Back at Southern, I enrolled in the usual classes for a religion major: Greek, more church history, Spanish II, Life and Teachings of Jesus, accounting. Accounting was the hardest class I ever took in school. Period. The concepts were not difficult, but copying or transferring numbers accurately between columns and adding or subtracting accurately was utterly beyond me. This difficulty with precision had always been a challenge but in science labs I could compensate for my clumsiness in manipulating devices, numbers, and materials by demonstrating comprehension of the underlying concepts. In accounting, the only way to demonstrate comprehension was to accurately copy and add numbers. Not possible. (I never balanced my check book until I had the services of Excel.)
Church history was exhilarating. The prof was a newly minted Ph. D. determined to stuff us with information. His tests were ridiculously broad. If I remember right, one of the questions on the final was something like: Write the history of the Christian Church from 500 to 1200 A.D. His lectures, the assigned reading and the class discussions brought the story of the church alive. The people, the theological disputes, the cycles of institutional formation, decline and reform all were surprisingly familiar. They offered a revealing mirror in which to inspect our world, the Adventist world, which I had always understood to be a unique endtime movement with unique problems and unique duties.
One of the “new things” on campus was a thirteen-week course in prayer called “The Positive Way.” It wasn't part of the formal curriculum, but it was spearheaded by a popular religion professor, Ed Zackrison and endorsed by most of the student spiritual leaders. By the time I got back from my adventures in New York and the Middle East, it had become the most visible expression of corporate zeal and piety.
My friend, Bill Shelly, urged me to enroll. Still, I was reluctant. It sounded too formulaic, a little too magical. But how could I sit out a program that promised to bring people to a whole new level of engagement with God? So I enrolled.
The class sessions included both teaching about the theory of prayer and testimonies from participants about their experiences in prayer during the previous week. We were assigned readings on prayer and specific prayer practices. Each participant was partnered with a sponsor, someone who had previously completed the class. You met with your sponsor once a week in addition to attending the group meeting.
The class content offered repeated, strong affirmations of God's affectionate regard for all us. Salvation was not difficult. God was not hard to please. As evidence of this God gave us many promises which we could claim in prayer with full expectation that he would give us what we asked.
In group sessions, students told stories of facing daunting examinations, certain they would fail. In prayer, they claimed the promise in James, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God who giveth liberally and upbraideth not.” Sure enough, they aced the test.
Relationship troubles, money troubles, sickness—all responded to the mighty power of prayer. Every group session featured accounts of amazing divine intervention in the lives of the class participants. I didn't have any stories to share. I wondered what made the difference.
My sponsor was someone I had gone to school with for a couple years back in grade school. He was a nice guy who didn't know much about the Bible. A serious interest in religion and spiritual life was fairly new to him. For each of our weekly sessions, he had a list of questions he was supposed to ask me. He asked them. I answered. It felt awkward. I had all sorts of questions about prayer I would have liked to explore, but I had no interest in dampening his enthusiasm. So we kept our appointments, while the whole thing felt increasingly unreal.
My own piety was no less intense for all this failure to experience tangible answers to prayer. I still prayed and read my Bible every morning, chasing a sense of intimacy with God, hoping for a sense of divine approval. I was outspoken in classroom and after-class debates. I vigorously advocated the primacy of grace. I seconded Venden's arguments that we are saved by relationship not by behavior. I read the mystics Johann Tauler, Meister Eckhart, Nicolas of Cusa and was both enthralled and tormented by their writing. I desperately wanted to experience for myself the kind of intimacy with God they described.
But peace and tranquility never came. At least not for more than a few minutes at a time.
I remember one Friday night coming back to the room from the evening meeting. I knelt by my bed and prayed silently. (Bill was asleep in the top bunk.) My praying was an inarticulate, desperate longing for God's affirmation. After a long time of futile praying I lay on the floor, still wearing my tie and tweed jacket, exhausted but too agitated with unfulfilled spiritual longing to go to bed. Going to bed would have been an admission that I was okay, that life could go on. But I was not okay. Life in the condition I was in was not acceptable. I was frustrated with God. But that was not allowed, so I was frustrated with myself. Eventually I fell asleep on the floor where I remained for the night.
That night was not particularly dramatic. The room was reasonably warm. I felt asleep on a carpet not on a bed of nails. But it epitomized the experiential vacuum hiding behind my voluble theologizing. I had opinions, strong opinions. I loved to preach. I led small groups. I found keen satisfaction in talking with others who struggled with spiritual alienation and confusion. Occasionally, I could see people relax as we talked. Somehow my words were helpful to them. But I was a pipe unwet by the water I carried,
I began again to question my call to the ministry. I was doing well in my classes. I enjoyed theology and philosophy. Greek was interesting. I took an American Lit class that focused especially on Emmerson, Thoreau and Hawthorne. All of them evinced a strong ethical vision. Thoreau's and Emmerson's vague pantheism was alluring. It was a view of God that invited wonder and contemplation and made theological disputation appear petty and maybe even irrelevant.
I was increasingly put off by the culture of the theological student community. We argued about everything. The meaning of this or that particular passage. The proper emphasis to be given to a particular point of doctrine in the overall life of the church. We debated the best methods of leading churches, about the proper role of paid clergy versus empowering the laity, the proper interpretive role of Ellen White in biblical studies.
There was no method for ending the arguments. If I appealed to Luther, my sparring partner could appeal to Carlstadt. If I cited Calvin, he could reference Armenius. Councils contradicted each other, and Adventists denied their authority, anyway, even if they had agreed. Every position could be defended by at least one quotation from Ellen White. Selected Messages would be pitted against The Great Controversy. What the prophet had written in Early Writings would be quoted against something she had written in a newly-discovered letter. And since everything she wrote was inspired, it was all authoritative even when contradictory. Church history could never resolve the debates. It merely proved that both positions in all arguments had been voiced by someone before.
When I hung out with my friends who were science students, which wasn't often, it seemed they were comfortable with each other and the world. They were part of an optimistic common quest for information and mastery. In contrast to the theology students who were training for an uphill battle against all-pervasive evil, science students were training for participation in a successful humanitarian enterprise. Science was making progress and expected to continue to do so. Theology was rooted in a profound pessimism. Things were bad and getting worse. The job of pastors and evangelists was to save a few people out of the doomed world. In retrospect, no wonder the scientists were more at ease.
In theology classes, it was common for students to complain bitterly—out loud, in front of the entire class—about how hard the material was, about how excessive the reading requirements were. Frequently, before a test, someone would raise his hand and ask what was going to be on the test. They would ask which of the assigned readings they would be tested on. They were whiners. Not all of them, of course. But enough, that it made me embarrassed to be part of the group. For too many of them, academic mastery was seen as utterly irrelevant to the real work of God. They saw the work of the ministry as entirely spiritual—meaning subjective and intuitive, guided by their solipsistic reading of the Bible. The details of academic theology, Greek grammar, exegesis, and philosophy were regarded by these “spiritualists” as merely artificial hurdles erected by the professors.
By the end of March, I decided I couldn’t stand another year in the same social environment and with the same professors. I knew the teachers in a different school were likely to be no better than those at Southern, but they would be different. I wouldn’t begin classes with negative expectations or the sense that I already knew their views.
I decided to finish a religion major. It was the shortest path to graduation. And I would complete the requirements for pre-med. I signed up for organic chemistry that summer at Memphis State University and wrote to three Adventist colleges inquiring how long it would take to graduate if I transferred. Andrews University in southwestern Michigan responded it would take two full years to finish my degree. Walla Walla College in Washington wrote back saying they could not offer a good estimate of how long it would take. But they would be happy to consider me if I were to apply. After I was accepted they would figure out what was needed for graduation. Pacific Union College in the Napa Valley said I could likely finish in a year and a summer.
So I wrote PUC saying I would like to come. My mother was thrilled. She had attended there for two years and had fond memories of the campus nestled among the pines. But weeks passed and I heard nothing. Finally in mid August, I told my mother, “If I don’t hear something by the end of this week, I’m going to have to do something else.”
On Friday, in the mail was an envelope from PUC. No postage, no postmark, unsealed. My registration packet. It was the sign I wanted. I bought a ticket to Oakland.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Chapter 18b The Gospel of Running
Chronologically, this chapter fits between chapters 18 and 19 that are already published on this blog.
The Gospel of Running
At the start of my sophomore year at Southern Missionary College (now Southern Adventist University), I was comfortably established as a theology major, so I signed up for Greek with Ronald Springett and other classes appropriate to my major.
I met Bill Shelly. I have no idea how we got acquainted. In my earliest memories, he was a striking personality. Devout, certainly, but dashing, debonair, popular, in a completely different league from me. Our becoming friends was entirely his doing. I still can't quite figure out how it happened.
Some time that fall, Bill decided we should run together. Which would be unremarkable except for the fact that I didn't run. Running was systematic misery. In high school when we were required to run a few laps around the football field, all I remembered was my ineffective flailing at the air. My body did not like running. My mind did not like running. I could not imagine running would ever be fun. Maybe for other people, for the guys I heard talking in the cafeteria about running ten miles!!! on Sunday mornings. But never for me.
Bill insisted. He dragged me out to the track and we did a couple of slow laps. Then I sat on the bleachers while he ran another four. We repeated this routine several times a week. Always at his insistence. I progressed to three laps. Then finally four. A whole mile! I was amazed at myself. I could run a whole mile! Wow! Of course, however far I ran, Bill ran another mile. But then, he was an athlete.
Late in the fall, he announced it was time to run the hills. Southern sits up against a ridge, White Oak Mountain. The first time out, I jogged maybe a third of the way up before pooping out. But running down was a blast. Bill kept me at it until I was jogging all the way to the top. Then we would leave the trail and tear down the mountain cross country. In this wild, off-trail running I could sometimes beat Bill. He was worried about spraining his ankles. I was made of rubber and didn't care.
Running became fun. No other single thing anyone has done to me or for me compares with the gift of running. I was attending a ministers' meeting when I was in my mid-fifties. During a break a young pastor asked if I wanted to go jogging with him. I protested I hadn't done any running in months and I didn't want to slow him down. He insisted, so I agreed. We ran down a hill and around a lake. His breathing sounded more labored than I expected. As we began to head back up hill, I upped the pace just a bit. He began gasping. I pushed a little harder, still feeling comfortable, taking immense pleasure in his discomfort. After a few more yards he gasped, “I'm done. You go ahead.” I did.
Having just bared my soul in the meeting about how inadequate I felt in my work, it was sweet to waste a young buck half my age running up hill after months of doing nothing.
I never figured out how to integrate the reality of the blessing of running with a theology of “justification by faith” which became the center of my thinking over the next couple of decades. In fact, I never thought the disconnect between my theology and the greatest physical blessing in my life. There is no vicarious way to receive the gifts running gives. The only way to enjoy the benefits is to embrace the discipline. Because of Bill, I endured the discipline and enjoy the benefits. In recent years as I have become a neo-legalist, running and my theology have come together. But that's getting way ahead of the story.
The Gospel of Running
At the start of my sophomore year at Southern Missionary College (now Southern Adventist University), I was comfortably established as a theology major, so I signed up for Greek with Ronald Springett and other classes appropriate to my major.
I met Bill Shelly. I have no idea how we got acquainted. In my earliest memories, he was a striking personality. Devout, certainly, but dashing, debonair, popular, in a completely different league from me. Our becoming friends was entirely his doing. I still can't quite figure out how it happened.
Some time that fall, Bill decided we should run together. Which would be unremarkable except for the fact that I didn't run. Running was systematic misery. In high school when we were required to run a few laps around the football field, all I remembered was my ineffective flailing at the air. My body did not like running. My mind did not like running. I could not imagine running would ever be fun. Maybe for other people, for the guys I heard talking in the cafeteria about running ten miles!!! on Sunday mornings. But never for me.
Bill insisted. He dragged me out to the track and we did a couple of slow laps. Then I sat on the bleachers while he ran another four. We repeated this routine several times a week. Always at his insistence. I progressed to three laps. Then finally four. A whole mile! I was amazed at myself. I could run a whole mile! Wow! Of course, however far I ran, Bill ran another mile. But then, he was an athlete.
Late in the fall, he announced it was time to run the hills. Southern sits up against a ridge, White Oak Mountain. The first time out, I jogged maybe a third of the way up before pooping out. But running down was a blast. Bill kept me at it until I was jogging all the way to the top. Then we would leave the trail and tear down the mountain cross country. In this wild, off-trail running I could sometimes beat Bill. He was worried about spraining his ankles. I was made of rubber and didn't care.
Running became fun. No other single thing anyone has done to me or for me compares with the gift of running. I was attending a ministers' meeting when I was in my mid-fifties. During a break a young pastor asked if I wanted to go jogging with him. I protested I hadn't done any running in months and I didn't want to slow him down. He insisted, so I agreed. We ran down a hill and around a lake. His breathing sounded more labored than I expected. As we began to head back up hill, I upped the pace just a bit. He began gasping. I pushed a little harder, still feeling comfortable, taking immense pleasure in his discomfort. After a few more yards he gasped, “I'm done. You go ahead.” I did.
Having just bared my soul in the meeting about how inadequate I felt in my work, it was sweet to waste a young buck half my age running up hill after months of doing nothing.
I never figured out how to integrate the reality of the blessing of running with a theology of “justification by faith” which became the center of my thinking over the next couple of decades. In fact, I never thought the disconnect between my theology and the greatest physical blessing in my life. There is no vicarious way to receive the gifts running gives. The only way to enjoy the benefits is to embrace the discipline. Because of Bill, I endured the discipline and enjoy the benefits. In recent years as I have become a neo-legalist, running and my theology have come together. But that's getting way ahead of the story.
Chapter 29 Middle East College
It was after dark when the plane landed in Beirut. By the time I cleared customs, it was 9:00 p.m. I called the number I had been given.
“Maharbah.” I presume that's what the person said. Whatever it was, it wasn't English. They sounded sleepy. They made some more foreign sounds then went silent. I hoped they were going to find someone I could understand. After a few minutes someone who spoke a bit of English came on.
“Hello.”
“Hi, I'm John McLarty from the United States. Is this Middle East College? I was told to call this number when I arrived.”
“Okay. Yes, yes. . . . the mix of Arabic and thickly accented English was beyond me. I thought I understood the words, “Somebody come.”
I hung up and sat on my suitcase. Eventually Bjorn Storfjell, one of the religion teachers showed up. We drove to the college. He woke the men’s dean who showed me to a room on the second floor. There were four beds. One was empty.
“Get some sleep,” the dean whispered. “We’ll talk in the morning.”
The view from the college out over the city was breathtaking. In January, 1973, Beirut was still outwardly the Paris of the Middle East, cosmopolitan, wealthy, inviting. My roommates were a Nigerian, a Finn and a Ugandan.
The Nigerian was married. An educator, he had left his wife and son to come to MEC to get his degree so he could return to his country to improve Adventist education there. He did not have enough money to go back and forth during breaks. He would see his wife in five years after he completed his masters. His devotion to education astonished me. He'd sit on his bed in the evening, reading over letters from home, his homesickness and longing almost palpable. What kind of world fueled that kind of devotion to education? What kind of person made those kinds of choices?
The Finn was a tall, quiet guy. He hung out with a couple of Norwegians, all of them comfortably supported by government scholarships. We did field trips together and traveled together on holidays.
My Ugandan roommate was ethnically Indian. The previous August, his family, along with other Asians, had been expelled from Uganda by Edi Amin. He was literally a man without a country. He dreamed of immigrating to the U.S., but the odds of getting a visa were remote. He asked if my dad would consider sponsoring him. I didn't know what to say.
Another friend at MEC was a theology student from Egypt. He, too, dreamed of getting to the U.S. In fact, it seemed like it was all he talked about. I was offended by his crude materialism. How could he be a theology student and remain so fixated on migrating to a place whose only appeals were greater ease, comfort and wealth? After we got better acquainted, I challenged him. “Why are you so determined to leave your own country and go to the United States? You know the Egyptian language and culture. You can be far more effective representing Jesus to your people than any Westerner could ever be. Why don't you focus on taking the gospel to the people of Egypt?”
He responded with a single question: “Where are you going when school is over?”
He said it with a smile apparently forgiving my crass insensitivity. Still I was stung to silence. What could I say? My sermon to him about the nobility and value of sacrificial service cost me nothing. Living it would cost him dearly.
The meager resources and narrowed choices available to my friends from developing countries haunted me then (and now, when I stop to think about it). The gulf between their world and my privilege state is inconceivable. How can one ever measure up to the enormous responsibilities implied by such privilege?
I took Old Testament from Jack Bohannon, archeology and Greek from Storfjell, Western civilization and church history from Baldour Pfeiffer, and Islam from Jack Darnell. Darnell was legendary. He was so immersed in the culture of the Middle East, he walked like an Arab. He had an astonishing memory. Not long before I arrived on campus, so other students told me, he had spent three weeks on an itinerary through eight countries. At the mission committee meeting when he returned, he gave a ninety-minute, day-by-day, interview-by-interview report without any notes. Darnell evinced deep appreciation for Mohammed and Islam. He saw both the prophet and the religion as essentially good, though flawed. As I remember it, his theory was that Mohammed had actually received visions from God. He was called by God to deliver a prophetic message, however, like Balaam he was unfaithful to his calling, perhaps through the seductive influence of power that his prophetic gift brought into his life.
Taking archeology was an obvious choice. Our frequent field trips took us to sites all over Lebanon.
In history, Dr. Pfeiffer pushed us hard. He knew his material. He expected us to know ours, to be fully conversant with everything in the textbook and outside reading. He taught dialogically, quizzing us, debating with us, pitting our ideas against each other. His exams, in typical German fashion, were essays. When I got my first test back, I was disappointed. A B-. From class discussions, I knew I was one of the top students in the class. Another American in the class who was not academically inclined got the same grade I did. How could that be? I went and protested my grade to Dr. Pfeiffer—without mentioning the other student, of course. What did I have to do to get an A on his test? Dr. Pfeiffer ripped my essays, giving very specific criticisms. My problem was not an incorrect facts but sloppy, ineffective writing. His negative evaluations stung, but I couldn't argue with his observations. They were right on.
The next test I got a B. I went back to Dr. Pfeiffer. Again, he gave me pointed, detailed criticism. It was the same on all of the tests. Once, he gave me an A-, the rest of the time, he gave me B's. I studied and studied. I tried to remember his criticisms as I wrote my essays. To no avail. On the final test, he gave me an A, and gave me a solid A for the term. He later explained that if he had given me an A earlier I would have quit pushing for greater competence. He knew I could better.
Dr. Pfeiffer's academic competence was intimidating. His spiritual life was intriguing. I remember his mentioning off hand that he was reading The Imitation of Christ with his family for worship. [The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a Kempis is a classic of medieval spirituality written by a monk.] Wow, that impressed me and perplexed me. I was impressed he would share with his family a classic of Western Christian spirituality. I was already moving beyond the notion that anything Catholic was evil. I growing in my appreciation for the long history of Christian spiritual life. Still, I was a little perplexed by his choice of a Catholic writer instead of an Adventist for “worship.” If I were going to read a Kempis, I would do it at some other time than during morning worship. It would be “extra-curricular reading” not the heart of my devotions.
Dr. Pfeiffer further unsettled my faith by his answer to a question I had about the interpretation of a phrase in Ellen White. I wanted to know what she meant when she wrote, “the pardoned soul goes on from grace to grace.” Did this mean the person experienced more and more grace? A different kind of grace? Did it mean the person entered grace and then was accompanied by it through all stages of growth? Just what exactly was Mrs. White trying to say?
Dr. Pfeiffer said, “I don't know. Ellen White was not a systematic theologian. She was using this phrase the way a poet uses language. She was evoking a meaning. So I can't tell you 'exactly' what she meant. I don't think anyone can. Her words here do not have an 'exact' meaning.”
His words made immediate sense cognitively. But they were deeply disturbing. If Ellen White was God's messenger to the remnant, how could it be that her words did not all have an explicit, unmistakable, denotative meaning. This idea that some of her writing was “poetic,” that it evoked rather than denoted meaning . . . this hinted at far more subjectivity in the interpretation of our prophet's writings than I was prepared to accept. But how could I argue? “From grace to grace” certainly made more sense as poetry than as a formal theological statement.
In the spring, after the rain, when the flowers were out and the weather warmed, war broke out. The Lebanese army against the Palestinians. One of the major Palestinian refugee camps was at the bottom of the hill below the school. We watched as Lebanese air force jets screamed over the city and swooped to bomb and strafe the camp.
Public sympathy on campus among the larger groups—Iranians, Egyptians, Lebanese, Americans, Europeans—was solidly with the Lebanese military. As the planes whirled and dived on the camp a large group of students watched from the front lawn and cheered the explosions. Sigve Tonstad, a Norwegian, and I finally ran among them protesting, “Don’t you realize there are people in those buildings? Mothers and children are being killed by those bombs.”
We didn't change anyone's political sympathies, but the cheering stopped.
After a couple of weeks the fighting died down enough for classes to resume. I finished the year and headed home.
“Maharbah.” I presume that's what the person said. Whatever it was, it wasn't English. They sounded sleepy. They made some more foreign sounds then went silent. I hoped they were going to find someone I could understand. After a few minutes someone who spoke a bit of English came on.
“Hello.”
“Hi, I'm John McLarty from the United States. Is this Middle East College? I was told to call this number when I arrived.”
“Okay. Yes, yes. . . . the mix of Arabic and thickly accented English was beyond me. I thought I understood the words, “Somebody come.”
I hung up and sat on my suitcase. Eventually Bjorn Storfjell, one of the religion teachers showed up. We drove to the college. He woke the men’s dean who showed me to a room on the second floor. There were four beds. One was empty.
“Get some sleep,” the dean whispered. “We’ll talk in the morning.”
The view from the college out over the city was breathtaking. In January, 1973, Beirut was still outwardly the Paris of the Middle East, cosmopolitan, wealthy, inviting. My roommates were a Nigerian, a Finn and a Ugandan.
The Nigerian was married. An educator, he had left his wife and son to come to MEC to get his degree so he could return to his country to improve Adventist education there. He did not have enough money to go back and forth during breaks. He would see his wife in five years after he completed his masters. His devotion to education astonished me. He'd sit on his bed in the evening, reading over letters from home, his homesickness and longing almost palpable. What kind of world fueled that kind of devotion to education? What kind of person made those kinds of choices?
The Finn was a tall, quiet guy. He hung out with a couple of Norwegians, all of them comfortably supported by government scholarships. We did field trips together and traveled together on holidays.
My Ugandan roommate was ethnically Indian. The previous August, his family, along with other Asians, had been expelled from Uganda by Edi Amin. He was literally a man without a country. He dreamed of immigrating to the U.S., but the odds of getting a visa were remote. He asked if my dad would consider sponsoring him. I didn't know what to say.
Another friend at MEC was a theology student from Egypt. He, too, dreamed of getting to the U.S. In fact, it seemed like it was all he talked about. I was offended by his crude materialism. How could he be a theology student and remain so fixated on migrating to a place whose only appeals were greater ease, comfort and wealth? After we got better acquainted, I challenged him. “Why are you so determined to leave your own country and go to the United States? You know the Egyptian language and culture. You can be far more effective representing Jesus to your people than any Westerner could ever be. Why don't you focus on taking the gospel to the people of Egypt?”
He responded with a single question: “Where are you going when school is over?”
He said it with a smile apparently forgiving my crass insensitivity. Still I was stung to silence. What could I say? My sermon to him about the nobility and value of sacrificial service cost me nothing. Living it would cost him dearly.
The meager resources and narrowed choices available to my friends from developing countries haunted me then (and now, when I stop to think about it). The gulf between their world and my privilege state is inconceivable. How can one ever measure up to the enormous responsibilities implied by such privilege?
I took Old Testament from Jack Bohannon, archeology and Greek from Storfjell, Western civilization and church history from Baldour Pfeiffer, and Islam from Jack Darnell. Darnell was legendary. He was so immersed in the culture of the Middle East, he walked like an Arab. He had an astonishing memory. Not long before I arrived on campus, so other students told me, he had spent three weeks on an itinerary through eight countries. At the mission committee meeting when he returned, he gave a ninety-minute, day-by-day, interview-by-interview report without any notes. Darnell evinced deep appreciation for Mohammed and Islam. He saw both the prophet and the religion as essentially good, though flawed. As I remember it, his theory was that Mohammed had actually received visions from God. He was called by God to deliver a prophetic message, however, like Balaam he was unfaithful to his calling, perhaps through the seductive influence of power that his prophetic gift brought into his life.
Taking archeology was an obvious choice. Our frequent field trips took us to sites all over Lebanon.
In history, Dr. Pfeiffer pushed us hard. He knew his material. He expected us to know ours, to be fully conversant with everything in the textbook and outside reading. He taught dialogically, quizzing us, debating with us, pitting our ideas against each other. His exams, in typical German fashion, were essays. When I got my first test back, I was disappointed. A B-. From class discussions, I knew I was one of the top students in the class. Another American in the class who was not academically inclined got the same grade I did. How could that be? I went and protested my grade to Dr. Pfeiffer—without mentioning the other student, of course. What did I have to do to get an A on his test? Dr. Pfeiffer ripped my essays, giving very specific criticisms. My problem was not an incorrect facts but sloppy, ineffective writing. His negative evaluations stung, but I couldn't argue with his observations. They were right on.
The next test I got a B. I went back to Dr. Pfeiffer. Again, he gave me pointed, detailed criticism. It was the same on all of the tests. Once, he gave me an A-, the rest of the time, he gave me B's. I studied and studied. I tried to remember his criticisms as I wrote my essays. To no avail. On the final test, he gave me an A, and gave me a solid A for the term. He later explained that if he had given me an A earlier I would have quit pushing for greater competence. He knew I could better.
Dr. Pfeiffer's academic competence was intimidating. His spiritual life was intriguing. I remember his mentioning off hand that he was reading The Imitation of Christ with his family for worship. [The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a Kempis is a classic of medieval spirituality written by a monk.] Wow, that impressed me and perplexed me. I was impressed he would share with his family a classic of Western Christian spirituality. I was already moving beyond the notion that anything Catholic was evil. I growing in my appreciation for the long history of Christian spiritual life. Still, I was a little perplexed by his choice of a Catholic writer instead of an Adventist for “worship.” If I were going to read a Kempis, I would do it at some other time than during morning worship. It would be “extra-curricular reading” not the heart of my devotions.
Dr. Pfeiffer further unsettled my faith by his answer to a question I had about the interpretation of a phrase in Ellen White. I wanted to know what she meant when she wrote, “the pardoned soul goes on from grace to grace.” Did this mean the person experienced more and more grace? A different kind of grace? Did it mean the person entered grace and then was accompanied by it through all stages of growth? Just what exactly was Mrs. White trying to say?
Dr. Pfeiffer said, “I don't know. Ellen White was not a systematic theologian. She was using this phrase the way a poet uses language. She was evoking a meaning. So I can't tell you 'exactly' what she meant. I don't think anyone can. Her words here do not have an 'exact' meaning.”
His words made immediate sense cognitively. But they were deeply disturbing. If Ellen White was God's messenger to the remnant, how could it be that her words did not all have an explicit, unmistakable, denotative meaning. This idea that some of her writing was “poetic,” that it evoked rather than denoted meaning . . . this hinted at far more subjectivity in the interpretation of our prophet's writings than I was prepared to accept. But how could I argue? “From grace to grace” certainly made more sense as poetry than as a formal theological statement.
In the spring, after the rain, when the flowers were out and the weather warmed, war broke out. The Lebanese army against the Palestinians. One of the major Palestinian refugee camps was at the bottom of the hill below the school. We watched as Lebanese air force jets screamed over the city and swooped to bomb and strafe the camp.
Public sympathy on campus among the larger groups—Iranians, Egyptians, Lebanese, Americans, Europeans—was solidly with the Lebanese military. As the planes whirled and dived on the camp a large group of students watched from the front lawn and cheered the explosions. Sigve Tonstad, a Norwegian, and I finally ran among them protesting, “Don’t you realize there are people in those buildings? Mothers and children are being killed by those bombs.”
We didn't change anyone's political sympathies, but the cheering stopped.
After a couple of weeks the fighting died down enough for classes to resume. I finished the year and headed home.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Chapter 28 In the Closet
Through the summer Ruth spent more time at the Center. She and I teased Colin about Anna, a single woman who worked for the Nurse’s Registry. We had tried to get him interested in other women occasionally, but Anna lived in the building. She worked there. She was available. She was nice. Why didn’t he take her out? Sometimes he acted a little sore at our teasing. But we didn’t stop.
By late September, I have given in to Ruth’s allure. She was my girlfriend. In October, I returned to the apartment on a Sunday evening after spending the day with Ruth. Colin, as usual, wanted to hear about my day. He was always cheering us on.
I asked him about Anna again. Why didn’t he date her . . . or someone? “You’re always talking about how nice it would be to have a woman in your life, why don’t you do something about it? It’s not like there aren’t any available women. If you’re not interested in Anna, what about Pauline or Linda?”
He didn’t answer immediately. When he did, he spoke with uncharacteristic hesitancy. “Listen, Johnny, I think it’s time to tell you why I’m single. Why I don’t date Anna or Emily or Pauline. I don’t want to hurt them. It just wouldn’t work out.
“When I was growing up in England, my mother was very strong. She ran my dad around like he was a child. And, of course, polio strongly affected my sense of who I was. I couldn’t compete with the other kids physically, so I became a voracious reader. I got into the occult.
“Then I saw an advertisement for some a lecture on flying saucers. I went and was shocked to discover that it was a religious meeting. But I got hooked and I attended every meeting. My parents didn’t have any particular religion so they didn’t mind when I decided to get baptized.
“I loved the prophecies and learning about God. But even as I was getting more and more involved in church, I was troubled by the growing realization that I did not like women the way other boys did.
“The preacher at our church encouraged me to go to Newbold College. He said that was the place to meet nice Adventist girls. So I went. And I went out with girls there, very nice girls. I even kissed a few of them. But there was nothing in my heart that responded.
“I talked with one of the religion professors. He told me to just find a nice girl who played the piano and marry her and everything would work out in time. I tried. I dated one girl for over a year, but as much as I enjoyed her as a friend, I just could not see being married to her.
“After I graduated from Newbold, I worked as a pastor for a few years, then came to Andrews to get my masters. There, I really faced this thing. I fasted and prayed. I had friends who fasted and prayed with me. One time I felt this utter confidence that God was going to heal me. I asked to be a anointed. In preparation, I spent a week fasting and praying. The anointing was held on Friday night. I had a girlfriend. She was there. Three seminary professors and several of my classmates participated. We spent an hour praying before they finally anointed me and claimed God’s promises of transformation and new life.
“I went to bed utterly euphoric.
“I picked up Wanda the next morning and we went to church together. The whole world was bright. I was healed. I was normal. I was a heterosexual. At the end of the day I kissed her. It was wonderful.
“But a couple of weeks later the old feelings were back. Wanda begged me not to worry about it. We could work on it together, she insisted. But it just wasn’t right to marry someone you didn’t have feelings for. I mean sexual desire. She was sweet. I liked her. But it just wasn’t there.
“Later at Andrews a group performed an exorcism on me. They believed homosexual impulses were a form of demon possession. Again, for a couple of weeks, I felt different. But it didn’t last.
“So I’m committed to a life of celibacy–unless God heals me. I still pray every day to be changed. But there you have it old boy. That’s why I don’t date Anna. That’s why I get upset when you and Ruth tease me.”
I was stunned. What would it be like to be trapped in a prison like that? I was mad at God for all the conflict I felt over Ruth, but that was just because she was the wrong race and this was the wrong time in my life for a serious relationship. What would it be like to know you could never have a wife? Never have someone to sleep with, have sex with, raise a family with, grow old with?
I had prayed for a bicycle, and money miraculously showed up. Colin prayed for healing from homosexuality. He fasted and prayed. He was anointed. He had an exorcism. He had tried everything imaginable to obtain God’s power to change so he could live the life God wanted him to live. And it didn’t work. Why would God condemn people for something there was no healing for?
I had picked up from church culture the assumption that homosexuals were people who made bad choices. Just like alcoholics or smokers. They might have a hard time altering their behavior, but if they would simply choose to do the right thing, they could. Of course, like all temptations, homosexual temptation could be resisted only with the help of God. But certainly that help was available. Now, I couldn’t be so sure. God didn’t show up to help Colin.
I didn’t know where this left the Bible’s bold claims. It talked glibly about God’s power. “No temptation has befallen you, except what is common to all men. And God will, with the temptation, make available a way of escape.” “God is at work in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.” “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
I knew my moral failures were my own fault. I had no excuse. I simply made bad choices–choices that were not inevitable, choices that could have been different if I had taken more time to pray and read my Bible. Listening to Colin, I could not imagine what more he could have done. If that was true, how could I as a preacher stand up and tell people about the power of God, when apparently it did not work in the lives of homosexuals?
I flew home for Christmas, then returned to New York for a weekend before leaving for Middle East College in Beirut, Lebanon.
Going to MEC was a lark. In September, someone had stayed at the Center for a couple of days to visit a girl who worked there. He was an American, returning for a second year at MEC. He loved it. Said it was easy to get accepted and easy to transfer credits back to Adventist colleges in the U.S. Why didn't I come when my year at the Center was up in December. Sure. Why not?
On Sunday of that last weekend back in New York, as Ruth and I were walking east on 46th Street away from The Center toward Avenue of the Americas to catch the “Train to the Plane,” the subway/bus system connecting Manhattan and JFK Airport, we met Benny coming toward us. He was drunk and wanted to talk. I explained I had a plane to catch. I couldn’t talk now. He shifted back and forth across the sidewalk determined to keep us from passing. I called to a policeman who happened to be standing not far away.
“Officer, can you help us?”
“What’s the trouble?”
“This guy won’t let us walk down the sidewalk. I’ve got a plane to catch.”
“You want me to arrest you?” The policeman challenged Benny sharply. “Get over against that wall.”
“But officer . . .”
“Shut up and get over against that wall.” Benny complied.
I thanked the policeman and we continued east. A minute later I looked back. Benny was staggering toward Times Square.
I first met Benny when he was newly arrived from Alabama, the son of a southern Pentecostal preacher. No job, but determined to find one and make a new life for himself far away from the stifling world of his childhood. He had attended Bible studies in the Ark occasionally. Then he started coming in drunk. After that I’d meet him on the street occasionally, obviously drunk, apparently homeless. Nothing I could say had the slightest affect on his addiction.
Other people could tell their stories of God’s miraculous intervention. They could talk about times when God clearly broke through and demonstrated his power through them. I remembered someone telling me about an Adventist preacher who took seriously our prophet's counsel about personal involvement with the unfortunate. This preacher took a homeless alcoholic into his home. Had the man accompany him everywhere he went–to conference committee meetings, to preaching appointments. Eventually, the man got his life straightened out, got a job, returned to his estranged wife.
The best I could do was witness a tragic slide into oblivion.
At JFK, I checked in, then Ruth and I walked out to the gate. We sat, holding hands, waiting for my flight to start boarding, already feeling the ache of separation.
By late September, I have given in to Ruth’s allure. She was my girlfriend. In October, I returned to the apartment on a Sunday evening after spending the day with Ruth. Colin, as usual, wanted to hear about my day. He was always cheering us on.
I asked him about Anna again. Why didn’t he date her . . . or someone? “You’re always talking about how nice it would be to have a woman in your life, why don’t you do something about it? It’s not like there aren’t any available women. If you’re not interested in Anna, what about Pauline or Linda?”
He didn’t answer immediately. When he did, he spoke with uncharacteristic hesitancy. “Listen, Johnny, I think it’s time to tell you why I’m single. Why I don’t date Anna or Emily or Pauline. I don’t want to hurt them. It just wouldn’t work out.
“When I was growing up in England, my mother was very strong. She ran my dad around like he was a child. And, of course, polio strongly affected my sense of who I was. I couldn’t compete with the other kids physically, so I became a voracious reader. I got into the occult.
“Then I saw an advertisement for some a lecture on flying saucers. I went and was shocked to discover that it was a religious meeting. But I got hooked and I attended every meeting. My parents didn’t have any particular religion so they didn’t mind when I decided to get baptized.
“I loved the prophecies and learning about God. But even as I was getting more and more involved in church, I was troubled by the growing realization that I did not like women the way other boys did.
“The preacher at our church encouraged me to go to Newbold College. He said that was the place to meet nice Adventist girls. So I went. And I went out with girls there, very nice girls. I even kissed a few of them. But there was nothing in my heart that responded.
“I talked with one of the religion professors. He told me to just find a nice girl who played the piano and marry her and everything would work out in time. I tried. I dated one girl for over a year, but as much as I enjoyed her as a friend, I just could not see being married to her.
“After I graduated from Newbold, I worked as a pastor for a few years, then came to Andrews to get my masters. There, I really faced this thing. I fasted and prayed. I had friends who fasted and prayed with me. One time I felt this utter confidence that God was going to heal me. I asked to be a anointed. In preparation, I spent a week fasting and praying. The anointing was held on Friday night. I had a girlfriend. She was there. Three seminary professors and several of my classmates participated. We spent an hour praying before they finally anointed me and claimed God’s promises of transformation and new life.
“I went to bed utterly euphoric.
“I picked up Wanda the next morning and we went to church together. The whole world was bright. I was healed. I was normal. I was a heterosexual. At the end of the day I kissed her. It was wonderful.
“But a couple of weeks later the old feelings were back. Wanda begged me not to worry about it. We could work on it together, she insisted. But it just wasn’t right to marry someone you didn’t have feelings for. I mean sexual desire. She was sweet. I liked her. But it just wasn’t there.
“Later at Andrews a group performed an exorcism on me. They believed homosexual impulses were a form of demon possession. Again, for a couple of weeks, I felt different. But it didn’t last.
“So I’m committed to a life of celibacy–unless God heals me. I still pray every day to be changed. But there you have it old boy. That’s why I don’t date Anna. That’s why I get upset when you and Ruth tease me.”
I was stunned. What would it be like to be trapped in a prison like that? I was mad at God for all the conflict I felt over Ruth, but that was just because she was the wrong race and this was the wrong time in my life for a serious relationship. What would it be like to know you could never have a wife? Never have someone to sleep with, have sex with, raise a family with, grow old with?
I had prayed for a bicycle, and money miraculously showed up. Colin prayed for healing from homosexuality. He fasted and prayed. He was anointed. He had an exorcism. He had tried everything imaginable to obtain God’s power to change so he could live the life God wanted him to live. And it didn’t work. Why would God condemn people for something there was no healing for?
I had picked up from church culture the assumption that homosexuals were people who made bad choices. Just like alcoholics or smokers. They might have a hard time altering their behavior, but if they would simply choose to do the right thing, they could. Of course, like all temptations, homosexual temptation could be resisted only with the help of God. But certainly that help was available. Now, I couldn’t be so sure. God didn’t show up to help Colin.
I didn’t know where this left the Bible’s bold claims. It talked glibly about God’s power. “No temptation has befallen you, except what is common to all men. And God will, with the temptation, make available a way of escape.” “God is at work in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.” “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
I knew my moral failures were my own fault. I had no excuse. I simply made bad choices–choices that were not inevitable, choices that could have been different if I had taken more time to pray and read my Bible. Listening to Colin, I could not imagine what more he could have done. If that was true, how could I as a preacher stand up and tell people about the power of God, when apparently it did not work in the lives of homosexuals?
I flew home for Christmas, then returned to New York for a weekend before leaving for Middle East College in Beirut, Lebanon.
Going to MEC was a lark. In September, someone had stayed at the Center for a couple of days to visit a girl who worked there. He was an American, returning for a second year at MEC. He loved it. Said it was easy to get accepted and easy to transfer credits back to Adventist colleges in the U.S. Why didn't I come when my year at the Center was up in December. Sure. Why not?
On Sunday of that last weekend back in New York, as Ruth and I were walking east on 46th Street away from The Center toward Avenue of the Americas to catch the “Train to the Plane,” the subway/bus system connecting Manhattan and JFK Airport, we met Benny coming toward us. He was drunk and wanted to talk. I explained I had a plane to catch. I couldn’t talk now. He shifted back and forth across the sidewalk determined to keep us from passing. I called to a policeman who happened to be standing not far away.
“Officer, can you help us?”
“What’s the trouble?”
“This guy won’t let us walk down the sidewalk. I’ve got a plane to catch.”
“You want me to arrest you?” The policeman challenged Benny sharply. “Get over against that wall.”
“But officer . . .”
“Shut up and get over against that wall.” Benny complied.
I thanked the policeman and we continued east. A minute later I looked back. Benny was staggering toward Times Square.
I first met Benny when he was newly arrived from Alabama, the son of a southern Pentecostal preacher. No job, but determined to find one and make a new life for himself far away from the stifling world of his childhood. He had attended Bible studies in the Ark occasionally. Then he started coming in drunk. After that I’d meet him on the street occasionally, obviously drunk, apparently homeless. Nothing I could say had the slightest affect on his addiction.
Other people could tell their stories of God’s miraculous intervention. They could talk about times when God clearly broke through and demonstrated his power through them. I remembered someone telling me about an Adventist preacher who took seriously our prophet's counsel about personal involvement with the unfortunate. This preacher took a homeless alcoholic into his home. Had the man accompany him everywhere he went–to conference committee meetings, to preaching appointments. Eventually, the man got his life straightened out, got a job, returned to his estranged wife.
The best I could do was witness a tragic slide into oblivion.
At JFK, I checked in, then Ruth and I walked out to the gate. We sat, holding hands, waiting for my flight to start boarding, already feeling the ache of separation.
Chapter 27 Times Square
I admired Colin–his fiery preaching, his bold, almost reckless forwardness in presenting himself and his ideas. But he got on my nerves in a way I could not make sense of. I couldn’t stand to have him near me, especially in the apartment. We bickered constantly. I felt guilty. It was his apartment. He was the minister. I was supposed to be helping him. I suspected I instead made his work harder. Ruth liked him. Everyone around me liked him. I couldn’t understand what was wrong with me.
The immediate environment of the Center didn’t help. It was several blocks to any of the four subway stations in the area. If I wore a suit, while walking between the Center and the subway in the evening, women in tiny skirts and tight tops called out, “Want a date?” If I wore casual clothes it was not uncommon for middle aged men to walk along side me and ask if they could buy me coffee. The first time a man used this line, I was handing out fliers on the street. I was thrilled thinking he had read the flier and was interested. Here was a divine appointment, an opportunity to share my faith. We walked to a small shop in the next block. I ordered hot chocolate, which he paid for, and we sat at a table on the street talking for more than ten minutes before I realized he, too, was “looking for a date.” I was deeply embarrassed, annoyed and a little smarter.
I learned to walk with a fierce directness. It violated both my instincts and my culture. I am addicted to people. I need them to smile at me. I want to connect with them. Besides, my Southern heritage placed an enormous value on courtesy. One was always pleasant in face-to-face encounters, even if privately you despised the person you were interacting with. But in Times Square courtesy toward strangers would be misinterpreted. Eye-contact was a violation of the social contract, unless one was prepared to do business. So every time I walked from the subway to the apartment, especially in the evening, I put on an artificial brusqueness. My body language had to say, don’t touch me, don’t talk to me, don’t notice me. I hated it. At the Center, I would ride the elevator to the sixth floor and walk to the apartment hoping Colin wasn’t there. Inside, Colin would look up from his reading with his enormous eyes. “How was it old boy? Welcome home!” I would tense. He wanted conversation. I knew of no courteous way to avoid it.
There was nowhere to be at ease. No where to rest. Except with Ruth. She asked nothing. Demanded nothing. Just seemed to enjoy hanging around.
God didn’t want me to date Ruth. I was sure of that. I knew my parents would not approve of my marrying someone who wasn’t White. Besides that, I wasn’t planning to marry until after grad school and that was a long time from now. There was no way I could date someone that long. So why date someone when breaking up was inevitable? Why should I bruise someone’s heart on purpose?
So I resisted–not her. She never pushed. I was resisting my own desperate craving for connection and sweetness and warmth and beauty. I complained bitterly to God in prayer: Why dangle her in front of me and forbid me to touch her?
My pay was 175 dollars a month plus free rent. I gave twenty percent to the church and paid for my travel and food and incidentals out of what was left. Not long after I arrived, I realized I did not have a coat adequate for the New York winter. Mrs. Toby gave me one she had received from somewhere. It seemed miraculous.
In the spring, I began to think of getting a bicycle for getting around Manhattan. This would save subway fare and give me some exercise. But how was I going to afford it? I could always call home and ask for money, but that seemed like a violation of the missionary venture. So I prayed.
A couple of weeks later, I received a check for a hundred twenty dollars for work I had done more than a year earlier. I bought a used bike. It was wonderful. It opened the city for me. On the bicycle I could traverse midtown faster than a taxi. The exercise eased the stress of living with Colin and pining for Ruth.
I lived in constant depression. My daily prayer time consisted of mournful, desperate pleas to heaven for help. I wasn’t sure exactly what kind of help I needed. I prayed for evidence that I was actually in God’s service. I wanted to see people changed. I prayed for a better attitude toward Colin. I prayed about Ruth.
Late in the summer I happened to weigh myself. I had lost thirty pounds. I could afford to lose it. But the loss startled me. I must be worse off than I thought.
One afternoon in August, a friend stopped by the Center. He was depressed and discouraged. We sat and talked for a couple of hours. I see the light coming back into his eyes. He left buoyant. I dragged myself upstairs and collapsed on my bed. I could heal others but could not help myself. Where was God? I was supposed to be an evangelist. My job was to persuade others to come join us, to believe what we believed, to live the way we lived. But why would I want anyone else to join a religion that was making me miserable? Our prophet had written that the greatest form of evangelism was to tell others what Jesus had done for me. But Jesus was making me miserable.
My evangelistic duties did bring enjoyment, at times. Just a couple of blocks west of the Center were the brownstone houses of Hell’s Kitchen. Three to six story walk ups. Cracked side walks. Stoops a couple of steps up from the street. I was responsible for knocking on doors there, to invite them to The Ark, to share with them gospel literature.
People opened their doors, welcomed my visits. I reveled in the rawness of their lives, the openness of their conversation. But there were no conversions.
The immediate environment of the Center didn’t help. It was several blocks to any of the four subway stations in the area. If I wore a suit, while walking between the Center and the subway in the evening, women in tiny skirts and tight tops called out, “Want a date?” If I wore casual clothes it was not uncommon for middle aged men to walk along side me and ask if they could buy me coffee. The first time a man used this line, I was handing out fliers on the street. I was thrilled thinking he had read the flier and was interested. Here was a divine appointment, an opportunity to share my faith. We walked to a small shop in the next block. I ordered hot chocolate, which he paid for, and we sat at a table on the street talking for more than ten minutes before I realized he, too, was “looking for a date.” I was deeply embarrassed, annoyed and a little smarter.
I learned to walk with a fierce directness. It violated both my instincts and my culture. I am addicted to people. I need them to smile at me. I want to connect with them. Besides, my Southern heritage placed an enormous value on courtesy. One was always pleasant in face-to-face encounters, even if privately you despised the person you were interacting with. But in Times Square courtesy toward strangers would be misinterpreted. Eye-contact was a violation of the social contract, unless one was prepared to do business. So every time I walked from the subway to the apartment, especially in the evening, I put on an artificial brusqueness. My body language had to say, don’t touch me, don’t talk to me, don’t notice me. I hated it. At the Center, I would ride the elevator to the sixth floor and walk to the apartment hoping Colin wasn’t there. Inside, Colin would look up from his reading with his enormous eyes. “How was it old boy? Welcome home!” I would tense. He wanted conversation. I knew of no courteous way to avoid it.
There was nowhere to be at ease. No where to rest. Except with Ruth. She asked nothing. Demanded nothing. Just seemed to enjoy hanging around.
God didn’t want me to date Ruth. I was sure of that. I knew my parents would not approve of my marrying someone who wasn’t White. Besides that, I wasn’t planning to marry until after grad school and that was a long time from now. There was no way I could date someone that long. So why date someone when breaking up was inevitable? Why should I bruise someone’s heart on purpose?
So I resisted–not her. She never pushed. I was resisting my own desperate craving for connection and sweetness and warmth and beauty. I complained bitterly to God in prayer: Why dangle her in front of me and forbid me to touch her?
My pay was 175 dollars a month plus free rent. I gave twenty percent to the church and paid for my travel and food and incidentals out of what was left. Not long after I arrived, I realized I did not have a coat adequate for the New York winter. Mrs. Toby gave me one she had received from somewhere. It seemed miraculous.
In the spring, I began to think of getting a bicycle for getting around Manhattan. This would save subway fare and give me some exercise. But how was I going to afford it? I could always call home and ask for money, but that seemed like a violation of the missionary venture. So I prayed.
A couple of weeks later, I received a check for a hundred twenty dollars for work I had done more than a year earlier. I bought a used bike. It was wonderful. It opened the city for me. On the bicycle I could traverse midtown faster than a taxi. The exercise eased the stress of living with Colin and pining for Ruth.
I lived in constant depression. My daily prayer time consisted of mournful, desperate pleas to heaven for help. I wasn’t sure exactly what kind of help I needed. I prayed for evidence that I was actually in God’s service. I wanted to see people changed. I prayed for a better attitude toward Colin. I prayed about Ruth.
Late in the summer I happened to weigh myself. I had lost thirty pounds. I could afford to lose it. But the loss startled me. I must be worse off than I thought.
One afternoon in August, a friend stopped by the Center. He was depressed and discouraged. We sat and talked for a couple of hours. I see the light coming back into his eyes. He left buoyant. I dragged myself upstairs and collapsed on my bed. I could heal others but could not help myself. Where was God? I was supposed to be an evangelist. My job was to persuade others to come join us, to believe what we believed, to live the way we lived. But why would I want anyone else to join a religion that was making me miserable? Our prophet had written that the greatest form of evangelism was to tell others what Jesus had done for me. But Jesus was making me miserable.
My evangelistic duties did bring enjoyment, at times. Just a couple of blocks west of the Center were the brownstone houses of Hell’s Kitchen. Three to six story walk ups. Cracked side walks. Stoops a couple of steps up from the street. I was responsible for knocking on doors there, to invite them to The Ark, to share with them gospel literature.
People opened their doors, welcomed my visits. I reveled in the rawness of their lives, the openness of their conversation. But there were no conversions.
Chapter 26 Ruth
With the end of school, Ruth began attending the Friday night Bible studies I led at Ark. I occasionally asked others in the group to lead it. When I asked Ruth if she would like to lead, she surprised me by saying yes.
The following Friday night, she gave a study on the Sabbath. I was astonished at her approach. She used none of the Bible passages commonly cited by Adventists in our promotion of Sabbath-keeping. Instead Ruth had us read passages from the Psalms and elsewhere that voiced praise to God for his work in creation and in rescuing people from all kinds of difficulties. As Ruth wrapped up her presentation, she said Sabbath was about remembering the good things that come from God’s work of Creation and Redemption.
I was blown away. All the Adventist discourse about Sabbath-keeping I had ever heard focused on either arguments about which day–Saturday or Sunday–was the right day or what was permitted and prohibited on the Sabbath. Well, that and arguments about the role Sabbath would play in testing the spiritual loyalty of people in the last days. Ruth brushed past all that and turned Sabbath into an occasion for worship.
One Friday, our meeting went quite late. We didn’t quit until ten o’clock. Colin was there that evening. As we were breaking up the meeting, Colin expressed concern about Ruth taking the subway to Brooklyn alone at that hour of the night.
“Oh, don’t be silly.” she laughingly protested to him. “I’ve ridden the subway all my life.”
“But, at this hour of the night? I don’t think Willie would be too happy for you to be riding by yourself this late." Colin turned to me. “Johnny why don’t you take her home?”
“Sure, I’d be happy to do that.”
“No, you can’t.” Ruth sputtered. “You won’t get home until midnight.”
“Which precisely makes our point. It’s late. You will be riding the subway and getting off in Park Slope at 11:00 p.m. You need someone with you.”
“You guys are being silly. You’re acting like mother hens.”
“Yes, but we’ll feel better if we know you are safely home." I said. "I’m going with you.”
Ruth and I walked through Times Square to the subway. We sat together on the bench seat. Our hands in our laps, our arms not quite touching. The sense of her closeness was intoxicating. We talked about her father who was a sailor and gone from home months at a time. I learned about her excursions with her brothers into upstate New York looking for bonsai specimens along rocky ridges. She was more and more fascinating.
We exited the subway and walked the six blocks to her house. It was classic Brooklyn, shops on the ground floor along Prospect Ave. Three- and four-story brownstones on the side streets. Trash cans at the curb. People on the sidewalks. Not a lot at that hour, but enough to make the place feel populated, friendly.
I said good night and watched her climb the steps to her front door. She didn’t look back. Once she was inside, I turned to walk to the subway, dizzy with desire and confused guilt because of the desire. I had no business getting involved with her.
The following Friday night, she gave a study on the Sabbath. I was astonished at her approach. She used none of the Bible passages commonly cited by Adventists in our promotion of Sabbath-keeping. Instead Ruth had us read passages from the Psalms and elsewhere that voiced praise to God for his work in creation and in rescuing people from all kinds of difficulties. As Ruth wrapped up her presentation, she said Sabbath was about remembering the good things that come from God’s work of Creation and Redemption.
I was blown away. All the Adventist discourse about Sabbath-keeping I had ever heard focused on either arguments about which day–Saturday or Sunday–was the right day or what was permitted and prohibited on the Sabbath. Well, that and arguments about the role Sabbath would play in testing the spiritual loyalty of people in the last days. Ruth brushed past all that and turned Sabbath into an occasion for worship.
One Friday, our meeting went quite late. We didn’t quit until ten o’clock. Colin was there that evening. As we were breaking up the meeting, Colin expressed concern about Ruth taking the subway to Brooklyn alone at that hour of the night.
“Oh, don’t be silly.” she laughingly protested to him. “I’ve ridden the subway all my life.”
“But, at this hour of the night? I don’t think Willie would be too happy for you to be riding by yourself this late." Colin turned to me. “Johnny why don’t you take her home?”
“Sure, I’d be happy to do that.”
“No, you can’t.” Ruth sputtered. “You won’t get home until midnight.”
“Which precisely makes our point. It’s late. You will be riding the subway and getting off in Park Slope at 11:00 p.m. You need someone with you.”
“You guys are being silly. You’re acting like mother hens.”
“Yes, but we’ll feel better if we know you are safely home." I said. "I’m going with you.”
Ruth and I walked through Times Square to the subway. We sat together on the bench seat. Our hands in our laps, our arms not quite touching. The sense of her closeness was intoxicating. We talked about her father who was a sailor and gone from home months at a time. I learned about her excursions with her brothers into upstate New York looking for bonsai specimens along rocky ridges. She was more and more fascinating.
We exited the subway and walked the six blocks to her house. It was classic Brooklyn, shops on the ground floor along Prospect Ave. Three- and four-story brownstones on the side streets. Trash cans at the curb. People on the sidewalks. Not a lot at that hour, but enough to make the place feel populated, friendly.
I said good night and watched her climb the steps to her front door. She didn’t look back. Once she was inside, I turned to walk to the subway, dizzy with desire and confused guilt because of the desire. I had no business getting involved with her.
Chapter 25 Colin's Disciples
Colin had collected a group of disciples–two couples who had joined the church through his ministry and another couple also fairly new to Adventism. They eagerly attended his Bible studies and became his allies in thinking and dreaming about an expansive ministry. A Filipino family was also an important part of Colin’s social circle in the church. The two Almario brothers were bright and energetic. Their mother considered Colin another of her sons. Their baby sister, Ruth, was a high school junior.
Ruth was quiet. To me she seemed shy, but as I watched her interact with others I was frequently surprised by her confidence and boldness. After awhile it seemed every time Colin did anything with his group Ruth was there. She hung on his every word. She took notes when he preached or taught classes. She was intensely devout.
She never gave the slightest indication that she was interested in me. But I couldn’t help but notice her. She was always there. She was the only person around who was younger than I. In conversation with me, she was always grave, serious, shy. But interacting with everyone else around me, her eyes sparkled. She laughed. She touched people. She teased them.
In March, Calvin headed back to school. That left Colin and me in the apartment. Five evenings a week, I stood on the street usually on Seventh Avenue, near 46th Street, handing out cards inviting people to “The Ark” for Bible studies at seven o’clock. The Ark was our name for the large meeting room in the basement of the Center. I’d hand out cards for a couple of hours until just before seven o’clock, hurry back to the Center to wait hopefully for people to show up, then go back out on the street from eight to ten p.m. Occasionally, someone would come in.
On Friday evenings, we often met with Colin’s disciples. Ollie was a tough, forceful Black man, a singer. His wife was a good looking blond. They often arrived separately coming straight from their jobs. They always greeted each other with a kiss. I wasn’t used to seeing people kiss on the lips. That wasn’t done publicly in our clan. And for sure I wasn’t used to seeing Black men kiss blond women. But they seemed happy enough.
Henry was thin and gentle with a very white face and wispy black hair. He wasn’t short, but his wife was four inches taller, blond and animated.
The other couple was the Barbers. He worked as a minor functionary at a bank. She taught high school.
They all revered Colin. They sometimes talked of creating a retreat center where people could come for extended periods to study under Colin’s tutelage. This dream of a retreat center was fueled in part by the people who attended our monthly smoking cessation clinics.
The Five-day Plan had been created by an Adventist minister and doctor in New England a few years earlier. We ran the program the first week every month at the Center. Mrs. Toby registered the people. Miss Harding made sure we had all the requisite supplies on hand–magazines and pamphlets, the pocket-sized syllabus inserts for each evening that outlined the strategy for that particular day.
Each evening, the program began with a film. The first film featured a lung cancer operation. We wanted people to go home that evening and clear all cigarettes out of their homes and cars. There was no better time to quit than right now. We asked the participants to fast for the first twenty-four hours, drinking only water and fruit juice. If they had to eat something, we wanted them to limit it to carrot and celery sticks and apple slices.
Following the film, each evening featured a presentation on physiology by a health professional and a short lecture on psychology by Colin. Sometimes Mrs. Croft helped us with the health lecture, but our mainstay was a Dr. Jones who drove all the way from Reading, Pennsylvania. He was a captivating speaker. His credentials as an M. D. helped our credibility. My job was to circulate among the class members and be friendly. From the second night on, just before we closed the meeting, we had the class break into small groups to talk about their experience in quitting. I was asked to chair one of these groups. I knew nothing about smoking and even less about quitting. These people were all old enough to be my parents, some old enough to be my grandparents. My leading a group seemed preposterous. Colin insisted, so I did it. I read all the material trying to learn all I could. By the end of the week fifty to eighty percent of the people reported they had successfully quit. That was cool.
Beginning in May with good weather, Colin had me go with him to Battery Park several days a week to do street preaching to the lunch time crowds. Colin would preach; I would stand and listen as “audience bait.” Then, if other people stopped to listen, I would hand out literature, including cards advertising “The Ark.”
I envied Colin his daring, his brashness. Sure, Battery Park had a tradition of street preaching. At the lunch hour in good weather, the park was jammed with people. Sometimes as many as five or six difference speakers would be holding forth at different places in the park–Christian preachers, Jewish preachers, socialists, atheists, right-wing conspiracy theorists. But I couldn’t imagine standing up and shouting at a milling crowd of indifferent strangers.
Colin kept bugging me to try it. “Come on, Johnny, my boy. No one’s going to hurt you.”
I wanted to do it. It seemed so quintessentially Christian. I remembered stories of Joseph Wolff, a converted Jew, who traveled throughout the Middle East and Central Asia in the late 1800s, talking of Jesus to all sorts of people whenever he could get an audience. I recalled stories of native preachers in interior China who would stand and preach on market days. These evangelists preached through storms of rotten produce and sometimes stones. What was I risking? People not stopping to listen?
I resisted, figuring I was already doing my part by helping Colin. Besides I had no idea how to preach in three minute segments. To be an effective street preacher you couldn’t presume a stationary audience for a thirty minute sermon. People were constantly drifting in and out. Your preaching had to have enough progression to keep the interest of people who had been standing there awhile. At the same time newcomers had to be able to pick up an intelligible train of thought immediately.
I finally tried it once. For ten minutes. Crowds did not gather. I did not try it again. But I continued to feel guilty for my lack of courage, my unwillingness to be a fool for Jesus.
Ruth was quiet. To me she seemed shy, but as I watched her interact with others I was frequently surprised by her confidence and boldness. After awhile it seemed every time Colin did anything with his group Ruth was there. She hung on his every word. She took notes when he preached or taught classes. She was intensely devout.
She never gave the slightest indication that she was interested in me. But I couldn’t help but notice her. She was always there. She was the only person around who was younger than I. In conversation with me, she was always grave, serious, shy. But interacting with everyone else around me, her eyes sparkled. She laughed. She touched people. She teased them.
In March, Calvin headed back to school. That left Colin and me in the apartment. Five evenings a week, I stood on the street usually on Seventh Avenue, near 46th Street, handing out cards inviting people to “The Ark” for Bible studies at seven o’clock. The Ark was our name for the large meeting room in the basement of the Center. I’d hand out cards for a couple of hours until just before seven o’clock, hurry back to the Center to wait hopefully for people to show up, then go back out on the street from eight to ten p.m. Occasionally, someone would come in.
On Friday evenings, we often met with Colin’s disciples. Ollie was a tough, forceful Black man, a singer. His wife was a good looking blond. They often arrived separately coming straight from their jobs. They always greeted each other with a kiss. I wasn’t used to seeing people kiss on the lips. That wasn’t done publicly in our clan. And for sure I wasn’t used to seeing Black men kiss blond women. But they seemed happy enough.
Henry was thin and gentle with a very white face and wispy black hair. He wasn’t short, but his wife was four inches taller, blond and animated.
The other couple was the Barbers. He worked as a minor functionary at a bank. She taught high school.
They all revered Colin. They sometimes talked of creating a retreat center where people could come for extended periods to study under Colin’s tutelage. This dream of a retreat center was fueled in part by the people who attended our monthly smoking cessation clinics.
The Five-day Plan had been created by an Adventist minister and doctor in New England a few years earlier. We ran the program the first week every month at the Center. Mrs. Toby registered the people. Miss Harding made sure we had all the requisite supplies on hand–magazines and pamphlets, the pocket-sized syllabus inserts for each evening that outlined the strategy for that particular day.
Each evening, the program began with a film. The first film featured a lung cancer operation. We wanted people to go home that evening and clear all cigarettes out of their homes and cars. There was no better time to quit than right now. We asked the participants to fast for the first twenty-four hours, drinking only water and fruit juice. If they had to eat something, we wanted them to limit it to carrot and celery sticks and apple slices.
Following the film, each evening featured a presentation on physiology by a health professional and a short lecture on psychology by Colin. Sometimes Mrs. Croft helped us with the health lecture, but our mainstay was a Dr. Jones who drove all the way from Reading, Pennsylvania. He was a captivating speaker. His credentials as an M. D. helped our credibility. My job was to circulate among the class members and be friendly. From the second night on, just before we closed the meeting, we had the class break into small groups to talk about their experience in quitting. I was asked to chair one of these groups. I knew nothing about smoking and even less about quitting. These people were all old enough to be my parents, some old enough to be my grandparents. My leading a group seemed preposterous. Colin insisted, so I did it. I read all the material trying to learn all I could. By the end of the week fifty to eighty percent of the people reported they had successfully quit. That was cool.
Beginning in May with good weather, Colin had me go with him to Battery Park several days a week to do street preaching to the lunch time crowds. Colin would preach; I would stand and listen as “audience bait.” Then, if other people stopped to listen, I would hand out literature, including cards advertising “The Ark.”
I envied Colin his daring, his brashness. Sure, Battery Park had a tradition of street preaching. At the lunch hour in good weather, the park was jammed with people. Sometimes as many as five or six difference speakers would be holding forth at different places in the park–Christian preachers, Jewish preachers, socialists, atheists, right-wing conspiracy theorists. But I couldn’t imagine standing up and shouting at a milling crowd of indifferent strangers.
Colin kept bugging me to try it. “Come on, Johnny, my boy. No one’s going to hurt you.”
I wanted to do it. It seemed so quintessentially Christian. I remembered stories of Joseph Wolff, a converted Jew, who traveled throughout the Middle East and Central Asia in the late 1800s, talking of Jesus to all sorts of people whenever he could get an audience. I recalled stories of native preachers in interior China who would stand and preach on market days. These evangelists preached through storms of rotten produce and sometimes stones. What was I risking? People not stopping to listen?
I resisted, figuring I was already doing my part by helping Colin. Besides I had no idea how to preach in three minute segments. To be an effective street preacher you couldn’t presume a stationary audience for a thirty minute sermon. People were constantly drifting in and out. Your preaching had to have enough progression to keep the interest of people who had been standing there awhile. At the same time newcomers had to be able to pick up an intelligible train of thought immediately.
I finally tried it once. For ten minutes. Crowds did not gather. I did not try it again. But I continued to feel guilty for my lack of courage, my unwillingness to be a fool for Jesus.
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