A classic Easter morning story from the memory of our buddy in Oklahoma, Paden Cash
There's nothing more inspiring to a small flock of Christian worshipers than Easter Sunday (pronounced Sun' dee) services held in the great outdoors. Other than the Christmas program this was THE big event of the year at the Pilgrim Congregational Church where us Cash boys learned our Holy Reverence.
I'm not sure of the attendance. In our sanctuary, on the wall to the right of the pulpit, hung the official scoreboard that told, among other things, of total members and how many showed up last week. As a small child I realized it was all hype though; the numbers never changed. I remember counting thirty something heads one Sunday. The next Sunday the scoreboard still proudly proclaimed 110 in attendance. I just assumed the remaining attended in spirit only.
But attending Easter Sunday was compulsory. It was such a big deal that the Saturday before all the men folk would show up to dig all the folding chairs out of the basement. This also required a bit of repair and oil for most of the chairs that hadn't been out since Christmas. And like all good Christians that survived the Great Depression chairs beyond repair were salvaged for good parts to keep the flock comfortable. After the big outdoor service we all would put on a pot-luck feed bag with a buffet line set up under the port by the side door. It was always a grand affair. Momma Cash loved it because she not only didn't have to cook on Easter Sunday, she didn't have to wash dishes either.
The outdoor services were held on the north side of the church with the chairs facing the traditional east. The north side of the church was a gradual slope down to an old 20 x 20 wooden by a creek we called "the annex". The annex was usually used for Boy Scout and CYF meetings and it also housed all the softball team's gear...and it was the bone yard for all the salvage folding chairs and tables. Sometimes the ground was a little soft for folding chairs and over the years the chairs migrated closer to the parking lot. But one thing that never changed was the "grand finale" at noon on Easter Sunday: "Christ The Lord Has Risen" being the last hymn (number 302 in your hymnal) as a 10' 4 x 4 wooden cross (painted in the finest gold paint to be had at the Otasco store) was raised by a few gents from laying on the ground and slipped into a permanent pipe base buried in the ground. As the congregation sang (all six verses because of the gravity of the day) folks would single file to the erected cross as our makeshift Calvary and toss their obligatory offerings into a brass offering plate at the base of the cross. As a child the significance of the worship escaped me, but it did signal that chow was fixing to occur.
And as it had happened for all the Easter Sundays of my life; Reverend Bradshaw began the hymn in slightly flat song and gave the signal for the "resurrection of the cross". As we sang our hearts the few elders assigned the task did so with a military precision reverence. But this one time it didn't go so well....
As the elders hoisted the cross there was one man that was in charge of centering the base so the cross could slip easily into the pipe as the other gents lowered it carefully. I remember watching the man in charge of centering stand up immediately, turn to run like he was on fire, and then immediately drop to the ground and begin thrashing around. The two "amen" widows that always sat on the front row were convinced the Holy Spirit had taken hold of him. The men holding the cross weren't so much convinced of the Holy Spirit as they were there was a nest of hornets that had occupied the buried pipe over the last year.
Reverend Bradshaw attempted to protect his flock in a manner of which Moses would have been proud. His volume doubled and he smiled as he spread his arms and waved to direct us all away from the horrible entomological carnage that was occurring at the cross. His smile turned to horror as he started swinging his bible to swat at the attacking hornets. Chaos ensued.
I'm not saying that your run of the mill Christian is an inherently 'starchy' individual. What I will say is nobody ever comes dressed to Easter service prepared to run for their lives. Old women with heels on soft ground is a formula for disaster. Old men will symbolically attempt to help their women folk until they themselves fall prey. Most of the men made it to safety a few yards ahead of their spouses, eagerly waving them on to "hurry". Momma Cash was lucky enough to get Pops to wake up and herded all her brood, including your truly, to the safety of the parking lot.
It was a horror eclipsed only by the sinking of the Titanic or possibly the final moments as the flaming Hindenburg settled to the ground in New Jersey. Oh, the humanity...I remember people will scream and howl with a lot more passion from a stinging hornet than singing a hymn.
Someone quickly made it to the mower shed by the annex and retrieved the jug of Malathion. It was soon determined there was no time to fill the galvanized sprayer. Men were volunteering for kamikaze duty to douse the nest with insecticide from the available Dixie cups. They really were the true heroes.
In good prairie settler fashion the women folk quickly made a makeshift triage in the basement of the church where our social meals were usually held. Everyone with bites and injuries were being seen to and doctored. Luckily there were no fatalities. Reverend Bradshaw (and quite a few others) looked like they had been in a bar fight. And the young folks were given the task of ferrying the foil covered dishes of chow down to the basement so we could eventually enjoy our communal meal in relative safety. And although the basement was a bit stuffy that time of year, we all eventually sat down for our Easter meal.
With a swollen face Reverend Bradshaw got us all to bow our heads and thank the good Lord above for not only the good fellowship and groceries, but for delivering us all from the swift retribution that boiled forth from the bowels of hell in an attempt to destroy our Holy worship. He made the point the devil lost this one and the righteous prevailed. Preachers are good with picking up on those things.
On the way home Pops made the point that sitting too close to the front of the congregation could be dangerous. He dropped back a few rows every Sunday after that.
