Holiness or Hell

I have a memory that may be half fiction. This much is true: I was in a Wal-Mart with my father during the Seventies. This was back when Wal-Mart was more of a regional chain. I remember seeing a blacklight poster of a devil with a pitchfork, in what I presume to be Hell. I was there with my father, and was probably six or seven years old—I gauge this by remembering where the store was located at the time in our little town, since I do remember the building, and that the Wal-Mart moved to a much larger location in the early 80s, that this must have been the late 70s.

The possibly fictional part---I recall my father pointing to the poster and saying, “That’s where you’ll go if you’re bad.” This isn’t too unlike my father, who occasionally took great joy in frightening us as children, but it seems a bit out there for him, so probably not. Hell was something I spent a great deal of time thinking about as a child. I was raised in the Pentecostal church, and Hell was a great motivator. Pentecostals were, as a group, far more interested in the stick than in the carrot, and especially in the idea that said stick would be applied to those who believed differently. I think the idea of love and the hope of Heaven seemed meaningless compared to the relish of non-believers roasting for all Eternity. It was a hard faith in which to grow up.

Baptists had it relatively easy in comparison. We found their theology questionable since they believed in “once saved, always saved.” We believed you could live a Christian life, say “Oh Shit” before dying in a car accident and end up in “the Devil’s Hell,’ as our pastor often called it. Being saved wasn’t really enough either, it was important to “get the Holy Ghost,” and to start speaking in tongues. It wasn’t required, but strongly encouraged, and you were considered spiritually immature and weak if you didn’t get it. Almost all of my family members who attended the church had “gotten it.” When I was around 11 or 12, it seemed like there was somewhat more pressure for those of us in junior high to “get the Spirit.” One summer, my cousin and I went to church camp for a week. That was my first attempt at it….

The camp was terrible, and looking back I see a lot of similarities in what people say about cults when they try to break people down. Instead of normal outdoor activities, we were in church sessions almost all day, so it was like non stop church. They gave us a break during the afternoon where we would just hang out in our bunks, then after dinner we’d be back to church. Eventually, you got worn down, and towards the last couple of nights there was a push to try to get all the kids to get the Holy Ghost. We sang and stood for what seemed like a long time. I had my eyes closed, praying. One of the counselors came up to me and said, “Raise your arms and listen to Jesus!” The pastor at one point tapped my head like he was trying to dislodge the contents of a stubborn bottle of ketchup and commanded me to speak in tongues. Nothing was working. I eventually tired and was lowered to the floor.

I was there for what felt like hours, though it most likely just seemed that way. I tried repeating things I’d heard, I tried praying, I tried everything, but nothing seemed to work and I wasn’t acting or feeling anything like what I’d seen from my fellow campers, not to mention what I routinely saw at my own church on Sunday night. Back home, people routinely spoke in tongues, occasionally interpreted the uttering of others, jumped pews, and ran laps around the sanctuary. As we went home from camp, I figured something must have been wrong with me.