Member Testimonial: Vickie Clark (2017)

My name is Vickie Clark and I have the pleasure of serving on your board. I’m currently serving as board Vice President, and I am not good at asking people for money. Truth be told, I’m not good at asking anybody for anything pretty much ever at all. So, I wasn’t exactly thrilled when I was asked to be a Canvass speaker this year. A few years ago, I was asked to do this very thing but the topic was different. I was asked to speak about how I came to the Church of the River and what the Church of the River means to me, and even though I had made it forty-two years without ever speaking into a microphone, I was excited. I was excited because it is not hard for me to talk about why I love the Church of the River. Ask me any time and I will tell you everything…but not today. Today my job is different. Today, I am here to ask you to help me fund a vision. I’m here to ask you for your time, and I’m here to ask you for your money.

When Bob Wallace, our Canvass Chair, emailed me and asked me to speak, I quickly wrote him back with a list of all of the very good reasons I was not the right person for this job. If I had gotten far enough along, I’m sure I would have included a list of some of your names…those of you who I think would be very good at this job. But I didn’t. I stopped and I thought about why I come to the Church of the River. I thought beyond some of the sort of “feel good” reasons, and I thought I don’t come to the Church of the River just to feel comfortable. I don’t come to the Church of the River to have my own opinions reflected back to me so that I can feel safe and smart and secure. I come to the Church of the River to grow, and in order to grow we have to do things that are uncomfortable. I realized that I come to the Church of the River to get disturbed.

I teach yoga, and in yoga we like to say that the yoga practice comforts the disturbed and disturbs the comfortable…comforts the disturbed and disturbs the comfortable. Well, I think the same can be said of the Church of the River. No doubt, we are here to comfort the disturbed, and as I look out I see so many faces of those of you who have done just so…valiantly and faithfully…and will continue to do so. But maybe…maybe we are also here to disturb what’s comfortable. I’m pretty sure our new minister thinks so.

So, if we are comfortable with a small amount of time and energy we devote to the church…now is the time to reassess that. If we are comfortable with the fact that we have never once volunteered to teach a Sunday school class because we don’t have children in the Religious Education program…now is the time to bestir ourselves and do something outside of that comfort zone, and if we are comfortable pledging less than we are able…now is the time to change it.

I know one thing—the river reminds me of it every Sunday—we are not here to be stagnant. We are here to grow and we are so lucky that our search committee devoted a year of their lives not just to finding the Reverend Sam Teitel but to presenting our church, our community, and our Memphis in a way that made him want to come. So now he is here and we are so lucky to have Sam to help us grow. He’s got big ideas…he’s got plans for this church that are bold, exciting, and full of love, but in order to make them happen, those of us who like to be comfortable are going to have to get disturbed.

Right now, I get to feel the discomfort of asking for your help…of asking you to join me in making our pledges bigger…making them rambunctious and joyous…making our pledges reflect the fact that the Church of the River is a force for good in this world and right now we are ready…we are poised to be an even greater force for what is true, beautiful, and, dare I say, holy than we ever have been before.

So now, leading up to Covenant Sunday, as we are all thinking about what we will pledge to the church for the coming year…now is the time to commit ourselves to love, to commit ourselves to growth, and to not be afraid to get disturbed. Thank you.