FICTION WRITER JOHN GRISHAM COMMENTS ON

CHURCHES IN A MISSISSIPPI TOWN DURING THE 70's

 

EXCERPTS FROM THE BOOK:

Grisham, John. The Last Juror. New York: Bantam Dell, 2004. pp. 355-358.

 

Grisham's chief character, a newspaper owner and journalist, visits the churches in Ford County, Mississippi, and makes interesting comments that reflect the author's interpretation of a few of them.

 

"I made a list of all the churches in Ford County. The total was eighty-eight, but it was a moving target since congregations were always splitting, folding here and popping up over there. My goal was to visit each one of them, something I was sure had never been done, and a feat that would put me in a class by myself among churchgoers.

"The denominations were varied and baffling-how could Protestants, all of whom claimed to follow the same basic tenets, get themselves so divided? They agreed basically that (I )Jesus was the only son of God; (2) he was born of a virgin; (3) lived a perfect life; (4) was persecuted by the Jews, arrested and crucified by the Romans; (5) that he arose on the third day and later ascended into heaven; (6) and some believed--though there were many variations--that one must follow Jesus in baptism and faith to make it to heaven.

"The county was heavily Baptist, but they were a fractured bunch. The Pentecostals were in second place, and evidently they had fought with themselves as much as the Baptists.

"In 1974, I'd begun my epic adventure to visit every church in Ford County. The first had been the Calvary Full Gospel, a rowdy Pentecostal assemblage on a gravel road two miles out of town. As advertised, the service began at ten-thirty, and I found a spot on the back pew, as far away from the action as I could get. I was greeted warmly and word spread that a bona-fide visitor was present. I did not recognize anyone there. Preacher Bob wore a white suit, navy shirt, white tie, and his thick black hair was wound around and plastered tightly at the base of his skull. People started hollering when he was giving the announcements. They waved their hands and shouted during a solo. When the sermon finally began an hour later, I was ready to leave. It lasted for fifty-five minutes, and left me confused and exhausted. At times the building shook with folks stomping the floor. Windows rattled as they were overcome with the spirit and yelled upward. Preacher Bob "laid hands" on three sick folks suffering vague diseases, and they claimed to be healed. At one point a deacon stood and in an astounding display began uttering something in a tongue I had never heard. He clenched his fists, closed his eyes tightly, and let loose with a steady, fluent flow of words. It was not an act; he wasn't faking. After a few minutes, a young girl in the choir stood and began translating into English. It was a vision God was sending through the deacon. There were those present with unforgiven sins.

"'Repent!' Preacher Bob shouted, and heads ducked.

"I listened to the Reverend Thurston Small preach for two hours and twelve minutes (I timed every sermon). The briefest was delivered by Pastor Phil Bish at the United Methodist Church of Karaway-seventeen minutes. That church also got the award for being the coldest. The furnace was broken, it was January, and that may have helped shorten the sermon. I sat with Margaret at the First Baptist Church in Clanton and listened to Reverend Millard Stark give his annual sermon on the sins of alcohol.

"I found the Harvest Tabernacle in the back room of an abandoned service station in Beech Hill, and I sat with six others as a wild-eyed doomsayer named Peter the Prophet yelled at us for almost an hour.

"The Clanton Church of Christ* had no musical instruments. The ban was based on Scripture, it was later explained to me. There was a beautiful solo*, which I wrote about at length. There was also no emotion whatsoever in the service**. For a contrast, I went to the Mount Pisgah Chapel in Lowtown, where the pulpit was surrounded by drums, guitars, horns, and amplifiers. As a warm up for the sermon, a full-blown concert was given with the congregation singing and dancing.

"Calico Ridge Independent Church, located deep in the hills in the northeastern part of the county. According to the Times archives, at this church in 1965 a Mr. Randy Bovee was bitten twice by a rattlesnake during a late Sunday night worship service. Mr. Bovee survived, and for a while the snakes were put away.

"There was no sign of any serpents. There were a few fits and convulsions below the pulpit as the preacher exhorted us to come forth and moan and groan in sin!' The choir chanted and hummed to the beat of an electric guitar and a drum, and the meeting took on the spookiness of an ancient tribal dance. I wanted to leave, especially since there were no snakes.

 

 My comments on

Quote: "The Clanton Church of Christ* had no musical instruments. The ban was based on Scripture, it was later explained to me. There was a beautiful solo*, which I wrote about at length. There was also no emotion whatsoever in the service**.

My comments about 'the Clanton Church of Christ' as viewed by the John Grisham character is as follows:

Answer

* For seventy years I have visited or been a part of assembly worship services of churches of Christ. Never have I seen or heard any "solo" during the worship services. This is probably a "ban" based on Scripture as well? --except at the "Clanton Church of Christ". Churches of Christ practice congregational singing (authorized in Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3). Thinking about the context and the writer's tongue in cheeck: it is possible that what is referred to as a solo may be the "song leader" who would stand at the front of the congregation. And the congregation's voices may have been weak?

   

A few years ago I worked with a member of the Greek Orthodox Catholic Church. I had understood that the denomination did not use musical instruments and never had since their inception historically. Then one day she was excited and told me that they were considering authorizing the musical instrument for worship. "They" were going to authorize it themselves.

    The church of Christ is an oddity today [among the religious world of churches] because of their mission to do only what is authorized in Holy Scripture. Jesus said, "God is a Spirit and they that would worship Him MUST worship Him in Spirit and Truth" (John 4:24). Concerning Truth, Jesus said that God's Word (Holy Scriptures 2 Timothy 3:15-17) was "Truth" (John 17:17).

**The observing of a service with "no emotion whatsoever" seems in the context to be interpreted by the author as meaning "no full-blown concert with singing and dancing" since he writes that this was "a contrast" to the Pisgah Chapel which did that. I wonder if the author ever thought that maybe a quiet and respectful spirit could have reverent emotions in worshipping the Living God.

At least he didn't describe the Clanton Church of Christ as being a "rowdy" church.