“It’s Tybee Church,” Johnny O said for no apparent reason.
I looked at him as I took a sip of coffee. I’m never certain where these conversations are going to go. Once he called me just to tell me that he had soiled his pants in the parking lot of Chu’s convenient store. You get my point. Conversations with Johnny O are like roller coaster rides.
“You call it Bar Church,” he continued. “It’s Tybee Church.”
“Whatever,” I replied. “It’s church. It’s in a bar. It’s Bar Church.”
“It’s Tybee Church,’ he scolded.
I thought “Really? I’m being scolded by Johnny O?” The world is surely coming to an end. The moon’s closer to the earth than it’s been in 19 years. That was the last time the world was coming to an end.
“If you have 86 people there,” he continued, “you’ll beat my record by one.”
I thought back to my days as a professional Christian in Louisville at the Jefferson Street Baptist Chapel. I was always in hot water with the Baptists (which is another way of saying they are convinced that I’m going to hell on the express train) and the only reason that I never got fired was because my numbers were through the roof (or heaven bound as I told them). The entire time that I was at Jeff Street more people kept coming! It was a wild collection of little old ladies, homeless people, hookers, kids from the projects and radical Seminarians.
It was orgasmic!
Anyway I would stroll into the pulpit while Shannon Freeman played the dance music from “A Charlie Brown Christmas” and sit in the throne type chair that Southern Baptist ministers prefer. I would make certain that my socks were pulled up and wondered if I should shave my legs? Then knowing that I would be trouble for something that week, I would count the number of people who were there that day so that I could complete the form that the Baptist required me to complete each week.
How many came to Sunday School? How many came to Church? How many got saved? How many got Baptized? Did anybody dance? Did another Baptist see you in the liquor store?
You know stuff Baptists care about!
One morning I walked into the sanctuary to the throne seat and somebody had put a cartoon in it. Underneath drawings of sheep were the words “Jesus called us to count his sheep. Not to feed them.”
I busted out laughing in front of a room full of people which is not a bad way to start a worship service.
All of these images rushed through my head as Johnny O paid for his coffee and told me that he would see me at Tybee Church.
I shrugged my shoulders. Another image came to me from my days as a Professional Christian.
“Get up!” I would be commanded.
“No!” I would yell back.
“YOU HAVE TO GET UP!”
“I do not,” I’d bark with the pillow over my head.
“GET UP NOW!”
“Give me one good reason dammit!” I yelled with my eyes still shut.
“It’s Sunday and you’re the minister!”
“Oh yeah,” I’d said. Then I’d get up.
So I’m up and it’s Sunday and I’m preaching at Bar Church today.
Hmmmm!
I wonder if I’ll have any words?
It doesn’t matter. It’s Bar Church. It’s all good.
