The Bubble
Stories
Object:
Contents
"The Bubble" by Keith Hewitt
"Tell Me a Story" by Craig Kelly
* * * * * * * *
The Bubble
by Keith Hewitt
Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25
Back in the 1970s and 80s, it was popular in some circles to talk about the "neutron bomb," a device that supposedly killed people but left buildings intact. Never mind the mythology -- what do you call something that destroys lives but leaves bodies alive? "Economic dislocation," "poverty," "cultural ennui?" Never mind -- the important thing to remember is that if you drop enough bombs, eventually war will break out…
The acrid blend of smoke and pepper spray still hung in the air, held close to the earth by the haze that had settled over the neighborhood, but that's not why Hammond was holding his breath as he rounded the corner onto Columbus Street. He had been holding it since he passed Division Street and looked down at the long rows of burned out buildings, where wisps of smoke played tag with scraps of paper in the street, and no one walked or drove.
Three nights and two days he had been away -- kept out by police barricades, if not common sense. For three nights and two days raw, senseless anger had held sway in the Riverside district. The bank had been the first to burn, the culmination of a demonstration that descended into a riot that soon spread through the entire district, fire marking its boundaries.
Snipers -- some said firecrackers -- had kept the firefighters out for a night and a day… long enough to ensure that most of the older buildings were total losses. Stores had been looted, cars turned over and torched in intersections, to impede police bringing in heavy equipment. Establishments that had been in existence for a hundred years burned brightly beside buildings that had been empty and decaying for decades.
And now… Hammond turned the corner onto Columbus Street and his heart jumped. His church stood like a stone sentinel, its belfry the tallest structure on a block of converted multifamily homes and a single corner storefront. The walls were dirty and one of the front doors had been ripped off its hinges, but the roof was still on and there was no sign of fire.
It had fared better than the three homes to its right and the corner convenience store. Fire had visited all four of them, hitting the little store the hardest. The door and windows were smashed, and it appeared that flames from inside had licked the outer wall; the sidewalk in front was strewn with magazines and candy wrappers, empty cigarette cartons and broken liquor bottles.
There was a line of half a dozen cars pulled up in front of the church. He slowed down, stopped at the back of the line and closed his eyes, sent up a guilty prayer of thanks that the church had not burned. After a moment he turned off the car and slid out slowly, stood up and looked around. There were people in the windows of the homes on the other side of the street, peeking out from behind curtains or blinds. Here and there, a bit of curtain fluttered through a broken window -- whether the result of the riot, or just how things were, he did not know.
Farther down the street, a couple of individuals walked, none of them purposefully. In the distance there was a rattle of gunfire -- five or six shots in quick succession. Looters, still? Or police? Or just someone venting their frustration?
Hammond mounted the steps to the front of the church slowly, kicking off debris as he went. The right front door had been pried open and torn almost off its hinges -- it hung crazily to one side, leaving the way open into the narthex. He touched it as he stepped through cautiously, trying to watch where he stepped; glass crunched underfoot. The lights were off but there was enough sunlight shining through the windows to let him identify the half-dozen men and women who were wandering through the sanctuary, looking down at the debris-littered floor or up at the walls, rich wood paneling covered by graffiti.
They were the people he would have expected -- hoped -- would be the first on the scene.
"Hell of a mess, Pastor," said the closest man -- short, squat, with gray hair. He raised a hand, pulled a cigar out of his mouth and pointed with it. "Looks like they came in there, ransacked the office, then trashed the place when they didn't find what they were looking for."
"And what would they have been looking for?" Hammond asked.
The man just scowled and shoved the cigar back in his mouth, shrugged at the ineffability of the question.
"And by the way," Hammond added, "this is still a no smoking building. We don't want that smoke smell in here."
Automatically, the older man took the cigar out of his mouth, looked around for a place to put it -- then stopped when Hammond smiled. With a snort, he stuck it back in his mouth and turned away.
"I can tell you they weren't looking for Bibles," a woman's voice said to his right, and he turned to see the Administrative Council Chair, holding a stack of black books. "On the other hand, they did take the TV out of the Sunday school room, and the monitor off the desk in the office. Left the CPU, though."
"Probably didn't know where they would find floppy disks, anymore." Thankfully, he had taken his own laptop home -- otherwise it probably wouldn't have been left behind. "I don't suppose we could count on the office computer disappearing between now and when the insurance adjuster gets here?"
"Why, Pastor Hammond, I do believe I am shocked to hear you say such a thing," the Ad Council Chair drawled, and fluttered her eyelashes a couple of times, and they both smiled. Hers faded first. "What do you suppose they were looking for?"
He shrugged, picked up a scrap of wood from the floor and held it up to the doorframe to see if it matched. "I doubt any of them could tell you, Jean. But I'm afraid I know what they found here."
Her eyebrows drew together. "What's that?"
"Nothing. All of this --" he swept an arm around the sanctuary, "-- it means nothing to them. And I'm afraid maybe it's because it stopped having meaning at all."
She frowned, set the books down on a pew and straightened the stack, fiddled with it for a moment or two before she looked back at him. "What do you mean, Pastor?"
"How long have you been a member here, Jean?"
"Eighteen -- no, nineteen years. We joined when Tim was baptized." She nodded out the gaping door. "Used to live about two blocks south, on Columbus."
"And when did you move?"
"I don't know -- maybe fifteen years, I think. We wanted to be somewhere where the schools were better."
He nodded, looked back toward the man who'd spoken earlier. "Jack, when did you and Lisa join the church?"
Jack worked his mouth to shift the cigar over to one corner, and answered, "I was confirmed here, Lisa joined when we got married. Forty-some years; I forget." He took the cigar out, tapped the ash on a pile of papers he'd swept together. "We had a duplex on Jackson Street, down toward the river. Sold it after we were broken into twice in one year."
"Right. That was just before I came here." He paused, took a deep breath. "You know, I don't even live down here. What's wrong with this picture?"
Jean shrugged; Jack answered, "What's wrong is that we got chased out of our homes years ago. This neighborhood's been going downhill for thirty years. Used to be it was a nice family neighborhood, and then --" He trailed off.
"Right." Hammond took a deep breath. "So here's the thing: for the last twenty years or so, this church hasn't been a part of this community -- it's like it just floats here, in a bubble. Members come to it -- I come to it -- from somewhere else, we do our thing, and leave. How many members do we have from anywhere within a mile radius of this church?"
He saw both their minds working, then, and the other members had stopped what they were doing and drawn closer. He plunged on while the thoughts were still bubbling inside of him. "Tell me if I'm wrong, but I can't think of any. And what does that tell you?"
"That the people in this neighborhood don't care about church?" one of the others ventured.
Hammond pointed with one finger, touched his nose with the index finger of his other hand. "And why is that? Because the church -- this church -- doesn't care about them. We have wandered way off from what we're supposed to be doing as a church, way off from what we're supposed to be doing for God. We've become a Sunday morning music and social club, an exclusive one."
Jack took the cigar out, waved it toward Hammond. "If this is a social club, why do we have to listen to you preach every Sunday morning?"
Hammond nodded and smiled sheepishly. "Good point. I think I've been wasting my time, because I've been thinking about how to reach you, and teach you, and help us all nurture one another… and I've forgotten the main thing I'm here to do. That we're here to do." He gestured toward the door again. "Look, God calls on us to take care of our neighbors -- not to slip by them on Sunday without making eye contact."
"So what are we supposed to do, Pastor?" Jean asked.
"Whatever we can. The problem isn't them, it's us. We forgot what we were here for, and let this church become irrelevant. Now look what's happened. You know what things were like before the riot -- burning down buildings and looting stores isn't going to make them any better. But we know what will."
"I do believe you have lost your mind," Jack said slowly.
"Maybe -- or maybe I just remembered what I'm supposed to be doing." He looked from one to the next. "If we can change our hearts and rededicate ourselves to doing what God expects of us, I think we can really make a difference, maybe keep something like this from happening again. And the first step is to pop this bubble we're in and become part of the community again."
"But I don't like this community," one of the other men said, blurting honestly.
"Then change it -- make it better."
Jean nodded thoughtfully. "Maybe you're right, Pastor. We can take this up at the next Ad Council, start making some plans. Find out what people need, start developing an outreach program."
Hammond reached down to the books she had stacked, picked up half a dozen, and smiled at her. "You do that," he said quietly, and turned away, walked out the door with a stack of Bibles in his hand.
Silently, they watched as he approached the house across the street. As Hammond knocked on the door and held out a book to the man who answered, Jack took out his cigar once more and scowled, looked at Jean. "I think we're going to need a lot more Bibles," he grumbled, and jammed the cigar back in, picked up a handful of books and headed for the door.
He was right…
Keith Hewitt is the author of two volumes of NaTiVity Dramas: Nontraditional Christmas Plays for All Ages (CSS). He is a local pastor, co-youth leader, former Sunday school teacher, and occasional speaker at Christian events. He lives in southeastern Wisconsin with his wife, two children, and assorted dogs and cats.
Tell Me a Story
by Craig Kelly
Psalm 78:1-7
Katherine always had a fascination with stories. Even as a baby, her eyes lit up whenever she saw Joan with a book. As a toddler, despite not being able to read a word, she would pick up a book and just stare at the pages. Even if it was an old volume from the bookshelf, with no pictures at all, she would just stare enraptured, slowly, almost reverently turning the pages. Her young life revolved around the written word.
By the time she was seven, she was already going through my library, reading through classics such as Robin Hood, King Solomon's Mines, and The Three Musketeers. She always seemed to gravitate toward adventure stories, leaving behind the more whimsical stories we tried sending her way. If it didn't have grand adventures, fierce battles, or daring rescues in it, she wasn't interested. It amused Joan and me to no end that while so many other girls were spouting off the names of the latest pop music star or the latest teen dreamboat actor, Katherine was more interested in names like d'Artagnan, Allan Quatermain, and Will Scarlet.
Although she was a highly proficient reader on her own, Katherine and I still enjoyed reading together every night. I had read to her every night since she was a toddler, and it always seemed to be the highlight of her day. Every night we would read of Robinson Crusoe and his adventures or the treachery of Long John Silver. We even kept a shelf filled with adventure books by her bed, each one waiting to be relived again and again in our imaginations. One night, as she was scanning the shelf, looking for another book to read, her finger stopped at one and at once she wore a look of confusion.
"What's the Bible doing up here? I thought this was just a shelf for adventures," she said.
I reached above her and took the leather-bound book from its place. "Katie, honey, don't you know that the Bible contains some of the greatest adventures of all?"
She looked even more puzzled. "I thought the Bible was just full of rules and stuff."
I quickly thumbed through the pages. "Oh no, Katie!" I replied. "This entire book is one adventure after another. Think of Noah saving his family from a worldwide flood. Think of Moses leading a band of refugees across the desert for forty years heading for their new home. Think of David leading his king's forces into battle, only to be betrayed and hunted by the king whom he loved. Every adventure is more thrilling than the last!"
Her look of confusion soon turned to one of skepticism. "Hmmm, I don't know, Dad. All I ever hear about in there is the rules. 'Do this.' 'Don't do that.' 'Don't lie.' 'Don't steal.' Doesn't sound like an adventure to me."
Taking the book, I sat at the head of her bed and motioned her over. When she shuffled up to my side, I leaned down and quietly whispered, "Then picture this. There was once a great king who ruled over everything he saw. He loved all of his subjects with his whole heart. But one day, one of the king's most trusted knights betrayed him. Taking some of the army, he marched into the kingdom and took all the subjects away from the king. Some he took by force, while others were convinced that if they went along, this knight would make them rulers in his new kingdom. But instead, all of the king's subjects became slaves to this evil knight. Many years passed as the good king saw the plight of his people. He sent secret messages to this faraway land, showing some people how to escape, and while a few did, most of the others had given up hope, to the point that after a while, they couldn't even remember the good king anymore.
"This broke the king's heart. Then he struck upon a bold plan. He would send the crown prince, his only son who he loved deeply, to the evil knight's land. Disguising himself as a slave, the prince walked the streets and country roads of this land, telling all the people of the good king and how to return to their first home. But agents of the knight started to see what was happening, and they decided to put a stop to it. First they tried to trick the prince, hoping he'd fall into their traps. But the prince was too clever to fall for their trickery. So finally, they seized the prince out of the crowd and beat him until he was almost dead. The knight came up, and in his moment of triumph, he stabbed the prince in his hands and feet, reveling in his pain. As the prince lay dying, the knight stabbed him again in his side, and the blood began to flow. When the knight saw that the prince was dead, he left him with his blood still flowing, celebrating in his final triumph over the king he hated.
"But the blood continued to flow for three days, eventually creating a pathway all the way back to the good king's realm. Finally on the morning of the third day, the prince who was dead… opened his eyes! He was alive again! The prince knew that only his blood could make a way back to his father, a way that the knight could not reach. As he rose and began to travel down that pathway back to his own land, the prince continued to call more slaves to follow him. Soon that road was filled with former slaves returning to the good king. And the prince promised that soon he would return and defeat the knight forever."
Katherine sat there, absorbing every word. "Wow, I've never heard a story like that! How did the prince come back to life?"
"It was a miracle," I replied. "You see, that prince was Jesus, and the good king is God the Father. Jesus knew the only way to bring us back to God was for him to die. It's only through his blood that we can be set free from sin."
Katherine took the Bible that was in my lap and slowly turned through the pages. After a time, she handed it back to me.
"Dad, could you please read me an adventure story… from here?"
I smiled, snuggled up close to her, opened the Bible, and we began to read.
Craig Kelly is an office assistant living in Lima, Ohio. He received his B.A. from the University of Saskatchewan in 2002. He and his wife, Beth, are actively involved in their church, working both in their church's children's ministry as well as working with low-income youth in their neighborhood. Craig enjoys reading, music, hiking, biking, and indulging in old sci-fi movies.
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StoryShare, November 6, 2011, issue.
Copyright 2011 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
"The Bubble" by Keith Hewitt
"Tell Me a Story" by Craig Kelly
* * * * * * * *
The Bubble
by Keith Hewitt
Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25
Back in the 1970s and 80s, it was popular in some circles to talk about the "neutron bomb," a device that supposedly killed people but left buildings intact. Never mind the mythology -- what do you call something that destroys lives but leaves bodies alive? "Economic dislocation," "poverty," "cultural ennui?" Never mind -- the important thing to remember is that if you drop enough bombs, eventually war will break out…
The acrid blend of smoke and pepper spray still hung in the air, held close to the earth by the haze that had settled over the neighborhood, but that's not why Hammond was holding his breath as he rounded the corner onto Columbus Street. He had been holding it since he passed Division Street and looked down at the long rows of burned out buildings, where wisps of smoke played tag with scraps of paper in the street, and no one walked or drove.
Three nights and two days he had been away -- kept out by police barricades, if not common sense. For three nights and two days raw, senseless anger had held sway in the Riverside district. The bank had been the first to burn, the culmination of a demonstration that descended into a riot that soon spread through the entire district, fire marking its boundaries.
Snipers -- some said firecrackers -- had kept the firefighters out for a night and a day… long enough to ensure that most of the older buildings were total losses. Stores had been looted, cars turned over and torched in intersections, to impede police bringing in heavy equipment. Establishments that had been in existence for a hundred years burned brightly beside buildings that had been empty and decaying for decades.
And now… Hammond turned the corner onto Columbus Street and his heart jumped. His church stood like a stone sentinel, its belfry the tallest structure on a block of converted multifamily homes and a single corner storefront. The walls were dirty and one of the front doors had been ripped off its hinges, but the roof was still on and there was no sign of fire.
It had fared better than the three homes to its right and the corner convenience store. Fire had visited all four of them, hitting the little store the hardest. The door and windows were smashed, and it appeared that flames from inside had licked the outer wall; the sidewalk in front was strewn with magazines and candy wrappers, empty cigarette cartons and broken liquor bottles.
There was a line of half a dozen cars pulled up in front of the church. He slowed down, stopped at the back of the line and closed his eyes, sent up a guilty prayer of thanks that the church had not burned. After a moment he turned off the car and slid out slowly, stood up and looked around. There were people in the windows of the homes on the other side of the street, peeking out from behind curtains or blinds. Here and there, a bit of curtain fluttered through a broken window -- whether the result of the riot, or just how things were, he did not know.
Farther down the street, a couple of individuals walked, none of them purposefully. In the distance there was a rattle of gunfire -- five or six shots in quick succession. Looters, still? Or police? Or just someone venting their frustration?
Hammond mounted the steps to the front of the church slowly, kicking off debris as he went. The right front door had been pried open and torn almost off its hinges -- it hung crazily to one side, leaving the way open into the narthex. He touched it as he stepped through cautiously, trying to watch where he stepped; glass crunched underfoot. The lights were off but there was enough sunlight shining through the windows to let him identify the half-dozen men and women who were wandering through the sanctuary, looking down at the debris-littered floor or up at the walls, rich wood paneling covered by graffiti.
They were the people he would have expected -- hoped -- would be the first on the scene.
"Hell of a mess, Pastor," said the closest man -- short, squat, with gray hair. He raised a hand, pulled a cigar out of his mouth and pointed with it. "Looks like they came in there, ransacked the office, then trashed the place when they didn't find what they were looking for."
"And what would they have been looking for?" Hammond asked.
The man just scowled and shoved the cigar back in his mouth, shrugged at the ineffability of the question.
"And by the way," Hammond added, "this is still a no smoking building. We don't want that smoke smell in here."
Automatically, the older man took the cigar out of his mouth, looked around for a place to put it -- then stopped when Hammond smiled. With a snort, he stuck it back in his mouth and turned away.
"I can tell you they weren't looking for Bibles," a woman's voice said to his right, and he turned to see the Administrative Council Chair, holding a stack of black books. "On the other hand, they did take the TV out of the Sunday school room, and the monitor off the desk in the office. Left the CPU, though."
"Probably didn't know where they would find floppy disks, anymore." Thankfully, he had taken his own laptop home -- otherwise it probably wouldn't have been left behind. "I don't suppose we could count on the office computer disappearing between now and when the insurance adjuster gets here?"
"Why, Pastor Hammond, I do believe I am shocked to hear you say such a thing," the Ad Council Chair drawled, and fluttered her eyelashes a couple of times, and they both smiled. Hers faded first. "What do you suppose they were looking for?"
He shrugged, picked up a scrap of wood from the floor and held it up to the doorframe to see if it matched. "I doubt any of them could tell you, Jean. But I'm afraid I know what they found here."
Her eyebrows drew together. "What's that?"
"Nothing. All of this --" he swept an arm around the sanctuary, "-- it means nothing to them. And I'm afraid maybe it's because it stopped having meaning at all."
She frowned, set the books down on a pew and straightened the stack, fiddled with it for a moment or two before she looked back at him. "What do you mean, Pastor?"
"How long have you been a member here, Jean?"
"Eighteen -- no, nineteen years. We joined when Tim was baptized." She nodded out the gaping door. "Used to live about two blocks south, on Columbus."
"And when did you move?"
"I don't know -- maybe fifteen years, I think. We wanted to be somewhere where the schools were better."
He nodded, looked back toward the man who'd spoken earlier. "Jack, when did you and Lisa join the church?"
Jack worked his mouth to shift the cigar over to one corner, and answered, "I was confirmed here, Lisa joined when we got married. Forty-some years; I forget." He took the cigar out, tapped the ash on a pile of papers he'd swept together. "We had a duplex on Jackson Street, down toward the river. Sold it after we were broken into twice in one year."
"Right. That was just before I came here." He paused, took a deep breath. "You know, I don't even live down here. What's wrong with this picture?"
Jean shrugged; Jack answered, "What's wrong is that we got chased out of our homes years ago. This neighborhood's been going downhill for thirty years. Used to be it was a nice family neighborhood, and then --" He trailed off.
"Right." Hammond took a deep breath. "So here's the thing: for the last twenty years or so, this church hasn't been a part of this community -- it's like it just floats here, in a bubble. Members come to it -- I come to it -- from somewhere else, we do our thing, and leave. How many members do we have from anywhere within a mile radius of this church?"
He saw both their minds working, then, and the other members had stopped what they were doing and drawn closer. He plunged on while the thoughts were still bubbling inside of him. "Tell me if I'm wrong, but I can't think of any. And what does that tell you?"
"That the people in this neighborhood don't care about church?" one of the others ventured.
Hammond pointed with one finger, touched his nose with the index finger of his other hand. "And why is that? Because the church -- this church -- doesn't care about them. We have wandered way off from what we're supposed to be doing as a church, way off from what we're supposed to be doing for God. We've become a Sunday morning music and social club, an exclusive one."
Jack took the cigar out, waved it toward Hammond. "If this is a social club, why do we have to listen to you preach every Sunday morning?"
Hammond nodded and smiled sheepishly. "Good point. I think I've been wasting my time, because I've been thinking about how to reach you, and teach you, and help us all nurture one another… and I've forgotten the main thing I'm here to do. That we're here to do." He gestured toward the door again. "Look, God calls on us to take care of our neighbors -- not to slip by them on Sunday without making eye contact."
"So what are we supposed to do, Pastor?" Jean asked.
"Whatever we can. The problem isn't them, it's us. We forgot what we were here for, and let this church become irrelevant. Now look what's happened. You know what things were like before the riot -- burning down buildings and looting stores isn't going to make them any better. But we know what will."
"I do believe you have lost your mind," Jack said slowly.
"Maybe -- or maybe I just remembered what I'm supposed to be doing." He looked from one to the next. "If we can change our hearts and rededicate ourselves to doing what God expects of us, I think we can really make a difference, maybe keep something like this from happening again. And the first step is to pop this bubble we're in and become part of the community again."
"But I don't like this community," one of the other men said, blurting honestly.
"Then change it -- make it better."
Jean nodded thoughtfully. "Maybe you're right, Pastor. We can take this up at the next Ad Council, start making some plans. Find out what people need, start developing an outreach program."
Hammond reached down to the books she had stacked, picked up half a dozen, and smiled at her. "You do that," he said quietly, and turned away, walked out the door with a stack of Bibles in his hand.
Silently, they watched as he approached the house across the street. As Hammond knocked on the door and held out a book to the man who answered, Jack took out his cigar once more and scowled, looked at Jean. "I think we're going to need a lot more Bibles," he grumbled, and jammed the cigar back in, picked up a handful of books and headed for the door.
He was right…
Keith Hewitt is the author of two volumes of NaTiVity Dramas: Nontraditional Christmas Plays for All Ages (CSS). He is a local pastor, co-youth leader, former Sunday school teacher, and occasional speaker at Christian events. He lives in southeastern Wisconsin with his wife, two children, and assorted dogs and cats.
Tell Me a Story
by Craig Kelly
Psalm 78:1-7
Katherine always had a fascination with stories. Even as a baby, her eyes lit up whenever she saw Joan with a book. As a toddler, despite not being able to read a word, she would pick up a book and just stare at the pages. Even if it was an old volume from the bookshelf, with no pictures at all, she would just stare enraptured, slowly, almost reverently turning the pages. Her young life revolved around the written word.
By the time she was seven, she was already going through my library, reading through classics such as Robin Hood, King Solomon's Mines, and The Three Musketeers. She always seemed to gravitate toward adventure stories, leaving behind the more whimsical stories we tried sending her way. If it didn't have grand adventures, fierce battles, or daring rescues in it, she wasn't interested. It amused Joan and me to no end that while so many other girls were spouting off the names of the latest pop music star or the latest teen dreamboat actor, Katherine was more interested in names like d'Artagnan, Allan Quatermain, and Will Scarlet.
Although she was a highly proficient reader on her own, Katherine and I still enjoyed reading together every night. I had read to her every night since she was a toddler, and it always seemed to be the highlight of her day. Every night we would read of Robinson Crusoe and his adventures or the treachery of Long John Silver. We even kept a shelf filled with adventure books by her bed, each one waiting to be relived again and again in our imaginations. One night, as she was scanning the shelf, looking for another book to read, her finger stopped at one and at once she wore a look of confusion.
"What's the Bible doing up here? I thought this was just a shelf for adventures," she said.
I reached above her and took the leather-bound book from its place. "Katie, honey, don't you know that the Bible contains some of the greatest adventures of all?"
She looked even more puzzled. "I thought the Bible was just full of rules and stuff."
I quickly thumbed through the pages. "Oh no, Katie!" I replied. "This entire book is one adventure after another. Think of Noah saving his family from a worldwide flood. Think of Moses leading a band of refugees across the desert for forty years heading for their new home. Think of David leading his king's forces into battle, only to be betrayed and hunted by the king whom he loved. Every adventure is more thrilling than the last!"
Her look of confusion soon turned to one of skepticism. "Hmmm, I don't know, Dad. All I ever hear about in there is the rules. 'Do this.' 'Don't do that.' 'Don't lie.' 'Don't steal.' Doesn't sound like an adventure to me."
Taking the book, I sat at the head of her bed and motioned her over. When she shuffled up to my side, I leaned down and quietly whispered, "Then picture this. There was once a great king who ruled over everything he saw. He loved all of his subjects with his whole heart. But one day, one of the king's most trusted knights betrayed him. Taking some of the army, he marched into the kingdom and took all the subjects away from the king. Some he took by force, while others were convinced that if they went along, this knight would make them rulers in his new kingdom. But instead, all of the king's subjects became slaves to this evil knight. Many years passed as the good king saw the plight of his people. He sent secret messages to this faraway land, showing some people how to escape, and while a few did, most of the others had given up hope, to the point that after a while, they couldn't even remember the good king anymore.
"This broke the king's heart. Then he struck upon a bold plan. He would send the crown prince, his only son who he loved deeply, to the evil knight's land. Disguising himself as a slave, the prince walked the streets and country roads of this land, telling all the people of the good king and how to return to their first home. But agents of the knight started to see what was happening, and they decided to put a stop to it. First they tried to trick the prince, hoping he'd fall into their traps. But the prince was too clever to fall for their trickery. So finally, they seized the prince out of the crowd and beat him until he was almost dead. The knight came up, and in his moment of triumph, he stabbed the prince in his hands and feet, reveling in his pain. As the prince lay dying, the knight stabbed him again in his side, and the blood began to flow. When the knight saw that the prince was dead, he left him with his blood still flowing, celebrating in his final triumph over the king he hated.
"But the blood continued to flow for three days, eventually creating a pathway all the way back to the good king's realm. Finally on the morning of the third day, the prince who was dead… opened his eyes! He was alive again! The prince knew that only his blood could make a way back to his father, a way that the knight could not reach. As he rose and began to travel down that pathway back to his own land, the prince continued to call more slaves to follow him. Soon that road was filled with former slaves returning to the good king. And the prince promised that soon he would return and defeat the knight forever."
Katherine sat there, absorbing every word. "Wow, I've never heard a story like that! How did the prince come back to life?"
"It was a miracle," I replied. "You see, that prince was Jesus, and the good king is God the Father. Jesus knew the only way to bring us back to God was for him to die. It's only through his blood that we can be set free from sin."
Katherine took the Bible that was in my lap and slowly turned through the pages. After a time, she handed it back to me.
"Dad, could you please read me an adventure story… from here?"
I smiled, snuggled up close to her, opened the Bible, and we began to read.
Craig Kelly is an office assistant living in Lima, Ohio. He received his B.A. from the University of Saskatchewan in 2002. He and his wife, Beth, are actively involved in their church, working both in their church's children's ministry as well as working with low-income youth in their neighborhood. Craig enjoys reading, music, hiking, biking, and indulging in old sci-fi movies.
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StoryShare, November 6, 2011, issue.
Copyright 2011 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
