Praise God?

Earlier this week I went to church and had some car work done in one fell swoop.

It’s not that the church has a mechanic on duty, but that the car dealer has a chapel on the premises.

The dealer is Harrold Ford, in Sacramento.  The chapel is in the new car showroom and consists of a customer waiting area in which sits an altar of a large-screen television.  And on the screen was Jimmy Swaggart.

So much to say about Jimmy Swaggart.  Octogenarian, musician, evangelist, cousin of Jerry Lee Lewis and Mickey Gilley.  Owns and operates the SonLife Broadcasting Network over which his televangelism is broadcast nonstop internationally.  Based in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, he operates Jimmy Swaggart Ministries and the Family Worship Center, the latter a nondenominational Pentecostal church that can seat 15,500 worshippers (read contributors).  He had a zipper problem in the late 1980s and was caught twice with prostitutes but has rebounded and today his net worth is probably somewhere in seven figures, anybody’s guess.

I watch Jimmy Swaggart at home sometimes.  The standout professionalism of his musicians impresses me, and I am intrigued by the draw of religious fervor.  Captivated would be a better word than intrigued. I guess it’s the skeptic in me, but I just don’t get it. 

The religious service in the Ford showroom was pure Swaggart.  The crowd in the Family Worship Center was mostly middle-aged, a mixture of whites and blacks. They clapped. They raised their hands toward the heaven they believe in.  Tears streamed down the faces of some.  They sang, swayed, and some periodically let out a loud “hallelujah” or “praise God.”

Swaggart played the piano, his fingers gliding easily over the keys.  He sang, his rich baritone telling a favorite hymn.  He is without a doubt a fine musician.  A small band accompanied him, and backup singers provided vocals.  A choir sang and swayed behind him. The music wasn’t modern Christian rock but reminiscent of old-time spirituals.  Off to one side of the screen a tote board showed how many millions of dollars had been collected during the current drive and how many millions to go to reach the goal.  Through it all, Swaggart would occasionally get up from the piano to prowl the stage proclaiming “Amen!” and “Praise God!”

And he sells Bibles.  During breaks in televised services and on other programs he hounds people to buy any one of several editions of the Bible, including a special edition just for women.

I may watch this at home, but at home I’m a volunteer, and I change the channel after ten or fifteen minutes; here I was part of a captive audience. There was a lot of praising God on the screen, but none from the customers:  We were trapped.  The man next to me went and asked a salesman if we could have a different channel selected and was told no; the channel could not be changed.  So we were trapped for a short time, but employees were trapped for the entire day.

I went looking for somewhere else to sit.  The service manager saw me and asked what I wanted.  When I told him, he said there was seating in the sales room.  “Yeah,” I answered, “and so is nonstop Jimmy Swaggart.”  I was not in my best mood.

I went back to the chapel.  Most seats had emptied out.  Customers were standing outside by the entrance or seated on the steps.  I went to the reception area.  No one was working there, so I took a chair at an empty desk.

And there I saw it—a pen left on the desk, a pen with the inscription “Bayside Church.”  The Bayside Church is a megachurch near Sacramento and has an average weekly attendance of 11,000.  The Bayside Church has also spawned smaller versions of itself in and around Sacramento, so I suppose you could get a franchise and open your own Bayside Church.

Any link here?  Any connection between Jimmy Swaggart Ministries and the Bayside Church?  Are megachurches conspiring to unite and take over a Ford dealer?  The whole company?  Could this have happened already?

I was thinking dark thoughts when I got the word that my car was ready.  I had left it for an inspection of the rear suspension.  The inspection took well over an hour and turned up no problems; the dealer didn’t charge me for the work.  Maybe my growling to the service manager about “nonstop Jimmy Swaggart” paid off.   Regardless, I was in no mood to Praise God.

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