Category: Peanuts Gang: A Voice Crying in the Pumpkin Patch

Some twenty of us were gathered on a Sunday night in the D.P. Culp Center auditorium on the campus of East Tennessee State University in Johnson City, TN, near the birthplace of the modern day Storytelling Festival. We were students and former students of Dr. Flora Joy who orchestrated the academic Storytelling program on campus. She had organized a 45 minute Halloween Storytelling show that included a little song, a skit, and a powerful story. For two days students were bussed from local schools for the free performance, and we were the entertainers. 

She was explaining how the program was going to unfold. We knew our individual parts, but hadn’t seen how it was going to come together until that evening. In the midst of explaining the program, she said that we still had five minutes we needed to fill, and asked if any of us had any ideas. 

I was wearing my suit because I drove from church services where I preached that night prior to the rehearsal. I wasn’t that well known by the other students and storytellers, and my friendship with Dr. Joy was still in its very infancy. Theologically, I had no clue where the people around me were; we weren’t exactly in the Bible belt. Were they believers? If they were believers, were they religiously liberal or conservative? Were they apathetic or resentful toward religion? I didn’t know where they stood, and I can only assume where they saw I stood. 

“Who has any ideas to fill a five minute void,” Flora asked us. No one else volunteered, so I raised my hand. She acknowledged my willingness and asked me to share my thoughts. I did. Like the excitement of a child, I suggested, “With all the children here, I could stand up and witness . . .” I saw her eyes struck with fear, and the room immediately grew eerily silent.  I’m pretty sure she was rethinking both the invitation to express my idea, as well as inviting me to participate in the production, and I can only imagine what the people around me was thinking. I continued my suggestion, “. . . and share with the children how on Halloween night the Great Pumpkin rises out of the most sincere pumpkin patch to deliver goodies to all the good little boys and girls.” The sigh of relief from my friend and teacher, with the laughter from those around me, was worth the suspense only moments before. The icing was taking great pride in knowing I had created a storytelling moment. 

Beyond the humor, the instant haunted me. I wondered. I questioned. I struggled with the larger issue: when should my faith go public? When should my private core values become a matter for the public forum? 

Give credit to Linus. He stands alone. He’s unmovable in his faith. He makes no excuses about where he places his faith. No matter the ridicule, he stands his ground. He’s vocal about the goodness of the Great Pumpkin, and even critical of the guy in the red suit. 

He writes letters. He shares his faith. He sits in the most sincere pumpkin patch. No all are so bold in their faith, but all need some boldness in their faith. 

During the days of Elijah, when King Ahab and his wicked wife, Jezebel, were persecuting the faithful, Elijah met with Obadiah (1 Kings 18:1-15). Elijah’s voice was on public display for the king. Obadiah operated under the radar. Obadiah was a servant in King Ahab’s courts, but he served the Living God. His ministry included hiding 100 of God’s prophets, keeping them supplied with food, water, and shelter (very difficult and remarkable since the land was in the midst of a three year drought). Elijah needed Obadiah to deliver a message to the king. In doing so, Obadiah would be exposed; Ahab would know his true loyalties and the prophets he’s hid would be vulnerable. Naturally, Obadiah hesitated in volunteering for Elijah’s mission. Elijah refused to take “no” for an answer, and Obadiah had to step out of the shadows and go public with his faith.

The church is filled with many Obadiah’s. They do great work and ministry behind the scenes. No one knows what they do – like buying lunch for a soldier, or visiting with an elderly person, or mowing the lawn of their neighbor who is battling an illness. No, their voice goes unheard, but their actions speak loud to God’s glory. However, a time may come, like it did for Obadiah, when one’s words must be as definitive as the actions they’ve been taking. Someone will have to say, “I need to tell you about what God has done in my life,” or “I need to tell you that I am a person of faith and my faith is in my Lord, Jesus Christ,” or “I need to speak so that you understand how my actions line up with my faith,” even if it brings ridicule.      

Schulz caught lightening in a bottle when he developed Linus’ Great Pumpkin story. But I cannot help but wonder the point of his message. Did he think Linus was brave, or just crazy?  I’m not sure. I am sure of this, “Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven” (Mt. 10:32). And they man who spoke those words, was often thought to be crazy himself (Mk. 3:20-21). 

bonum dolar!
(i.e., Good Grief!)

In 1963 Schulz introduced a new character to his Peanuts Gang, and his name was “5.” He had twin sisters named “3” and “4” respectfully (you can spot them in the famous dance scene of “A Charlie Brown Christmas”). Five’s full name was 555 95742, which was also his family’s zip code (placing him in Rancho Cordova, CA outside of Sacramento). His father, in naming his children numbers instead of names, was protesting, or at least surrendering, to the system of reducing human lives to numbers and statistics. Thus, the commentary Schulz might have been giving is that you’re more than just a number! 

As a child, Schulz’s humor often evaded me: what did Snoopy mean when he said, “I’m bad with names. Did he say ‘5’ or ‘V’?” As an adult trying to keep up with house numbers, phone numbers, bank numbers, insurance numbers, social security numbers, passwords, etc., Schultz’s humor is alive while his commentary is poignant. Note that his character was introduced during the sixties, when Social Security numbers were not assigned at birth. If anything, the numbering system has worsened in the past fifty plus years, and we tend to forget that people, faces, and lives stand behind the statistics and numbers society forces upon us. 

In one way, the healthcare in America is an example of how the numbers become more important than person they are servicing. When I sat in the examination room talking to my internal medicine doctor, an epiphany came to him and I told him, “You need to write book.” He looked at me with a puzzlement. He was beyond the age of retirement, but his body appearance was much younger. He walks with a bounce, and joy emanates from him. He’s a good doctor, and very good at his job. He’s wanted to walk away from medicine and into the less stressful life of retirement, but the hospital knows the value in having a good physician. For years they allowed him to reduce his work schedule and responsibilities in order for them to have the best doctor on staff. He looked at me and inquired, “What kind of book?” I responded, “I bet you made house calls as a young doctor, didn’t you?” He laughed and confirmed what I suspected. I continued, “You’ve see so much change in healthcare and, no doubt, you have stories. Never mind the advancement in curing diseases. You remember a time when the patient was a person you visited in their home, instead of running patients through your office doors like cattle to maximize the number of people you see.” 

There was a time when numbers were far less prevalent than today. Banks offered loans to customers based on loyal friendship, and less on a bottom line. Stores kept a tab knowing that customers, who were also their neighbors, would make good on payment when the crops came in. And doctors made house calls, in part to keep contagious diseases isolated, and in part because of the personal relationship doctors had with their patients. 

As Schulz seemed to have foreshadowed, our society is driven by numbers. Churches are far from immune. When consumers are reduced to a number, customer service erodes. When churches reduce membership to a number, or a ministry to a project, (i.e. the bottom line) the church devolves into a machine cranking out another product for the consumers to consume, use up, and then discard like a piece of junk. Serving one another erodes in the process.

Statistics are present everywhere, and even surface in the Bible. However, tension exists when the Bible addresses these statistics and numbers. Paul refuses to keep track of how many he baptizes (1 Cor. 1:16), while Luke freely records the number of those baptized (Act. 1:15; 2:41; 4:4). David sins when he instructs Joab to count his fighting men (1 Chron. 21:1-7), while the book of Numbers is dedicated to determining the number of people in Israel, especially the fighting men. While 5000 men present was far too many to feed, one boy’s lunch ended up being more than enough food for Jesus to feed, with twelve basketfuls for left-overs later (John 6:1-13). Some sort of balance must be reached in working with people; real people with real lives are behind the numbers often posted. 

Numbers aren’t everything, but numbers mean something. Churches track their numbers through attendance and contribution. Spotting trends, and knowing the ebb and flow of people’s decision to attend the assembly and to give their offering, are important for the leadership of the church. Growing churches usually realize that the larger the church grows, the smaller it must intentionally become, in part to avoid reducing individual members to a mere number. But when numbers become the defining moment for decisions, then we run into two moments of crisis. First, when decisions are made with numbers being the bottom line, then where is faith? Isn’t that the issue the disciples faced when Jesus fed the 5000? They saw the numbers, but Jesus challenged them to work out the problem beyond the number (Mark 6:37a). They failed. Could it be that Jesus was challenging the numbers mentality, and pointing them (or us) to act in faith beyond the numbers?

Secondly, when churches make numbers the bottom line, we’re simply mimicking society’s system of reducing human lives to impersonal numbers and statistics, instead of an active counter-culture approach to the numbers. The message sent is that we don’t care, and people no longer matter as a person. We just need to fill the auditorium or make the program a success. As one person reminded me once, “If church members don’t speak to me outside of the church building, then I know they don’t care about me.” 

I’m not sure if Mr. Schultz foreshadowed something or even foresaw the future. I’m pretty sure he was making social commentary on current events. That said, by introducing his readers to quirky kid named, “5,” by telling us his father was rebelling against the use of numbers, he was warning us about something. At least maybe in the church, people need to be prioritized over numbers. If not, we might as well assign a numerical value to each individual, and I’m not sure if we want to go down that road. 

bonum dolar!
(i.e., Good Grief!)

I have no memory of my life without Snoopy or the Peanuts Gang. For Christmas in 1968, my parents gave me a Snoopy doll that I slept with longer than I hated to admit. I remember deciding that I was too old for the doll and placed it on top of the wardrobe my father constructed for my room. But like Linus and his blue blanket, one night I woke up from a nightmare and immediately retrieved my doll from the wardrobe. About the time I was 35 years old, I found Snoopy in a box at my parents’ house. Disappointment overcame me as he was filthy; “rigor” had set in. Suddenly, I found myself traveling my childhood road as my mother took the doll from me and said, “I’ll fix him.” And she did. With her sister by her side, they used Snoopy as a pattern and cloned four copies of him, one for me and one for each of my children (a piece of the original Snoopy was placed inside each clone). 

For Christmas in 1972 Santa put an Avon Snoopy mug in my stocking, and I cannot count the number of times I drank Spice Tea from that cup. The next year I found the Fire-King, “Life Is Pure Joy” mug, in my stocking, and each subsequent year I anticipated finding the newest Snoopy mug in my stocking. Today, I have well over 90 mugs and cups which I proudly display in my man-cave. 

Along with the mugs strategically place, I’ve collected multiple wall hangings. Some include a classic plaster World War I Flying Ace I piloting his Sopwith Camel, purchased at the 1975 Portland, Oregon Columbia Christian Schools Holiday Fair (that I still have it over 40 years later is quite an accomplishment). A tole painting of Snoopy dancing with the slogan, “Happiness is February 14,” was painted by my mother made for me on my 11^th birthday. And then a cross stitched picture of Snoopy and Woodstock with the message, “A Friend Is Someone Who’ll Go Running With You At Six In The Morning,” given to me by my wife while we were dating and I was running track and cross country for Harding University (morning runs were common). Cross-stitched shirts, collectable stamps, coloring pictures, patches, phones . . . the list of Peanuts Gang memorabilia is almost embarrassingly endless. 

I own and have read the entire Peanuts Collection published by Fantagraphics Books. As a child, I collected multiple Peanuts books and read them more than my school assigned books. When I was in college, dad cut out Peanuts from the daily strip and mailed them to me on a weekly basis. Since I often checked my mailbox on the way to lunch, I read the strips while I ate in the cafeteria. With students around me, I was immediately the most popular kid – my own five minutes of weekly fame. I shared the strips with those with me. And somewhere, lost in the universe, is a picture of the Peanuts Gang autographed by “Snoopy” when I wrote him a letter. 

What made Charles M. Schulz and Peanuts so successful? Fifty years of meticulous drawings and punchlines certainly wear on a person (not counting overseeing TV specials and movies). I have no answers, nor will I attempt to be Lucy and invent answers which will just make me sound ridiculous. Who doesn’t connect with Charlie Brown’s failure in life, but always optimistic enough to throw another pitch, fly another kite, or entertain the thought of introducing himself to the Pretty Little Red-Haired Girl? Who doesn’t identify with the insecurities of Linus and his need for a blue security blanket? Who hasn’t encountered a bully like Lucy, or in some cases been the bully like Lucy? And if you’ve ever owned a dog, surely every now and then you could see Snoopy emerge somewhere in their actions. And yes, and in my life, I’ve felt many times the pain in the stomach as “I feel like I’m standing in the middle of the Roman Coliseum.” They were simple children, but struggled with complicated, adult-like, issues and character flaws. Through their own imperfections, we fell in love with them. 

In my reading about Mr. Schulz, two things emerged which have touched me deeply. First, he was a very unassuming and humble man. He enjoyed life out of the spotlight, and tried to make sure others felt like they were more important than he, which sounds a lot like Philippians 2:3. Secondly, for many years he taught a Bible class at the Methodist Church where he was a member. No one could doubt that one of the wells Schulz drew from was the Bible, and he drew from that well more times than one should forgive each other (see Mt. 18:21-22), but as it turned out the Bible was far more than just fodder for a punchline. He was a man of faith. 

I will not assume that Mr. Schultz would readily endorse any of my thoughts or how I interpret the Peanuts Gang. Had he read any of these stories, he may have been gracious enough to me to say something kind, but I have no intention of allowing this work to speak for him, nor do I believe in any way that my thoughts ever crossed his mind. He often inserted references to Bill Mauldin, the World War II artist, in an attempt to honor him for his work. What I offer is in that same vein. I’m merging my own thoughts from the biblical narrative with my insight into the Peanuts Gang. Both have had a tremendous impact in my own life. Maybe all of this is simply an act of futility, but if you find encouragement from my endeavors, then I’ve succeeded. 

The title of these posts is a parody of Mark 1:3’s reference to John the Baptist when he quotes Isaiah 40:3. While John was in the desert calling people to repentance and was the first to point them to Jesus, we find Linus convincing Sally (and others) to sit with him in the pumpkin patch to await the Great Pumpkin. For those of us awaiting Jesus’ return, we still find ourselves sitting in the pumpkin patch of life hoping beyond hope for his return. 

Finally, I normally end my writings with “soli deo gloria!” which is Latin for “Glory only to God!” (loosely translated). However, for these writings, I’ve chosen “bonum dolor!” which is Latin for “Good Grief!” If you’ve just smiled at that statement, then you’ll probably enjoy the pages you’ll be reading.   

bonum dolor!
(i.e., Good Grief!)