Preacher Wilson

Way back in the day when I was a kid, my family attended church on a regular basis.

Church back then was not like church today. For one thing, there were no mega churches. If you had over a hundred parishioners that showed up on a regular basis, you had a right nice sized congregation to brag about.

Secondly, you actually had to dress up to go to church. That meant that women and little girls actually wore dresses with stockings, and men and little boys wore a suit and tie. If you showed up in regular pants and shirt, then obviously you either weren't right or you were the devil himself.

I hated going to church....but not for the reasons you might think. (Keep in mind that I was a kid of anywhere from three to about eight during this time frame.)

Anyone who knows me well knows that I absolutely HATE getting dressed up for anything. Always have.

But the real reason I hated going to church was because of Preacher Wilson.

Let me give you a little background.

This was a Baptist church that I attended. I don't know if things have changed since then, but Preacher Wilson would scare the devil himself.

His sermons would start out simple enough. He would just start talking like he was carrying on a conversation with us.

Then he would start talking a little louder.

Then......it would happen.

His face would turn colors. His face was white...and as he preached (and spoke louder), his face turned pink.

Then he would work himself up into a frenzy yelling and pounding his fist into the pulpit and by this time his face would be crimson red. Even the top of his bald head would be red as a fire engine.

To this day I have no idea what any of those sermons were about. All I knew was that Preacher Wilson was mad as the dickens about something and whatever it was I didn't do it. All I wanted was to get the heck out of the church and away from Preacher Wilson.

Then eventually he'd cool down, lead us in a couple of hymns, say a prayer and say he hoped to see us next Sunday.

Then we'd go home to eat the roast and mashed potatoes that my mom had warming in the oven for us. Back then, there was this thing called Sunday dinner that everyone went home to eat after church.

Now here was the weird thing about Preacher Wilson.

Get him outside a church and he was a completely different person. (No, he didn't drink, smoke, or chase after women!) He didn't yell!

He made it a point to visit his flock in their homes once a month just to say hi and talk about stuff.

I have no idea what was actually talked about.

My brother and I had strict orders to either stay in the den and watch tv when the preacher came....and if we were already in bed there better not be no snickering, giggling, scratching on walls trying to scare my little brother while the preacher was there.

But we could hear everyone laughing and talking in the living room so it was probably just a regular old visitation.

Then, when he got ready to leave, he'd say a little prayer with my mom and dad, say he'd hope to see us in church that Sunday and leave.

I have no idea whatever became of Preacher Wilson. I know that after he left the church, a lot of people stopped going to that church. My guess is it was one of those little church squabbles that split up congregations.

I know my parents hated to see him leave. Not me, though. We got yelled at enough getting into trouble without having the preacher yell at us every Sunday just for good measure.