As the months progressed, the Baptist Episcopal Church grew even larger. Besides Camp Eden and the Methodist Church in town, the pastors of two country churches approached Davy and Danny about showing them how the “new” church structure worked. Between Davy and Danny, Billy Bob and Bubba and Dominick and Gorge, they were well-equipped to give the little churches what they needed with the exception of one church, Green Hill Church about twenty miles outside of town.
Green Hill Church was the creation of Pastor Morris Green who called himself a Baptist minister, but never had any formal training. Davy and Danny had gone to Green Hill several times and given a service. The people seemed very responsive, the problem was not the congregation, the problem was Reverend Green.
“Okay, you’re the Baptist, and Green calls himself a Baptist, what do we need to do?” asked Danny.
“Danny, I can call myself an oak tree, but that doesn’t mean I can sprout leaves. To me, the man is an open book. He’s in it for the money. Just listen to his sermons. He tries to make every person in the congregation feel like crap. They’re all sinners and are doomed for hell,” shouted Davy. “Then, comes the collection plate. Salvation can be bought. You saw how he treated us. All the man is capable of dishing out is hellfire and brimstone. We don’t need that ‘you’re a sinner and you’re bound for hell’ crap. My suggestion is we bite the bullet on this one and leave Reverend Green to his own devices. The man’s a nut! He’s all but told us he doesn’t want our help. Why waste our time?”
“I don’t agree with you, Davy.”
“What do you mean you don’t agree? You heard his sermons. The man has one tune, change your ways or go to hell.”
“Oh, you’re right about that, the man is in it for the money. And his ‘repent’ stuff has got to be the lowest form of religion. That and the seventy thousand dollar Cadillac he’s driving told me all I need to know the first time we saw him. No, that’s not what I mean.”
“Then what else is there?”
“The people. You saw their faces. When we explained that bible passage with feeling and detail and then followed it up with that killer sermon of yours, they were happy. They were really happy.”
“Hell Danny, I guess they were. If I had listened to his ‘you’re going to hell if you don’t change’ crap every week, I would have been happy too. I’ve seen it before. I sincerely doubt the man has ever read more than a few chapters of the bible. His sermon is always the same. It’s designed to make the people feel like shit and then try to buy their way out. Don’t you remember, he reminded them about their ‘tithes’? He’s got what, thirty, forty people in that church. I guess he is worried about their ‘tithes’. Somebody’s got to make the payment on that Cadillac. Damn. . . tithes, how low can you go?”
“Calm down, Dude. I’m not disagreeing with you on that. The man has taken religion to it’s lowest form. He’s only one step away from bringing in snakes. No, I don’t give a tinker’s damn about Green. But, I do care about the people.”
“Danny, Green came to us because his membership was falling off–“
”I know, Davy, and it will continue falling off as long as Green is there. But, he owns the church.”
“My suggestion is we pull the plug. We have too many good things going to worry about a bottom feeder like Green.”
“Okay, but you and I do one more service at Green Hill Church.”
“I don’t see why, but somehow I think you’re up to something.”
“Oh, I am. I’ll do the scripture, you do the sermon. And, in your sermon announce that it will be our last service at Green Hill and we invite the people to visit at Camp Eden and the Methodist Church.”
“That’s all?”
“That’s it.”
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