means and faith community means, and what can it look like. And it we're living in a wonderful time to where we're able to raise the question and struggle with it and learn from it and try new things. And that's what I I like your hope.
T.J.:Thank you for sharing it because your hope really is, in part a reality as the church at large is is exploring new ways to worship and to share, the good news.
Lee:Oh, yeah.
T.J.:Lee, you mentioned earlier, Hickory Log and and you gave out the the website. Are there other ways for for those who are listening where they can continue to follow you on your faith journey?
Lee:I I do have my own Facebook page and, a lot of it's about Hickory Log, because I kind of drum up advertisement. You know, you can donate. You can help us. That kind of thing. I can't really think of anything else.
T.J.:Well, that's good enough. If people want to know more about Hickory Log, you can go to hickorylog.org, and, you'll find some contact information for Lee. And, you can reach out to her that way. Lee, I I wanna thank you. It has been a joy.
T.J.:You have taken me on quite a journey of your ministry, where you are today as chaplain, golly, preparing for school and special education, and your hopes for the church, and and even where you see god working in the world today, you have covered the spectrum in terms of of seeing the beauty of god in in everything and great aspirations for the church. I I can't thank you enough, Lee.
Lee:Thank you, Lee. I was kind of afraid to do this, but I kinda kind of like when, god started pushing me to ask the Hickory Line director years ago that, you know, find out if Hickory Line needs a a chaplain or a pastor and kind of argued with God a little bit and God set me up to meet the guy at a retired educator's Christmas party and I kept kind of feeling a nudge, you know, and so finally I hear the Holy Spirit say, ah, skip, you know, and you you know, like, got to kick my butt. You sure don't wanna get your butt kicked by the holy spirit. And so, I asked and, your gentleman, Blake Blake Flowers said, yeah. Yeah.
Lee:And, you know, I was kind of like another I was kind of like another activity. God started making it into chaplaincy and it's kinda like, well, ask your presbytery if you can, you know, have a ordinationable all if you don't get paid. Still, you know, it's kinda like God's saying, okay. You need to talk to TJ. You need to email TJ.
Lee:Finally, it's one of those do it minutes.
T.J.:Well, Lee, I wanna thank you for serving our friends with intellectual disabilities and developmental disabilities and for ministering to and with them. And I wanna thank you for your sharing today.
Lee:You're so welcome TJ. Thank you for this ministry. It's so interesting to listen, with the TV going and the cooking choppy. I'm one of those multitasking round up folks. I think it's called ADHD. I'm on.
T.J.:Well, thank you, Lee, and thank you for listening to today's podcast. Grab a friend and travel with us on our next journey down Cumberland Road.
