Positively Fouth Street

The verbalized thought of dismissal had barely cleared the overcharged synapses of my simmering brain, when I spontaneously emptied everything from my pockets and headed Uptown, saying to everyone I met, "Jesus is coming!" without understanding why I was doing it. I wasn't confused beyond my norm, particularly: just contentedly blank, willing to go with the flow; and that was good enough for me.

When I reached Central Park, I thought I might follow bicycle trails I had walked before; but the City had begun excavations to lay new sewage pipes down the center of my known paths, and they were blocked off. Just a little perplexed, and not knowing what else to do, I headed back Downtown by the West Side Docks, a new experience. A day tripper way out of his element as night approached, I worried that I needed help at one point; and I imagined that an angel came to walk beside me. One of the passers-by must have seen it there; for he jumped out of my way as though repelled by a magnetic charge. He was street-hip, no doubt.

I think it occurred to me that it was distinctly possible that things were now, somehow, somewhat different! I wandered around for a day or so in this deliberation, walking through familiar routines without my usual dissatisfaction, until I found myself in front of a big, imposing church. Upon arriving there, something in me stopped! I can't really say that I stopped. Not knowing why, I stood there foolishly, waiting a noticeable moment for I knew not what with some conscious unease. A tiny voice said, "Go in and wait." I did.

Inside, I it dawned on me that I was inside a church without having been forced to go there, and that I believed that I was actually supposed to be there! I had no idea why, beyond what survived of my instruction as a child. I figured I might as well pray, or something, while waiting. I did my best. When closing time came, two men approached and said, "You'll have to leave, now; we're closing the doors for the night." They were surprisingly respectful, sounding a lot like funeral directors. "He told me to wait here!" I protested. It was, as I considered the problem, rather nice to have a place to sit.

"Oh! He did, did he!?" they sneered. All pleasantries aside, they picked me up (one burly man grabbing each arm), yanked me out of the pew, and literally threw me back into the street. At last I was certain that what was happening to me was some kind of religious experience (John 16:2)! Remarkable, the verses that stick in the minds of those who have made no serious attempt to study scripture. Bless those men, I deserved it: I was still stoned (2 Sam. 7:14).

About a thousand mindless exclamations later, I concluded that I had probably received the Holy Spirit [I wasn't altogether sure, as I thought water baptism came first, or something (Acts 10 would have helped a lot)] and that I had better get myself to a real church somewhere to find out what ought to be done! After a few more days' lollygagging and marijuana smoking, I decided to head home-- well, that's where I intended to go; but where I actually went was to the city of my natural birth and to the church of a natural parent.

After settling in with relatives for an extended stay while I figured out what I was to do, I decided to go to a revival meeting and to obey whatever those in charge said I should do, no matter how difficult. Sneaking into what I considered to be their "Sin-a-Gog," I sat down in an inconspicuous place. The family was pleased to see me. As the singing began, it sounded more pleasant than I remembered. I was nearly ready to enjoy myself-- my still-stoned self-- when a Great Force literally yanked me out of the pew . . . (Here I go, again! But this time, I was being thrown back into the street without hands: nobody ever told me about Leviticus 10:9, and I hadn't read it!) . . . and sent me on my way.

The church followed me out, after no small confusion. I don't know how they found me; but when they caught up, I was firmly seated on a three-legged stool in my grandpa's abandoned workshop, perched before a lighted candle I got from somewhere at some time that I remember not at all. The garage was, otherwise, utterly dark; and I must certainly have seemed demonic, a daring presence in the gloom that I had prepared as defense for when whatever was going to happen, did. So, there I was found sitting, in the single light of the candle, when the congregation caught up with me.

"Why don't you come to me where I am?" I pleaded. "Why must I first become pure, in order to be saved?" The concepts and doctrines I had learned from my youth taught me-- in part because of my naturally convoluted reasoning-- that salvation was rather like a pat on the back for "doing the right thing." Sitting there alone, before the judgment of ministers, family, and friends, I had yet to learn that salvation is an ongoing process, and that the trappings belonging to the sinner that I had so long been would accompany me for so many more long years to come as I traded them for new garments on the long path towards perfection. Ignorant of the process of salvation, I saw my unworthiness reflected in gaping eyes that ought to have regarded me as a brother, wretch though I was. Perhaps they did; for the disaster of the evening was shared by all.

Unprepared to grapple with my reality because of tradition, the family church had no choice but to begin casting out devils. No doubt I was wrestling with a few (Deut. 7:22), but my words of question to them came by the Holy Spirit; and the answer to those questions came little by little on a fantastic journey of thirteen years to my water baptism-- it's coming still today, truth be told, little by little! Baruch HaShem: Praise The Name of hwhy! Glory belongs to Father hy, to his Projection as the Word that rides the Holy Breath: unending majesty; because these are faces of the one hla. HaShem, he is la. The universe cannot contain him; nor can any words of definition we might contrive. All that we perceive of him is but the glory of the faces he chooses to reveal to us as he turns his countenance upon us. His countenance will turn until, at last, it shall shine enlighten the hearts of all men and women with his abundant Life.