Everybody Has a Story: Sunday school with Secret Service

We knew that President Jimmy Carter taught a Sunday school class on a somewhat regular basis when he was president, and continues to do so in Plains, Ga., even though he is now 91. Since my wife, Betty, and I would be in that area on March 6, I went online to find out about the class. Sure enough, there it was: Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains has a website with all of the information. More exciting for us, he was teaching that Sunday!

Now what? Plains is a very small town, so we did not expect to find a motel, and we did not. What we found online was Plains Historic Inn, which is located in the one-block downtown section and has seven very large rooms with baths, each decorated in a decade theme. After emailing a reservation I was informed that if we stayed there on Friday, Saturday or Sunday night, we had reserved seats for Carter’s Sunday school class. We reserved the 1940s room for Sunday night and were told to be at Maranatha Baptist Church at 8:30 a.m. that Sunday.

If you do not reserve a room, you must arrive at 6:30 a.m. to have any chance of ending up inside the church, which seats 150 including the choir loft. Sure enough, as we arrived at 8:30 and had a Marine detail check out our rental car with a bomb-sniffing dog. There was a long line of people waiting to get in. (A family that sat right in front had arrived at 5:15 a.m.!) The amount of security present indicated that this would not be an ordinary Sunday school class, but since Carter was the teacher, it was extraordinary already.

We ended up sitting in the fourth row, right side, near brother Billy Carter’s daughter and her children and their families. Then “Miss Jan” came forward to explain in incredible and graphic detail, for 45 full minutes, how we were expected to behave. We were not to speak to him unless spoken to. It was OK to call him “President Jimmy” if he spoke to us. She pointed out that several Secret Service agents were there to make sure we made no sudden moves. A retired grade school teacher, Miss Jan did an excellent job of setting us up for the class. I found myself sitting up very straight and imagining I was in second grade.

Right at 10 a.m., Carter came in and announced that his brain cancer was in remission; it turned out NBC was there to video his remarks and interview him and his wife, Rosalynn, later. He talked about the Carter Center’s efforts to eliminate debilitating childhood diseases in developing countries. After asking us to shout out the states we were from, he was ready to start teaching. When someone shouted out “Washington, D.C.,” he replied, “I lived there once.”

He taught 40 minutes on the Last Supper of Christ and his disciples. One of his major points was that Christ was teaching his disciples to be humble; instead they squabbled about who among them was the greatest. “Kind of like presidential elections,” he joked. It was obvious that his knowledge of the Bible is substantial, as is his experience with presidential elections.

If we stayed for church, we could have our picture taken with the Carters after the service. We had planned to stay anyway, and were pleased when the Carters were seated two rows in front of us for the service. However, a large Secret Service agent sat in the row right behind the Carters, right in front of us. We must have looked threatening. (Actually, the Carters and the agent sit in those same seats each Sunday.)

After the service, Jimmy and Rosalynn moved to the front left side of the church and sat on stools while everyone who wanted to do so — which was everyone — came forward with their own cameras to have pictures taken with President and Mrs. Carter. There were about 320 people in less than 45 minutes.

We were impressed that a church with only 40 members could be so organized as to support the Carters each Sunday he teaches, which is about 30 Sundays per year. By the way, about not making any sudden moves: a little boy started to run down an aisle during the picture-taking and was immediately met by a Secret Service agent.

A different kind of Sunday school class for sure, and an altogether amazing experience!

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