Boaz Brown (20 page)

“You see . . . uh. . . since man can remember, we have set ourselves upon creating groups, cliques, and boundaries. While I do understand that sometimes . . . these things are necessary to maintain a civilization. After all, you can’t very well have people running in and out of other people’s homes and expect to maintain order. Somebody would end up hurt if we didn’t have boundaries.

“But I’m not talking about the world. The world has to maintain a lot of rules and regulations on the books in order to force people into what it believes they should do. Tonight I’m talking about the body of Christ. We have to begin to look at the boundaries and walls that we have set up between God’s children, which hinder the spread of the gospel.”

“Well,” one of the deacons called out.

Ding! Ding!
sounded the internal bell. I knew that Minister Jackson’s message was meant for me. He’d hit the nail on the head, bringing the same issues—love, unity, Christianity—to the forefront. He talked about everything from age separation to racial separation to economic separation, then ascribed it all to the enemy’s clever plan to disconnect the members of the body of Christ.

I talked with Peaches quickly outside after the service, thanking her for her company and letting her know that I’d be in touch later in the week.

“Thanks for inviting me. That minister was really preachin’ tonight. You know how black folks are—always trying to pull each other down. Always creating boundaries with our economic cliques and sororities and denominations. We really do need to come back to the Lord as one,” she said as we walked toward the lot.

“Yeah, that’s true,” I agreed. “But do you ever think that maybe we need to do the same with everybody—I mean, people who aren’t black, too?”

“I don’t know about all that.” She gave me the eye. “I think our first priority is to love ourselves enough to help one another. We have to learn to deal with our own kind before we can worry about dealing with outsiders. Maybe that’s a job for the next generation.”

“Hmm.” I heard her, but I was on another page.

The message
I
received was about race, love, and the body of Christ. In fact, the rest of the week’s sermons poked and prodded me. Night after night, the Holy Spirit convicted me of prejudice. I saw it in myself—a short temper with the white woman behind the counter at a drug store. I heard it in my conversation with Peaches. I felt it when I was uncomfortably alone on an elevator at the mall with a man of Middle Eastern descent.

The conflict inside me was a war of words and emotions, as though an angel sat on one shoulder and the enemy sat on the other. One whispered messages of love and peace, while the other whispered horrible, discouraging facts and realities about life, people, the way things were and had been for hundreds of years.

I wept at the altar, surrounded by missionaries and other altar workers who must have felt my undec
lared battle. “Just give it to
Jesus,” they whispered in
my ear. Their hands made warm
paths up and down my back. They encircled those of us who had come to have Min
ister Jackson lay hands on us,
agreeing in the Spirit that God would deliver us from mental and physical afflictions. “Just leave it here at the altar. He is able.”
 

Saturday sneaked up on me before I had the chance to fully develop an excuse
not
to call Mr. Stelson Brown. But when I got in the Word and reviewed the notes from Minister Jackson’s sermons, I put the excuses aside.

I decided to call Mr. Brown early, figuring he wouldn’t be home since many people—at least the ones I knew—tried to run their errands before noon. I planned to leave a “sorry I missed you” message, then screen my calls (if he got my number from caller ID), and conveniently miss him until it was way too late to go out.

No such luck.

“Hello.”

“Hi, may I speak with Stelson, please?”

“This is Stelson.”

“Stelson, this is LaShondra Smith. How are you?”

“I’m great. . . great.” He seemed glad to hear my voice. “How about you?”

“Fine as well. I’m calling to take you up on your offer.” I laughed.

“Okay,” he laughed, too, ”I’m glad you did. Um, let’s see. . . do you like Mexican food?”

“I love Mexican food.”

“I’ve got just the right place in mind. There’s a Mexican restaurant named Abuelita’s on the south side of town—off Industrial and Ninth. It’s a tiny little place, but they’ve got live entertainment and the best Mexican food on the entire globe.”

“Mmm,” I said, “I think I’ve heard it, but I’ve never gone there. I’d like to try it.”

“What time shall I pick you up?” he asked.

“Uh, no offense, Stelson, but I would prefer to meet you there.” I imposed my standard residence rule: don’t let a man know where you live until after the third date.

“None taken.” He didn’t skip a beat. “I can meet you there at eight.”

“Eight is fine. I’ll see you there.”

I scoured my closet for the perfect outfit and settled on an indigo pants set with a pair of black low-heeled boots. I swept my hair up into a twist and let what was left of my curls sweep across my forehead and on top of my head. The hairstyle was a bit more formal than I wanted, but I didn’t have much choice.

Eight took its sweet time coming but found both Stelson and me being seated at a table for two. “You look great, LaShondra,” he said to me as he placed his jacket on the back of his chair. Any other time, I would have mentally twisted his compliment to the point that it was perverted. But not tonight.

“Thank you, Stelson.”

Once again he was wearing that cologne that I had come to associate with him—not too strong, definitely masculine. His hair had grown out a little, maybe into what it was supposed to look like at its best.

The smell of authentic Mexican food filled the atmosphere, along with the energy of the mariachi band. Every song had the distinct, three-count beat of Latino rhythm. Waitresses dressed in sombreros and bright, colorful skirts whisked through the crowd with platters of sizzling fajitas giving off their mouth-watering aroma. It was different, but I liked it.

I almost hurt myself on the biggest, spiciest, most delicious chicken burrito I ever tasted. Stelson laughed at me when we were finished, because I just sat there, too full to move.

“Just give me a minute,” I said, after stealthily loosening the drawstring on my pants. After the way I threw down on that burrito, I was well past manners. “Okay. I’ll be all right in just a few minutes.”

“I told you this place was awesome.” He smiled. A clump of his dark hair fell out of place, and touched his eyebrow. He forced it back to its rightful spot by yanking his head back and shaking it slightly, like it was really going to stay in place now.
There goes the white-girl flip.

“‘Awesome’ is an understatement,” I said, willing myself to ignore the hair thing.

“We’ll have to come here again,” he suggested.

“Definitely,” I inadvertently agreed to another date.

“So, Miss Smith,” he teased, “tell me all about you. What goes on in a typical week in the life of LaShondra Smith?” he asked.

“Not too much. I spend a lot of time at work. I usually go to a singles Bible study on Tuesday nights, tutoring on Wednesday nights at my church before midweek service,” I babbled freely, “but that tutoring takes a lot out of me because right now I’m the only one on who’s tutoring. Every once in a while, someone will come back to volunteer and help, but for the most part I’m roughing it alone. I’ve been praying that God will send some help—anybody.

“The rest of the week I’ll probably lounge around. Check out a few bookstores, do a little shopping. Go to church Sunday morning.” I shrugged.

“Tell me about your church,” he requested. “I mean, what denomination is it? What’s it like?”

“I attend True Way Church of God in Christ, where my pastor is the Reverend Billy Williams.” I gave my spiel.

“You’re kidding!” he exclaimed. “Church of God in Christ?”

“Yes, Church of God in Christ. Pentecostal. Holy rollers, open expressions of praise, tongue-talking, let the Spirit take lead in the service. That kind of church.”

“You’re kidding me,” he repeated.

“No, I’m not. What’s so incredible?” I asked him, waiting for him to say something derogatory about my denomination. I’d be the first to admit that COGIC wasn’t perfect. But if Stelson said one bad thing about my church, I would have to go left.

“Did you know that your church and the church I was raised in were once the same denomination?” he asked.

The blank look on my face must have answered his question.

“It’s true. The Church of God in Christ and the Assemblies of God were once one church. The founders of your church and the founders of my church worked together up until the early nineteen hundreds.”

My ears heard it, but I couldn’t really imagine it. Blacks and whites together in the early 1900s for
any
reason was highly unlikely.

“LaShondra,” he continued, breathing hard with excitement, “The Church of God in Christ was part of the Apostolic Faith movement that started in America in the late eighteen hundreds. I mean, my church’s founders and your church’s founders were both present at the Azusa Street revival in 1906.”

“I’ve heard of Azusa Street. They still have the convention every year,” I commented. “But what makes you think that the Church of God in Christ, founded by Bishop Charles Mason, and the Assemblies of God were ever one?”

“I’ve researched this, LaShondra. The Church of God in Christ had huge, absolutely phenomenal growth. At one point, there were as many white Church of God in Christ congregations as there were black ones—all of them with Bishop Mason’s stamp on them. People were beginning to see that God was alive in everybody, with no regard to nationality or race or class. It was amazing. And it went on until around 1918 or so.”

“What happened?”

“It split up,” he said, bowing his head and lowering his voice. “It got divided right down the middle.”

“Along racial lines, huh?”

“That among other things,” he said. “That’s how we ended up the Assemblies of God and the Church of God in Christ. Two separate denominations that shouldn’t have
ever
been apart. The truth is, you and I go way back, LaShondra.”

“Well, why haven’t I ever heard about any of this?”

“I didn’t hear about any of it, either, growing up. It wasn’t until I started looking for a church home in Dallas that I got into the church’s history. I guess it’s just one of those things that isn’t discussed.”

“Are you still in the Assemblies of God?”

“No. I belong to Living Word. It’s nondenominational.”

“So how did you end up in a nondenominational church?” I asked him. “If you were raised anything like I was raised, you know it’s a serious thing to leave ‘the church.”

“I didn’t really make the decision to be nondenominational. I just asked God to send me to the church where He wanted me to serve and give. That’s how I ended up at Living Word Church. The pastor and congregation have been such a blessing to me. There is so much love—probably the same love that was once shared between the Church of God in Christ and the Assemblies of God.”

“You
are right about it, nobody discusses that kind of thing,” I said. “I mean, I can probably count on one hand the number of white people that I know of who were members at a Church of God in Christ. Every once in a while, we have a white visitor or something, but that’s about it. If we’re supposed to have been so close, why are we so far apart?”

“That’s a good question.”

“What about at the Assemblies of God? Is the congregation still all white?”

“No, not any more. I mean, it’s predominantly white, but in the past twenty years or so, with interracial couples and fellowship with churches of different denominations, they’ve gotten somewhat diversified. Most of the members who aren’t white are younger. It’s funny how kids don’t seem to care about race as much as adults do.”