Allan Appel Photo
Congregant Eleanor Boyd and Pastor King.
The government can provide potable water, a local minister told his Newhallville congregation, but it can’t make a man love his wife or take care of his children or pull up his pants.
That’s what Jesus and churches are for, sermonized Pastor Keith King, who since 2004 has served as spiritual leader of the 400-member Christian Tabernacle Baptist Church straddling the New Haven-Hamden line on upper Newhall Street.
Gloria Barnes (in the blue on right) has been a member for 40 years.
King, who’s 49, spoke about both government and the church from personal experience in his sermon this past Sunday: He wears a second hat as an assistant U.S. attorney based in New Haven. (Click here for a recent story on a project he’s spearheading linking ministers with cops and prosecutors.)
To his parishioners Sunday, only one role was on display: that of a man of the cloth who both presides over a church with at least a dozen deacons and 40 programs, and also never fails to visit the sick in the hospital. The church celebrates its 50th anniversary in October.
“His calling is first in his life. If you stay for his sermon, you’ll not see him as a prosecutor,” said deacon Larry Mazon.
That proved true. But if you listened closely to Sunday’s sermon, it was clear that both preacher and prosecutor were in the house.
“I Am Not Ashamed”
To rhythmic drum rolls and spirited calls of “Come on, preacher!” King delivered that sermon expatiating on two chapters and verses: 2 Samuel, chapter six, verses 16 to 23; and Romans, chapter one, verses 16 – 17.
In the first text King David dances in his tunic and rebuffs charges that he’s vulgar because he’s expressing his joy to God. God is a higher authority than the dance criticism of Saul’s daughter, King pointed out.
In the New Testament text, Paul urges the early Christians never to be ashamed of the gospel. Why might they be ashamed? Because the early image or symbol of the new Christian faith is a criminal who died on the cross, which itself is a symbol of capital punishment.
The early Christians need not be ashamed because “the power that he [Paul] is preaching is more powerful than all the armies of Rome,” King sermonized.
Lucille Patton and Mozelle Vann have belonged to the church since its 1962 founding.
Mixing tough love with Jesus’s love, and doing so with charm and apostrophes to specific members of the congregation, King added, “Paul is here to tell us the one thing you should not be ashamed of is the gospel of Jesus Christ. But there are things you can be ashamed of.”
He then listed black on black crime, the prison incarceration rate for African-Americans, and people pulling down their pants in public.
King addressed parents who don’t parent. “If the only thing you can do is scream at your children and have no patience, you ought to be ashamed,” he said.
That sermonic chord especially resonated with Eleanor Boyd, who worked in the New Haven school system for 40 years and said she has never seen crime worse. She praised her pastor and then said, “If the churches don’t do it [eliminate violence and crime], no one’s going to.”
King listened and consented. “Parenting, that’s the key,” King said. But the missing link is that parents have a difficult time negotiating the school system. That’s where churches come in, he said.
Persuading A Jury, Shepherding A Flock
King’s denomination doesn’t have a required text for each week; the pastor chooses the scriptural reading.
King was asked: Does he choose texts that reflect crime and punishment?
Sunday’s sermon was less chosen than “inspired,” he replied. There had been congregational discussions about impediments to prayer, including feeling ashamed.
He did say that his sermons and other work may reflect his background in the U.S. Attorney’s Office as well as, prior to that, six years in the Marine Corps’ Judge Advocate division.
“God is a very efficient God,” he said. “He uses all our backgrounds and training.”
Congregant Miriam Jackson with Pastor King.
King said that his litigation experience gives him a “comfort level” when working with congregants. And preaching as a pastor does bear similarity to delivering a message to a jury. On an elementary level, he needs to make eye contact. And he needs to know as much as he can about the lives of his congregants.
King sees no contradiction or inconsistency between the two hats: “God’s word requires we adhere to justice. The two systems are based on truth.”
After the benediction and the conclusion of services Sunday, King, as is his habit, stood by the sanctuary door as one by one, nearly the whole congregation waited in line for a hug or intimate word.
“They [the congregants] know I love them,” he said. “But the truth is the truth.”