Home to Harmony (6 page)

T
he day before Billy Bundle, the World's Shortest Evangelist, came to preach our revival, it occurred to me I needed a secretary. Back in April, the elders had put me in charge of calling Bob Miles Jr. at the
Herald
to arrange publicity, which I forgot to do even though I had written it on my to-do list:
Call B.M. regarding B.B.
I spent the next two months trying to decipher my own note, and by the time I figured it out, Billy Bundle was on his way.

At first I thought I was supposed to call Bea Majors about the Bible Bonanza, when we donated Bibles to the Choctaw Indians, but when I called to remind her she said the Bible Bonanza wasn't for another eight months. Then I thought it meant I was supposed to call Bill Muldock about buying new baseball bats for our men's softball team, not that it would help. In fifteen years, our men's softball team had won only one game. We beat the Friendly Women's Circle, who rallied in the last inning when my grandmother hit a
home run. We squeaked out a one-run victory, just barely.

It wasn't until Dale Hinshaw phoned to ask why our revival ad wasn't in the
Herald
that I figured out that
Call B.M. regarding B.B.
meant “Call Bob Miles regarding Billy Bundle.” I explained to Dale what had happened, then suggested that if I had a secretary these mistakes could be avoided.

The reason I didn't have a secretary was because every time I mentioned needing one, Dale shot it down. He had read somewhere, though he couldn't remember where, that 26 percent of church pastors ran off with their secretaries. Because it was in print, Dale believed it. Plus, his brother-in-law's pastor had run off with his secretary, which meant, of course, that if I had a secretary I would do the same.

“Lead us not into temptation,” Dale intoned whenever I raised the subject of hiring a secretary.

 

F
or as long as I had known Dale, he had taken his vacation the first week of July. Every year Dale and his wife went to the same place, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, where they rented a cabin and fished. Dale had two bumper stickers on his car. One read,
Jesus said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers…”
and the other read,
Work is for people who don't know how to fish.

With Dale in Fond du Lac, July was the one month we got things done in the church. We saved all our important business for the July elders' meeting, which was when I brought up the subject of Harmony Friends
Meeting hiring a secretary to help me write the newsletter, print the bulletins, and answer the phone.

Even with Dale gone, it was a spirited discussion. Asa Peacock mentioned that we'd never had a secretary before. Why start now?

Miriam Hodge asked if he'd had indoor plumbing growing up. Asa shook his head no.

She said, “Well, Asa, since you'd never had it, why did you bother getting it?” In one fell swoop, Miriam Hodge killed the venerable we've-never-done-it-this-way-before argument. It was a thing of beauty to behold.

Then Harvey Muldock waded in with the time-honored we-can't-afford-it argument, to which Miriam replied, “It seems a waste of money to pay Sam to do secretarial work when we could hire it done cheaper.”

With all the arguments exhausted, they formed a hiring committee, and since Dale Hinshaw was gone, they appointed him to chair it.

I was the one who had to tell him. I scribbled on my to-do list,
Talk with Dale Hinshaw about sec.
I'd learned my lesson and used his full name.

Dale took it better than I thought.

He said, “I can see how having a secretary could be a help. I guess we can trust you to behave yourself.”

The next week he hired a seventy-year-old secretary. His name was Frank. Frank was a widower. His wife had just died, and Dale thought making Frank our secretary would boost his spirits.

I was leery at first, but in fairness to Frank, it's worked out better than I anticipated. Frank was a bookkeeper during the Korean War, where he devel
oped a knack for organization. Each morning he tells me my schedule. He keeps my pencils sharpened and arranges my books alphabetically. If I have a church meeting, Frank attends and takes notes. His only drawback is that he is farsighted, so he can't see well. He blames it on the war.

“It was all that squinting. But what with people getting shot at, I didn't think I should complain about not being able to see.”

Some men gave their lives for freedom. Frank gave his 20/20 eyesight. He wears thick glasses that slip down his nose. He spends a lot of time looking at people over his glasses.

 

I
t has been said that patience comes with age. Whoever said that never met Frank. He does not entertain fools gladly. When Fern Hampton called to complain about our worship service, Frank listened for one minute, then hung up the phone.

Complaining about the service was a weekly ritual for Fern, a deep joy, almost a sacrament. During worship she would sit in the sixth row and scribble furiously. At first I thought she was taking notes, but what she was doing was gathering evidence. She'd phone the office every Monday morning and complain for ten minutes. She'd start with the prelude and work her way through to the benediction. I used to listen to her entire harangue. After a while I learned to set the phone down, do my paperwork, then pick up the phone ten minutes later just as she was winding down.

She complains about the hymns and the sermon and
about people sneaking in church announcements during prayer time. Bill Muldock is notorious for that. He stands during prayer time, bows his head, and intones, “Lord, we just ask Your blessings on our men's softball practice this Tuesday night at seven o'clock at the park.” Fern glares at him from across the meeting room.

Then one Monday I wasn't at the church office, and Frank answered the phone. He listened to Fern for one minute, then hung up the phone, and she hasn't called back since.

It's like Frank told me, “Once you've been to war, you learn what's important. A good war would do wonders for Fern.”

Frank has a sign over his desk that reads:

I can only make one person happy each day.

Today is not your day.

Tomorrow doesn't look good, either.

I suspect Dale hired Frank to spite me. He thought Frank would be a burden, but that hasn't happened. People are so afraid to call the office on the off chance Frank will answer—my workload has dropped considerably.

People call and ask me to visit someone in the hospital. Frank asks them, “Why can't you go? Are your legs broken? Why do you want Pastor Sam to do your Christian work for you?”

Dale Hinshaw was the worst offender. Fearing I might have a spare moment, he would phone me daily with suggestions of things I could do. Frank put up with this for one week, then said, “Dale, if you spent
as much time doing the work of the Lord as you do fishing, we'd all be better off.”

 

F
rank's greatest contribution to date came during the August meeting of elders. Miriam Hodge opened with prayer, read through the old business, then asked if I had anything to say.

I turned to Frank and asked him to read my to-do list. Frank squinted at the list through his thick glasses.

“It says here you need to talk with Dale Hinshaw about sex,” he said.

The room grew quiet. The elders raised their eyes and looked down the table at Dale, wondering why Dale needed to be talked to about sex. What had he done? Was there something they needed to know?

I asked Frank to hand me the to-do list.

“No, Frank, it says for me to talk with Dale about a secretary. I abbreviated the word
secretary
. That's
s-e-c,
not
s-e-x.
I needed to talk with Dale about a secretary.”

Dale looked vastly relieved.

Frank said, “Maybe you ought to talk with Dale about sex just the same. Everyone's talking about sex these days, except for the church. Maybe that's why we're so messed up about sex. The people who should be teaching about it, aren't. Maybe we ought to teach about sex.”

Then he paused and said, “Golly, I sure miss sex. I miss the holding part.”

Dale reddened and Miriam blushed. I was relatively certain that in our hundred and seventy years of exis
tence, sex had never been the focus of an elders' meeting at Harmony Friends Meeting.

Dale sat bolt upright and said, “I think Frank is right. Someone needs to talk about sex to our teenagers. Just the other day I saw two of our kids kissing in the church parking lot. Pastor, why don't you talk with those kids?”

Frank said, “Dale, how come you want Pastor Sam to do everything? Why can't you talk with the teenagers?”

So that's how Dale Hinshaw came to talk with the youth of Harmony Friends Meeting about the birds and the bees.

The next Sunday, Dale and his wife came to church armed with pictures of flowers, of pistils and stamens. He spoke at length about pollination. Then he asked if there were any questions. There weren't.

Dale reported back to the September meeting of elders. He said, “Well, I got them squared around. We won't be having any sex problems in this church. You can bet on that.”

Frank asked him what he had talked about, specifically. He wanted details.

Dale said, “Pistils and stamens. They got the message.”

Frank asked, “Did you tell them about the holding part? How the holding part is the best. How it's sweeter over the years. How they need to wait until they're married. That when love and commitment aren't in it, it'll leave you feeling empty and cheap. Did you tell them that?”

Dale said he implied it.

Frank erupted, “Good golly, man, you got to put the hay down where the goats can get it.”

That's when Frank volunteered to talk with the youth of Harmony Friends Meeting about the birds and the bees.

 

I
went with him. He didn't bring any pictures of flowers or pistils and stamens. Mostly, he just talked. He talked about his wife Martha, and how they met, and how tempted they had been, and how they waited. He spoke of how he missed her during the war, how he kept her picture in his shirt pocket, next to his heart. He hung his head and wiped his eyes and told how much he missed her now. Then he told them sex was a gift of love from God and that's what made it sacred. And how it's our job not to cheapen it.

Then he asked if the kids had any questions.

One boy raised his hand and asked if it was all right to pick flowers from a neighbor's garden.

Frank asked him what that had to do with sex. The boy wasn't sure, but that's what Dale had told him—not to pick flowers from your neighbor's garden.

Well, that's how things get done in this place. We put things off and put things off until someone like Frank gets fed up and wades in and gets the job done. And if that doesn't work, we wait until Dale Hinshaw goes fishing, and then we do it.

But there are some things that shouldn't wait, things we need to talk about right now. Making sure our children know right from wrong and good from bad is one
of them. I wrote it on my to-do list:
Talk with your sons about sex.

Dale lent me his pistil and stamen pictures. Frank said if I had any questions, he'd be happy to help.

By golly, Dale Hinshaw was right. If you hire a church secretary, sex is never far behind.

O
f all the things I like about summer, what I like most is that we don't hold Sunday school. It wasn't my idea—it's been that way as long as I can remember.

The Sunday before Memorial Day we hold a Sunday school picnic after meeting. Each class does a recitation. It's the same every year. The children sing “Jesus Loves Me,” though in watching them you certainly couldn't fault Jesus if He found some of them easier to love than others. The ladies of the Mary and Martha Sunday school class recite a poem, and Bob Miles Sr., who teaches the Live Free or Die class, leads everyone in the Pledge of Allegiance. He stands on a picnic table, leads the pledge, then advises the rest of us where the food line starts, even though we've been lining up the same way since 1964 and could do it in our sleep.

The picnic tables are set up behind the meetinghouse, underneath the trees, alongside the parking lot.
The line forms at the basketball goal, which Dale Hinshaw wants to take down so the teenagers will hang out somewhere else. The women of the Mary and Martha class are first in line, then the men of the Live Free or Die class, then the families with children, then the teenagers—who eat fast, then shoot Horse at the basketball goal.

It requires no special skill to stand in line, so no one listens to Bob Sr., which infuriates him. He wants the church to buy a bullhorn so he can be heard. He brings it up every May when we're planning the Sunday school picnic. Says the same thing every year.

“It's not just for the picnic. We could use it for other things. If there was civil disorder and we had to crack down, a bullhorn would come in handy.”

Bob Sr. is intrigued with the idea of the town falling into chaos and the townspeople begging him to restore order.

We tell him if he wants a bullhorn, he'll have to buy it with his own money. He says, “You'll be sorry. One day this town will erupt. It happened in Los Angeles. There's no reason it couldn't happen here. Trust me, this town is a powder keg. And when it blows, you'll wish you had a bullhorn.”

He talks about it during Sunday school, too, which is why I welcome the summer reprieve. He talks about how America is going to pot, how young people aren't worth a darn, how folks don't pull together anymore, and how everyone is lazy. His answer to moral depravity is a bullhorn.

Bob Miles Sr. founded the Live Free or Die Sunday school class in 1960. Concerned about the im
pending Communist threat and how President Kennedy was put into office by the pope, he began the class as a watchdog group to guard against foreign infiltration at Harmony Friends Meeting. In 1960, when Nikita Khrushchev visited a pig farm in Iowa, Bob Sr. drove ten hours to hold up a sign that read
LIVE FREE OR DIE.
There was a picture in
Time
magazine of Nikita Krushchev lifting up a pig, and right behind him, Bob Sr. with his sign. Then Bob came home and the very next Sunday began the Live Free or Die class.

It is not the kind of class that attracts the current generation, who, while valuing freedom, are more interested in parenting classes and classes on biblical financial management. Bob Sr.'s class is fading, which he laments at least once a month during open worship. We sit in silence waiting for the Lord to speak, and Bob Sr. rises to his feet to warn against Communism. He writes letters to the
Herald
every week, which his son, Bob Jr., who does not share his father's political philosophy, refuses to print.

But Bob Sr. is persistent. If the
Herald
won't print his opinion, he'll offer it during church, when no one can stop him, though not for lack of trying.

 

T
his past May, during the elders' meeting, Miriam Hodge suggested naming Bob Sr. as our Official Prayer Warrior.

I thought it unwise. I thought it ill-advised to give Bob Sr. a platform. I imagined him rising to his feet
during worship and ordering us to pray for a return to the gold standard.

But Miriam was one step ahead of me. “We'll make him our Official Prayer Warrior,” she said, “but we'll have him pray according to Scripture.”

She opened her Bible to the Gospel of Matthew and read from chapter 6, “When you pray, go into your closet and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”

Miriam said, “The only closet in the meetinghouse is down in the basement, next to the furnace. We can put him down there on Sunday mornings. He'll be out of our hair.”

Bob Miles Sr., banished to the utility closet. A glorious thought.

That Sunday we asked him to be our Official Prayer Warrior. We could see he was intrigued with the idea of being named a warrior.

Then Miriam said, “Of course, if you're our Official Prayer Warrior, you'll have to pray according to Scripture.”

“What do you mean?” Bob asked. She quoted from Matthew and told him he'd have to pray in the closet down in the basement.

I could see Bob begin to waver.

“Of course,” I told him, “we'll need to put in the bulletin that you're the Official Prayer Warrior.”

It was then Bob Sr. felt called to the ministry of prayer.

The next Sunday he went downstairs to the utility closet, closed the door behind him, and sat on a fold
ing chair next to the furnace. We sang our hymns, I preached my sermon without fear of rebuttal, and then we settled into silence so the Lord could speak. People were relaxed. This was wonderful. We didn't have to worry about Bob rising to his feet and wading in. Oh, such quiet joy. One minute passed, then two.

Peace, perfect peace.

It was then we heard Bob's voice rising up through the heating vents.

“OH, LORD, THESE ARE A STIFF-NECKED PEOPLE WHO SCORN TRUTH. STRIKE THEM DOWN IN THEIR INSOLENCE. BREAK THEIR HAUGHTY SPIRITS.”

He went on and on. We could hear each word. The heating ducts were serving as a kind of bullhorn.

Bob prayed for fifteen minutes. He beseeched the Lord to chasten us. He railed against the Communist threat. He prophesied against the New World Order and Democrats and bar codes.

Jessie Peacock, who sat over the furnace, pounded the floor with her foot. Bob prayed even louder.

“BRING THEM TO THEIR KNEES, LORD,” and “WOE TO YOU, HYPOCRITES!”

It was John the Baptist come to life.

Finally, he stopped. I prayed a closing prayer—loud, so Bob Sr. would know church was over.

Bob came upstairs. Miriam Hodge and I met him at the front door.

Miriam said, “Bob, we had in mind you'd sort of whisper your prayers.”

Bob Sr. drew himself up and stared at Miriam and
said, “Warriors don't whisper.” And he walked out the door.

 

T
he next week was the Sunday before Memorial Day. We held our Sunday school picnic. The kids sang “Jesus Loves Me.” The Mary and Martha class read a poem. Then Bob Sr. climbed up on a picnic table, cleared his throat, and led us in the Pledge of Allegiance. As it wound to a close, he made us repeat it.

“This time,” he ordered, “say it like you mean it.”

Then he said that, as the Official Prayer Warrior, he had something to say. He spoke of the sacrifice of the veterans, and how we Quakers tarnished their memories by being pacifists.

“This pacifism stuff,” he declared, “makes us look like Communists. What would happen if everyone was a pacifist?”

Asa Peacock didn't realize it was a rhetorical question. “Peace,” he ventured.

Bob Sr. went on. Ranting against evolution and the United Nations and various Hollywood liberals.

After five minutes, I interrupted Bob to say the meal grace.

We filled our plates, then stood in line as Fern Hampton and the women of the Friendly Women's Circle poured weak lemonade into Styrofoam cups. I took my food and my family and sat with Miriam and Ellis Hodge.

We talked about Bob Sr.

“I've created a monster,” Miriam said. “I never should have made him the Official Prayer Warrior.”

Ellis patted her hand. “Don't be so hard on yourself, honey,” he told her. “Bob was a jerk long before that.”

The attendance was down the next Sunday. People were tired of Bob Sr. Tired of sitting in the silence and listening to his prayers rise up through the heat vents. I couldn't blame them. Life is hard enough without being prayed against. I knew the time had come to speak with him. I couldn't bear the thought of it. I hated conflict. I liked peace and quiet; that's why I was a Quaker. But it had to be done.

I went to Bob's house the next evening after supper. I rang his doorbell. It played the first two lines of the national anthem.

Oh, say can you see, by the dawn's early light,

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's

last gleaming?

I could hear Bob Sr. singing the words inside the house. He swung open the door.

I greeted him, walked inside, and sat on the couch.

There was a picture of George Washington in his living room, over the television. George Washington giving his painful smile, like he'd stubbed his toe and was trying hard not to cuss.

All the way over, I had wondered how best to approach Bob. I decided to go with straightforward. I dreaded it, but this was no time for subtlety.

I said, “Bob Miles, your behavior has been rude, and we're tired of it. You disrupt our worship with your prayers against us. You're acting like a spoiled child
who hasn't gotten his way. If you don't straighten up, you can't be the Official Prayer Warrior.”

He rocked back in his chair and stared. He'd never been talked to this way.

He got ready to say something, but I didn't let him. I went on. “You want everyone to do things your way, and when they don't, you throw a fit. You talk about how this is the land of the free, but you really don't want anyone to be free. You want everything your way. And that makes you a tyrant.”

I didn't stay to hear his response. I was too afraid. I stood and walked out the door, went home, and went to bed. I lay there feeling guilty, wondering if I'd been too hard. I shouldn't have called him a tyrant. Just because something is true doesn't mean it has to be said. I didn't sleep much.

When I got to my office the next morning, Bob was waiting for me. He was mad, I could tell. He said he wouldn't be coming back to church. My first thought was to talk him out of it, to tell him he was welcome to stay. Then I came to my senses and recognized Bob's departure for what it was—a gift from the Lord. So I kept quiet except to say, “Well, Bob, that is up to you. You are free to do that.”

I phoned Miriam Hodge to tell her.

“He'll be back,” she said. “We won't get off that easy.”

But he didn't come that Sunday and hasn't been back since.

 

I
felt bad about it at first, though ours is a sweeter fellowship without him. You try to win people
over with love and patience, but some people don't want to be won over. All they want is to get their way.

I saw Bob Sr. several times over the summer at the Coffee Cup Restaurant. I'd smile and hold out my hand, but he wouldn't take it. I invited him back to church. No thank you, he'd say. Then I got a phone call from the Baptist minister. He was telling me Bob wanted to transfer his membership to their church. He asked what Bob was like.

“Interesting,” I told him.

I wish it hadn't come to this. I wish we could have softened him. We tried for eighty years, but failed. Now we're giving the Baptists a crack at him. May God bless and guide them.

He might come back. Miriam Hodge said it's happened once before. “It was during Vietnam,” she said. “He read a story about Quakers protesting the war and it set him off, but he came back. Don't worry, he'll be back.”

I told her I wasn't worried.

But I am worried. I fear for his soul. I worry how God can tame such a hard and bitter pride. This callous pride, which shuts first the ear and then the heart.

With Bob Sr. gone, the Live Free or Die class is looking for someone to lead the pledge at the Sunday school picnic next year. They asked me if I could do it.

“Do I have to stand on the picnic table?” I asked.

“Sam,” they said, “stand where you feel led.”

In the end, that is what we all must do. Stand where we feel led. Stand straight, stand tall, and try hard to remember that other folks might be led to stand elsewhere.