Chapter 32

            Aaron arrived five minutes before the start time wearing his best navy blue suit and long sleeve white shirt and silk maroon colored silk tie.  He was told to wait outside the conference room until the entire board was seated.

             There would be old Mr. Greenwald, a retired pharmacist and Ben Peacock was the owner of a tire dealership.  Then there was Mr. Pirtle, a retired school teacher and Mr. Johnson, who had at one time been a minister but found the sale of securities more lucrative.  The youngest man on the board was probably a good fifteen years senior to Aaron’s thirty years of age.

             Once they were all assembled Aaron was invited in.  Mr. Becker sat at the head of the table; the other men sat on the sides.  Aaron was given the seat at the other end directly opposite Mr. Becker.  “The hot seat,” Aaron thought.

             Mr. Becker began.  “Pastor Cooper,” he started out very formally.  “There have been certain allegations that you have been involved with certain persons who are espousing doctrines that are in opposition to our church tradition.  We feel . . .”

             He was interrupted by the sound of the door opening.  Everyone turned to see who it was.  “Uh . . . this is a private meeting” Mr. Becker called out.

             “I understand you might be talking about me so I thought I ought to be here” Charles Okinyi responded as he strode confidently into the room with his head held high.  His very bearing said that no one was going to be able to remove him and he was staying whether they liked it or not.

             “Well . . . uh . . .” Mr. Becker stuttered as he looked at the others on the board questioning with his eyes as if to say ‘what do we do?’  Finally he said “Well, have a seat over there on the side.”  He then turned to face Aaron again but was obviously disturbed by Charles’ presence.

             “As I was saying . . . you seem to be supportive of the concept of polygamy which is very anti-Christian as you well know and . . .”

             He was interrupted again by the door opening.  “Good morning, gentlemen,” George spoke as he entered.  “I thought I’d just drop in for moral support of my friend, the pastor.”

             “This is supposed to be a private meeting” Mr. Becker stated irritably.

             “A man doesn’t deserve to be alone when he’s being railroaded!”  George stated emphatically.

             Charles, who was now seated in a chair on the side with his legs crossed and his arms folded across his chest, smiled at George’s antics.

             “Polygamy is not of God!”  Mr. Johnson blurted out.

             “Oh, really” Aaron countered.  “And on what scriptural basis do you make such a statement, seeing as how that most of the Patriarchs in the Bible were men who had more than one wife.  Let’s see -- there was Abraham, Israel, Moses, Gideon, and David to name a few of many.”

             “Well that’s all Old Testament stuff,” Mr. Johnson argued.  “God winked at a time when men didn’t know any better.”

             “Really!”  Aaron responded, feeling a boldness come over him.  “God could say He was against idolatry, murder, theft and covetousness but he was afraid to say don’t have more than one wife?  I’ve never known God to be afraid to say anything He wanted to!”  Aaron finished confidently.

             “Wait a minute.”  Mr. Pirtle jumped in.  “Adam had only one wife, Eve.  If God had intended man to have more than one He’d have made more than one.”

             Aaron smiled slightly before answering.  He was using the same old tired, weak argument that he himself had made a couple of months ago.  Charles sat quietly with a twinkle in his eyes as he watched his protege handle the arguments one after another.  The board members were becoming more and more irritated, as none of them could find an argument to defend their ‘monogamy only’ position that Aaron couldn’t counter.

             Mr. Johnson sat quietly and thumbed through his Bible, in as much as he was the only one other than Aaron who had thought to bring one.  Finally, he spoke up.  “Tell me Pastor Cooper, does the Bible say that we are to be a kingdom of priests?”

             “Yes.”

             “The priests were only to have one wife” Mr. Johnson stated.  “So God is effectively ruling out a plural number of wives for New Testament believers.”

             Aaron was stunned.  He’d never heard this argument before.  He didn’t think the reasoning could be right but he had no answer.  He turned to look at George, whose facial expression and the hunch of his shoulders told him, he didn’t know either.

             Finally, Charles spoke up.  “Is our priesthood after the Levitical order, sir?” he asked and waited for an answer.

             “Well . . . uh . . . uh . . .” Mr. Johnson stuttered, obviously not quite knowing what to say.

             “No!” Charles answered his own question as he stood up and walked over beside Aaron.  “We have priesthood that is after the Melchizedek order, and if you remember the Melchizedek order is above the Levitical order.  Melchizedek was a king and a priest.  Most of the kings mentioned in the Bible had a plurality of wives.

             “Jesus is our King and High Priest, right?”  He continued without waiting for an answer.  “. . . He depicts himself as the bridegroom marrying five wise virgins in Matthew 25.  True, it is a parable speaking of union with the true church but he would never have used such an example if having a plurality of wives was wrong!”

             The room was silent.  Charles walked back over to his seat and sat down again.  Finally Mr. Becker spoke.  “I don’t care how you silver tongued young punks twist the Bible, I don’t think it’s right and it makes us look like a bunch of Mormon fundamentalists weirdoes.  It will destroy the church’s reputation, I tell you!”

             “What?”  George stood to his feet.  “You mean you don’t care about truth, you only care about what people will think?”  He questioned incredulously.

             “You, mister!”  Mr. Becker said as he turned red in the face and stood up.  “You be careful!  You’ve got three women living with you now and have been seen playing around with a fourth.”

             “What?” Aaron responded almost involuntarily as he looked toward his friend.  Although he knew about Tabitha, George hadn’t told him about how he had handled the Judy Chandler situation and George had never thought to say anything about Shawanda.  She was just a friend of Tabitha.

             “What?  How?  How did you come up with this?”  George questioned. 

             “I have my sources!”  Mr. Becker warned as he shook his finger at George.

             Most of the men on the board had shocked looks on their faces as it seemed that Mr. Becker had delivered the knockout punch.

             Aaron decided not to wait any longer.  He delivered a punch of his own.  “Mr. Becker!” he called out.  “Is the real reason you’re interested in getting me fired, because you want to date my wife!”

             Mr. Becker rocked back on his heels, shocked at the accusations; but Aaron pulled the pictures from his jacket pocket and flung them on the table for all to see.  There were gasps from everyone as they looked at the pictures and then at Mr. Becker and back at Aaron.

             “Don’t worry!”  Aaron said as he stood up.  “I’m resigning!  I’ll give my final sermon on Sunday and have my office cleared out in a week!”  With that he pivoted, moved around his chair and marched out the door, followed by Charles.  George hastily grabbed the pictures off the conference table and rushed out to join his friends.

             “You be careful, or I’ll sue you for liable!” Mr. Becker yelled after them.

             Later, Aaron and Cheryl were seated together in their double wide love seat in front of the fire in the fireplace in the living room. 

             “What are we going to do now” Cheryl asked as she nestled her head between his head and shoulder.

             “I’m not sure,” came the response.

             “Dear,” she said, “I still wish you hadn’t gotten involved in this whole polygamy thing.”

             “Babe” he responded “the Bible says, ‘if you continue in my word, ye shall know the truth and the truth will make you free.’  I wish you had come to Kenya and met Charles’ wives and seen how well they get along.  Sure, there are marriages with several wives that have problems, just as there are monogamous marriages that have problems.  I just wish you could have seen that it can work.”

             After a moment of silence Cheryl asked “Does that mean you want to be involved in it?”

             “No,” Aaron replied, “Not necessarily.  But it does mean I can’t condemn those that do.  The Bible says ‘to whom much is given, much is required.’  Said  another way, it means that the more we have, the more we are required to live out.”