It sounded a lot like “we’ve always done it that way” the first time I heard about it.  Ten years ago, I was new at LPC, and then, like now, “we’ve always done it that way” set me against the idea whatever it was.

On Sunday we will celebrate the eleventh Annual Labor Day Weekend Shared Worship Service with First Baptist Church since I’ve been here.  The event with its not memorable name has been around for much longer than ten years. Twenty years?  Thirty years?  I don’t know. We’ve always done it.

Of course, I was going to do what I needed to do to help make the ALDWSWSFBC as good as they said it always had been. That didn’t mean that I had to like the idea.

Then I met Luke.

Luke Mason had arrived in Langhorne only a few months before I had.  The 2008 ALDWSWSLPC was his first as well, and I would come to find out that it had been presented as “we’ve always done it that way” a few blocks up Pine Street just as it had been around the corner on Gillam Avenue.  We’d both been told that our respective predecessors had invested much in the service and were good friends.  That set me against the idea that I would have to be a friend with the Baptist pastor up the street.

Then I met Luke.

When they first thought up the ALDWSWSFBC/LPC there were hopes that it might somehow be a small part of the racial reconciliation so desperately needed in our country – then and now.  So, to state the obvious.  First Baptist Church is a historically Black Church.  Langhorne Presbyterian Church is, well, you know, frozen chosen and all that.

I don’t know how well the ALDWSWSFBC/LPC has lived up to the probably naïve expectations of those who first came up with the idea so long ago.  But I would never dismiss what little it may have done and know beyond a shadow of a doubt that its potential remains largely untapped.

The ALDWSWSFBC/LPC has become one of my favorite Sundays of the year.  But much more than that, Luke Mason, the pastor at First Baptist Church, has become a valued colleague and a friend I did not expect.  Sometimes a friend surprises.

That Luke is black and I am white is of some importance in our friendship. To say otherwise would be naïve and dishonest.  We sometimes talk about black and white, worlds that remain too separate and which are kept separate by things not of God. Repentance is in order. I have learned much from Luke.  That Luke preaches like a preacher and that I am rhythm-challenged is the stuff about which we laugh good laughs.

Above all else, and much of all else matters, Luke is my friend.  Mostly when we talk we talk about our lives as Christian men, husbands, fathers, and as pastors. We talk about our congregations and I am not going to tell you what we say.

Ten years ago Luke and I met to talk about the ALDWSWSFBC/LPC.  We’d both been told that it had always been that way, and, no pressure, that our predecessors had been friends.  I think both of us may have been a little bit set against the whole idea.

Ten years later both Luke and I look forward to the ALDWSWSFBC/LPC.  But much more than that we give thanks to God for the gift of a wonderful friendship.

Some day a new pastor at FBC and a new pastor at LPC will be told about the ALDWSWSFBC/LPC and how we’ve always done it that way.  Allow them to roll their eyes and know that they may be set against the idea.  But also remember that our God is a God of good surprises.  Just maybe God has something never expected in store for them.

See you Sunday