Mincey’s Musings
Year One, Week Sixteen

Don’t you love getting tickled in church? The worst times are those during an actual service when it would be most inappropriate to laugh; also, these are the times incidents seem funnier than they might otherwise.

But sometimes we get lucky and funny things happen in church when we can laugh and not be inappropriate. I hadn’t been driving long, and I still had my first car. It was a 1967 Chevrolet Impala that I inherited from my father. The car rode low on its springs, so roads with unexpected dips could be challenging. The car also seemed as long as a small bus, and I tried in those early days of driving to park it where it would be easiest to pull out for the ride home. My choice parking space at that time was at the edge of the parsonage driveway, directly under a cedar tree.

Richard Nixon once said his mother was a saint, but his could have been no saintlier than mine. There was one word she used, the four-letter “S” word, but Mother said that wasn’t a bad word because everybody did it.

My first car also had its idiosyncrasies, one of which was the passenger door was hard to open from inside. One Sunday morning I parked in my accustomed spot, and Pastor Bill Mitchell was walking from the parsonage to the back door of the church. It was summer, and the windows might have been lowered somewhat (who knows if the air conditioning was working on the car at that particular moment?). Mother was having trouble getting her door open, and she said aloud, “I can’t get this s----en door open!” I was horrified and said, “Mother, the preacher will hear you.” She replied, “Aw, he does it, too.”

Another Sunday morning as we entered the vestibule, we saw that the inside of the church had been renovated with new carpet, paint and paneled wainscoting. I said in admirable appreciation, “Mother, look at this finery!” Mother was not one who liked things changed; she thought it was perfectly fine the way it had always been, green paint and red carpet included. “She took one look and said, “Finery, S---!”

Sometimes the word was not said but alluded to. One Sunday evening we arrived early for Training Union. I parked in my accustomed spot, entered the back door and walked up the steps closest to the front entrance. Mother followed my path a short time later. Barbara Archer and Losie Miracle were sitting on the back bench on the right side of the sanctuary. Barbara told me to go to her car which was parked out front and get a dozen eggs to take home. I went out the front door of the church, got the eggs, walked to my car around back, and retraced my earlier path up the stairs to the sanctuary.

I could not but help notice the unmistakable flatulent odor, and it appeared the last person to have entered the church was my mother. I reentered the sanctuary, and Losie, Barbara, and Mother were sitting in back. I asked Barbara, “Were those eggs you gave me boiled?” Barbara replied, “No, they were fresh.” I looked at Mother in mock horror and said, “MOTHER, YOU DIDN’T!”

But of course she did. (Did you ever notice the resemblance of what country people politely call “poots” to the smell of boiled eggs?) We were all laughing so hard that when Preacher Mitchell himself came up those very steps and asked what was so funny, none of us were able to respond. Had he smelled what I smelt, I doubt he would have had to ask.

It’s amazing how it is so much easier to remember these things than it is what the preacher used as a text this past Sunday. Thankfully, I believe God himself has a sense of humor, and these are the memories that make life all the sweeter.

Next week I’ll share some of the times in actual church services when I needed a good laugh, but it would have been most inappropriate.