These Wholesome Towns
Verdant hills. Meandering streams. Bucolic fields. Local high school football. Sunday school dresses. Fried chicken. Homecoming. This is small town life . . . Right?
Hiding from that suicide
Painting houses, getting by
I read that book just like they said
Tried my best to raise the dead
But there's cracks in the walls in every room
Sweating and bleeding just like a wound
Just like a wound
Put me in a ten-by-ten
And let me sit with all my sins
Cigarettes and dirty pictures
Dreaming of that forked river
You can’t fill me up with your false hope
It won't never sink into my bones
I spoke them words just like you please
Tried my best to keep it neat
But there's holes in the floor right where we stand
Don’t tell me 'bout your promised land
Your promised land
Put me in a ten-by-ten
And let me sit with all my sins
Cigarettes and dirty pictures
Dreaming of that forked river
- 10x10, Pony Bradshaw
Pony Bradshaw is a very geographically powerful songwriter. North Georgia is not only his home but his lyrical backdrop for a dramatic culture pockmarked by a cocktail of religion and addiction. His words strike hard and hit deep. He seems to understand the shallow religiosity that fills the coves and shrieks from the mountaintops leaving behind even the closest of kin wondering what went wrong.
Richard Lovelace, in his book, Dynamics of Spiritual Growth, writes,
There is a deep and indissoluble connection between our appropriation of justification and our experience of sanctification. On the one hand, the conscience cannot accept justification without sanctification. Assurance of justification which penetrates and cleanses our consciousness of guilt is impossible to obtain without an awareness that we are in some measure committed to progress in spiritual growth. This assurance increases as we move forward in sanctification and weakens or vanishes as we move away from the light of holiness (2 Pet. 1:2-11)... On the other hand, the conscience cannot accept sanctification unless it is based on a foundation in justification. When this is attempted the resulting insecurity creates a luxuriant overgrowth of religious flesh as believers seek to build a holiness formidable enough to pacify their consciences and quiet their sense of alienation from God.
Unpacking that hefty quote we see that if a Christian attempts to grow without her roots deeply grounded in the fact that she is accepted in Jesus, on His merit and His righteousness and not her own, she will attempt gaining holiness through outward action and appearance. It’s an attempt to clear her conscience because she knows she is far from holy. The thought is, maybe covering up guilt and shame with good works will help. The result, unfortunately, is building a self righteousness that can be very ugly. It leads to a judgmental spirit, anger at how life is going, hypocrisy, and unrepentant sin . . . All under a thin, but colorful, coating of religious behavior. Jesus described the Pharisees as “whitewashed tombs”; painted on the outside but dead inside.
Jesus pointed out this danger in His parable in Luke 18:
9 He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt:10 "Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.12 I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.'13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me, a sinner!'14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted."
Pony Bradshaw also sees, feels, and delivers this all-too-common storyline in his music:
We throw paint on the canvas
And call it post-modernistic magic
On my Christ-haunted shoulders
I carry Jehovah like a soldier
- Jehovah
In these lyrics he echoes Flannery O’Connor when she writes, “. . . I think it is safe to say that while the South is hardly Christ-centered, it is most certainly Christ-haunted.”
What happens if a church culture feeds on such false pretense? The good news of the gospel is exchanged for following impossible rules. It is an impossible yoke to bear. Those who give up on attempting to live out the oppressive and impossible holiness are cast out, demonized, and cut off. Many of the hurt are left battered and abused and seeking refuge in sex, methamphetamines, and the evil’s of drink about which they were so often warned from the pulpit. The very preaching against these abuses can be the actual catalyst for these abuses. The message is certainly a concoction for running away from the church and it is prevalent in rural settings.
What is the solution for the brokenness? The message delivered must change. That message must be the truly good news of the Bible not more bad news from abusive people.
John 3:17 tells us the heart of God: “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” Here it is in the King James version: “For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.” Jesus is a Rescuer.
The message of rescue comes, not through external performance of duties and rules, but through heart transformation. That starts when we realize we cannot truly and fully do anything to merit Christ’s love. His grace is unmerited. We simply trust that Jesus is our righteousness, not we ourselves. When we grasp the depth of His grace on our behalf, it is a luxuriant growth of gratitude that begins to mark our lives. Rather than being judgmental, hypocritical, and mean, we become merciful, compassionate, and kind. It is from the springboard of our justification (the act of God’s grace in Jesus) that we are propelled into our sanctification (the work of God’s grace through Jesus).
Pony Bradshaw’s songs resonate through these hills. May the depth of the despair and trail of tearful spiritual abuse be healed through a greater message of hope in the perfect righteousness of Christ on our behalf. Then, living by the forked river of Eden will not be merely a dream, but a reality by the true river of life (Revelation 22:1-5).