My mom and dad never went
to church when I was a child. I never really ever talked about
religion or God with my father. From what I can gather, their family
made claim to the Baptist denomination. My mom's parents were
unequally yoked. My grandma (Oma) was Catholic. My grandpa (Opa) is
Protestant (Lutheran). My mom attended school in Germany in the
60's to mid 70's. She tells me that her schools were always segregated. The Catholics learned on one side of the building and
the Protestants learned in the other side. Religion was never a big
part of their lives other than weddings, funerals, confirmations of
nephews and nieces, and obligatory baptisms. Faith or a relationship with a higher power? Forget about it. My Oma definitely was
closer to God than my Opa.
When I was in head start
and kindergarten, the old lady across the street took us to her church regularly. This lady was a real sweetheart. She
sometimes babysat my sister and me and taught me the awesomeness of
something truly divine. Peanut butter soup. Mixing syrup and
peanut butter. Looking back, that was probably a mistake. Too much
decadence.
The 1st and
2nd grade saw my sister and me attending Fannin Bible
Baptist Church. The old lady moved and we caught on to a bus
ministry. The bus rides were fun. The bus driver was a real hoot.
He'd pretend to do wheelies. And in the summer we would get ice cream
from Braums on the way home.
I remember getting
disenchanted by the whole thing when there was a conflict about the
fate of Adam and Eve. The children's pastor told us that God killed
the couple after eating the fruit.
Gen. 2:17
But of the tree of knowledge of good
and evil, thou shalt not eat of it:
for in the day that thou eatest thereof
though shalt surely die.
Seemed pretty straight
forward. I came upon another pastor in the church and he had asked me
what I had learned. I told him that I learned about how Adam and Eve
disobeyed God and ate the forbidden fruit. He interrupted and said,
“Yes, they were banished, kicked out of the garden of Eden.” And
he made his way.
What? This is
disagreement. Chaos.
I didn't realize that
Gen 3:23
Therefore the LORD God sent him
forth from the Garden of Eden, to till
the ground from where he was taken.
These ideas didn't really
contradict. When eating the fruit, disobeying God and dishonoring
the boundaries placed on them, Adam and Eve indeed obtained the
knowledge of good and evil. Sin was introduced. No longer would
they be innocent. Eve would have to endure the pain of child birth.
And her son Cain would kill his brother Abel. Their third son Seth
would eventually beget through his lineage Ham who would endure the
curse of Canaan. Of course before that, Adam and Eve themselves
would actually die. None of that had to happen. But they were
wicked. Had that second pastor took the time to actually talk to me
and listen instead of being in a hurry and finishing my sentences I may not have soured on the whole idea.
I eventually quit going
to church soon after this. It was a fraud.
In the 3rd or 4th grade our parents let us cut school and planned to
take us to Six Flags. The plan was to go to Six Flags, but the
weather did no cooperate. We ended up going to the wax
museum instead. One of the last exhibits there was a scene depicting
the Trinity. Seeing Christ, the thief and the murderer really
disturbed me. I didn't get nightmares or anything. Just the visual
would be seared in my mind for many years. Randomly this scene would
be in my head and I didn't like it.
I tried my hand and
evangelism once. I was still attending Fannin Bible Baptist and
thought I was called to save one of my friends on the playground of
Bailey Inglish Elementary. There were giant monster truck tires.
The edgy kids would slip inside those bad boys and hang out. Out
of earshot of teachers we would cuss. Nothing else. No
conversations or anything. Just say cuss words. We were so bad.
Just showing off that we had the stones to say forbidden words and
phrases. A wicked version of the Tower of Babel.
James Coughener was the
kid I was going to save. He was a friend and I asked him if he knew
the good word. If he knew Jesus. He had heard of him but didn't go
to church. I told him all about it. I told him to renounce Satan
and he agreed. Boom. He was saved. I had led a lamb away from the
wolves.
About six years after I
left Fannin Bible Baptist, I'd make my way back to church regularly
again. This time it was for a woman. A girl actually. She was a
7th grader and I was in the 8th grade. Now I
went to Boyd Baptist Church. Her name was Anna and she was my first
love. Her step-father drove
the church van and would pick me up so I could join them. My only
real strong memory during this time was hearing about how Anna had
gotten in trouble because I was leaning against, almost laying on her
in the van. I didn't think at the time it was a big deal, but now I
realize it wasn't a good look.
I broke up with Anna but
would later get back together with her in high school. I was a
sophomore with a license. Now I drove myself and sometimes got the
honor of escorting my girl to church!
The youth services were
fun. We got to socialize and I actually didn't feel too weird.
Typically interaction with a lot of people gets me feeling awkward
and small. I was actually okay. I only went to church for her
though. We would sneak holding hands in the pew during service. And
following Sunday service outside the church if nobody was around, we
would sneak some smooches around the corner of the building. It
would have been scandalous I say! When she eventually broke up with
me though, I quit the church once again. It would be about nine
years before I would regularly be attending church again. Once again,
I'd go because of the woman I loved.
Burger King hired all
kinds of people. Students, unskilled adults, adults that were
managers, uneducated adults, adults down on their luck, and
apparently guys right out of prison needing a second chance.
The first time I met Doug
he asked me my name. I told him, “Jeremy.”
“Like in the Bible? Like Jeremiah?”
“Sure,” I tell him,
“Though I think my parents gave me my name because it starts with J
and they like how it sounds.” He was a nice enough man most of the
time. It didn't take long for him to tell me he was fresh out of jail
for, “Having been a bad person and doing bad things.” I didn't
ask him for what, and I didn't hold it against him. I believe in
second chances. And if an ex con can't even work in fast food, what
the hell is he supposed to do? Over the course of his tenure at
Bonham Burger King he would preach to me. And that was fine. The
guy that lived down the street from me volunteered at one of the
nearby prisons as a chaplain and would bring us vegetables from
the inmate garden. Maybe they knew each other.
Doug got weird though.
One time while we were
closing down for the night he said I should come over to his apartment
and watch movies and have pizza and drink sodas. Doug was pushing 40
and I was 16-years-old. I told him nah. He was agitated and told
me, “Come and have some innocent fun. Nothing is gonna happen.
We're just gonna watch some movies.” I've seen enough movies to
know “nothing is gonna happen” is baloney. I told him my parents
would not be cool with that and I had to come right home after work.
Honestly they would not have cared how late I got home. They just
made a convenient excuse.
The other time Doug got
real weird was when he walked by as Briane Jones and I were washing
dishes. He took his house key out of his pocket and told me, “You
know, I could cut a man's throat with this key?” and then he walked
off. Briane and I were like, “What the fuck?” I'm not sure but
I don't think Doug worked there very much longer.
My wife is five years
older than I am. Women are already hyper-sensitive about their age.
Add an age difference with their man and it magnifies age awareness.
We were married about a year and moved into our house. A couple of Mormon kids rang the
doorbell one morning. I had been up for a while and was freshly
shaved. I politely listened to their tracting spiel. My wife came to
the door looking like she just woke up and asked, “Honey, who are
these kids?”
“Oh, is this your
mother?”
Oh no he didn't.
“I'm his wife, and
we're not interested.” She shut the door in their faces. I have
only shaved my beard off a couple times since then the past 7 years. We attend a Charismatic Christian Church and my wife is particularly leery of allowing other influences penetrate any possible crack in our foundation. You can't be tempted if there is no temptation right? I have faith enough in myself to be "polite" and listen to people, don't want to seem rude, but I understand where she's coming from.
That reminds me of
another moment where I witnessed foot-in-mouth disease. My manager
at Burger King Richard was flirting with a woman in her late
twenties. Another woman exited the bathroom and stands next to her.
She looked older and had a scarf on her head. Richard says, “Oh, is
this your mother?”
“I'm her sister. I
have cancer and you just ruined my day.” They left and I couldn't
help but laugh in Richard's face.
Marketing, spreading the
word of God, politics, anything really when you want to appeal to a
broad base of people all are common in that they need effective
networking skills. Look people in the eyes. Listen to what they have
to say. Tell people what they need or want to hear. Be honest.
Don't make assumptions. Ever. And above all: Don't be a creep.
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| My mom and me soon after my birth. My Oma saw to it that I was baptized within a few weeks. 1981 |
If I had to pick a single song to be the soundtrack for this post it would be...
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