Coming Along

Chapter 10 -

Davy was awakened by the sound of one of the rocking chairs on his front porch. It wasn’t unusual for one of the children from the camp to get into one of the rockers, but it was five o’clock in the morning. The children were asleep long ago. Davy pulled aside the window shade. It was Danny sitting in the chair. Davy threw on his robe and went out onto the porch.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Yea, I was about to wake you up.”
“What’s on your mind?”
“I guess it’s the same things that may have concerned Martin Luther, and John Calvin and what was the name of that Anglican priest who started the Baptist faith?”
“John Smythe.”
“Yea, John Smythe.”
“They’re all people who began new Christian denominations.”
“Aren’t you putting yourself up on a pretty high level?”
“Not really, but I believe it’s us.”
“Oh, us, okay,” said Davy, “but if I remember my history correctly. Those people didn’t set out to start new denominations, they just wanted to correct what was already there.”
“I believe you’re right and I want to ask you a question.”
“Shoot,” said Davy.
“What is the Baptist Episcopal church trying to do?”
Davy hesitated, then replied, “Trying to do the same thing, trying to correct what is already there.”
“What we have right now is good. Heck, I’d almost say perfect, but one day, a Green or a Hamm or somebody is going to come along and try to change the whole thing.”
“You’re right. For greed or his ego, probably for greed.”
“We can’t let that happen.”
“No, but doesn’t that open a catch-22?”
“You mean a bunch of rules to protect what we’ve got that actually creates something worse than what we had?”
“I can’t think of a better way of putting it.”
“That’s why you’re out here at five o’clock in the morning?”
“I was going to wake you up, but I just decided to sit for a while before I do. At first, it seemed simple. We just keep on doing what we’re doing.”
“Then you figured in human nature and it was no longer simple, right?”
“Right.”
“Obviously, you’ve been up most of the night thinking about this.”
“Yes, several nights. Many nights.”
“Okay,” said Davy, “Let me piece it together. Make up a bunch of rules and it becomes like the Episcopal Church or, God forbid, the Catholic Church. Don’t have any rules and it becomes like the Baptist Church and we lose what we’ve gained.”
“I guess you’ve got it. No rules and how long is it going to be before everything will have to be done in an hour? And, when that happens–“
”We’re back to where we started, right?”
“Right.”
“Really, this is a pretty stupid thing for us to discuss. There shouldn’t be a time limit on God.”
“Maybe not, but there is. If it makes you feel better, we didn’t create it.”
“No, and Luther didn’t start the corruption in the Catholic Church, or your man Smythe begin infant baptism. Do you think that made them feel any better?”
In the dark, Davy saw the slight outline of Danny’s smile. “How do we answer the questions in church sometimes, ‘I don’t know, I wasn’t there’.”
“Right now, what we have is new. What happens when the people have heard the same thing before? Are they going to want to listen to it all over again?”
“I don’t know. The Catholic mass has been the same for well over a thousand years. The Episcopal and Lutheran, nearly five hundred. They’re almost the exact same every time, yet, people still come. Bringing it back to the bare truth, the black churches are packed every Sunday and you can’t tell me they haven’t heard the same sermon before.”
“This is true. There’s no such thing as a brand new sermon.”
“Then why are they there?”
“I would hope they are there wanting to spend some time thinking about their creator. Isn’t that the crux of it?”
“I guess so, because if they’re there for entertainment, we’re way behind.”
 Once again, Davy saw the outline of Danny’s smile. “What is it?”
"I was just thinking. What you just said may be nothing short of brilliant.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why do people go to see the Hamms and those television preachers?”
“Because it’s a show, a well-coordinated show. It’s entertainment.”
“That’s what I was thinking. They take emotion to a new high.”
In the dark, Danny couldn’t see Davy, but he was nodding.
“What are we offering then?”
“I would say a form of completeness. We describe what is in the Bible and in the sermon, we make it come alive. It’s complete. Remember when we saw Hamm steal those services from us? Billy-Bob and Bubba and I wanted to sue him, but you said no.”
“I never said no.”
“No, you said nothing. Why?”
“You want to know th truth?”
“Certainly.”
“Because even if a crook like Hamm accidently brings someone to God, that’s one more person who has been brought to God.”
“Doesn’t that answer your question then? We’re going to have crooks. They’ve been in every religion and faith since religion began. So what? We do what’s right and if we do it well enough, we’ll be okay and the Baptist Episcopal Church will survive. We lead by example, not written order.”
At that very moment, the sun broke over Saint David’s and Saint Daniel’s Baptist Episcopal Church. A bright beam illuminated the front of the church and the steeple. Danny looked at Davy. “I believe the boss is letting us know he agrees.”