Angels of Humility: A Novel (28 page)

She rolled to her back and lay still, praying. She lifted her head and looked down her body. Her left foot was pointing toward the ceiling. Her right foot was pointed toward the wall.

“You’ve done it now,” screeched Discouragement. “You’ll definitely live your last days in a nursing home for sure.” Sarah began to cry as much from
fear as from the pain. There was no getting around it; she knew that her actions would cause major changes in her life.

When she’d agreed to get the necklace, she’d never really planned on using it. It was just part of an agreement to let her stay in her home.

“Sarah, this isn’t going to go away,” said Malta. “You need help.” Reluctantly she pushed the button.

In a few seconds, her phone was ringing; she counted 17 times. Then it stopped. In a few minutes she heard the siren in the distance. Another minute and it was screamingly loud. She heard pounding on the front door. Then running feet went past the basement window to the back. There was more knocking, then the sound of splintering wood. At the top of the stairs stood a fireman. “She’s down here,” he yelled, shoving her walker aside. Seeing that only added to her humiliation. She shook her head at her foolishness and choked back more tears.

In just a few seconds she was surrounded. One intense-looking fireman put a blood pressure cuff on her while another asked an unending string of questions. “What’s the president’s name? What’s the date? What city are you in? What happened? What medicines are you taking? Are you having problems breathing?” They scooped her onto a long, cold plastic board and strapped her down. The movement caused her to cry out in pain, especially the trip up the steep stairs.

As they were carrying her across the kitchen, Malta prompted her to speak her thoughts. Through her tears she managed to say, “All this just so I could blow out the pilot light and save a few dollars.”

“Ma’am, did you say ‘blow out’ the pilot light?”

“Yes.”

“Did you turn off the gas?”

“No. I didn’t know I was supposed to. George always….” her voice trailed off as she watched him run for the basement door.

She didn’t think it was possible to be more embarrassed, more humiliated, than she was already, but when she saw the firemen shaking their heads and smirking at each other, she felt like a chastised, incompetent child.

“Ma’am,” said the returning officer, “I don’t want to say you’re lucky that you fell and hurt yourself, but it’s a good thing we’re here. You would have blown up yourself, your house, and possibly your closest neighbors.”

The ambulance arrived at the hospital within minutes. Nothing in Bradbury was very far from anything else. Sarah was X-rayed in the ER, which confirmed a broken hip. The good news was, instead of needing a hip replacement, the bones could be pinned. They whisked her into surgery late that afternoon.

Her exhaustion and the medication caused her to sleep all through the evening and night. When she opened her eyes she looked up into the face of a smiling nurse.

“Good morning, my name’s Jan. How do you feel this morning?”

Sarah assessed the situation; she felt pain, a sharp unrelenting pain in her right hip. She had an IV in her left hand and her right arm was one big bruise. Then the memories of last night all came flooding back. She teared up slightly, “How long will I be here?”

Jan patted her arm gently, “That’s partly up to you. We’ll keep you on this floor and start rehabilitation therapy. Probably after a week or so you’ll be moved to a temporary facility to continue your therapy, all together you can expect rehab to take about six weeks.”

She didn’t ask the question, but she knew the answer. They wouldn’t want her to go back home by herself, and they wouldn’t want her to drive.

She took the medicine Jan had brought her and with much embarrassment and excruciating pain, used the bedpan. When Jan left, Sarah started thinking. Suddenly, having Parkinson’s and having to use a walker to get around didn’t seem so bad compared to the situation she was in now. Waves of discouragement rolled over her as she listened to the spirit of Deception: “You were so ungrateful when you should have been grateful for what you still had left. You were just too stupid to see it then.”

“Your life is wasted,” lied Depression. “You can’t do anything for anyone now. Everyone has to do for you. You’ll never go back to the jail to minister. You can bet God is really mad at you.” Sarah began to fixate on God being mad at her. This was an open door for the spirit of Guilt, who readily joined
Deception at his gruesome game. “You’re such a failure! Your ministry and your prayer walking have come to an end. You just ruined the plans that God had for the rest of your life because of your stupidity.”

“Sarah,” whispered Joel, “God is not mad at you for your failures, accidents, and weakness. Your sin sometimes surprises you, but it never surprises God. Before He even saved you He knew every sin you’d commit your whole life, and He called you as His daughter anyway.”

“No one is a failure by God’s standard until they give up and just quit trying. No pun intended, Sarah, but Proverbs says that ‘the righteous falls seven times and rises again.’
²
You can fall, get up, and try again and fall, get up, and try again. As long as you keep getting up after each fall, God never classifies you as a failure. You’re not a failure. God always looks at your heart and your intentions.”

“God can still use your life even though it looks bleak to you,” said Joel. “Romans 8 says He can turn anything for good.
³
He is the all-powerful God of the universe; He still wants to use you. Trust Him.”

“You have the ability to make bad situations worse by the way you react. The opposite is also true.”

The life in Joel and Malta’s words imparted hope and faith during one of the most trying times in her life. By an act of her will, Sarah began to sing out loud, “You’re all I want. You’re all I’ve ever needed. You’re all I want. Help me know You are near.”
⁴
There was no one in the bed next to hers, but she wouldn’t have cared anyway. Joel looked at Malta, who was grinning from ear to ear. He nodded. Joel pulled his sword and split the evil spirits between their yellow eyes. When they vanished, Sarah felt a freedom she hadn’t felt for quite awhile.

She was still in significant pain from the surgery, but she called Barbara and asked her to pick up her Bible, devotional book, and other reading material. She also asked her to call Herald to fix her back door.
It could have been worse
, she thought. I
could have not only blown myself up, but also taken some of the neighbors with me. Clarence Harvey would have been only too happy to tell of my stupidity and death in large headlines on the front page of the Gazette. S
he shook her head and said sheepishly,
Thank God for the lesser of the two evils. Even though I’m really in a bind, I’m grateful to be alive
.

Paul hadn’t slept well last night. The spirits were influencing his dreams again. He’d tossed and turned so much that Kathy pleaded with him to move to the couch. At 3:50 he finally trudged out of the bedroom. On the way down the hall, he passed the steps to Jordan’s room. Saldu was pointing up. Paul took the suggestion. Jordan’s door was ajar and his nightlight spilled out into the hall. Paul entered and stood over his crib. He was lying on his back, clutching his favorite blankie in one arm. Winnie the Pooh was sitting by his side like some incompetent night watchman, and it made Paul chuckle.

Hael watched as Paul brushed Jordan’s fine, brown hair to the side of his head and pulled his T-shirt down over his belly button. Jordan was so precious to him. Soberly, Paul made a sincere commitment to spend more time with the family.

Every so often, Jordan made little sucking motions with his lips. Paul was so filled with emotion for the little guy he wanted to scoop him in his arms right there, but he knew it would be selfish on his part. Besides, Kathy had an ironclad rule—never wake a sleeping child!

Paul stayed by Jordan’s crib admiring his son. His thoughts drifted. He wondered if his dad had ever stood over his crib admiring and appreciating him.
Unlikely
, he thought. He couldn’t picture his dad being sentimental over much; it wasn’t a side of his dad that he ever saw.

He was probably sentimental for his drinking buddies. I can imagine them crying in their beer together. He must have used it all up before he came home, that’s for sure. Whenever he came home drunk, all he did was spew contempt
.

Contempt, that was what Paul felt toward his dad now. When he was younger, it was fear; when he became an adolescent, it was hatred. Paul’s feelings had mellowed to contempt through the years because his dad was gone and unable to continue sinning against him.

Saldu had been standing by Hael watching Paul’s tender side expressing itself toward his son. They were enjoying the intimate scene; Hael pulled his flute and played a lullaby. When Paul’s thoughts switched to his childhood wounds, their ministry did, too.

Paul couldn’t remember a time in his life when his dad wasn’t a drunk. But Saldu and Hael knew it didn’t happen until Paul was three and a half, when the family business started to falter. Paul’s dad, Wilson, had taken over the family clothing store from his father, who constantly pressured Wilson to perform. Wilson had wanted desperately to be a mechanic. When he was just 16, he saved the money he earned from working in the family store and bought a 1936 two-door Ford coup that wouldn’t run. He overhauled the engine, replaced some parts, and proudly drove that car for the next six years. He loved the hands-on aspect; he loved puttering, getting greasy, and figuring things out by trial and error.

When he was a senior in high school, he broached the subject that he might not want to follow his dad in the family business. His dad pitched such a fit that he never brought it up again. He always resented the clothing store. When a new shopping center was built on the town’s outskirts, most of the downtown customers were pulled away, and Wilson watched
the numbers steadily deteriorate. He hated the fact that he was going to be the one to kill the family business. It would become his legacy. Emotional pain always seeks pleasure, or what it perceives as pleasure. That’s when he started going from the business to the bar and then home.

Before that, Wilson had been a caring, involved father. He did indeed stand over Paul’s crib admiring his son. It was Wilson who coaxed Paul to take his first steps and Wilson who insisted on having a family portrait taken every year, at least for the first three years.

Saldu placed his hand over Paul’s heart. He could feel the anointing surging through his hand into Paul’s spirit. He spoke softly, “Receive this, Paul, really receive it: It wasn’t you your father was mad at; it was himself, and it was his own father. Unfortunately, it just spilled out on everyone else who was around. Once the spirit of Addiction trapped your dad with alcohol, it was a downhill ride, an open invitation for Anger and Rage and other bad spirits to join in. Your father was ensnared by evil, and it spilled onto everyone he was around, but mostly his family. As a child you were a helpless victim with no protection. But you didn’t deserve that. You deserved better. You were a beautiful, wonderful, worthy child created in God’s image to run and play and laugh and be loved. Father cried many tears. Every night you cried yourself to sleep, He cried, too. It was not His plan for your father to become a drunk.” A murky haze of deception started to lift.

Saldu pulled his flaming sword. “Receive the Love of the Father for you. Feel His unconditional love. He chose you before the foundation of the world, and His thoughts toward you are more than the sand on the sea-shore.
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Even in your sin and brokenness, you are a source of joy to Him, just like Jordan, in his immaturity, is a source of joy for you. Receive,” said Saldu as he tried to plunge the sword into Paul’s heart and spirit. It wouldn’t penetrate.

Saldu dropped his head to his chest,
Still the wall of unforgiveness
. “Paul, listen, being in unforgiveness moves you out of the fold. Sheep don’t survive well without the shepherd’s loving care. You’re putting yourself at great peril by being on your own. You’re moving into the same territory your dad did.”

“If humans only knew how bitterness and unforgiveness cut them off from Father, they wouldn’t be able to repent fast enough,” said Hael.

The next morning after breakfast, Paul stayed to play with Jordan, giving him a rambunctious piggyback ride. Jordan squealed in delight. Kathy loved watching Paul play with Jordan and threw back her head, laughing at Paul’s imitation of a horse’s whinny.

As Paul was getting ready to leave, Kathy commented, “It says here in
The Gazette
that Sarah is in the hospital. She apparently fell and broke her hip. What a shame.”