Monday January 26, 2015 “On top of the world…!” For many years, that’s the way he answered the question, “How are you?” We lost Lee Earl Hill Jr. to death three years ago yesterday, but the influence of his life and times continues. * I’m not sure if Earl (we called him ‘Pearl,’ the ‘Silver Bullet, grand daddy, and several other things) always answered that way when asked that question. But I can tell when our family and I first became aware of it: When he returned to Jackson from Sloan Kettering in New York after successful cancer surgery. We were excited and he was surprised when we met him at the airport that Wednesday evening as he returned home. ‘We’ being a good number of our church people. We had asked folks at the airport if we could hold our Wednesday prayer meeting on their property that evening. After some discussion, the bar was offered. Earl was delighted with the reception and we were glad to be present to affirm a man we loved, admired and grew because of. I remember he prayed ‘at the bar’ that evening to this effect, “Lord it’s hard to believe so many would come out to welcome an old man home, but how thankful I am for those who love us the way you love us, God—by putting yourself out for us.” Earl introduced many of us to his broad interests in everything. He took our kids on trips around the world with him. Oh, how I think of him at the foot of the hospital bed of our daughter in deep labor, on his knees—arms outstretched---saying in prayer tones, “Come on out baby, come on out.” That same daughter, Tracy, gave our son Anthony a very special birthday gift. It’s a large copper artistic cut -out of the world with ‘on top of the world’ cut into the piece. Ricky, and Tracy put it up by the door of our house. We see it going and coming, and sometimes even touch it as our Jewish friends do their Mezuzahs. Earl was good at that: Helping people see that respecting the faith of others did not diminish your own. He showed that when you were willing to learn about theirs, you grew your understanding of yours. Earl’s funeral service was attended, supported, and included prayers from God loving Jews, and peace loving Muslims as well as a deep appreciation for his strong and practiced Christian faith. The Dialogue Institute named their main meeting room for Earl after his death. Granddaddy Earl was ‘progressive.’ “You can call all the political parties whatever you want to, but ‘progressive’ ought to be what they are about. And if they aren’t that, do you think people will continue to support them?” About race relations. He joined our church when the one he had attended turned a black man away. The man, it turned out, (he came to us) was a bishop for the Church of God from Belize or some Caribbean state. The day the ‘Pearl’ joined, he came to our men’s club breakfast and after being welcomed, said to us all, “The trouble with the church is not people who won’t follow. It’s about pastors who won’t lead.” Talk about a word to we pastors… About climate change. “Who do you want to believe? A bunch of preachers and news folk or radio talk show hosts who don’t think it’s happening because they don’t want it to, or a bunch of scientists showing clearly that the climate is changing, and we can do something about it.” When he was layminister in charge of a worship service: “You can wax eloquent, quote Scripture, insist on the proper form of baptism or Holy Communion, but if you don’t really and truly love, it all doesn’t amount to a hill of beans—and that word is from a Hill—I hope not of beans!” On education: He had plenty of it. Mississippi College, Mississippi State, Union Theological Seminary (which few knew about), LSU for his Master’s, and a long list of conferences, seminars, books and magazines which he read until eyesight was lost, and then listened as others read to him, or by way of the radio. Earl could play a snazzy hand of poker too, but he wouldn’t tell you that, because “It’s not broadly understood, or universally accepted, ahem, by some of my church people friends.” His laughter was infectious, his spirit fully alive, and even on his death-bed as we held hands praying, there was a sense of suffering, loss, and pain indeed, but there was more: There was a distinct sense in that ICU room at Baptist that we were witnesses to a passing, not and ending, a conclusion that was in truth, an introduction. The Pearl once said to me when I had talked about how Bishop Mack Stokes used to say, “Don’t think heaven is sitting around drinking sarsaparilla, God is going to have some great thing for you to do.” “You know, I like that,” he said, “I’ll finally have time to do all those new things I wanted to do and never got around to here .” If heaven didn’t have a social work department before Lee Earl Hill Jr. got there, it’s got one now. With a green tree growing in the office, and a sign on the way reading: “On top of it worlds” Yes, worlds! Always love, always, Keith * Yesterday morning Anthony had a picture of Earl on his bed next to a large family favorite teddy bear, and a pillow that calls us to pray without ceasing. That made me think of this. ** Earl spent 23 years in the Social Work department at University Medical Center, and many more investing in whatever might make the human and social environment better. Forget the ‘Rest in peace’ line for Earl. “I’m at it all the time, and enjoying every minute—or whatever you call it here—of it. When you all get here, I’ve found several new books, and species, and…”
Posted on: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 12:33:33 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015