Make it right
The next Sunday, Oscar and Esther did go back to church. After the choir sang their songs, Brother James stood behind the pulpit with his suit coat unbuttoned and his left hand in his pocket. There was a hushed silence that fell over the congregation.
“I had one of the ladies ask me where I’ve been all week?” He rubbed his free hand through his hair. “I’ve been praying.” He paused, “God tells us to go to a closet and pray, (Matthew 6:6) that’s pretty much where I’ve been.” He paused. “Last Sunday I upset someone very much with my sermon. And God led me to learn more about why. The subject of sin is always upsetting. But there is always more to every story.”
Oscar put his arm around Esther.
Brother James fidgeted for a moment. “I have never had anyone in my life commit suicide. No one close to me is a homosexual. I do have people close to me that have committed adultery. That have abused drugs. That have sucked the very marrow out of life, threw away the bone and sucked for more.” He turned to lean on the pulpit; “the human in me wants to glorify God and to live a life that is pleasing onto him. The human in me also knows the pain that having people close to you commit public sins causes.” He put his hand over his heart. “Pain that, it’s hard to talk about; pain that we had soon just forget.” He lowered his head as if in shame. “I try really hard not to preach about those sins that lay close to me. For the simple reason, I don’t want to relive the pain. I guess in essence, that too is a sin. Ignoring the will of God.” He rubbed his face with his hands and let out a long sigh. “I mentioned that I felt led to go to talk to the person that I hurt. And when I did, it wasn’t about the sin. It was about hope. I had popped her bubble of hope. I had taken away the hope that she would one day get to see that special person again. I need to wrap up in grace.” He hugged himself for a moment as if wrapping himself up in that word. “Jesus died on the cross to forgive all our sins and give us grace. It’s all about grace.” He pointed out over the congregation. “I see heads bobbing so some of you agree with me. As it was pointed out to me, the Bible is full of fire and brimstone. The bible is also full of mercy, love, compassion, our beloved grace, and,” he paused, “hope. I forget about hope. But think with me, when we pray: we pray for Bob’s cancer to go away. We pray that Amber will arrive safely in Denver. We pray that God will make the people that we work with more understanding. We pray the Cats will win tonight.” There was soft laughter in the congregation. “But what is that prayer?” He looked out over the crowd. “It is our expression of hope. This person wasn’t upset because I said suicide was a sin. She agrees with me that it is. But I took away her hope.” He put both hands over his heart. “When Jesus was hanging on the cross with the two thieves next to him, one says to him, ‘if you are the Lord, get yourself and us down.’ But the other one said, ‘we deserve to be here. We have committed our crime. Lord, but you are innocent. Remember me when you come into your kingdom.’ And what did Jesus say, ‘Today you will be in my kingdom with me.’ I paraphrased a bit, my point is this, I don’t want you to leave here today thinking that Brother Randall gave me permission to kill myself, no. What I am saying, is that without being witness to the event. We have no way of knowing if he or she cried out to the Lord. That’s what we need to do in our time of sorrow and triumph, is cry out to the Lord.” He stretched out his arms, “cry out to the Lord. He will hear us.” He bowed his head, “please brothers and sisters, if I ever preach on a subject that is close to you and you are hurt by my words: please, talk with me about it. I don’t want to be the preacher that turns you away from God. Tell me about it. I don’t want to be the man with blood on his hands.” He closed his eyes for a moment. “She asked me why I chose suicide as my sermon? I didn’t have an answer until now. I can only assume it’s like being an author.” He put his hands in the air around his head. “God puts ideas here.” And with a fluid motion, he moved his hands from his head to his mouth, “and they come out here. I didn’t have a sermon prepared that morning.” He leaned back on the pulpit. “Perhaps it was to teach me a lesson. If I am too human to talk about my pain, it is ungodly of me to belittle someone else’s. And for that I am truly sorry and I beg your forgiveness.” He made direct eye contact with Esther. “There will be inflammatory subjects that we discuss. Not because they are political, but because God requires it. Please, let it be a learning opportunity for me. We are all here to learn about God, myself included. I am young and the years of life are not under my belt. Let me learn from you just as you come here to learn from me.”
After the service, Brother James shook Oscar’s hand. He just stared at Esther, not really knowing what to say. She finally said, “thank you.”
He smiled for the first time since she had met him. “No, thank you.” He didn’t shake her hand, instead he hugged her.
On the way home, Oscar asked, “are you okay?”
“I think so.”
He took her hand and kissed the top of it. “What do you think about coming back?”
“Let’s give it a try.” She smiled.
Poetry & More 
I like this whole idea. Sometimes in writing we touch on things that push our readers buttons, or make them think, or even hurt them. And why do we do this? Because somewhere in us there’s an idea that it needs to be said. Maybe we can’t even put a finger on it. But we have to remember that the purpose of saying it is to try to find an explanation for the thoughts that are important to us. Hopefully so we can examine the world and move through it in a better way, spiritually too.
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Religion always gets a bad rap. Humans make mistakes. We do ugly things. We say ugly things. We have tried, over the years, to make God do and say the things we want him to say. We have used The Bible as a weapon. Either personal or societal. There is so much about The Bible that we don’t understand. We get so laser focused on; this is a sin or that is a sin. We over look hope, grace, and love. One thing that people do that makes me shake my head is when they quote Ephesians 5:22 – 33 “wives be subject to your own husbands,” then they stop. Neglecting the rest of the conversation, “husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church.” People want to do one without the other. We can do a lot of damage through our lack of understanding.
It is never my intent to hurt anyone. My life is such a mess, who am I? My purpose in exploring this hurtful subject with Esther; I was trying to highlight God’s love and grace. At the same time show that we can learn from our mistakes if we take the time to. If we own up to them, learn and grow.
Thank you 💕 for sticking with me so that this subject could be talked about in the context of my story. I realize it was difficult. I’m so very sorry that I upset you.
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You didn’t upset me at all😎but I can understand how I gave you that impression. I am admiring the way you’re touching on subjects that affect me (and our times) personally. That’s the hallmark of a good writer! You’re also doing it in a very sympathetic and interesting way. I love it. I love that your characters are struggling with these things so much that it’s hurting them physically, but they’re trying to find a way through together. I hope they make it.
My issues with religion are always related to humanity’s need to interpret it in their own best interests, for power, for money, for fame, for control. It’s exactly what you said: we cherrypick what suits us and then we forget to examine the rest.
What it’s really all about is faith, and hope, and love, and trying to approach things that we don’t understand, and won’t until we reach a different plane. Those are the parts I care about.
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Thank you for your kind comments. 💕
And I agree with you, we haven’t reached that place.
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