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  The same darkness you feel when you sit on a polished pew in a funeral chapel and listen to the obituary of the one you love more than life.

  The same darkness you feel when you hear the words, “The tumor is malignant. We have to operate.”

  The same darkness that falls upon you when you realize you just lost your temper . . . again.

  The same darkness you feel when you realize the divorce you never wanted is final.

  The same darkness into which Jesus screamed, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

  Appropriate words. For when we doubt, God seems very far away.

  Which is exactly why he chose to draw so near.

  God had told Abram to take three animals, cut them in half, and arrange the halves facing each other. To us the command is mysterious. To Abram, it wasn’t. He’d seen the ceremony before. He’d participated in it. He’d sealed many covenants by walking through the divided carcasses and stating, “May what has happened to these animals happen also to me if I fail to uphold my word.”2

  That is why his heart must have skipped a beat when he saw the lights in the darkness passing between the carcasses. The soft golden glow from the coals in the firepot and the courageous flames from the torch. What did they mean?

  The invisible God had drawn near to make his immovable promise. “To your descendants I give this land.”3

  And though God’s people often forgot their God, God didn’t forget them. He kept his word. The land became theirs.

  God didn’t give up. He never gives up.

  When Joseph was dropped into a pit by his own brothers, God didn’t give up.

  When Moses said, “Here I am, send Aaron,” God didn’t give up. When the delivered Israelites wanted Egyptian slavery instead of milk and honey, God didn’t give up.

  When Aaron was making a false god at the very moment Moses was with the true God, God didn’t give up.

  When only two of the ten spies thought the Creator was powerful enough to deliver the created, God didn’t give up.

  When Samson whispered to Delilah, when Saul roared after David, when David schemed against Uriah, God didn’t give up.

  When God’s word lay forgotten and man’s idols stood glistening, God didn’t give up.

  When the children of Israel were taken into captivity, God didn’t give up.

  He could have given up. He could have turned his back. He could have walked away from the wretched mess, but he didn’t.

  He didn’t give up.

  When he became flesh and was the victim of an assassination attempt before he was two years old, he didn’t give up.

  When the people from his own hometown tried to push him over a cliff, he didn’t give up.

  When his brothers ridiculed him, he didn’t give up.

  When he was accused of blaspheming God by people who didn’t fear God, he didn’t give up.

  When Peter worshiped him at the supper and cursed him at the fire, he didn’t give up.

  When people spat in his face, he didn’t spit back. When the bystanders slapped him, he didn’t slap them. When a whip ripped his sides, he didn’t turn and command the awaiting angels to stuff that whip down that soldier’s throat.

  And when human hands fastened the divine hands to a cross with spikes, it wasn’t the soldiers who held the hands of Jesus steady. It was God who held them steady. For those wounded hands were the same invisible hands that had carried the firepot and the torch two thousand years earlier. They were the same hands that had brought light into Abram’s thick and dreadful darkness. They had come to do it again.

  So the next time that obnoxious neighbor walks in, escort him out. Out to the hill. Out to Calvary. Out to the cross where, with holy blood, the hand that carried the flame wrote the promise, “God would give up his only Son before he’d give up on you.”

  CHAPTER 6

  ANGELIC MESSAGES

  I had every right to be angry. If you’d had a week like mine, you would have been angry too. My problems began on Sunday night. I was still living in Brazil and was taking some relatives to southern Brazil to see the Iguaçú Falls. A canceled flight left us stranded several hours in the Saõ Paulo airport. No warning. No explanation. Just a notification as we were landing that the plane we were going to catch was going nowhere. If we wanted, we could wait two hours and catch another one.

  “If we wanted!” Grrrr.

  When we got to our hotel, it was raining. It rained until the day we left.

  Determined to record the falls, I carried my video camera for one mile through a rainstorm. I don’t mean a drizzle or a sprinkle or a shower. I mean a blinding downpour. When I reached the falls, I realized I had left the camera turned on for the previous hour and filmed the inside of the camera bag and run down the battery.

  When I got back to the hotel, I realized that the rain had ruined the camera. How much ruin? Three hundred dollars’ worth of ruin. That was Wednesday. The week wasn’t over yet.

  When I got back to Rio, I found out Denalyn had told her family that we were going to spend the upcoming Christmas with them. I had already told my family that we were going to spend the holidays with them.

  Thursday was the clincher. Denalyn called me at home. Our car had broken down. The car that the car dealer promised was in great shape. The car that the car dealer promised was worth the extra money. The car that the car dealer had sworn was trouble free. It broke down. Downtown. Again. On my day off.

  I walked to the shopping center. I spoke to no one. No one dared to speak to me.

  I sat in the car and tried to start it. No luck. When I turned the key in the ignition, all I could hear were the promises of the car dealer and the jingle of the mechanic’s cash register. I spent an hour tinkering with a broken-down car in a parking lot.

  Finally I called the mechanic. The tow truck was busy. Could I wait a few minutes? In Brazil, the word minutes can better be translated years. So I waited. And I waited. And I waited. My children grew up and had children of their own, and still I was waiting.

  Finally, as the sun was setting, the truck appeared. “Put it in neutral,” I was instructed. As I climbed in the car, I thought, Might as well try it one more time. I turned the key in the ignition. Guess what? You got it. It started.

  That should have been good news. It was, until I saw the driver of the tow truck in no hurry to leave. He wanted to be paid. “For what?” I implored. “Was it my fault your car started?” he replied. It’s a good thing I didn’t know how to say “smart aleck” in Portuguese. So I paid him for watching me start my car.

  I immediately drove the car to the mechanic. As I drove, two devils came and perched on my shoulders. The fact that I couldn’t see them didn’t make them any less real. I could hear them—they spoke the language of the Liar.

  One was anger. If there was anything I wasn’t mad at by this point, he took care of that. My list of offenses was long and ugly.

  The other was self-pity. Boy, did he find a listening ear. Not only had I had a bad week, he reminded me that I had been plagued with a bad life! Born with the handicap of freckles and red hair. Always too slow for track. Never elected “most likely to succeed.” And now, a missionary suffering on foreign soil.

  Anger in one ear and self-pity in the other . . . if I hadn’t seen him, who knows what I would have done.

  He didn’t look like an angel. In fact, he looked like anything but an angel. But I know he was an angel, for only angels bring that type of a message.

  He knocked on my car window.

  “Trocadinho, Senhor?” (“Do you have any spare change, sir?”)

  He was, at most, nine years old. Shirtless. Barefooted. Dirty. So dirty I couldn’t tell if he was wearing shorts or not. His hair was matted. His skin was crusty. I rolled down the window. The voices on my shoulders became silent.

  “What’s your name?” I asked.

  “José.”

  I looked over at the sidewalk. Two other street orphans were walking towards the
cars behind me. They were naked except for ragged gym shorts.

  “Are they your brothers?” I asked.

  “No, just friends.”

  “Have you collected much money today?”

  He opened a dirty hand full of coins. Enough money, perhaps, for a soft drink.

  I reached in my wallet and pulled out the equivalent to a dollar. His eyes brightened. Mine watered. The light changed and the cars behind me honked. As I drove away, I saw him running to tell his friends what he had received.

  The voices on my shoulders didn’t dare say a word. Nor did I. The three of us drove in shameful silence.

  I figured I had said enough. And God had heard every word.

  What if God had responded to my grumblings? What if he’d heeded my complaints? He could have. He could have answered my carelessly mumbled prayers.

  And had he chosen to do so, a prototype of the result had just appeared at my door.

  “Don’t want to mess with airlines? This boy doesn’t have that problem. Frustrated with your video camera? That’s one headache this boy doesn’t have. He may have to worry about tonight’s dinner, but he doesn’t have to worry about video cameras. And family? I’m sure this orphan would gladly take one of your families if you are too busy to appreciate them. And cars? Yes, they are a hassle, aren’t they? You should try this boy’s mode of transportation—bare feet.”

  God sent the boy with a message. And the point the boy made was razor sharp.

  “You cry over spilled champagne.”

  Ouch.

  “Your complaints are not over the lack of necessities but the abundance of benefits. You bellyache over the frills, not the basics; over benefits, not essentials. The source of your problems is your blessings.”

  José gave me a lot for my dollar; he gave me a lesson on gratitude.

  Gratitude. More aware of what you have than what you don’t. Recognizing the treasure in the simple—a child’s hug, fertile soil, a golden sunset. Relishing in the comfort of the common—a warm bed, a hot meal, a clean shirt.

  And no one has more reason to be grateful than the one who has been reminded of God’s gift by one of God’s angels. I was. And so was Franciszek Gajowniczek. His story is moving.

  It’s difficult to find beauty in death. It’s even more difficult to find beauty in a death camp. Especially Auschwitz. Four million Jews died there in World War II. A half-ton of human hair is still preserved. The showers that sprayed poison gas still stand.

  But for all the ugly memories of Auschwitz there is one of beauty. It’s the memory Gajowniczek has of Maximilian Kolbe.

  In February 1941 Kolbe was incarcerated at Auschwitz. He was a Franciscan priest. In the harshness of the slaughterhouse he maintained the gentleness of Christ. He shared his food. He gave up his bunk. He prayed for his captors. One could call him the “Saint of Auschwitz.”

  In July of that same year there was an escape from the prison. It was the custom at Auschwitz to kill ten prisoners for every one who escaped. All the prisoners would be gathered in the courtyard, and the commandant would randomly select ten men from the ranks. These victims would be immediately taken to a cell where they would receive no food or water until they died.

  The commandant begins his selection. At each selection another prisoner steps forward to fill the sinister quota. The tenth name he calls is Gajowniczek.

  As the SS officers check the numbers of the condemned, one of the condemned begins to sob. “My wife and my children,” he weeps.

  The officers turn as they hear movement among the prisoners. The guards raise their rifles. The dogs tense, anticipating a command to attack. A prisoner has left his row and is pushing his way to the front.

  It is Kolbe. No fear on his face. No hesitancy in his step. The capo shouts at him to stop or be shot. “I want to talk to the commander,” he says calmly. For some reason the officer doesn’t club or kill him. Kolbe stops a few paces from the commandant, removes his hat, and looks the German officer in the eye.

  “Herr Commandant, I wish to make a request, please.”

  That no one shot him is a miracle.

  “I want to die in the place of this prisoner.” He points at the sobbing Gajowniczek. The audacious request is presented without stammer.

  “I have no wife and children. Besides, I am old and not good for anything. He’s in better condition.” Kolbe knew well the Nazi mentality.

  “Who are you?” the officer asks.

  “A Catholic priest.”

  The block is stunned. The commandant, uncharacteristically speechless. After a moment, he barks, “Request granted.”

  Prisoners were never allowed to speak. Gajowniczek says, “I could only thank him with my eyes. I was stunned and could hardly grasp what was going on. The immensity of it: I, the condemned, am to live and someone else willingly and voluntarily offers his life for me—a stranger. Is this some dream?”

  The Saint of Auschwitz outlived the other nine. In fact, he didn’t die of thirst or starvation. He died only after carbolic acid was injected into his veins. It was August 14, 1941.

  Gajowniczek survived the Holocaust. He made his way back to his hometown. Every year, however, he goes back to Auschwitz. Every August 14 he goes back to say thank you to the man who died in his place.

  In his backyard there is a plaque. A plaque he carved with his own hands. A tribute to Maximilian Kolbe—the man who died so he could live.1

  There are times that it takes an angel to remind us about what we have.

  There aren’t very many similarities between Franciszek Gajowniczek and Max Lucado. We speak two different languages. We salute two different flags. We know two different homelands. But we do have three things in common.

  We both had an angel set us free from a prison. We both had a Jewish Teacher die in our place. And we both learned that what we already have is far greater than anything we might want.

  CHAPTER 7

  REMEMBER

  On the evening of that first day of the week,

  when the disciples were together, with the

  doors locked for fear of the Jews . . .

  JOHN 20:19

  The church of Jesus Christ began with a group of frightened men in a second-floor room in Jerusalem.

  Though trained and taught, they didn’t know what to say. Though they’d marched with him for three years, they now sat . . . afraid. They were timid soldiers, reluctant warriors, speechless messengers.

  Their most courageous act was to get up and lock the door.

  Some looked out the window, some looked at the wall, some looked at the floor, but all looked inside themselves.

  And well they should, for it was an hour of self-examination. All their efforts seemed so futile. Nagging their memories were the promises they’d made but not kept. When the Roman soldiers took Jesus, Jesus’ followers took off. With the very wine of the covenant on their breath and the bread of his sacrifice in their bellies, they fled.

  All those boasts of bravado? All those declarations of devotion? They lay broken and shattered at the gate of Gethsemane’s garden.

  We don’t know where the disciples went when they fled the garden, but we do know what they took: a memory. They took a heart-stopping memory of a man who called himself no less than God in the flesh. And they couldn’t get him out of their minds. Try as they might to lose him in the crowd, they couldn’t forget him. If they saw a leper, they thought of his compassion. If they heard a storm, they would remember the day he silenced one. If they saw a child, they would think of the day he held one. And if they saw a lamb being carried to the temple, they would remember his face streaked with blood and his eyes flooded with love.

  No, they couldn’t forget him. As a result, they came back. And, as a result, the church of our Lord began with a group of frightened men in an upper room.

  Sound familiar? Things haven’t changed much in two thousand years, have they? How many churches today find themselves paralyzed in the upper room?

 
How many congregations have just enough religion to come together, but not enough passion to go out? If the doors aren’t locked, they might as well be.

  Upper-room futility. A little bit of faith but very little fire.

  “Sure, we’re doing our part to reach the world. Why, just last year we mailed ten correspondence courses. We’re anticipating a response any day now.”

  “You bet we care that the world is reached! We send $150 a month to . . . uh, well . . . ol’ what’s-his-name down there in . . . uh, well, oh, I forget the place, but . . . we pray for it often.”

  “World hunger? Why, that’s high on our priority list! In fact, we have plans to plan a planning session. At least, that is what we are planning to do.”

  Good people. Lots of ideas. Plenty of good intentions. Budgets. Meetings. Words. Promises. But while all this is going on, the door remains locked and the story stays a secret.

  You don’t turn your back on Christ, but you don’t turn toward him either. You don’t curse his name, but neither do you praise it. You know you should do something, but you’re not sure what. You know you should come together, but you’re not sure why.

  Upper-room futility. Confused ambassadors behind locked doors. What will it take to unlock them? What will it take to ignite the fire? What will it take to restore the first-century passion? What will have to happen before the padlocks of futility tumble from our doors and are trampled under the feet of departing disciples?

  More training? That’s part of it. Better strategies? That would help. A greater world vision? Undoubtedly. More money? That’s imperative. A greater dependence on the Holy Spirit? Absolutely.

  But in the midst of these items there is one basic ingredient that cannot be overlooked. There is one element so vital that its absence ensures our failure. What is needed to get us out is exactly what got the apostles out.

  Picture the scene. Peter, John, James. They came back. Banking on some zany possibility that the well of forgiveness still had a few drops, they came back. Daring to dream that the master had left them some word, some plan, some direction, they came back.