Frankie on church
TW: religion/church
Sunday was church day. So was Friday (youth group), and Wednesday (bible studies) - but Sunday was the church day. In our nicest clothes we’d pile into our beat up work van, us older kids strapping ourselves into the non-regulation bench seat behind the cab. With our backs against the hot engine, we’d glance out the back and side windows, praying that our school friends didn’t catch a glimpse of the straps and zip ties holding the DIY seat in place. Sweating already, we’d park behind the converted storage warehouse in Miami and join the rest of the congregation marching up the back stairs to the atrium. Sleepy people were chatting with their bibles and styrofoam cups of tea in hand. Bio-dad got called away immediately. He had led the building team in designing and constructing the church, and today he was on the sound desk. Bio-mum dropped the toddler in the nursery and hurried off to fulfil her role as a ‘Worship Assistant’. The three older kids trudged upstairs to ‘kids church’. It was led by a husband and wife who wore bright purple shirts and wigs made of silver streamers. The explosion of colour and volume of kids and pop music hit hard at 9am.
It was competition day. After weeks of memorising the sixty-six bible book names, the children were about to be tested. Everyone stood up. As soon as we missed a name, we had to sit down. This would go on until only those who could repeat the sixty-six names perfectly still stood. I thought it’d be funny to get just the first one (“Genesis!”) and immediately regretted it as I sat staring at everyone’s backs, unease only lifting when more and more kids joined me in their seats. My older sister won. Emma collected her prize -a shiny new bible inscribed with the purple and gold church emblem.
At 11:30am adults would drink more tea and socialise until the roar of kids bugging them for lunch became too loud to ignore. Bio-dad was always packing away the sound equipment and getting pulled into the offices for one thing or another, which consistently made our family the last to leave. The sweaty car and Sunday traffic was only made bearable by the promise of a Junior Whopper with cheese. This Sunday post-morning service tradition was a wise motivator for patience after the barrage of wigs, sermons and waiting. Sunday afternoons were lazy, with the call to return to church for the evening service always coming too soon.
No kids church on Sunday evenings meant the 500 seat auditorium would be even more packed due to the sea of little heads punctuating the crowd. At least there was air con. It circulated the atmosphere carrying the music of Hillsong, our sister church. The Sunday night service began with praise and worship, followed by tithes and offerings. Baskets were handed down each row and bio-dad would give ten percent of our sole family wage from the church back to the church. Insanity.
Then came the sermon. Pastor Mike was an American preacher who had, like us, migrated to the Gold Coast to start the church. His booming voice hit the back row like he was a Military General. But I think Pastor Mike was actually more like a Ringmaster. He would intermittently bring the music down with a wave of his hand to share passages, anecdotes, and thoughts he felt we needed to hear. He’d wander through the crowd seeking testimony and be rewarded with tales of ‘god’s love’, shouts of ‘hallelujah!’ & ‘thank you jesus!’.
Inevitably, there would be prayer. Pastor Mike would lay his hands (ok just one hand, the other was holding the microphone) on the church member (who he would call the ‘brother’ or ‘sister’). He would pull the congregation along, starting soft then growing louder & louder until hitting a peak and forcefully pushing his palm into the crying persons’ chest. They would fall to the ground supported by the many hands of the people tailing Pastor Mike. The ‘Worship Assistants’ would be ready with purple and gold hemmed cotton to lay over them, ankle to neck -but only if they were a woman. By 9:00pm the aisles and the space between the front row and the stage were littered with the fallen, some bawling their eyes out, some being comforted by or praying with the pastoral team, others lay as still as if they were dead. I used to wonder if anyone was having a nap.
Pastor Mike would at some point return to his pulpit on the stage. It was time to recruit. ‘Is there anyone here, who feels the lord knockin’ on their heart, who wants to join our congregation and be covered in God’s love. Is there a person who is brave enough to open their heart to Jesus!?’. On a good night, three to five people, generally neighbours or friends of members of the church, would step up to the stage, gazing up as Pastor Mike descended the carpeted deep purple stairs. The pastoral team and ‘Worship Assistants’ would stand at the ready, dressed in black with a purple and gold scarf around their necks. Mike’s wife Randa, his adult son and daughter, and all the Bible College graduates would gather around these new members, placing their hands upon them and bowing their heads. All hands in the room would reach out, all five hundred adult heads bowed. Kids watched on or copied their parents. The huge band played a soothing, emotional melody, the lighting team sent purple and gold streams of light that hit the smoke machines at the perfect angle. The atmosphere was intoxicating. It was more than smoke and music. It was community. It was life-affirming. Tribal. It was the closest most of us had ever come to the magic of belonging.
Mike worked his way down the line. One at a time the new recruits fell to the ground, the ‘catchers’ (2-3 men wearing their stage blacks) were ready for them, carefully laying them in a row. The ‘worship assistants’ would again sweep in with their sheets already unfolded, tucking the women in like babies. These nights would sometimes go on for hours. The smaller kids slept, their parents making little nooks in corners using jackets and stray worship blankets. Older kids stayed in their seats, with their friends, or else followed the action around the auditorium. On these nights the music of the second act would transition from Hillsong to American gospel. Pastor Mike’s American influence had a way of permeating the Australian white middle class reserve. The beliefs he was spitting became more insistent & more urgent. People rose to their feet and clapped hard on the off-beat. They’d jump and do high fives with an invisible force. Kids stood on chairs to watch. The ‘holy ghost’ was starting to show itself… The sound desk clipped into the orange. More people fell, some shaking and writhing and speaking languages unknown to even themselves. Everything was peaking. Adults were in trances, some running circles around the auditorium with glazed eyes and limbs flailing. They probably didn’t even notice the swarms of giggling children racing them for fun. As a child in this room there was a choice; be afraid, or get into it.
This could go on for hours. The members with babies, early Monday mornings or who weren’t feeling ‘the spirit’ had left out the back door throughout the night. And those that were left behind now huddled in crying, swaying groups on the floor, or else sat in their chairs with hands over their hearts. The band was on the come down, playing a simple and sweet melody as Pastor Mike spoke. ‘Let us all remember god’s good work tonight. Let us all spread the word of his love, his greatness.’
