Our Church Isn’t Alone — in Forgetting Who We Serve
Last Sunday morning I got tapped to run the words up in the balcony, for the screens. After the service I stayed put, waiting for the place to clear out a bit before shutting the screens down, putting the computer in sleep mode and then going downstairs to clean up the stage and set it up (not completely — I do not possess the strength for all of it) for the evening modern worship service. I observed one of our older church members participating in concealing the cross behind the curtains at the back of the sanctuary. So apparently it’s become an at least somewhat accepted practice.
We’re forgetting Who we serve. We seem to be so worried that some young person will be offended at the sight of an old (and revered) symbol of our Lord and Savior’s sacrifice that we are compelled to conceal it. Because… we’re cool! Or something.
I ran across this today. I love the Anchoress. She expresses her thoughts so much better than I do mine.
Some things you Just. Don’t. Do. One of them is subject His Majesty to your own conceited ideas of what is “humble” and befitting his Body and Blood, or presuming to know what demonstrates “unity with the poor.” A cousin of mine, a Capuchin who has long-served the poor, learned how much they hated seeing Christ’s Body offered to them from straw baskets and jelly glasses: it caused them pain. They wondered if, because they were poor, they to be denied a measure of Christ’s beauty and grandeur so common to the middle classes and above?
My cousin learned to buff up the good stuff and use it, in honor of both Christ Jesus and the poor who sought him.
Another thing you just don’t do? Be “really cool” and “modern” about Holy Communion, by using pitas, or honey cakes, or commercial crackers. Sorry. We do not get to play with the Eucharistic species; we don’t get to play with the liturgy, and we ought not because
a) we’re not children, and mass is not playtime, and
b) left to our own devices (and convinced that everything that came before us is in need of ‘updating’) we will usually get it all wrong, because of our egos.
Yes. Exactly. Emphasis mine, by the way. Baptists don’t do mass, but we are supposed to do respect for our Lord and Savior.
Just because it’s old doesn’t mean it should be got rid of. The cross is never something we should feel comfortable hiding, or being ashamed of/embarrassed by. Jesus Himself accepted this excruciating and humiliating form of murder as payment for our sins. Our sins. Our iniquities. We are the reason He came, taught, and allowed Himself to be arrested, tortured and murdered.
I still cannot, and I hope will never manage to, wrap my brain around the thought process that led our pastoral staff to conclude that hiding the cross was a fine idea. They’re pastors. They’re supposed to know better.
I had a conversation this morning with another church member while waiting to march in the St. Patrick’s Day parade with the Wild Irish Band (it rained — we ended up riding the bus and playing while seated — easiest parade I ever “marched” in). She told me that I’m not alone in my misgivings. Seems I have plenty of company. It also seems we’re all waiting to let God handle it. Which is, actually, exactly what we’re supposed to do. Some days that’s harder than others.
Don’t Run Over the Power Cables
I mentioned this in a previous post (recent), that during the modern worship service the altar Lord’s Table (I’ve been corrected) gets rolled into the choir loft. I discovered when they do this, they run the altar Lord’s Table (which probably weighs about 1,000 pounds and is on wheels) over a power cable. The cable goes to the hazer (fog machine, for us uninitiates). It’s already seriously damaged, and won’t be working for much longer. I mentioned this to the boss the other day, and he said “they” (whoever that is) said it would be okay whenever the decision was made to run the cable over every week with a 1,000-pound altar Lord’s Table. I’m having a little trouble wrapping my brain around the thought process that would have led to that conclusion. It’s easier, I guess, than to pull the cable up (it’s gaff-taped down), rolling the altar Lord’s Table into the choir loft (after moving the chairs) and then putting it back. Too much work, maybe.
This crowd is all about expediency. It’s unfortunate, but that’s the way they operate.
I’ve warned him and that’s all I can do. He said he’d make sure it wasn’t done that way anymore, although the cable is seriously damaged now and that can’t be fixed. It’ll stop working one day, and then there will be considerable consternation that they don’t have a fog machine to create the appropriate modern worship service ambiance.
My plan is, as soon as the Sunday morning service is over, as I’m setting the musicians’ stands and music out, to pull up that cable by unplugging it from the power strip and rolling it up next to the fogger. That way whoever sets up the stage later knows what appliance it belongs to, but it won’t be in harm’s way while they’re rolling the altar Lord’s Table around and hiding the cross behind the curtains.
We found out not long ago that Newspring Church is coming to our town. I’m not going to post a link to their website; you can find it on Google. They’ve been doing the modern worship thing for awhile. It’s likely that when they arrive, they’ll be siphoning off our modern worship attendees. I suspect their delivery is a good bit more polished. I hope we won’t lose everybody, and I hope we still have enough attending to continue. We are reaching people. There are enough people in town for every church in town to have bursting-at-the-seams attendance. Unfortunately, less than half of the population (South Carolina-wide) attends church regularly (in 2014, a Gallup Poll came up with 42% attending every week, with 25% of the surveyed group saying once a month or so). Doing the math, with a little over 108,000 people in our county (2013), that’s 45,360 (give or take) that should be in church every Sunday. I think that’s generous, but I’m in no position to say for sure. It leaves (yes, this is just math) 62,640 people who aren’t in church on any given Sunday. More than enough to stuff all our churches full every Sunday. And given that some of these folks may have been raised in and are presently in religions that don’t meet on Sunday, but on another day, that’s still a bunch of folks who aren’t putting God in an important role in their lives.
That’s a lot of people who need to be reached.
So, even if Newspring shows up and begins packing in the folks who prefer the modern worship style, there are still plenty more to be reached. I wonder if we’ll still be successful in reaching them. I hope so.
Slightly off topic — I mentioned the power cable issue to a friend, and my plan to pull the thing up every Sunday afternoon so it doesn’t get further massacred. Her response was, “You’re too conscientious.” What an odd thing to say.
Critter Stuff
We’ve got, at the moment, 7 dogs and 14 cats. That’s 14 cats inside the house. There are others that are outside cats — feral or semi-feral that we look after. Yes, we’re crazy.
One of our dogs, Tucker, is ailing. Well, Maxwell is too — he’s suffering from seizures. The Bromide pills and phenobarbital the vet has him on have got them controlled, for now. Tucker is having liver failure issues.
He showed up about 11 years ago, running the neighborhood. We ran ads in the paper (this was before Facebook), no one answered. So we kept him.
Here he is when he first showed up.
I posted this photo on a couple lost pet websites. No luck. So he stayed.
He’s one of our escape artists. Well, since Shiloh died, our only escape artist. The 6-foot privacy fence has defeated him, fortunately, so he hasn’t gone missing in recent years.
This is a more recent picture, but it’s about 6 years old.
That’s Sadie behind him; she’s been gone 3 years now. Doesn’t seem that long.
The vet diagnosed him with the beginnings of liver failure. He’s on Denamarin, or was until a few weeks ago, when the vet took him off of it and said we’d wait a month and then do blood work. He’s been doing fine until last night, when he refused to eat. Wouldn’t even take a treat. So we put him back on the meds this morning. Hubby said he was feeling fine even before that, so we may have jumped the gun a bit. He seems to be back to his old self, now. Here’s hoping it continues.
We’ve had him for 11 years, and he was fully grown when he showed up. So he’s probably at least 12 years old. He’s a good dog. A sweetheart. He doesn’t bark, doesn’t dig, doesn’t tear up the yard, doesn’t chew anything inside the house. Or out. I wonder sometimes if his previous people wonder what happened to him. Or if someone dropped him off in our neighborhood on purpose. He was in excellent shape when he showed up, clean and neutered. Seems someone cared for him back then. He’s had a good home with us since, though, so I suppose it worked out.
And Another Piece of My Childhood Disappears
Leonard Nimoy has gone home.
Leonard Nimoy, the sonorous, gaunt-faced actor who won a worshipful global following as Mr. Spock, the resolutely logical human-alien first officer of the Starship Enterprise in the television and movie juggernaut “Star Trek,” died on Friday morning at his home in the Bel Air section of Los Angeles. He was 83.
When TOS was airing, my friends all had crushes on Capt Kirk. I preferred Mr Spock.
*sigh* Godspeed, sir.
Choir Rehearsal
Wednesday night is choir rehearsal night. We’ve gone back to meeting at 7 p.m., now that the Singing Christmas Tree is well over. We met at 6 p.m. during Tree rehearsal season, rather than after SCT rehearsals, because some people (including my boss) didn’t want to stay late.
We had a very productive rehearsal tonight. The boss wasn’t there. He had a finance committee meeting to go to (oh, to have been a fly on the wall for that) so the woman who directed the Tree conducted rehearsal. She actually knows what she’s doing, hence the productivity. We’re singing a special this Sunday, and the past couple times the boss has tried to rehearse us on it it hasn’t gone well. Mostly because he doesn’t know what he’s doing, so he can’t give us any guidance. Tonight was miles past the previous rehearsals in quality. We actually made significant progress. Might be this Sunday the special will come off fine. Unfortunately he’ll be in front of us, but if we can remember to look past him and listen to each other, it’ll go better.
When I got home hubby had made a cinnamon coffee cake. It was from a mix. I don’t care. It smells wonderful.
Modern Worship Service, and Where the Cross Sits
I’d like to say I’m back. It’s been very easy to fall out of the habit. But this blog is important to me, even if nobody reads it but me. So I’m going to make the effort.
More on the topic of my boss the musically clueless sociopath/worship pastor. Specifically, our modern worship service. This was in the planning stages for quite some time. Our first modern worship service occurred January 18th, and they’ve been continuing every Sunday evening since.
I’ve made a point of not going. I’m responsible for making sure all the musicians and singers have their music charts available for rehearsals and the service itself, getting the music stands out and placed, and the microphone stands out and placed (even though I’m never really sure how many they need). I’m supposed to attach stand lights to the music stands also, as the place is fairly dark because of the lighting they use. Forgot to do that this past Sunday. The result is that my boss has taken the music stand lights out of my office and placed them in front of his office door. I intend to leave them right there. They’ll walk, eventually, and we won’t have enough remaining to do what we need to do should we ever have another Singing Christmas Tree. However, as this is unlikely because we don’t have the money and donations are way down, this probably won’t be an issue.
Not my circus, not my monkeys.
I finally attended a modern worship service this past Sunday. The previous Sunday evenings have been spent having Sunday dinner with my husband, which because of his work schedule has been a rarity for the past year and a half. It’s nice to be able to prepare a meal and then sit together and eat at the same time and have a conversation and everything. I didn’t want to give that up. This past Sunday, though, he was working in the evening. So I went, if for no other reason to say I tried.
It met my expectations. Meaning loud. Very loud. Punishingly loud. I have to photos to show you, both taken before the service started and so the light level is much higher than it was when they got going. You can actually see people in these photos. Once the lights were set to where they wanted them during the service, you could only see my boss (front and center) and the two female praise singers (the one on the left in the second photo is his wife). The first photo was taken well before the service started, the second one 50 seconds prior to kickoff.
The volume was so high that if it weren’t for the words on the screen, I wouldn’t have understood anything anyone was singing. We spent the first 15 minutes standing while they sang song after song after song. Frankly, ow. I was up in the balcony by myself, except for the tech crew. Down on the floor in the sanctuary there were ropes strung to keep people from sitting in the section to the right in the photos, which keeps the congregation/audience centered on the stage itself.
It was like being at a rock concert. And I know that’s deliberate. That’s the demographic we’re aiming for, young. And it is working. We are reaching people. I’d guess there were 100+ people but I didn’t make a point of looking. IIRC we had over 200 for the first modern worship service, and for all I know it’s gotten larger. Couldn’t see from where I was.
I won’t attend another. I’m not who they’re trying to reach. And I just can’t stand the thought of bludgeoning my eardrums like that again, voluntarily.
I discovered something accidentally a couple weeks ago, though, that has me bothered. If you look at the photos above, bearing in mind they were taken in a Baptist church, ask yourself — where’s the cross? You know, the symbol of our Lord and Savior’s sacrifice, made so we could be forgiven and taken to Him to spend eternity in Heaven. Where is it? You might notice the altar Lord’s Table, which for that service (I’m not sure about any of the previous ones) was shoved into the choir loft (on the far right of the photos; if you click on the first photo you can see it behind the two women sitting in the choir loft, there’s a lot of stuff piled on it). So, the altar Lord’s Table has been relegated to an unobtrusive location (to be used as a storage area, apparently), so as to not distract from the rock band in the middle of the stage. Yes, I’m being snarky. Also accurate.
Where’s the cross? Why, it’s here. I found it by accident one day.
It’s behind the purple curtain that hangs at the back of the stage in the sanctuary. Where there are several electrical and audio jacks. Along with the other accouterments usually found on the altar Lord’s Table. Hidden. Shoved in the back, where no one can see it.
Why? I have no idea. Maybe it’s in the way. Maybe the modern worship service intent is not to bore anyone with any traditional and outdated symbolism. Maybe the pastoral staff has decided it’s aesthetically unpleasing, doesn’t fit the motif.
You’d think they’d know better. I can’t see Jesus observing this choice and thinking, “Well, that’s fine. It’s not necessary for people who don’t know Me very well to see a cross at a worship service. They can hear the message. It’s cool.”
I may be wrong. But this situation makes me sick to my stomach. It’s yet another confirmation, in my limited perception of reality, that the forces that are running things at our church aren’t the ones that are supposed to be running things at our church.
In other news, I’ve had three interviews recently for other jobs, two at the same place. The job I interviewed for with my former boss some months ago was given to someone else. One of the jobs I interviewed for recently is at another church, part time, sort of doing what I do now, only larger. The other job is a full-time state job, with benefits. That would be stupendous — but the state works at glacial speed and I won’t find out anything for awhile. God could speed it up if He wanted to, but I have no idea what His plan is.
So. Today I finally tackled a chore I’ve been putting off for about a year and a half, putting music away from an event in August 2013. And the continuity books I’ve been building (one for the music assistant position and the other for the Singing Christmas Tree) are almost finished. I have a box in my office to cart out what few personal possessions I have when it comes time to go.
I’m quite certain (although God is still in control, and could change this) that once I turn in my notice things will get frosty. Hostile, probably. So maybe they get two weeks transition out of me and maybe they don’t. God will let me know what He wants me to do.
BTW — The Finance/IT guy who got run out of town on a rail, so to speak, has found another job. At a church in Columbia. Where he is apparently doing very well. Thank you, God. He never deserved what this crowd did to him; I hope the people he’s working for and with now appreciate what a blessing he is.
*sigh*
Coming Up for Air
Yikes. It’s very easy to fall out of the habit of posting. I never meant to neglect this blog. Not that anyone has noticed, except me. I’m my only reader. I think. If there’s anyone else out there lurking and reading, I thank you. Even if you never make me aware of your presence, I appreciate your time and patience.
So.
I’ve posted many, many blurbs about my job. Grousing, for the most part. Maybe that’s just what humans do. Certainly it’s what this human does. And in this economy, grousing about your job is not smart. So many people don’t have jobs to grouse about. I’ve been blessed.
All the complaints, prayers, commentary, etc. I’ve posted in the past year, detailing encounters and conversations with my boss, who was hired as our full-time worship pastor a little over a year ago, are pretty clear evidence that while I knew something was wrong, I had no clue how massive it was. Events in the past few weeks have made one thing clear: My boss is a sociopath.
Yeah, yeah, if there’s anybody else reading you’re thinking, “Oh, please. People are so quick to slap that label on anyone they don’t agree with.” And perhaps that’s true, in some circles. Not this one.
My one ally in the church office has been the Finance and IT guy. He’s a godly man, one of the nicest people I know. He loves God, and he loves his church. In that order. As it should be. He and I have had the occasional conversation and we discovered we both had misgivings about our shiny new worship pastor, who can’t read music and doesn’t know how to direct. As the months have passed, we have developed more than misgivings. I can’t speak for him, but I have been developing a healthy sense of dread.
I know that the one phrase in the Bible that appears more than any other is, “Do not be afraid”, or some variation thereof. I know God is still on the Throne, that Jesus is still at His right hand, that He is in control. I know that the Enemy prowls the Earth in search of victims, and finds them everywhere. I know that God is aware of this, and allows it to suit His own purpose. I know that as long as I am doing what God wants me to do, He will protect me. Not make my life easier, not make the problems go away, not take the obstacles or pain out of my path. He will protect me. He will help me through it.
In my conversations with the Finance/IT guy, he told me more than once that he was on his way out. I didn’t understand what he meant. Or at least didn’t appreciate what was happening to him. He told me that last November, when our shiny new worship pastor was hired, he’d had to tell someone on staff — either the shiny new worship pastor (okay, let’s just call him SNWP) or the senior pastor — no. To some expenditure that the church could not afford. Since then, he said, he’s been persona non grata. I didn’t appreciate how much pressure he was under. And then this past Tuesday, November 18th, he quit.
When I came in to work that afternoon, no one said anything for quite awhile. I was blipping around oblivious. I was busy, too much to do to worry about the odd atmosphere in the office. Late in the afternoon one of the junior pastors called me into his office and explained that the Finance/IT guy had quit. It was couched in terms of being “in the best interests of the church.”
I was astounded, both by the fact of his departure and the way it was framed. Best interests of the church? Really? That’s what you say about someone you’ve discovered had their hand in the till, or who was using his office to perform some variety of unsavory tasks. And there is no way this man was doing any of that. They wanted him gone, and they finally managed it. I didn’t say much, except to ask if it was a health issue. The junior pastor assured me that it wasn’t. And then I went back to work.
The next afternoon I got to the office a bit late. I was right behind the woman who is the ministry assistant. A person who comes across as sweet and kind. She is, frankly, neither. I have figured that out after observing her behavior and demeanor, and hearing the words that actually come out of her mouth, especially after hanging up from a conversation with a church member or person in need who has in her opinion taken up entirely too much of her precious time. She may be a Christian, but she is not a nice person. She was carrying the post office containers she uses to haul the newsletters to the Post Awful for mailing, having just returned from doing that. One of the deacons met us coming the other way. A young man. Very much involved in the church. In the choir. One of our soloists in the Tree for a few years. Wonderful tenor voice. And, I thought, a good Christian.
He had nothing to say to me, even though he could see me clearly. He spoke to the ministry assistant, with a little smirk on his face. He asked her if she had skipped on her way into work this morning. She laughed and said something affirmative. I motored on down the hallway, my presence being unnecessary, and at first I didn’t make the connection. And then I realized they were referring to the Finance/IT guy’s departure. They were celebrating. When I got into the office itself, I discovered there was already a replacement. A very nice (apparently; I reserve the right to change my assessment) young woman who will never stand up to the pastoral staff to tell them they can’t spend the money as we don’t have it, no you cannot raid the savings accounts to do this, yes you do have to fill out these forms and dot all these i’s and cross all these t’s or the IRS will be all over us. Because that’s what the Finance/IT guy did, and it got him booted out.
She was in there so fast, it was clear it had all been arranged beforehand.
And now there is no sheepdog watching over the sheep. I am working in a den of pit vipers. Or wolves, if you will. And the deacons are being willfully blind, or don’t care. Or they’re buying the senior pastor’s depiction of reality wholesale.
We are screwed. We are spending tens of thousands of dollars that we don’t have buying lighting and sound equipment for the sanctuary. The Finance/IT guy made it clear that the church is hemorrhaging red ink, and has been for some time. A few weeks ago he sent out an email stating that the problem was so bad, that expenditures had to be cleared by two of the deacons who serve on the Finance Committee.
I suppose that requirement has been withdrawn as well. And so the checks will be written and the money will flow out, until there really isn’t any more. And then maybe the church will acquire loans to continue spending. Until there isn’t any more of that, and we can’t make payments that we owe. Yes, I’m speculating. I have grounds.
Meanwhile, our Singing Christmas Tree is swinging into the last week of rehearsals. We’re on the Tree for the first time on Tuesday. The week after that is performance week. We will be presenting to our community a ministry that has brought so many people to Jesus, and many other people closer to Him. No matter how shallow the presentation (and the music this year can only be described, with a few exceptions, as vapid), God will use it. He can do anything. Our help is not necessary. My boss, the SNWP, is playing the lead in the drama. His wife is playing right alongside him. The story as it has been presented in previous years, with its emphasis on our Lord and Savior, is changed. Not that Jesus won’t have center stage. It’s just that this year He’s going to be sharing it with my boss.
There’s more. A week ago this past Wednesday my boss called me and told me to cancel choir rehearsal but don’t tell anybody. Don’t send an email to warn the choir members. He wanted them to show up. He said put a note on the choir room door telling them choir rehearsal had been canceled but please come to the sanctuary to give us a hand setting the place up for the Tree. I said no, we can’t do that. They’ll be angry. I said, “It’s manipulative.”
He burst out laughing. Laughing. He howled like it was the funniest thing he’d heard all week. “That’s great!” He crowed. “Manipulative! That’s great!”
I was stunned. And then I yelled, “Dude!” at him. I almost never do that. I mean, really? Dude? But he stopped laughing. I said, “It’s not funny. They’ll be pissed.”
There was a pause, and then he said, “Well, okay, if you think they’ll be upset, send the email.” So I did.
I finally, at that moment (and God forgive me for being so obtuse for so long) realized that he has no consideration for anyone but himself. He does not care about anyone, or anything, but himself. The choir means nothing to him, unless he can use it to promote his own agenda. He lies, he has demonstrated a complete lack of integrity, he’s tried to kick people out of the choir because he doesn’t like them personally, and he does not have so much as a scintilla of compassion or consideration for anyone outside of himself.
He’s a sociopath. God help us. The Enemy has managed to install a sociopath on the pastoral staff of the largest church in our town. Quite the coup.
The Enemy will not win, of course. God is very much aware of what is happening. It comes as no surprise to Him. He will use it to further His own purpose. My friend, who has been telling me for a long time that this is a test, reiterated it to me the other day. It’s a test, she says. And God is watching to see who does what. Who reacts how. And who notices.
There is nothing I can do, in my own strength. I can’t fix this. If I told the senior pastor what I know, I’d be fired. I’ve become aware that the senior pastor hired this guy on purpose, as he did at his previous church (hired an utterly unqualified person to the music ministry) because he wanted more than anything else someone he could control. So, while our senior pastor may not realize he’s doing the Enemy’s work for him, that is what he’s doing. We have a sociopath in charge of the worship ministry, and the SNWP is destroying it piece by piece. I’m a witness. I’ve seen it. I’ve done the best I can to mitigate the damage, but I can’t stop it.
God help us. Evil is walking the hallways of my church. We are in so much trouble. Angels and saints, please pray for us. Please pray for us.
And Then I Went to DCI Finals in Indianapolis
Not that anyone noticed. I’ll probably post about it later. And also about work stuff, which continues to be aggravating.
But for now I’ll just vent about the ALS dump-a-bucket-of-ice-water-over-your-head stupidity.
I do not understand how dumping water over your head will in any way facilitate research to discover a cure or even an effective treatment for any disease. I hear one option for avoiding some sort of social blacklist is contributing money. We’re living paycheck to paycheck around here (and thanking God that we even have paychecks, because a lot of people don’t) so sending money isn’t really an option either.
A friend just challenged me on Facebook. Then she messaged me with a question about something else, which I was unable to help her with, unfortunately. She then mentioned the challenge. I messaged back that I wouldn’t be participating, sorry. No response. I hope I didn’t offend her, but I just don’t get the efficacy of the whole business. It strikes me as about as sensible as lemmings hurtling off the cliff — lots of activity, plenty of sturm und drang, very little effect.
I think I’m about qualified for curmudgeon status. Some days more than others.
Margaret
A couple months ago I was on my way to the perfectionist’s house for a flute trio rehearsal. As I approached an intersection near where we live, where there’s a vacant (at the moment) building where many feral cats hang out (and where someone feeds them) I noticed a woman standing there on the side of the road with her hand in the air and looking distressed.
I’d seen her before, many times. I figured she lived nearby as she walks with a cane, and not speedily. Or gracefully. She has difficulty getting around. She manages; I’ve seen her blocks from where it turns out she lives, but she’s not fast. When I see her walking along, I pray for her. I had no idea what her issues were, or anything about her, but I asked God to look after her, and give her what she needed.
My mother raised all of us to never but never stop and pick anyone up. That rule applied even to people you knew, unless they were family. She felt anyone could be an ax murderer, including your acquaintances. So when I pulled over I could hear my mother’s voice yelling at me.
But. But. I also heard something else. And the something else was clear that right now, my task was to pull over and see what was wrong with her.
She told me she hadn’t eaten in two days, and would I take her to McDonald’s. I said sure, she got in the car, and off we went. On the way I called the perfectionist and told her I was going to be late. She wanted to know how late. I told her I didn’t know, but I’d get there as soon as I could.
On the way Margaret (she told me her name eventually, but not at first) told me she didn’t have any money, and had no food in the house. I asked if she’d like to go to the grocery store and get some food first. So that’s what we did. She snagged one of those motorized carts and headed for the produce section. I bought her some bananas, a box of Honey Buns (she says she takes her medicine with them) and some Banquet TV dinners. We were on our way to McDonald’s when she asked if we could go somewhere else, as she really didn’t like McDonald’s. I said sure, and asked where she wanted to go. Cookout, she said.
That’s a bit of a trek. But I said sure, and we headed that way. It’s towards town. We were a few minutes down the road when she changed her mind and asked if we could go to KFC. So we did. It’s closer, by the way.
I bought her her food, we loaded her back in the car and I took her home. She thanked me profusely the entire way. When we pulled into her driveway she sighed and said, “Back to the dungeon.”
Her house is small. She says it’s hers, although the tax records indicate otherwise. She has electricity and a window air conditioner. It’s been recently painted. The yard tends toward overgrown, although a few weeks ago when I drove by, someone with a lawnmower on a trailer was just leaving after cutting it, so someone is helping her with yard work. That first time she didn’t want me to come inside, so I put her bags on the wooden steps (deteriorating) and left.
About a month later, there she was again. I pulled over, and this time she said she hadn’t eaten in 3 days, and would I take her to McDonald’s. The pattern was pretty much the same — the grocery store for bananas and Honey Buns and Banquet TV dinners (which were on sale). This time we made it to McDonald’s, and then I took her home. She let me come inside the house just far enough to set her bags down.
The first thing I noticed was empty McDonald’s cups everywhere. She’s very fond of their sweet tea, and gets a large every time. I expect cleaning is very difficult for her, so the trash accumulates. She had complained that someone had broken into her home and stolen her purse, and that she couldn’t lock her door because she’d lost the key. She locks it when she’s home, but when she goes anywhere, she leaves it unlocked.
A few days later, she was on the corner as I was on my way to do our grocery shopping. I picked her up, and when we got to the grocery store she needed laundry detergent, bath soap, and toilet paper. When we got in the car she told me her shoes were so bad, her feet hurt, and she needed new shoes. So we went to Wal Mart and I bought her a pair with velcro on them. We went to Wendy’s. And then I took her home.
A couple days after that, there she was again. This time, besides something to eat, she needed socks. And she told me she needed to find someone who could help her on the first of the month when she got her check. She needed to go to the bank to get her money, then to pay bills, then to pay on a loan. I promised to pick her up Friday, yesterday, at 9. She said she was excited, and looking forward to a day out. She said she’d treat me to lunch at Golden Corral. I didn’t want her to, I realize she has little, but I didn’t want to hurt her feelings.
I told my husband what had been happening, as the last event was on my way home from karate class and I was very late. He wasn’t pleased. I know he thinks she’s taking advantage. And maybe she is. But she’s got so little, and needs help. She has a daughter who works on base at the bowling alley and she says her daughter never comes to see her, never checks on her. I have no idea if any of that is true, or if there’s a reason the daughter doesn’t come by besides she doesn’t want to be burdened with a mother in such need.
Friday morning I got up, got ready, and headed out to go get her. As I was driving up the road to her house I could see a minivan pulling out of her driveway. It was moving very slowly, but I wasn’t able to get close enough to see if Margaret was in the passenger seat before it crossed the intersection and headed towards town. On the chance that I was wrong, that it hadn’t come from her house, I pulled into her driveway. There was no answer to my knocks on the door. She wasn’t there.
So I went on and took care of what I needed to do for us.
She told me she’d had a stroke 7 years ago and lost her driver’s license. That she used to work at a local clothing outlet which recently closed. She’d stopped working there after her stroke, though, she hasn’t been able to work in years.
So. I don’t know what’s going to happen next. She was flagged down by someone she knew during one of our trips to McDonald’s, and obviously someone came to help her yesterday morning, in what might have been a previously arranged meeting. So I’m not her only help.
I guess I’ll wait and let God tell me what I’m to do. I have a doorknob in the trunk of the car that I bought at WalMart and planned to install for her yesterday. But you can’t just open the door of someone’s house (that’s breaking and entering, even if you don’t mean any harm) and you can’t just install a new doorknob on someone’s house.
Waiting for instructions, here. Meanwhile I pray for her. She needs help. She’s a believer, we’ve had some conversation about God. So He’s with her.
The Boss Is Still Getting Negative Feedback
Last week the boss asked me to research something for him. He wanted to know how many traditional hymns and how many contemporary songs he’d done since taking over as worship pastor. I thought it would involve a considerable amount of digging, but it didn’t. I went into the online service we use to put the services together and went back to when he first arrived. The first service that was actually filled out with information was about 2 weeks after he took over. I paged through them, week by week, and tallied the hymns/songs up.
Almost exactly 50/50. The score was traditional hymns 83, contemporary songs 87.
My guess is that people are still grousing about the number of “modern” pieces we’re doing. It’s interesting that he’s got it split almost exactly down the middle.
He also repeats things from week to week, which I don’t understand. There are so many hymns available, and you can add the number of contemporary songs to that, that you could play entirely different sets from week to week and not repeat anything for years. I don’t know why he doesn’t. But I don’t get a vote. I am in charge of nothing.
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