First Semester 3

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8. I'm embarrassed to say that I did not particularly grow up thinking of my school friends as Christians. I'm sure my family would have been agnostic on their eternal state, but we certainly didn't think they were living or believing the right way. Early on, I felt the pressure to witness. I remember John Maxwell talking about how he witnessed to cashiers in check out lines. I remember him talking about witnessing to the people who sat next to him on planes.

So I began to feel very guilty about not sharing my faith with any and everybody around me. Of course, Maxwell is a mega-extrovert. He's going to talk to everyone in the world anyway. Real virtue is when you do the right things that come hard to you, not as much when you just happen to enjoy doing the right thing--although that's a good thing too. I was excruciatingly shy in those days.

But I began carrying my black Thompson Chain Reference KJV to school for a time. Under an immense feeling of guilt, I placed it strategically on my desk so that others could see. Maybe they'll ask me about it. When I flew, I sometimes read my Bible too just in case it might prompt a conversation. I did awkwardly get a friend to pray in our driveway once.

Like I said, about ten years of my life from about 1977-87 were quite torturous. Guilt was my middle name. Doubt was my first name. When I played Thomas in a church Easter play in 1987, a former girlfriend joked that I had been typecast.

I might mention that many of my friends from high school are quite serious Christians. The way that I thought of who might or might not be a Christian in high school was seriously defective. There was no animus to my perspective, but it was the consequence of the worldview with which I was raised. Accordingly, in addition to my intense shyness, dating anyone in high school was not a possibility because they "weren't Christians," at least not my kind.

9. But Central was completely different. I was still excruciatingly backward, but there were no faith barriers to asking someone out there. One shouldn't speak much of past relationships, so I'll simply say that over the course of the first semester I finally did muster the courage to ask someone on a date. I felt like an idiot going out of my way to be friendly. I said stupid things at church. I am quite convinced that the person only said yes because they felt sorry for me.

As an aside, I remember Dr. Schmutz, my chemistry professor, seeing me agonize waiting on an answer. He remarked, "Man, I'm glad that's over." :-)

I feel bad that the next year was a time of great emotional turmoil and transition for me. In general, I didn't care much about what others did or didn't do with regard to old holiness issues like make-up or whether women wore pants or skirts or whether women cut their hair or not or whether women wore jewelry. I had never really cared about these things. You'll notice, by the way, that hardly any of the benchmark holiness standards affect men.

I had some friends my senior year at Central who had come out of a holiness church in Kentucky. At that church, they were called the "Hollywood girls" because they wore a little make-up. They always felt like the pastor's daughter got brownie holiness points for rolling out of bed and coming to church without combing her hair or showering. Of course I only had their side of the story.

For those of you who are saying, "None of that is really about holiness!" you are of course right. Holiness is about belonging to God and living a life appropriate for those who image him. Jesus was quite clear that the way we do that is by loving our neighbors and enemies. The fruit of the Spirit is love, accompanied by joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. John Wesley primarily understood holiness in terms of perfect love.

But at some point holiness degenerated in some circles to "standards," how you dress, where you go, and in general what you don't do. In this degenerated form, there seemed to be little joy, peace, or patience. Kindness and gentleness certainly would not have been typical in my view. I was once kicked off a playground as a child at a holiness camp on Sunday because you don't work on Sunday. I would later muse to myself, so is playing work for children?

10. When I started dating, my conscience began to worry about such "standards." I didn't care in general if other people didn't follow the holiness standards. That was between them and God. But should I date someone who doesn't follow those rules. Would I then be sinning? It wasn't really so much about the other person, but my fear of going to hell myself.

Eventually the poor saint rightly broke up with me, a roller coaster of introspective torture. At that time Judy Huffman was the RD for Stuart Bennett, the girl's dorm. I met with her in the aftermath, and she painfully asked me if I had ever considered going to a place like Kentucky Mountain Bible Institute. In my mind, that was way too conservative. It hurt my pride.

I prayed with Judy, I suspect in the spring of 1986. I said, "Lord, if I'm wrong on these things, please show me." I of course thought I was right. Even though I said the words and meant them, I had no expectation of any of my understandings changing. By the way, my mother had urged me to be reasonable, to let God take care of such things. But I was an idealist. If something was right it was right.

To be continued.

11. The college church was not the style of worship familiar to me in those days. It was where most of the professors went. It was a little more liturgical. It was a little more proper and had more of a Methodist feel. I never even tried it.

The professors at Central were an interesting group. At one point I thought of them as Jimmy Carter Democrats. I don't know if they were. I will say this. They had the right values. They were in favor of civil rights. Central had students of color attend from its earliest days. While Bob Jones up the road kicked Jim Lo out for interracial dating, there were interracial couples at Central. [1]

Some time after I graduated they moved Freedom's Hill Church to campus, the church where Adam Crooks preached abolition in North Carolina before the Civil War. You can still see the bullet holes in it. My professors at Central were, in the proper sense, holy people, spiritual people. In church this morning at Houghton Wesleyan, Mike Walters preached. He reminds me of my professors at Central. The professors of that generation had the right values. Keith Drury is another one.

At Central I went to what was then still "Central Second Wesleyan." Pastor Jim Wiggins was much more the kind of preacher I was used to and the services were much less formal. I remember the sanctuary being completely packed. It is no wonder they started a building program.

Pastor Wiggins would be my primary mentor in my ministerial training at Central. I would go on visitation with him often, but more on that later.

[1] As a side-note, my sister Juanita married Eduardo Garcia in 1982, son of the general superintendent of the Philippines. I heard some verses invoked from Ezra in those days completely out of context. Ezra of course had Israel divorce their non-Israelite wives. This was then completely twisted out of context to suggest that different races shouldn't marry. It is a good example of how the Bible in the hands of misinterpretation can be used to make evil into a divine command.