October, 1987. I'm standing on a sidewalk on the rough edge of downtown Dallas--desperately looking for the address the woman had given me on the phone. All the words you would use to describe a neighborhood like this: seedy, gritty, crime-infested (and the more politically correct "transitional") all seemed to line up and describe this spot. Right before noon a crazy grab-bag of humanity began to find their way down a dirt alley between two boarded up storefronts. That alley looked seriously dangerous but I took a deep breath and followed them. What I found there was something I had been looking for my whole life and hadn't even known how to ask for. I was born on a Sunday and was in church the next Sunday. I had been taught and trained at two Christian universities and a seminary. I was 34 years old and the Sr. Pastor for one of the largest churches of my denomination in the world. I witnessed "church" that day for the first time in my life. These were the people who would save my life, re-write my theology, and change me forever. My life was about to turn upside down and go to places I could have never imagined.
advertisement