Revival 2006 Lecture: “Resisting Grace”
Monday, November 20th, 2006It is our pleasure to publish here one of the Keynote Lectures at Revival 2006 in New York City at Fourth Universalist Society. This was by Jim Mulholland, pastor of Irvington Friends Meeting in Indianapolis and co-author with Phil Gulley of “If Grace Is True,” and “If God Is Love.” He is also the author of “Praying Like Jesus.” Ordained as an American Baptist, he has served in United Methodist as well as Quaker congregations. We are also posting the lecture at our blog, www.uuchristianfellowship.blogspot.com for your commentary. You may order his books at a discount by contacting the UUCF.
RESISTING GRACE
Introduction
It is a real joy for me to be here with you today. It’s not often that I get a chance to preach to the choir. Though people are seldom rude or obnoxious, Phil and I are more accustomed to speaking before hostile and resistant groups where people sit with their arms crossed and glares on their faces.
I remember our very first speech after the release of If Grace Is True. We were asked to speak at the Plainfield Public Library – a large, state of the art facility in a suburb outside of Indianapolis. Though the book had just been released, people in Indianapolis had been critiquing the book for months. An Indianapolis newspaper had printed an interview with Phil where he’d explained why his Christian publisher – Multinomah – had fired him. They’d fired him because he and I were writing If Grace Is True.
In the article, Phil spoke of our belief that all people will be saved. Within days, the newspaper was inundated with angry letters to the editor. Phil soon faced an effort by some Quakers to see his credentials as a Quaker pastor removed. One Quaker leader distributed a letter in which he suggested Phil and I should be taken outside the meetinghouse and horsewhipped – harsh words when you remember that Quakers are supposed to be pacifists. Long before the book was released and we spoke at that library, most of Indianapolis had an opinion about our writing.
As I speak across the country, I’ve discovered people on the coasts are sometimes surprised by the energy Midwestern folks give to the questions of hell – which is precisely why most Midwesterners believe the people on the coasts are headed there. In the heartland of America, where Phil and I were born and raised, questioning hell isn’t a religious discussion, but a battleground in a cultural war.