Where the Light Fell

by Philip Yancey

  Alone, though, in the little privacy I have on the top bunk in our cramped bedroom, doubts nag at me. My prayers address God as “Our Heavenly Father,” but with no earthly father to compare him to, I don’t know what that means. I hear a woman pray at church, “Lord, be gentle with me, just be gentle. But, dear Lord, use whatever it takes with my kids, even if it’s suffering. Break them.” Maybe God is like my mother—a superperson who both loves me and schemes to break me.

  “Say or do nothing you would not want to be saying or doing at the moment of Jesus’s Second Coming,” Mother admonishes me. She tells of a time in her youth when a friend invited her to a movie. She was tempted at first. “Then I thought about what would happen if Jesus came back while I was in that theater! What could I say to him?”

  I lie awake at night reviewing everything I’ve said or done recently. Tossing a baseball at a net backstop for an hour. Joining my brother in the silence wars around the dinner table. Sneaking a look at my uncle’s dirty magazines. What would cause me shame if Jesus returned today?

  Mother’s prophecy magazines—Midnight Call, The Chosen People, Fruits of Zion, Israel My Glory—report an increase in famines, earthquakes, and catastrophes, sure signs of the end times. Communism is spreading like a virus, fulfilling the prophecy about “wars and rumors of wars.” Russia has hydrogen bombs more powerful than ours.

  Every day a gruff voice comes on the radio, introducing the 20th Century Reformation Hour. “Friends, it’s Carl McIntire. Have you heard that Khrushchev claims to want peace?

  Khrushchev was a man of peace and this we all recall

  A piece of this, a piece of that until he has it all.”

  McIntire has just lost his campaign to keep Hawaii from becoming our fiftieth state. “Think of it—in our own nation, a perfect nest for spies from China! Communism is at our doorstep.”

  There is so much to fear.

  * * *

  —

  Each year I make a New Year’s resolution to read through the entire Bible, checking off the little boxes on a printed guide—three chapters a day, five on Sunday. Some years I achieve the goal; more often I bog down in the Prophets. Marshall and I practice saying names of the Bible’s sixty-six books in order, as fast as we can: “GenesisExodusLeviticusNumbers….” My record is seventeen seconds, better even than Marshall’s. “That doesn’t count,” he argues. “You slur your words together.”

  Faith Baptist is a King James Only church, loyal to the English translation of the Bible published in 1611. We don’t trust any of the newfangled versions because, as Brother Pyle says, most of them have translators who are liberals. We get a full dose of venom against the Revised Standard Version when a preacher named Peter Ruckman visits Faith Baptist. He regales us with stories of his colorful past—Zen Buddhism, alcohol abuse, working first as a disc jockey, then as a drummer for dance bands—before Pastor Howard Pyle’s brother converted him to fundamentalism.

  From the pulpit, Ruckman mocks the Revised Standard Version, which he calls the Reviled Standard PerVersion. He reads a few passages from that edition and sails the Bible out toward the pews, where it falls with a thud. Next he tosses an American Standard Version, which he says is “more of the same godless, depraved crap.” Though Ruckman’s antics offend some church members, including my mother, we stick with the King James Version just to be safe.

  Faith Baptist fosters a minority complex, a feeling of us against the world. Others may see us as a radical fringe but we take pride in living in a way that outsiders—Hollywood, Washington, DC, The New York Times—cannot possibly understand. A phrase from the Bible’s book of Titus sums up our identity: “a peculiar people, zealous of good works.”

  In order to avoid any appearance of evil, the church frowns on such activities as roller-skating (too much like dancing), bowling (alleys often serve liquor), mixed swimming, and reading the Sunday newspaper. Movies are forbidden, and television is suspect. A few girls wear makeup and mild lipstick, always discreetly, but they never wear slacks on church property. My mother shuns makeup and all jewelry, except for a single strand of pop beads.

  Every so often a woman who doesn’t know the code enters our church with a fancy hairdo, bright-colored lipstick, open-toed shoes, and shiny red nails. She exerts a force like gravity. The men keep stealing glances, and the women with scrubbed skin and hair buns frown and shake their heads in disapproval. My hormones have not yet kicked in, and I don’t fully understand the need for all the safeguards. I gather that bodies represent danger, and on the danger scale, female bodies must rank near the top.

  All these rules are meant to protect us from the sinful world outside, and in a way they succeed. Marshall and I might sneak off to a bowling alley, but we would never think of touching cigarettes, liquor, or drugs. I have no time for worldly activities anyway. I am always at church.

  * * *

  —

  The year I enter high school, I feel a subtle but seductive tug in a different direction. A growing part of me resists the image of a redneck fundamentalist. I feel an urge to experience life, not avoid it. I don’t reject the faith—not yet, anyway. Rather, I find myself swinging like a pendulum, sometimes striving to be the best Christian around and sometimes wanting to give up in despair.

  Charles Sheldon’s classic, In His Steps, rocks me. The novel imagines what happens when a pastor dares his church members to ask before every major decision, “What would Jesus do?” His congregation takes up the challenge. A woman turns down a marriage proposal because her suitor lacks direction in life. In order to help the needy, a rich woman buys property in a seedy part of town. A publisher discontinues his newspaper’s Sunday edition.

  I think long and hard about how I might follow in Jesus’s steps. Then one Sunday Brother Pyle preaches a sermon on idolatry, and I start wondering if I have idols. My prized collection of seven hundred baseball cards comes to mind. It’s the envy of my friends, and includes an original 1947 Jackie Robinson as well as Mickey Mantle’s rookie card. I spend hours organizing the cards by team, position, and stats—time that could be put to spiritual use. Definitely an idol.

  After prayer and anguished indecision, I resolve to destroy the idol by giving away most of my precious collection to a neighbor down the street. Expecting a divine reward, I feel betrayed when several days later my neighbor auctions off the collection for a tidy sum. I try to console myself: “Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake.”

  When we last visited Maranatha Tabernacle in Philadelphia, I heard the doctrine of perfection that Mother has been teaching. The pastor urged us to go through the “love” chapter in 1 Corinthians 13. “Self-sacrificing love never gets impatient…never gets jealous…never boasts…never gets conceited…” and so on. Love “is always kind, happy in the truth, and generous. It overlooks faults in others, believes in the best in others, and is always long-suffering and victorious.”

  “Now, substitute Jesus every time you see the word love,” the pastor said. That worked just fine. “Next,” he added, “go through and substitute yourself: ‘I am always patient and kind. I never envy nor boast nor think an unkind thought.’ ” I saw immediately that I had a long way to go to attain this Victorious Christian Life.

  Mother buys into this theology one hundred percent and maintains she’s reached that higher plane of life. I have to bite my tongue to keep from reminding her of that sermon on love when she flies into one of her rages. As for myself, I sincerely want to follow Jesus’s steps, but then I tell a lie or do something stupid the next day. I feel attracted to holiness and repelled at the same time, like two magnets brought together. “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect,” Jesus said. I want that ideal, yet always a little voice inside ridicules how far I fall short. It works on my soft conscience like a poison.

  I’ve read biographies of Christians who were t
ortured for their faith, such as Watchman Nee, a Chinese pastor who spent twenty years in a Communist prison. If Communists ever subjected me to torture, I know exactly what I’d do. I would fall, sniveling, at their feet and deny my faith.

  * * *

  —

  Pastor Howard Pyle is an entrepreneur. After we’ve lived at Faith Baptist for nearly a year, he asks Mother to head up the teaching at a new youth camp he’s developing with his brother Norman at a facility near Conyers, about twenty-five miles east of Atlanta. It means canceling her work at the Kentucky camp, but she accepts. I’m soon delighted with the upgrade. As we drive on the grounds, I notice manicured athletic fields and a large swimming pool. I’m most impressed when I learn that the cabins have indoor bathrooms.

  The Pyle brothers try their best to impose order on the campers: no card playing, lights out at ten, separate swim times for boys and girls, no hand-holding or kissing, no shorts (for girls), no radios, mandatory quiet time and attendance at all meetings. But in contrast to the Kentuckians, these city campers compete to break as many rules as possible, not to accumulate good-behavior points. They short-sheet each other’s beds, cover the urinals with transparent plastic wrap, and play secular music on contraband radios.

  The camp brings in speakers from Bob Jones University who prove to be funny and entertaining. Local athletes stop by to lecture the boys on how tough and masculine Jesus was. Musical groups make appearances, too, including a trio of blond sisters who sway as they sing. I fall instantly in love with all three. As they sing, I pick out one of the sisters and stare at her, trying my old church trick of channeling my admiration directly through thought waves. Of course, I’m too shy and awkward to actually speak to such a goddess.

  Each week we gather for a required sex talk. For an hour, one of the counselors tries to hold the attention of teenage boys who are poking each other and laughing at inappropriate places. We learn that sex before marriage is like grabbing a peanut-butter sandwich instead of waiting for steak. The proper question is not “How far can I go?” but “How far should I stay away?” Like Joseph in the Bible, we must resist even the appearance of improper behavior with the other sex.

  The counselors talk a lot about lust. “How do you know when you’re lusting?” one camper asks. The answer: “Look once, that’s normal. Look twice, and you’re borderline. Keep following that girl with your eyes, and you cross the line.” I never want to stop looking. Am I a serial luster?

  I lie low the first week or two at the new camp. But as I grow more confident in the new place, I adopt a goody-two-shoes routine of getting up early and having extra-long devotions on the front porch, where the counselor can see me. I pray in public at every opportunity and give testimonies. Sure enough, I win “Camper of the Week” and receive a plaque on the final night.

  The last week of the summer, however, I start listening to the dark side. I climb a fence with a friend and do cannonballs in the algae-lined swimming pool after hours. I persuade a kid with diabetes to hand over the used syringes from his daily injections. As if the scene with the turtles has never happened, I give them to a science freak who experiments by injecting frogs with Mountain Dew and Coca-Cola. With each day of camp, I get ornerier.

  Peter Ruckman, the man who tossed Bibles around in our church, is the featured speaker this week. Besides the evening sermons, which he illustrates with colored chalk as he speaks, he conducts afternoon workshops on various topics. We meet in the dining room, and this day he’s chosen to speak about race.

  It’s the sixties, and the civil rights movement is making daily news in Georgia. Freedom riders and other protesters are demanding an end to whites-only schools, restrooms, and lunch counters. Ruckman uses his workshop to defend segregation, citing the same “Curse of Ham” theory that I heard at Colonial Hills. “Read Genesis 9 for yourself,” he says. “God cursed Ham and his descendants to be servants. Campers, this is where the Negro race comes from.”

  Then Ruckman grins and moves from behind the pulpit. “Have you ever noticed how Coloreds make good waiters? Watch them sometime. They swivel their hips around the chairs and hold those trays high without spilling a drop.” He does an exaggerated imitation, and the campers laugh. “Don’t you see, that’s the kind of job they’re good at. But have you ever met a Negro who’s the president of a company? Have you? Name one. Every race has its place, and they should accept it. We can get along fine as long as we stay separate and don’t mix.”

  As it happens, I have become the pet of Bessie, the camp cook. She’s a large Black woman who loves kids, works hard, and sings while she prepares food. As Ruckman is talking, I see her refilling the salt and pepper shakers at the other end of the large room. She shows no sign that she has heard him, but I break out in a sweat just thinking about it.

  * * *

  —

  Later that afternoon I check up on Bessie. She seems cheerful as a bird, so maybe she didn’t hear what Ruckman said. Or maybe she wouldn’t let me know if she had. I still feel queasy about the workshop. We talk for a while and she gives me three peanut-butter cookies fresh out of the oven, meant for dessert at the evening meal. I’m still munching on one when I walk outside and run smack into Brother Pyle.

  He must have been gunning for me. He looks down at the cookies, flushes red, and accuses me of stealing them. I try to explain, but he won’t listen. He points his finger at my chest, and his head gives a little jerk. “You’re a deceitful troublemaker, an Achan in the camp, young man,” he says. “You’re trying to bring down the work God is doing here.” I look at him with a blank expression that he must take as a sneer, because he stalks off.

  That night, Friday, culminates the camp week, the last meeting before campers head home on Saturday. We hold evening services in an open-sided building that seats four hundred. Sometimes a summer thunderstorm rumbles through, unleashing a downpour that rattles the metal roof so loudly that the meeting has to adjourn. I pray for rain, not wanting to sit through another emotional revival service in my crotchety mood.

  Friday night is the camp’s final shot at converting the unconverted and heating up the lukewarm. We’re tired and sunburned, aware that we will be returning to homes without swimming pools and foosball, and that school will soon take over our lives. In a word, we are vulnerable.

  The speaker, Nicky Chavers, a student from Bob Jones, does his best. He plays off advertising slogans. “Are you a Brylcreem Christian? A little dab’ll do you? Are you an Alka-Seltzer Baptist? Put him in the water and he’ll fizz for half a minute?” He’s witty and passionate and also long-winded. To my dismay, the rains hold off.

  When time comes for the altar call, Norman Pyle takes over, and we start singing “Just as I Am.” After the first verse Pyle says, “Maybe you’ve held out all week, determined not to give in. Friend, are you ready to meet your Maker? Are you ready to die? Why wait? You never know what tomorrow may bring.” A few campers trickle forward as we plow through another stanza.

  The invitation widens. “Now I want all of you who have rededicated your life to Christ this week to join these dear souls at the front. Make a public profession. I know it’s not easy, so be courageous and show God that you mean it.”

  Then follows a call for those who have decided on full-time Christian service. Before long, fully two-thirds of the audience has come forward to kneel at the front. I glance wistfully at the corrugated roof overhead. Still no rain.

  “If you just feel a need for someone to pray with you, we have counselors standing by,” Pyle continues. More campers make their way to the crowded front. Finally, the clincher. “I have one last invitation. Now listen carefully. Any of you with unconfessed sin in your life—any sin whatsoever—God is calling you to come forward and confess it.”

  Campers stream down the aisles as he prompts us. “A careless word, perhaps…a flash of anger…a laziness in your spiritual life. Have you looked on anyone wit
h lust this week? Have you thought ill of anyone?” The stream becomes a river as the pianist gallantly pounds out another refrain.

  This is my sixth straight week at camp. Every other week I have gone forward at the final service. Tonight, my soul is calloused. Eventually only two of us remain standing in the large auditorium. I edge closer to my friend Rodney for moral support as the pianist begins yet another round of verses. Fellow campers kneeling down front glare back at us in irritation; we are delaying the late-night round of refreshments.

  “I don’t know, Rodney,” I whisper, “I can’t think of any sins tonight, can you?”

  “No unconfessed ones,” he replies with a tight grin. The two of us hold out until at last the speaker gives up, says a closing prayer, and calls it a night. When I walk out, my knees ache from standing so long.

  PART FOUR

  DISORDER

  I am a slow unlearner. But I love my unteachers.

  —Ursula K. Le Guin, Dancing at the Edge of the World

  CHAPTER 14

  HIGH SCHOOL

  The gymnasium stands creak and groan from the weight of five hundred fidgety adolescents. “Welcome to Gordon High School,” says the principal, Mr. Craig, a dapper man with silver streaks in his well-combed hair. He is wearing a suit, starched white shirt, and plaid bow tie. “You are about to experience the best years of your lives.”

  It feels as though we are entering the scariest years of our lives. In our Georgia school district, which lacks middle schools, we have gone directly from elementary school into high school, entering the eighth grade as lowly “subfreshmen.” And because I began school a few months early and then skipped second grade, I am entering high school in 1961 at the tender age of eleven.