Louisville Church Tour Part 4 of 8 - A Grief Mystery of Time
Hillcrest Baptist Church
December 18, 2005
11 AM
I think I am a bi-weekly churchgoer at best. I don’t even remember why I didn’t go to Church on December 11th other than my wife stayed home sick from work. Really that should have made it even easier for me to steal away for an hour, but I just went to the store and bought a paper and bacon and a raspberry Danish for the kids. To tell the truth, I don’t see myself going to church this weekend either. It’s Christmas anyhow, and a lot of churches are going to be closed, oddly enough. Hey, if they can close, so can I.
Hillcrest Baptist is really close to my house – just three right turns away. It couldn’t be in a more beautiful setting nestled between our subdivision, a horse farm and KY HWY 22. This church is just a big box with a steeple on top. Inside were 13 rows of pews (ooh, scary) with two aisles to break them apart. The floor and pews were all carpeted in the same light blue color, and red bows were everywhere. Up near the alter was a Christmas tree and a frigging pyramid of poinsettias. There were eight stained glass windows – four on each side
The alter itself was pretty rad with all kinds of crazy stonework on the back wall which made it look more like a fireplace. A large cross hung in the middle of the wall against a plain white backdrop and there were Christmas trimmings everywhere. I wondered why they didn’t just do the whole wall in stone, but I would find out why shortly thereafter.
I was a little early and there were mostly young people in the sanctuary when I sat down – yes, in the back left corner. Pew 13 – seat 1. Finally, at like 10:59 people started arriving in bunches from the main entrance behind the pews and also a side door near the alter. Most folks sat in the back, but they all seemed very cheerful and happy to be there.
A young man walked up to the alter from out of the crowd and asked everyone to stand and said, “Shoot, it’s almost Christmas, let’s sing some Christmas music. How about Come all ye Faithful.” “Right on,” I thought, “I know that one.” The room soon lit up with the song. Everyone was singing and seemed really into it. I was hoping that O Holy Night would be on the play list. “Hmmm… I wonder if they take requests?”
After we finished a young couple walked up to the alter and led us in prayer for this, the fourth day of the advent. I suddenly realized that they didn’t hand out any pamphlet or syllabus or schedule and I looked around to see if I missed it, but nobody seemed to have one. Okay, freestyle, cool. I noticed an old lady taking pictures of the couple as they read from the bible and lit the candle and I was pissed that I didn’t bring my camera. Man, no script and you can bring your camera? I might bring the girls to this church.
When the couple finished my eyes were suddenly tricked by some spell. A man was standing in the wall! Right below the cross in the plain white area that they didn’t add stone to like the rest of the alter. Okay, I finally got it. The cross was actually hanging on another wall behind the back wall of the alter, and I just couldn’t tell from where I was sitting. The man was the pastor and I wondered to myself if he was going to speak from behind the wall the whole time? I mean this would have been a good place to give a rad puppet show and I was hoping that at any moment he would kneel down and stick his arm in Jesus’ ass and begin.
When he started speaking everyone got real excited and sat up in their seats. He said that we were lucky because two folks were gonna get baptized. Nice, I thought to myself, how often do you get to see this. So, two folks walk down some stairs just out of view and then you see them and hear their feet splash into the water. They are man and wife and they are going to be baptized together.
He grabs the lady and looks her right in the eye, and like some kind of initiation into the crips, he asks her, “Bitch, oh fuck, bitch, do you accept Christ as your fucking savior? God damn, do you fucking know and believe that he died for your stupid ass and your motherfucking sins? Do you, bitch? (slap) Oh fuck, do you believe he rose from the dead on the third goddamn day and shit?”
“Fo shizzle, my nizzle.”
He then puts his arm behind her back and actually holds her nose and dips her in the drink. She comes back up quickly and uses her hands to wipe the water from her face. She is totally soaked and her hair is dripping all over the white gown she is wearing for the occasion.
Next the pastor goes though the same sequence of events with her husband, but this guy must eat even more bacon than I do, ‘cause he is a big boy. When the pastor goes to dunk him, he has to stop and then you could see him really steady himself and dunk the guy. I didn’t notice until he came back up that he was wearing glasses. Nice. To my surprise everyone then started applauding.
As the couple made their way back up the stairs the pastor toweled off his hands like a chef on a cooking show and then leaned back through the window and said, “If you’ve never trusted Jesus, God will speak to you today.” All right, I’ve been waiting all my life for this, I thought to myself.
So the pastor exited, stage left and the same young man walked up front and lead us in another song. “The Family of God” (that’s #386 in the Baptist Hymnal, btw). Next we did the stand-and-greet-your-neighbor thing, and wow, they really mean it. They didn’t just meet and greet everyone within arms length, but rather they walked all over the sanctuary, up and down the aisles, and seemed to say hi to everyone. I stayed in one spot but ended up meeting a lot of folks. They all had goofy smiles and seemed really interested in getting details out of me – “Are you new to the neighborhood? Visiting from out of town? Do you have children? What are you doing here?”
Shit, I was worn out when all of that was over. We mingled about for a solid 15 minutes. Now that I think about it we were probably giving the pastor a chance to dry his feet and put on his shoes and socks. We finally sat down and the same young man lead us in another prayer – totally off the cuff though, nothing scripted. He went out of his way, it seemed, to thank the lord for bringing new visitors to church. Then we stood and sang “Silent Night.” Fuck yeah, I love that song.
Next came the time for tidings and yes I had another fiver. I’m smooth. Lot’s of singles in the tray, but you know how I roll - a fiver. The pastor then came out and started with the sermon. He had some notes, but he was trying hard to make it seem like he was just making all this up as he went along. He started with a little Christmas joke saying that in all his 60-plus years he has never once dreamed of a sugarplum, and if anyone else had, well, congratulations to them.
He then transitioned nicely into another question about dreams. “Do you ever dream of a perfect world? Do you ever dream that you will feel as good at 60 as you did when you were 17? Do you ever dream that Football and Baseball players have to hold a bake sale to raise funds while teachers sign multi-million dollar contracts? Do you ever dream that the fat content in potato chips could be neutralized by dip?
He then read a verse from Galatians 4: 4,5. It was weird, ‘cause what he read didn’t match the text in my Baptist Bible, but it was close:
4 But when the completion of the time came, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.
Basically he broke this down into three parts: Time, God’s Gift, and Redemption, although I still don’t know how any of this related to his dream examples.
According to the pastor God is in control of time and everything has been scheduled. “What time is it in your life?” he asked. Then we prayed and he asked God to help us prepare our hearts and minds and lives to receive Jesus – the reason for the season. He went on to point out some events in the bible that were predicted to the day to drive home his point about God’s schedule. Something happened exactly 436 days after somebody said it would happen in 436 days. I don’t know, I was getting lost and hoping he would dunk somebody else.
He gave some more examples of perfect timing – something about Rebekah watering a camel and how it was at just the right time. Nothing is surprising to God, blah, blah, blah. So then I started thinking about Hurricane Katrina, and the Beastie Boys’ Sabotage Ringtone I just downloaded, and the way my shit fell in the toilet that morning and wondered if they all happened at “just the right time.”
Next he moved on to Jesus being God’s gift and how even that happened at just the right time. I could hear Chuck D singing “Ain’t that how God planned it?” But then instead of talking about this Gift, he just went right back to talking about the time thing. Something about how the whole world was speaking the same language which made it the perfect cultural time and then he talked about Alexander the great in comparison, but since he was a man and not God’s gift he became an alcoholic, drug-addict and contracted VD. He conquered the world but not his lust.
I was totally lost now. I mean the pastor seemed like a nice guy, but well, he didn’t stick to his plan – his schedule – of what he was going to talk about. He then mentioned some lady who was on a Christian mission and she met this prisoner and told him about the gospel, and then a week later she bumped into his wife! Huh? Huh? See? That’s no coincidence, that’s God’s plan, G. No doubt about it. Everything happens for a reason.
He closed by asking us again what time it was in our lives. “For the visitor’s,” he said, looking right at me, “is it time to become a Christian? Time to accept Jesus as your savior? Eternity is only a heartbeat away, people. Somebody just died and eternity is a reality for them. If you’re ashamed of Jesus in public, then Jesus will be ashamed of you before his father.”
Dang, now that was some powerful stuff there. Pretty much daring you to NOT accept Jesus as your savior. Still, it seemed to be in conflict with the message of God’s schedule. I mean, do I really have a choice in the matter? If it’s just the right time it’s gonna happen anyhow.
We sang one last song and this time the pastor shouted like a carnival barker between the singing. We would sing, “la la la.” And then he would shout, “Who is gonna come up here and accept Jesus?” “la la la” “Come on up here and join me, and join the church and accept Jesus as your savior.” “la la la” “God fucking damn it, let’s go, shit, the lord waits for no man, let’s go, the train is leaving the station, all aboard and shit.”
Well, one thing is certain. God must not have planned for me to go to church for the last three weeks, or finish this entry until now. As I write this it’s Friday the 13th. Wait, Friday the 13th? 13 pews? 13 folks at the last supper? Holy shit, I’m comin’ lord, I’m comin’.
December 18, 2005
11 AM
I think I am a bi-weekly churchgoer at best. I don’t even remember why I didn’t go to Church on December 11th other than my wife stayed home sick from work. Really that should have made it even easier for me to steal away for an hour, but I just went to the store and bought a paper and bacon and a raspberry Danish for the kids. To tell the truth, I don’t see myself going to church this weekend either. It’s Christmas anyhow, and a lot of churches are going to be closed, oddly enough. Hey, if they can close, so can I.
Hillcrest Baptist is really close to my house – just three right turns away. It couldn’t be in a more beautiful setting nestled between our subdivision, a horse farm and KY HWY 22. This church is just a big box with a steeple on top. Inside were 13 rows of pews (ooh, scary) with two aisles to break them apart. The floor and pews were all carpeted in the same light blue color, and red bows were everywhere. Up near the alter was a Christmas tree and a frigging pyramid of poinsettias. There were eight stained glass windows – four on each side
The alter itself was pretty rad with all kinds of crazy stonework on the back wall which made it look more like a fireplace. A large cross hung in the middle of the wall against a plain white backdrop and there were Christmas trimmings everywhere. I wondered why they didn’t just do the whole wall in stone, but I would find out why shortly thereafter.
I was a little early and there were mostly young people in the sanctuary when I sat down – yes, in the back left corner. Pew 13 – seat 1. Finally, at like 10:59 people started arriving in bunches from the main entrance behind the pews and also a side door near the alter. Most folks sat in the back, but they all seemed very cheerful and happy to be there.
A young man walked up to the alter from out of the crowd and asked everyone to stand and said, “Shoot, it’s almost Christmas, let’s sing some Christmas music. How about Come all ye Faithful.” “Right on,” I thought, “I know that one.” The room soon lit up with the song. Everyone was singing and seemed really into it. I was hoping that O Holy Night would be on the play list. “Hmmm… I wonder if they take requests?”
After we finished a young couple walked up to the alter and led us in prayer for this, the fourth day of the advent. I suddenly realized that they didn’t hand out any pamphlet or syllabus or schedule and I looked around to see if I missed it, but nobody seemed to have one. Okay, freestyle, cool. I noticed an old lady taking pictures of the couple as they read from the bible and lit the candle and I was pissed that I didn’t bring my camera. Man, no script and you can bring your camera? I might bring the girls to this church.
When the couple finished my eyes were suddenly tricked by some spell. A man was standing in the wall! Right below the cross in the plain white area that they didn’t add stone to like the rest of the alter. Okay, I finally got it. The cross was actually hanging on another wall behind the back wall of the alter, and I just couldn’t tell from where I was sitting. The man was the pastor and I wondered to myself if he was going to speak from behind the wall the whole time? I mean this would have been a good place to give a rad puppet show and I was hoping that at any moment he would kneel down and stick his arm in Jesus’ ass and begin.
When he started speaking everyone got real excited and sat up in their seats. He said that we were lucky because two folks were gonna get baptized. Nice, I thought to myself, how often do you get to see this. So, two folks walk down some stairs just out of view and then you see them and hear their feet splash into the water. They are man and wife and they are going to be baptized together.
He grabs the lady and looks her right in the eye, and like some kind of initiation into the crips, he asks her, “Bitch, oh fuck, bitch, do you accept Christ as your fucking savior? God damn, do you fucking know and believe that he died for your stupid ass and your motherfucking sins? Do you, bitch? (slap) Oh fuck, do you believe he rose from the dead on the third goddamn day and shit?”
“Fo shizzle, my nizzle.”
He then puts his arm behind her back and actually holds her nose and dips her in the drink. She comes back up quickly and uses her hands to wipe the water from her face. She is totally soaked and her hair is dripping all over the white gown she is wearing for the occasion.
Next the pastor goes though the same sequence of events with her husband, but this guy must eat even more bacon than I do, ‘cause he is a big boy. When the pastor goes to dunk him, he has to stop and then you could see him really steady himself and dunk the guy. I didn’t notice until he came back up that he was wearing glasses. Nice. To my surprise everyone then started applauding.
As the couple made their way back up the stairs the pastor toweled off his hands like a chef on a cooking show and then leaned back through the window and said, “If you’ve never trusted Jesus, God will speak to you today.” All right, I’ve been waiting all my life for this, I thought to myself.
So the pastor exited, stage left and the same young man walked up front and lead us in another song. “The Family of God” (that’s #386 in the Baptist Hymnal, btw). Next we did the stand-and-greet-your-neighbor thing, and wow, they really mean it. They didn’t just meet and greet everyone within arms length, but rather they walked all over the sanctuary, up and down the aisles, and seemed to say hi to everyone. I stayed in one spot but ended up meeting a lot of folks. They all had goofy smiles and seemed really interested in getting details out of me – “Are you new to the neighborhood? Visiting from out of town? Do you have children? What are you doing here?”
Shit, I was worn out when all of that was over. We mingled about for a solid 15 minutes. Now that I think about it we were probably giving the pastor a chance to dry his feet and put on his shoes and socks. We finally sat down and the same young man lead us in another prayer – totally off the cuff though, nothing scripted. He went out of his way, it seemed, to thank the lord for bringing new visitors to church. Then we stood and sang “Silent Night.” Fuck yeah, I love that song.
Next came the time for tidings and yes I had another fiver. I’m smooth. Lot’s of singles in the tray, but you know how I roll - a fiver. The pastor then came out and started with the sermon. He had some notes, but he was trying hard to make it seem like he was just making all this up as he went along. He started with a little Christmas joke saying that in all his 60-plus years he has never once dreamed of a sugarplum, and if anyone else had, well, congratulations to them.
He then transitioned nicely into another question about dreams. “Do you ever dream of a perfect world? Do you ever dream that you will feel as good at 60 as you did when you were 17? Do you ever dream that Football and Baseball players have to hold a bake sale to raise funds while teachers sign multi-million dollar contracts? Do you ever dream that the fat content in potato chips could be neutralized by dip?
He then read a verse from Galatians 4: 4,5. It was weird, ‘cause what he read didn’t match the text in my Baptist Bible, but it was close:
4 But when the completion of the time came, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.
Basically he broke this down into three parts: Time, God’s Gift, and Redemption, although I still don’t know how any of this related to his dream examples.
According to the pastor God is in control of time and everything has been scheduled. “What time is it in your life?” he asked. Then we prayed and he asked God to help us prepare our hearts and minds and lives to receive Jesus – the reason for the season. He went on to point out some events in the bible that were predicted to the day to drive home his point about God’s schedule. Something happened exactly 436 days after somebody said it would happen in 436 days. I don’t know, I was getting lost and hoping he would dunk somebody else.
He gave some more examples of perfect timing – something about Rebekah watering a camel and how it was at just the right time. Nothing is surprising to God, blah, blah, blah. So then I started thinking about Hurricane Katrina, and the Beastie Boys’ Sabotage Ringtone I just downloaded, and the way my shit fell in the toilet that morning and wondered if they all happened at “just the right time.”
Next he moved on to Jesus being God’s gift and how even that happened at just the right time. I could hear Chuck D singing “Ain’t that how God planned it?” But then instead of talking about this Gift, he just went right back to talking about the time thing. Something about how the whole world was speaking the same language which made it the perfect cultural time and then he talked about Alexander the great in comparison, but since he was a man and not God’s gift he became an alcoholic, drug-addict and contracted VD. He conquered the world but not his lust.
I was totally lost now. I mean the pastor seemed like a nice guy, but well, he didn’t stick to his plan – his schedule – of what he was going to talk about. He then mentioned some lady who was on a Christian mission and she met this prisoner and told him about the gospel, and then a week later she bumped into his wife! Huh? Huh? See? That’s no coincidence, that’s God’s plan, G. No doubt about it. Everything happens for a reason.
He closed by asking us again what time it was in our lives. “For the visitor’s,” he said, looking right at me, “is it time to become a Christian? Time to accept Jesus as your savior? Eternity is only a heartbeat away, people. Somebody just died and eternity is a reality for them. If you’re ashamed of Jesus in public, then Jesus will be ashamed of you before his father.”
Dang, now that was some powerful stuff there. Pretty much daring you to NOT accept Jesus as your savior. Still, it seemed to be in conflict with the message of God’s schedule. I mean, do I really have a choice in the matter? If it’s just the right time it’s gonna happen anyhow.
We sang one last song and this time the pastor shouted like a carnival barker between the singing. We would sing, “la la la.” And then he would shout, “Who is gonna come up here and accept Jesus?” “la la la” “Come on up here and join me, and join the church and accept Jesus as your savior.” “la la la” “God fucking damn it, let’s go, shit, the lord waits for no man, let’s go, the train is leaving the station, all aboard and shit.”
Well, one thing is certain. God must not have planned for me to go to church for the last three weeks, or finish this entry until now. As I write this it’s Friday the 13th. Wait, Friday the 13th? 13 pews? 13 folks at the last supper? Holy shit, I’m comin’ lord, I’m comin’.
posted by Tsahkratis at 8:15 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home