I was ten that summer ...
The year was 1946 and social life was limited in our country town. Church was important, but not always for the right reasons. Mostly, I went to Baptist. Sometimes, Pentecost. Occasionally, Methodist. Wherever my best friend of the moment went, I went.
Baptist people were having an old time revival. Along about dusk dark I fitted myself into the proper pew with my current best friend. It was closer to the front than I would have chosen. Best friend's mother was sitting right behind us. Not a desirable arrangement. She was fanning herself with a cardboard funeral home fan. There was a picture of Jesus holding a lamb on front. The handle was shaped like a big popsicle stick. That woman wouldn't hesitate to hit us on the head with the sharp edge of her fan at the first hint of a giggle. I'd sat in front of her before.
A few more stragglers wedged themselves into our row. About seven of us in all. Boys and girls. Hoodlums, everyone. I didn't look back but I could feel the Jesus fan picking up tempo and I could just imagine the narrow suspicious eyes and tightly clamped lips of a saint who was prepared to straighten out every no-good one of us.
Please rise and turn your hymnals to page 73. Our row didn't have to be told twice. Up we bounced. Standing at attention. We liked singing. The old upright piano began pounding out "There is a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Immanuel's veins ..." We opened our mouths wide. What we lacked in talent we made up for in volume.
Another song or two then we braced ourselves for the long haul. Please open your Bibles to Eclesiastes chapter two, verses eight and nine. Our ears promptly went dead. We had neither Bibles nor interest. What we did have was bubble gum. And paper. And pencils. Chewing and note passing began in earnest as the preacher rushed headlong into his sermon with bubbles of spit quickly forming at the corners of his mouth. One hand clutched a Bible and waved it wildly above his head while the other hand pounded the podium and his face turned bright red with eyes bulging half-way out of their sockets.
Each minute lasted an hour. Would he ever get through up there?
None of us had felt the bite of a funeral home fan yet.
We were doing okay.
Please rise and turn your hymnals to page 112. Thank you, Jesus! It was coming to an end. Old upright began a slow mournful wail. Our row stood quietly and waited for the night's climax. Would there be screaming and shouting? No, no, wrong church. Will there be nose blowing and weeping out loud? Yes, maybe. Probably. "Soft-ly and ten-der-ly Je-sus is call-ing ... Call-ing for you and for me ... Come ho-o-ome. Come ho-o-ome. Ye who are weary, come ho-o-ome ..."
Preacher man stopped the singing and began talking. Piano played eerily in the background.
"You may die before you reach your homes tonight, brothers and sisters. Are you prepared to face your maker? Are you ready to meet your eternal life. Have you been saved? You may die before you reach your homes tonight. Are you prepared to die?"
I nervously scratched a mosquitto bite on my arm and tried not to remember the rabbit foot key chain I stole from Woolworth's when I was visiting a cousin in the city two years before.
"Will you come? While the piano plays softly and every head is bowed and every eye is closed? All you have to do is step one foot out in the aisle and I'll meet you half way. Will you come? Don't put it off. You need to be saved. If you die before reaching home tonight you'll spend eternity in a burning hell. The pain will be worse than anything you can imagine and it will never end. You need to walk down this aisle and get saved right now."
Piano plays softer and softer. scarier and scarier. Preacher man begins to cry. "Oh, Sinner, won't you come?" long ragged breath ends in a sob. I sneak a look. He has his handkerchief out now, wiping his eyes. "Please won't you come? Please! I'm begging you! Sinner, I don't want you to leave this church tonight without accepting the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior. You may die on the way home. If you do, you'll spend eternity burning in the flames of hell."
Oh dear, he's sobbing so hard now he can hardly get his breath.
Whispers begin moving along our pew. "I will if you will ... Well, I will if you will ... Okay, but you go first ... No, you go first ... Okay, let's all hold hands ..."
And, simple as that, a bunch of ignorant children who hadn't heard one word of the sermon and hadn't the foggiest idea what they were doing, "got saved." Oh, there was shouting and dancing in the aisles. We stood facing the congregation, feeling proud to have done something that made everyone so happy. We felt important to be receiving so much attention. Even the fan woman hugged me and whispered, "Praise Jesus!" in my ear.
Back at my house, the coal oil lamp was burning low on the kitchen table. I passed it by and felt my way into Daddy's room. Shaking him awake, I announced my news, "I got saved tonight, Daddy!"
"You what?" he was up from sleep and out of bed in one fluid motion, "You did what?"
"Uh, um, well, Daddy, I got saved over at the Baptist revival."
Brushing past me, Daddy turned the coal oil flame up brighter and motioned me to take a seat. we faced each other across the kitchen table. The questioning began.
"What, exactly, does that mean ... you got saved?"
"Well, um, it means I won't go to hell when I die, and, Daddy, I could very easily have died on my way home from church tonight."
"Did the preacher tell you that?"
"Yes Sir."
"Did he tell you that before you got saved?"
"Yes Sir."
"Is that why you got saved? You were scared you'd die on the way home from church?"
"Well, yes, that and the fact that the preacher was crying real hard because nobody was coming down the aisle to shake his hand and I felt sorry for him and my friends wanted to get saved too so we just all decided to do it."
"Kind of like daring each other to jump off the river bridge?"
"Yes, Sir," My voice had dropped so low I could barely hear it in my own ears.
"Tomorrow, we'll talk to the preacher. Then we'll decide what's the right thing for you to do."
"Did I do wrong, Daddy?"
"No, Jo, you didn't do one thing wrong, but I'd feel easier in my mind if you were a little older before you took a step like this. We'll talk more about it tomorrow."
The two men met out by the road. Preacher parked his car in the shade of the magnolia tree. Daddy removed his hat as he walked across the front yard. Whether to show respect for the man or the Bible prominently displayed against the man's belly, I wasn't sure. I watched from the front porch steps as they shook hands. My life was hanging in the balance. Not my eternity. My here-and-now. Friends would never stop laughing if Daddy didn't let me get baptized.
Both men agreed the weather was warm. Both agreed we were long overdue for a little rain. I started to breathe easier until the talk turned churchy and I didn't have to strain my ears to know this visit wasn't gonna be pleasant.
"Your daughter's decision has upset you, Sir?"
"Not if it really was her decision," Daddy answered.
"I see," Preacher cleared his throat and held his Bible a little more front and center against his white shirt, "Yes. Yes. I see."
Daddy waited patiently under the tree. I waited on the steps.
"The holy spirit was really moving at last night's meeting, Sir, and God spoke ..."
"No," Daddy said, "No disrespect, Preacher, but it was you who spoke. Not God."
Preacher smiled sadly and shifted his weight from one foot to the other, "I can't believe any father would object to his child getting saved."
My father stood taller and his voice dropped lower. He wasn't smiling. "Preacher, with all due respect, I've explained to my child that a person is saved by knowing and believing more than by feeling. Getting saved is not a game. It's serious."
Preacher nodded his head and smiled, pleased, he thought, at the way the conversation was heading ...
But Daddy wasn't through. "I don't want to talk my daughter out of something she's old enough to do, but, with all due respect, Preacher, I don't want you talking her into something she's too young to do either."
"Well, Sir, I can appreciate ..."
Appreciation was interrupted mid-sentence, "Much obliged for coming by. We'll let you know what we decide," Daddy replaced his hat on his head as he walked off toward the barns.
Preacher gave me a weak smile as he climbed back into his car. I remained sitting on the front steps, wondering how long it would take Daddy to come to a decision.
It didn't take long. He asked more questions. I answered the best I could.
"Is your life going to be better from now on?" he asked.
"Yes, Sir."
"How?" he wanted to know.
"Well, um, see, Daddy, I won't have to be worried anymore about all the bad things I've done."
"Girl," he looked shocked, "You've never done anything bad!"
I stared at the ground, watching my big toe make circles in the grass, thinking how glad I was Daddy didn't know about that rabbit foot key chain I shoplifted two years before.
Finally, with a deep sigh, he said, "Okay, if you're sure this is what you want, I won't stand in your way."
A large crowd stood on the banks of the Arkansas river as - one by one - we children were guided out into the water. I heard the preacher say, "I baptize thee, my sister, in the name of the father, the son and the holy ghost." Down I went under the water. Up I came again, sputtering, wiping my eyes and quickly searching past the crowd to find that familiar figure standing alone and apart. He was wearing his one good suit, white shirt and tie. Our eyes barely met before he turned and walked away.
So ... was my childhood conversion real? No. It was exciting and it made me feel temporarily important, but my father had been right to object. It wasn't real.
At age nineteen, I looked into the face of my first-born child and knew - really knew for the first time - there was a God. Suddenly, I wanted to know Him better.
My true journey was beginning.
It's been the work of a lifetime. I've stumbled, fallen and strayed too many times to count, but each time I look up ...
God is still there.
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