Wednesday, January 18, 2006
Grace Triumphant 003
March 2 2005
Well, Greg certainly didn't like the idea of visiting Amy Carmichael and Jim! We very nearly had a fight. After I write this entry I will go apologize to him. Whenever we fight, it's usually my fault. Not that he cannot do really aggravating things: he can. But I usually over react.
Anyway, I want to tell my story in proper order. In my last journal the Standard Christian blog, I left off on a happy note. I had made friends with the beautiful, youthful, and engaging Hillary, a former movie and television actress who settled in the Asheville area to stay sober and work with community theater. Some of the people at my church hated her because she'd once posed nude in a magazine. But she'd been so kind to me and was so tolerant and generous that friendship was inevitable.
I worked at Simpsons Department store, run by the Simpson family, and within my first year I was made a manager and was on my way to becoming a buyer. Mr. Simpson, a Reformed Episcopal man in a conservative congregation, amazed me because he was not Baptist but was a godly Christian man. Certainly, the tone he set at Simpsons was one of kindness, hard work, honesty, and hospitality to our customers.
But my very best friend was Mr. Beauchamp, the town's local and beloved eccentric. Twenty years my senior, he tutored me in my math classes from night school, took me to the theater, and gave me books as presents for my birthday and Christmas.
He never once set foot inside my house, and I visited his house only in the company of others. It was through him that I learned the art of what Hillary called "Café Friendships." We both "went out" to meet each other: always looking our best, with our thoughts carefully marshaled, our conversation polite and focused on literature, history, and theology.
Beauchamp did belong to the same gym where I worked out, as he was under doctor's orders to walk four miles a week to strengthen his heart and circulation. He was a neat and meticulous man who hated to sweat. But he believed in good sense and preventive health care. So he obediently, with fixed expression and eyes showing mild disgust, trudged away for 30 minutes twice a week on the gym's treadmills, mopping the perspiration from his round, bald head as he walked. His doctor rewarded him by assigning another two miles per week.
Every Saturday morning, he and I joined the "Breakfast Club" from the gym, a group made up mostly of Christians from the local Pentecostal church. They talked over the Bible and theology. Steve Pickle, our unofficial leader, was an assistant pastor at the church and a man who could think through any discussion and discuss, with references, what the Bible said in light of the topic. Steve sported a battered nose from a youth spent in boxing, and I often wondered if the Pentecostal "seminary" he'd attended was not as bad as my own alma mater, GIBC. But he studied the Bible passionately.
Beauchamp was what Steve called a "theistic rationalist." But there was no enmity between them. Indeed, Beauchamp acted as mentor to Steve when he could and directed him to notable authors from the past and classic literature both inside and outside of Christianity. Steve, who was married to Julie, was a kind of hero and role model to Kazzazz and his wife, both avid weight lifters and recent Christians, and John Ohara, another recent convert and a member of the gym. Our oldest Christian members of the Breakfast Club were Alfred and Cindy Rogers. They were Presbyterians who preferred Steve's church to their own. But to my horror and amazement, they were Calvinists. I got over my revulsion in short order, for they were kind, likeable people.
We made a noisy and happy group at Shoney's every Saturday morning. We talked Bible, philosophy, and literature. I attended night school back then to get a real college degree. As more semesters went by, I participated more in the breakfast discussions, always encouraged by Beauchamp and always forced by my own friends to think.
Until I married Greg, years later, those were the happiest days of my life. In secret from my Baptist parents, I joined the Pentecostal church and stayed busy with a sort of happy, good works philosophy. I spent my energy on school, work, exercise, and church work. I had more and more money as time went by and my job status improved. I had happy fellowship on church nights, excited, engaging conversation on Saturday mornings, encouraging dinners and lunches with Beauchamp, and cozy evenings with Hillary when she would make supper for me and we would watch black and white movies.
It all started to go bad when Steve and Julie Pickle left us. You never realize how some people are lynch pins until the lynch pin is pulled out all of a sudden.
Oh, I hear Greg's car in the garage. He's just come back and I want to go make up with him.
|
Well, Greg certainly didn't like the idea of visiting Amy Carmichael and Jim! We very nearly had a fight. After I write this entry I will go apologize to him. Whenever we fight, it's usually my fault. Not that he cannot do really aggravating things: he can. But I usually over react.
Anyway, I want to tell my story in proper order. In my last journal the Standard Christian blog, I left off on a happy note. I had made friends with the beautiful, youthful, and engaging Hillary, a former movie and television actress who settled in the Asheville area to stay sober and work with community theater. Some of the people at my church hated her because she'd once posed nude in a magazine. But she'd been so kind to me and was so tolerant and generous that friendship was inevitable.
I worked at Simpsons Department store, run by the Simpson family, and within my first year I was made a manager and was on my way to becoming a buyer. Mr. Simpson, a Reformed Episcopal man in a conservative congregation, amazed me because he was not Baptist but was a godly Christian man. Certainly, the tone he set at Simpsons was one of kindness, hard work, honesty, and hospitality to our customers.
But my very best friend was Mr. Beauchamp, the town's local and beloved eccentric. Twenty years my senior, he tutored me in my math classes from night school, took me to the theater, and gave me books as presents for my birthday and Christmas.
He never once set foot inside my house, and I visited his house only in the company of others. It was through him that I learned the art of what Hillary called "Café Friendships." We both "went out" to meet each other: always looking our best, with our thoughts carefully marshaled, our conversation polite and focused on literature, history, and theology.
Beauchamp did belong to the same gym where I worked out, as he was under doctor's orders to walk four miles a week to strengthen his heart and circulation. He was a neat and meticulous man who hated to sweat. But he believed in good sense and preventive health care. So he obediently, with fixed expression and eyes showing mild disgust, trudged away for 30 minutes twice a week on the gym's treadmills, mopping the perspiration from his round, bald head as he walked. His doctor rewarded him by assigning another two miles per week.
Every Saturday morning, he and I joined the "Breakfast Club" from the gym, a group made up mostly of Christians from the local Pentecostal church. They talked over the Bible and theology. Steve Pickle, our unofficial leader, was an assistant pastor at the church and a man who could think through any discussion and discuss, with references, what the Bible said in light of the topic. Steve sported a battered nose from a youth spent in boxing, and I often wondered if the Pentecostal "seminary" he'd attended was not as bad as my own alma mater, GIBC. But he studied the Bible passionately.
Beauchamp was what Steve called a "theistic rationalist." But there was no enmity between them. Indeed, Beauchamp acted as mentor to Steve when he could and directed him to notable authors from the past and classic literature both inside and outside of Christianity. Steve, who was married to Julie, was a kind of hero and role model to Kazzazz and his wife, both avid weight lifters and recent Christians, and John Ohara, another recent convert and a member of the gym. Our oldest Christian members of the Breakfast Club were Alfred and Cindy Rogers. They were Presbyterians who preferred Steve's church to their own. But to my horror and amazement, they were Calvinists. I got over my revulsion in short order, for they were kind, likeable people.
We made a noisy and happy group at Shoney's every Saturday morning. We talked Bible, philosophy, and literature. I attended night school back then to get a real college degree. As more semesters went by, I participated more in the breakfast discussions, always encouraged by Beauchamp and always forced by my own friends to think.
Until I married Greg, years later, those were the happiest days of my life. In secret from my Baptist parents, I joined the Pentecostal church and stayed busy with a sort of happy, good works philosophy. I spent my energy on school, work, exercise, and church work. I had more and more money as time went by and my job status improved. I had happy fellowship on church nights, excited, engaging conversation on Saturday mornings, encouraging dinners and lunches with Beauchamp, and cozy evenings with Hillary when she would make supper for me and we would watch black and white movies.
It all started to go bad when Steve and Julie Pickle left us. You never realize how some people are lynch pins until the lynch pin is pulled out all of a sudden.
Oh, I hear Greg's car in the garage. He's just come back and I want to go make up with him.
