The front entrance to New Hope Baptist Church, Lincolnton, Georgia.
By Tom Poland, A Southern Writer
TomPoland.net
For the first time in my life I was alone in my church. The old Regulator wall clock ticked away as I ticked away the families who had walked through their last door. Ivys, Williams, Wells, Partridges, Flemings, Bradfords, Guillebeau, Hawes, Ashmore, others still, and my family, who always sat in the third pew on the right from the back. From there you cannot see the front door. Wish I could.
Four things about my church absorb me. The baptistry, the oak with the big burl, the cemetery, and the front door.
The baptistry, a latecomer to my fascinations, portrays a paradise with a river running through it. Palm trees front the river and in the background looms a mountain.
The burl. It’s prized by woodworkers for its swirling grain. No two are alike.
The cemetery. As a boy I played in it with its orange-and-black grasshoppers known as eastern lubber grasshoppers, known also as graveyard grasshoppers, black diablos, or devil’s horses. They sound a bit satanic, do they not?
That front door. I have mostly passed through it as a pall bearer. I cannot find one bright thing about the word “pall.” It’s a cloth spread over a casket, a dark cloud, something ominous — a pall fell over the crowd. Even those coffin nails, Pall Mall cigarettes, employ the dark word.
My memories trace their origin to August 1961 when I presented myself as a candidate for baptism. Back then when enough people professed their desire to wash their sins away, a baptizing ceremony went on the calendar. Mine came in winter, a cold day when your breath looked like a drag off a Chesterfield.
We walked across Highway 220 into woods where a creek ran. On that creek stood a shack with steps descending into a creek-fed pool. The preacher and soon-to-be church members would descend the steps as the moment approached, and the moment burned. Not with Hell fire, Heavens forbid, which we hoped to avoid, but plain old wood fire.
Upstream men were heating 55-gallon drums of water over burning logs. When the water neared boiling they’d dump it into the creek. A deacon would test the water and signal warm water on the way. Mere feet from the preacher another deacon would signal, “Here comes hot water,” something I would get into in the years ahead despite my baptism. I waded in behind the reverend who slipped me beneath the water. Even with firewater, it made for a cold introduction to Holy matters.
On an Easter Sunday seven years ago I went back to the creek and its little pool. The creek had long dried up and the little shack had collapsed. Stagnant water filled the pool. Briars, bushes, and tangled undergrowth choked what had been open space for onlookers. The place where I had been baptized had surrendered all to time, gravity, the elements, and most of all lack of use.
Things sure do change. Once upon a time preachers dipped New Hope folk in a creek that ran through woods. It was good enough for generations and good enough for me. I try to accept the newfangled Baptismal pool and its chlorinated water. I cannot.
Now, that front door. I have been through doors of all types—screened, classroom, corporate, hospital, barn, storm shelter, walk-in cooler, country store, darkroom, hotel, motel, and double doors where one side is maddeningly locked, but the double door looking out on Highway 220 and woods will be my last.
Both doors will be wide open that day. What day? My day, my last above ground. The funeral director and his assistants will roll me to my last steps where pall bearers will ease me down and across the last driveway to my place beside my parent’s double crypt.
Outside of my parents’ funerals I have few other church memories save a wedding memorable and a wedding utterly forgettable with its fakery and dramatized display of love. Hokey, I daresay.
So ends my memories, but before I go, let me confess something most would not. Sitting in church sends my mind spinning in all directions. Do you know what I mean? Enlighten me if you do. I need to do much better before I pass through my last open door. You only do that once you know. Better get it right.
