CHAPTER 138. A CHRISTIAN AGE BEGINS. 1975 - 1977
Just to review where we were at this time in our lives. We had lost our seventh baby due to a weakness in my wife’s cervix. She could not hold the fetus in place beyond 5 months. Four of the losses came in the fourth month, just short of that deadline; three were born after five months had been reached. If before the five months they were classified as miscarriages; after as still births. Although these three lived briefly after being born it wasn’t for long. . If these early births had occurred in our present day most, if not all, would have probably survived. That is how far birth science has progressed. This was not the situation in the 1960s and 1970s. The doctors concluded my wife would not and could not ever carry a baby to a point of viability and warned against any future pregnancy. My wife claimed she had now complied and had her tubes tied after she lost the seventh child, a girl we called Amy.
After we lost the seventh baby, my wife sank into a debilitating depression and in desperation we did what we had avoided for nearly a decade. We entered a church. Its name was Laurel Hill Bible Church, a spanking new construction along Blackwood-Clementon Road just down the road from our apartment.
Although the building and location were new, the Pastor and Congregation were not. They had simply outgrew their old building called Laurel Springs Church (right). How strangely coincidental wasn’t it? Here was this Atheist, whose wife had lost seven babies, who suddenly accepted that a God might exist because he listened to the heart beat of a last doomed child, but still needed something further to complete that message. It is odd, is it not, that in Biblical numerology the number 7 stands for completeness. This last loss completed a phase of our lives and the lost of any more babies.
church scared me to death because it read, “Fundamentalist”, nothing untoward happened, no weird behavior, no people slammed a Bible over my head, nothing except friendliness and a invite to come again.
Come again we did. We came the next Sunday and the next. On that third visit the Pastor, Fred Diven preached from James 5, 15-18.
And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.
I was caught by the words I was hearing. It seemed as if Pastor Diven was speaking directly to me, everything he said was my life up until that moment. At the end of the service he stated anyone who wanted prayer should raise their hand. I raised my hand. What could it hurt? They did an alter call almost every Sunday and did so that day as well, but I wasn’t making that trip out in front of everyone. We were all supposed to have our eyes closed, but maybe someone was peaking. I often did.
But his message of redemption and salvation stayed with me. Having been brought up by hook or crook against my will in the Methodist Church, before it turned too liberal, I did know the basic procedure and something of the Sinner’s Prayer. That Tuesday I knelt down next to my desk where I wrote and stumbled through my version of it.
didn’t burst out in song, nothing like that. That mysterious cross did not appear again on any of my walls. I think the first thing I did was follow an urge and toss all the pornographic magazines I tucked about the apartment into the trash. Well, that’s no big deal. It is the kind of thing many do when they believe that they had an epiphany about something, one of those spur of the moment actions in a burst of
enthusiasm, like a smoker crushing his cigarettes or an alcoholic pouring her cooking sherry into the toilet. How could I be sure I wouldn’t be running to the nearest adult bookstore by Thursday.
I did feel different. I felt light as if some burden had been taken off me, but what really convinced me of real change was when I dug a Bible off the bookshelf. I hadn’t done that much in recent years, the top of the thing was pretty dusty. I sat down and read at random and that was when I noticed something. I had read Bible passages many times in my life and most of them made very little sense to me. Now a sudden I could understand what I read. And amazingly, it was interesting. The more I read the Bible, the more it made logical sense, and the more I wanted to read.
We began being church mice; that is, we were attending other
than just Sunday morning. We were going to the the Sunday evening service and the Wednesday Night Bible Study and Prayer Meeting. I noticed as we did that my wife was coming out of her depression, she was becoming human again. We also began to make friends with people at Laurel Hill. A couple we began socializing with was Rick and Mary Lee
Webber. I had begun bonding with Rick through shared ministries we were involved in, especially the sound and sight controls for services. I had been in Audio-Visual Club in Junior High School so it seemed an area they had a need that I could fill.
Rick was already involved in this activity and now we worked together. We sat in a small booth at the top and rear of the balcony and ran all the sound equipment, projectors, etc. during services. We didn’t work every Sunday, we shared duties with a few others so no one was stuck doing it every week; however, Rick (left) and I sort of became the chief operators and we generally did any special services as well as every third Sunday.
Being together a lot in that little booth we became quick friends and soon he and his wife, Mary Lee Webber (right), and we would visit each other.
Rick and Mary Lee were very active, perhaps a bit too much.
Their children were growing up in the church quite literally. They were at the building so often the sanctuary was a playground to the kids. There is a saying sometimes bandied about in the church community, “So Heavenly minded you’re no earthly good”. Sometimes we forget that serving God may actually entail a bit less serving the building and a bit more exampling the faith.
I was certainly in danger of this. I was quickly into all sorts of ministry, even though I was a new Christian and needed more guidance than being a guide, but like many a new convert in anything my enthusiasm was unbounded. On Sundays when I wasn’t manning the audio-visual booth, I was Ushering. Then before one could blink I became an active member of the Visitation Team, going out on Tuesday evening to the home of anyone who dropped a visitor card in the collection plate. Lois and I also joined the Adult Fellowship almost immediately. Despite being new members of Laurel Hill and having accept Christ as my Savior only in September, Lois and I were elected the Leaders of the Adult Fellowship (left) by that December.
Things got even more active in 1976. I assisted as a leader for Boy’s Brigade, a Christian organization patterned after the Cub Scouts. I taught Bible School that summer. If I wasn’t at work, I was at the church doing something.
Bill Bright’s Campus Crusade for Christ launched a nationwide campaign called “I Found It”. I became the Publicity Coordinator for the South Jersey area. I was training people, making speeches, meeting with media and ministers. I was at a phone bank along Philadelphia’s City Line Avenue making calls. At one point I was on the street making cold home visits in neighborhoods and delivering the Gospel message. It was an intense and busy time. We handed out small booklets called “Have You Heard of the Four Spiritual Laws:
Law one: God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life
Law two: Man is sinful and separated from God. Therefore, he can not know and experience God’s love and plan for his life
Law three: Jesus Christ is God’s ONLY provision for man’s sin. Through Him you can know and experience God’s love and plan for your life
Law Four: We must individually receive Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, then we can know and experience God’s love and plan for our life
Lois and I also attended the week long seminar at the Philadelphia
Convention Center of Bill Gothard’s Institute in Basic Youth Conflicts Seminar. In fact, we attended two years in a row.
Before the year was out we
became youth ministers for Laurel Hill’s chapter of Word of Life Bible Clubs. With two other married couples, we planned, designed and ran the meetings of the junior high aged kids in our church. This was almost a full time job in itself and Lois was never really happy doing it, but did it because she knew how much I wanted to. In the photo we stand in the rear next to another couple on our team, The Ditmans. One of the other leaders, Bruce Gardner, is on the far right. I think Bruce’s wife took the picture. We were doing a Christian Service of cleaning car windows, thus the paper towels.
Thirteen to fifteen year olds can be a rough bunch to deal with,
I’m sure most junior high school teachers will tell you that. To herd them together more at the insistence of their parents than themselves for some Bible lessons and goody-two-shoes talk is a challenge. I found it interesting, probably harking back to my teen years in MYF. I wasn’t afraid to challenge them to think more than lecture on dos and don’ts.
I had quite a record collection by then, all kinds of music. Pastor Diven and others were trying to urge youth to destroy their Rock records, but I thought it would be better to utilize them for lessons. We sat about and analyzed the lyrics, broke down what the subject was and how it was presented. Better to understand what was being aimed at you then just be told it was evil.
In 1976 I wrote a long piece called “Words of Life”, which combined Bible passages with hymns. Every kid in the club had a part in the play and we took it on the road, performing at other churches and in Nursing Homes (generally referred to in those days as “Old Folks’ Homes”).
I sometimes wrote short plays for our meetings.
PREACHER: Come on. I heard you say you wish you could fly away/
(The curtain closes behind them and the stage is darkened while two chairs are placed down stage center. When the lights come back up, TOM and the PREACHER are in these seats as if they were flying an airplane.)
TOM: (Looking nervous.) How can you fly? It’s so overcast can’t even see the airport lights.
PREACHER: Relax. I’m flying by instruments.
TOM: Hey! We’re dipping!
PREACHER: No, we’re flying level.
TOM: We’re going down! Do something! Pull us up!
PREACHER: Tom, what you’re experiencing is called vertigo. You’re letting feelings rule the facts. Pilot’s that do that end up crashing. Look here. See these instruments? This is my bank and turn indicator. It tells me which way and how fast I make a turn. Here is my artificial horizon. It gives me my relationship to earth. And this is my directional gyro, which shows me the course. I can see we are flying straight and level, but with no outside perspective you feel as if you were falling. See, you can’t trust your feelings. The same is true in spiritual matters. Don’t listen to Satan or anyone else. Turn to your instrument panel, the Bible, for the facts. Then you will fly straight.
(Exit TOM and the PREACHER. Enter LEADER, who stands at the lectern.)
LEADER: Like TOM in the play, you may have doubts. Old Satan steps in and disarms you, and you crash. A doubting dizzy Christian is worth more to Satan than a dozen drunkards. When the Lord saves you, it’s forever. Done. Complete. You get reborn, you can’t be unborn. No man can pluck you from Jesus’ hand. You will still sin. But when you do, confess it to the Lord and he’ll forgive and forget. He promised.
Except from a short play, So You Got Saved Last Night (1977)
originally staged at the Laurel Hill Bible Church, Laurel Springs, N. J.,
January 19, 1977 at 7:30 PM.
Written and directed by Larry E. Meredith
In between weekly meetings we did either social fellowships, such as going horseback riding, or Christian Service. One Christian Service we did was go to the nearby strip malls and wash car windows in the parking lot. We would place a tract under the
wipers. If a car owner appeared we explained what we were doing and tell them, we weren’t raising funds. If they tried to give us any money, we would refuse it and simply ask they read the tract.
One of the weekly challenges we gave was when in school that
week to tell their classmates they were a Christian. We didn’t ask them to go into any long spiel, just to tell other kids they were Christian and see where that led. Part of this was to get them over any fear of presenting their belief publicly. Of course, anything we assigned to the kids, we leaders had to do. Therefore we had to tell our fellow workers we were Christians. I met with no problem from anyone I told. Some asked some questions, most just accepted it matter of fact; however, after that I found when someone in the office was struggling with life difficulties, they would come and ask to talk with me. The kids reported back with kind of the same experience. This was in the mid 1970s; I am not sure what would have happened if the same assignment was given today. The kids would have probably been reprimanded for such religious activity within their schools.
This was our life then, working and going to church.
We quickly lost some of our old friends, especially the Stones. We had tried continuing getting together, but they felt we had changed too much, we were now too boring and we just stopped seeing each other. Bill died a few years ago, I do not know where Grace is today assuming she is still alive. Bill had been ten years older than Grace, Lois and I. If he were alive he’d be 89 now.
The Pastor was Dr. Frederick C. Diven and his wife was JoyMundell Diven. They had two children, Gwen Olivia and a son Douglas. Dr. Diven died July 28, 2017 in Sebastian, Florida from myasthenia graves complications. He was 82 years old. His wife preceded him in death.
His wife was very quiet and receded into the background. Her name was Joy, but it wasn’t an emotion she displayed very often. Joy was never really joyful. She was somewhat mousy and a nervous woman. Joy Louise Diven died in February 17, of 2015 at the age of 81.
The photo was taken late in Pastor Diven’s life. I remember him from when he was in his early 40s. We didn’t socialize with Pastor Diven, he was not the socializing type. Frankly, he was rather oft-putting. He was somewhat prideful, although sometimes in laughable ways. He wore a cheap toupee and dressed often in a green leisure suit on Sundays, one of those outfits with the oversized lapels. He had grand schemes for Laurel Hill, none of which materialized, at least while we were there. One was a desire to open a Christian school, a strange desire since he really was uncomfortable with the kids attending Word of Life events in the church, fearful constantly of their scuffing up the floors or breaking something.
He also had a strong desire to become a radio evangelist.
Frederick Diven was a dour man, stand offish, not at all likable as his brother-in-law, Pastor Raymond Van der veer, who was married to Joy’s sister Pearl. Pearl was very outgoing and down to earth, she and
Lois bonded and wrote each other until Pearl’s death. Pearl died on February 28, 2015 in Stratford, NJ. She was 91 years old Her husband, Reverend Raymond Van der veer died at the age of 77, on September 14, 2001. Pearl and Ray ran the Cedar Lane Missionary homes when Lois and I befriends them in 1975. Previously they had together founded Bible Baptist Church in Claymont, Delaware. Pastor Diven’ wife’s Joy’s sister, Pearl, is the one who should have had the name of Joy. She and her husband, Reverend Raymond Van der veer were both joyful people. Lois and Pearl became friends and for many after those years they still wrote to each other. Pearl passed away in 1917.
Ray and Pearl during the 1970s directed the Cedar Lane Missionary Homes, located just behind Laurel Hill. These were cottages where missionaries would come to from off the mission field at times and stay. They also retired to Florida and it was there that Ray died, after which Pearl moved to New Jersey. Pearl never liked Florida and she moved back to live with their daughter Gwen.
It is a small world, for Ray and Pearl often spoke with fondness, and some wistfulness, about a church they had started and Pastored in Claymont Delaware called Bible Baptist. They had begun it in an abandoned movie theater and finally been able to build a proper church (left). It was called Bible Baptist and would play a role in my life some years later.
We also became friends with Rusty and Beth Van der veer (right),
who were closer to our age. Rusty was Ray and Pearl’s son. At one point Rusty and I began writing a play we titled, A Little Fuss. The concept was how the Passion Week would be covered if the media of 1976 existed then.
(A Street in Bethany during Tuesday evening.)
(CLAY ADAMS enters, looking at the houses.)
(ADAMS is a reporter. He is middle-aged, hardened, cynical, and at the moment, dusty.)
(Another MAN enters the street from the other direction.)
CLAY
Excuse me, sir.
MAN
Uh?
CLAY
Excuse me, but could you tell me where to find Simon the Leper’s house.
MAN
(Suspiciously.)
You one of his?
CLAY
Whose?
MAN
That Nazarene, Jesu barJoseph.
CLAY
Never met the man. But I am looking for him. I was told I’d find him at Simon the Leper’s tonight.
MAN
(Pointing.)
That house. Eating with lepers and sinners. One don’t kill him, the other might. Listen, don’t go falling for any of his talk. I hear he’s a fancy talker.
CLAY
You never heard him yourself?
MAN
Never heard him. Never seen him. Never want to. Nothing good ever came out of Nazareth
.(Whispers.)
I hear rumors, though. I hear he’s illegitimate.
CLAY
May I quote you?
MAN
Say what? Quote me? To who?
CLAY
My names Clay Adams. I’m a reporter for the Times. We heard there was a little fuss in Jerusalem last Sunday. I was sent down to check out the story, if there is one.
MAN
You can quote this: those people in Jerusalem were fools. They
think he’s some kind of king. Well, I say he’s the son of a whore and should be put away before trouble starts for us all. He’ll come to a bad end, mark my words.
Excerpt from the Play,A Little Fuzz (1977)
By Larry Eugene Meredith & Rusty Van der veer
Pine Hill, N.J.
Unfortunately we never finished it. We also collaborated on a story called, “Monster of Little Big Bridge”, but we didn’t finish that work either.
Abderrahim and Lennie Biad. They were missionaries stateside on furlough and staying at Cedar Lane. He was from Morocco, a country he could not return to because he had a price on his head for preaching Christ. They were in the states raising support to return to the mission field, which would be to the Muslim population in Paris. They did eventually go to France, but I don’t know their fate after they left New Jersey.
All our new friends weren’t directly connected to churches or missions. For instance we befriended the Bob McFalls, (left with his family) who was a Special Agent of the FBI, even if he didn’t look like Hollywood’s version of an FBI Agent.
Our life in the mid 1970s was
far from what it had been when the decade started. The porno magazines had all been replaced by Christian books and my record collection now had such artists as Jimmy Swaggart, The Harbor Lights, Honeytree (Nancy Heniggbaum - right), Bill Gaither Trio, Tony Valenti and other Christian singers then popular. My car radio was preset on WVCH, a Christian station out of Chester, Pennsylvania that broadcast such shows as Chuck Swindoll and Oliver B. Green, or Harold Camping’s (left) Family Radio. This was many years before Camping got into predicting the date the world
would end. He was a fairly respected Christian commentator back then. He fell into disgrace after predicting the Second coming of Christ. Camping had strayed from Scripture in his later years and he had predicted the Second Coming would be about September 6, 1994. When it didn’t happen he changed the date to May 21, 2011. Many people believed him and they lost everything when it didn’t happen. In October 2011 he retired from actively preaching on radio. He died in Alameda, CA. on
December 15, 2013 at the age of 92.
My life was busy and happy, actually, but I was definitely into too much too early as a new Christian. Something would soon change all this over involvement and that something was indeed a miracle.
No comments:
Post a Comment