Plopping down in our library, I pour myself a glass of something the unlicensed Baptist preacher Elijah Craig had a hand in making. I sift through a plastic milk crate. A small collection of vinyl is housed in it.
I bend to a few pretentious vices. Puffing on loose-leaf pipe tobacco is one. The other is listening to country music crack and pop on my boxy Vitrola. These are nightly rituals I invoke when I’m not folding clothes or experimenting in the kitchen.
Justin Cox
My hands find a worn cover supporting the image of Merle Haggard. I’ll spin his 1978 “best of” collection until I decide to move on to something else. I flip to side two, let the needle find the groove, and lean back in a chair as “Today I Started Loving You Again” comes through the speakers like a breeze through a screen door.
Country music, at its best, is relatable. It’s humorous at times and heartbreakingly sincere when it needs to be. Because of this, a good country song has to be honest. One of the songwriters who helped prop up the Nashville sound, Harlan Howard, had it right long before the Chase Rice hit. “Three chords and the truth” are all you really need to speak to people.
I lightly jostle the contents in my hand, relishing the sound of ice against glass. I think preachers and anyone claiming to follow Jesus should follow similar advice.
With Haggard’s Bakersfield baritone working on me, I glance back over a few texts I’ve refrained from responding to. I delete a couple, nothing more than spam. A fake USPS push requesting I update my delivery method is swiped to the right. I read over a notification from a church member letting me know she and her family arrived safe and sound at their summer destination. I fire back a “Glad ya’ll made it” before moving on to the next.
“Wow. Christians sure got worked up on social media today. You been following it?”
It’s a message from a fellow pastor. It reads, “Wow. Christians sure got worked up on social media today. You been following it?”
I haven’t. I’ve been doing church work. Administrative duties leave bits of me all over the place like a deck of cards after the game 52 Pick-Up. Still scattered, I open a few apps to see what all the fuss is about. As I do, I silently wonder what’s kicked the holy hornet’s today. Lord knows there’s much in this world that should ignite righteous anger.
I’m hoping it’s something to do with the murder of Sonya Massey and the continued violence broken across Black and brown bodies in these here United States.
I’m hoping it has something to do with police brutality and how, as of today, 763 people have been killed by those in law enforcement.
I hope to read about a peace-passing coalition of Christians living out the old hymn verse, “Ain’t gonna study war no more.” Finally united and calling out the atrocities seen in the Middle East, in African countries like Mali and Senegal, in Asia’s Myanmar, and the occupation of Ukraine and several other European countries by Russian Armed Forces. With all the border concerns the United States has, perhaps it’s the continued conflict for our neighbors in Mexico that has people ready to dismantle worldwide wars.
Or maybe it’s another mass shooting. The political violence early this month in Butler, Pa., has hit a nerve, and Christians are marching arm in arm to lay down firearms so they can be beaten into plowshares.
Could it be that faith leaders like Robert Jeffress, Pastor Joel Osteen and Rick Warren have come together to say the 41% of LGBTQ youth who are contemplating suicide is an affront against the gospel of the lowly carpenter from Galilee? And now, they will work tirelessly to bring communities like Saddleback and First Baptist Dallas into queer safe spaces.
“I silently wonder what’s kicked the holy hornet’s today.”
Or could it be the continuous exploitation of Appalachia that got them fired up. Did the new GOP vice presidential candidate take a special trip to the coal fields of West Virginia or Kentucky and recite his elegy to a captivated crowd? Promising them representation and unionization is returning.
Did enough Social Gospel upholders organize in front of Sallie Mae, Aid Advantage and the U.S. Department of Education buildings shouting for the forgiveness of student loan debt? Calling it for what it is; an unethical government-sanctioned payday loan scam?
Did hopeful Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris run a campaign ad calling for prison reform? Did she call on her faith tradition to be the reason for breaking down jail walls and setting the captives free?
Could it have been something related to injustices in securing fair housing? Was it the beyond-repairable capitalism-driven medical care system that sparked the fire?
Did enough Mainline denominational leaders come together for the love of God to give folks in Flynt, Mich., clean drinking water? Did evangelicals pull their resources to sort out the same issue in Jackson, Miss.?
Did I somehow miss the AP News reporting on the diminishing rights of women in this country? Was the last straw a bill purposing male spouses approve their credit card requests?
Was it the words of another, like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, championing the call for Christian nationalism? Did the spiritual descendants of Roger Williams, Isaac Backus and John Leland cry out along with every stone across the land?
“No, it’s got to be this one,” I say to myself as I read where would-be king and former president Donald Trump promises a group of conservative Christians they “won’t have to vote anymore” if he gets back in office. This has to be the straw breaking the camel’s back of democracy. But I’m wrong.
“It is Christians of this country, and dare I say the world, that needs to issue an apology.”
Christendom is imploding over the opening ceremonies of the 2024 Paris Olympics. Calling it a mockery and demanding apologies.
There’s not enough water in the Pool of Bethesda or bourbon in the Bluegrass state to get me to swallow that all of Christendom is simply unaware of ancient pagan gods and traditions. No, I think the offense rests more in the possibility that Jesus ever would choose to sup with such a diverse group of drag and rag-taggy saints.
I send my colleague a reply, a smiley face with a tear emoji, and put my phone down.
Finishing my last sip of spirits, I set the glass down, already waiting for a time when the church will call war, violence, injustice, discrimination, capital punishment, exploitation and exclusion of any and all made in the image of God a “mockery” to the gospel.
And because it hasn’t, I say it is Christendom masking itself as God’s kin-dom that is the true mockery. It is Christians of this country, and dare I say the world, that needs to issue an apology.
My hope is that one brave day, they and I will.
And on that day, I’ll have a whole new appreciation for Merle’s “Today I Started Loving You Again.”
Maybe those hurt by the steeples will too.
Justin Cox received his theological education from Campbell University and Wake Forest University School of Divinity. He is an ordained minister affiliated with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and enrolled in the doctor of ministry program at McAfee School of Theology. When not spending time with his spouse and daughters, he can be found writing and baking late into the night. He currently resides in New England with his family. His thoughts and reflections are his own.
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