Jesus an’ the Four-Year-Old

Man on A Cross – Girl on A Mission

Audio narration coming soon you YouTube.

Long, long ago when the ice began to melt an’ the earth began to warm, house-size quartz rock came barrelin’ out of the Appalachian Mountain range. Tossed around an’ pulverized by the almighty force of creation, enormous boulders turned into sugar-white sand. They found their landin’ place along the emerald, green shores of what would someday be called Santa Rosa Island, Florida’s Panhandle, my childhood home.

People in my world were shaped by somethin’ just as powerful, somethin’ just as fierce. But this force shaped us into somethin’ darker, angrier, an’ harder to escape.

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The men in my life, an’ especially in our church, were full of anger. They shouted sermons at the top of their lungs, an’ Bibles were pounded with great force on pulpits made of soft pine that looked for all the world like they might fall apart with ever’ blow. Anyone who refused to believe like they did was a heathen deservin’ of hellfire, an’ all true believers were gonna be there to watch ‘em fall in the pit.

God was pissed an’ we were the lucky ones who’d found a way to assuage his anger. If you weren’t smart enough to get on board then you deserved whatever you got.

At the same time, Jesus was some kind of milk-toast wimp whose love was so sugary sweet we were all in danger of goin’ into a diabetic coma at any minute. He was this sad, abused character who was mistreated an’ misunderstood. He had come to set us free an’ we had spit in his face. Poor thing. We were supposed to love him for what he endured, but how could the same angry God send someone so weak to save us?

Growin’ up in the Christian church a real woman of God was meant to be sweet, kind an’ always submissive. Anger was not allowed. I don’t remember the exact moment I first heard that lie or even if anyone ever said it that clearly. Sometimes things are not taught — they’re caught.

I caught this message at home, at church, an’ ever’where else I went. Like an infection goin’ viral, it was impossible for any female to avoid it. Women were the weaker sex, an’ if any of us thought we ought to build some sexual muscle, we’d find ourselves kicked right outta that man gym.

After all, women needed men to keep ‘em safe. Ever’ fairy tale I’d ever heard, ever’ romance, adventure, an’ thriller comin’ outta Hollywood needed a prince Charmin’ to save his damsel in distress. Once he did, they could finally live happily ever after. Especially if that prince loved Jesus.

I’s pulled apart by opposin’ forces that were supposed to be on the same side. It was the all-or-nothin’ show: God is nothin’ but violently angry — like the men — an’ Jesus is all sugary-sweet love an’ martyrdom — like the women. It made no sense an’ the tension it created was suffocatin’.

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I’s a few months shy of my fifth birthday when I went to Vacation Bible School for the first time. I’s startin’ kindergarten in the fall an’ finally old enough to join this once-a-year, weeklong day camp with my brothers an’ sisters. They were old hands at it, but this was my maiden voyage.

Gold stars for memorizin’ scripture, learnin’ new songs ‘bout Jesus, an’ cookies an’ Kool-Aid were topped off with BINGO-style Sword Drill Bible games. We raced to be first to find the scripture called out by the teacher. But the highlight for me was paintin’ my very own plaster of Paris masterpiece.

There were dogs an’ cats, trees an’ houses, plaques with Bible verses on ‘em, an’ statues of Jesus. One impressive piece was called “The Last Supper.” A long line of men sat at a table with no food. I didn’t know what they planned to eat for this last supper, but somebody was about to go hungry. I mean, if it was gonna be their last meal, you’d think they’d make sure there was somethin’ on the table. Maybe they’d already eaten, but who knows? Well, I didn’t have time for such nonsense, so I chose a little bird an’ painted her blue. It was a work of art. ‘Course, it was mostly a mess, but that didn’t matter to this four-year-old.

Durin’ Bible School we’s told the story of how Jesus came to die for our sins. He had come to love us, but we had nailed him to a cross an’ left him there to die. Jesus was in heaven now an’ if we wanted to be with him someday, we had to give him our heart.

“Have you given your heart to Jesus? Have you accepted him as your personal Lord an’ Savior?” These were questions I heard daily while I painted my plaster of Paris wonder.

I’s just beginnin’ to take on a sense of guilt an’ shame for not measurin’ up, but I still had a lot of spunk an’ fire. When I first heard this story about nailin’ Jesus to a cross, I’s pretty sure I had nothin’ to do with it. Didn’t seem right to blame me for it, either. If the adults around me felt so bad about it, then they should take care of it themselves. I figured if they were feelin’ so bad ‘bout nailin’ Jesus to a cross, they oughta take it up with him instead of draggin’ me into it.

I musta said somethin’ like that to my mother, because next thing I knew, she had the pastor sit down with me an’ explain it.

Now, you have got to stop at this point an’ get this picture clear in your head. I’m a 4-year-old little girl in the South in 1962, sittin’ at the front of our little church with a man around the age of 50. He’s tall, bald, an’ wears wire-rimmed glasses. We call him Brother Carter.

He smiled kindly when he told me, “When you do somethin’ wrong, that’s a sin, an’ that makes you a sinner. Wally Faye, do you know what a sinner is?”

You bet I did. That was the reason our pine pulpit got pounded so hard ever’ Sunday: God was angry an’ sinners were the reason! I sat there wonderin’ why he looked happy at such bad news.

Oh, yeah. I knew what a sinner was, an’ even at my young age, I knew how this worked: Jesus came to earth to die for my sins so I could be saved an’ get my dirty heart cleaned up. Then I could give my cleaned-up heart back to Jesus an’ someday go to heaven to live with him — instead of burnin’ in the “flamin’ fires” of Hell when I die. I’d heard about these flamin’ fires ever’ Sunday, so I knew what was at stake here, an’ I did not wanna go to Hell.

A few weeks earlier, I’d burned my hand pretty bad when I touched Mama’s cast iron skillet full of cornbread. It had just come out of the oven. When Mama put it on a hot pad at the center of the table, I tried to pick it up by the handle. I just wanted to see if I could do it. The tender skin of my palm an’ fingers was blistered for weeks to come. So now I’s tryin’ to imagine bein’ sent to a place where “the worm dieth not,” where the pain I felt on my hand would be felt all over my body. Forever.

It’d be years before I would think through this doctrine, an’ have serious issues with how a lovin’, albeit very angry, God could send people to such a terrible place. Right now, I only knew it terrified me to think I might be one of ‘em.

When Brother Carter said I sinned by doin’ things that were wrong, he hit a home run. I’s always fightin’ with my older brother, an’ my mother was always tellin’ me that was wrong. I couldn’t think of anything else I’s doin’ wrong, but accordin’ to this man one sin is as good as a million. Didn’t matter how many sins, just mattered that I had sinned a’tall.

I’m a 4-year-old sinner on my way to Hell an’ I need to get saved. Got it.

The next Sunday I sat by my mother about 4 pews back from the front. After no less than a hour of preachin’ we finally started to sing “Just as I am, without one plea…” I knew my time had come. I’s gonna give my heart to Jesus. I’s gonna try to help make him feel better an’ maybe God wouldn’t be so pissed off anymore. Besides, this would make Mama happy.

I stepped out into the aisle of our little church an’ started walkin’. When I got to the front, the preacher was waitin’ for me. It was his job to stand there while the music played so that the evildoers could come forward an’ confess their unworthiness. Many times, there would be cryin’ at the altar while somebody celebrated a few pews back. The reformation of a sinner was a beautiful sight to behold.

When he bent down to take my hand, he asked me why I had come forward. I must have said somethin' like I’s willin’ to give my heart to Jesus if he was willin’ to take it, ‘cause I remember Brother Carter smilin’ at me sayin’ that I should kneel at the altar so we could pray.

The altar at our tiny Baptist church was the first of two steps leadin’ up to the platform where the pulpit stood. The floor was white speckled tile, an’ a wooden rail lined that first step from one end to the other, with a three-foot openin’ in the middle. That’s where I would kneel.

Brother Carter opened up the King James Version of the Bible an’ read words to me that I had heard many times.

“For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23 KJV).

“For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:23 KJV).

“For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13 KJV).

An' the biggest, baddest one of ‘em all, the one we’ve all seen wavin’ in the breeze at football games: John 3:16. I could quote it from memory.

“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlastin’ life.”

When he finished, he explained that to perish meant to go to Hell to burn in eternal torment where the “worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched.”

Holy Shit! I was absolutely certain I did not want to go there.

To be saved meant my soul would be rescued from the fires of eternal damnation an’ someday I’d go to Heaven. Thank God! I’s absolutely certain that I did want to go there. If I give my heart to Jesus, then God wouldn’t be so mad an’ I wouldn’t burn in Hell for all eternity.

All right, I’m in. Let’s do it. Only I didn’t say it quite like that. “I wanna give my heart to Jesus. I wanna make him happy.” I whispered from my kneelin’ position.

Brother Carter’s approvin’ smile started small, spreadin’ across his face as I gave all the right answers. An’ I could feel Mama’s pride coverin’ me like a security blanket. She told me years later that they’d been doubtful I could understand the doctrines they were sharin’. I’s only four years old, but the drive I felt to fix what was wrong an’ make Mama happy was a powerful force.

Brother Carter told me to bow my head an’ repeat these words after him: “Dear Lord Jesus, I know I’m a sinner, an’ I need you to save me. I believe that you died on the cross for me. Forgive me of my sins. Right now, I turn from my sins, an’ I give my heart to you. I receive you as my personal Lord an’ Savior, come into my life an’ save me. Thank you for what you did for me. Amen.”

Those are a lot of big words for a 4-year-old, but I repeated each one perfectly.

There was a lot at stake here an’ I wanted to get this right. The line that cut the deepest was the one about givin’ my heart to Jesus. I brought that little blue plaster of Paris bird with me to the altar that mornin’ an’ I remember lookin’ at it as I prayed thinkin’, “My heart has just flown up to heaven like this little bird.” I’s convinced that I no longer had a heart in my chest because Jesus had it now. I had just become a heartless, born-again 4-year-old Christian.

Well, now things are startin’ to make sense.

This must be how it happens. You give your heart away an’ eventually compassion an’ mercy follow it. You stop thinkin’ for yourself an’ start demandin’ perfection from ever’body. You buy in an’ sell out. You give up an’ shut down.

That was when I traded my spunk an’ fire for a good dose of fittin’ in.

On that Sunday mornin’, as I climbed into a tiny, cramped box of guilt an’ fear created just for little girls like me, I heard the far-off rumblings of massive, house-sized boulders tumblin’ down. Thrown this way an’ that, broken up, crushed an’ pulverized by the force of man’s creation, these once mighty boulders became tiny grains of sand deposited along my Shoreline of Denial.

It was a breathtakin’ odyssey down to the hot sandy flats at the bottom of a long-standin’ lie.

An' I felt every mile of the journey when, with the help of my mother an’ Brother Carter, I found the perfect place to dig a great big hole, stick my butt up into the air an’ plunk my head firmly down into the sand.

There, now. Don’t we all feel better?

Audio narration coming soon you YouTube.