Chapter 38

© Copyright 2006 by Kendra Cornell



Karen lay in the white bed, her room smelling of antiseptic. A heart-rate monitor was hooked up to her index finger, but other than that, she looked much as she normally did..

Paul entered alone, his mother content to sit in the waiting room. He swallowed nervously, not wanting to wake her. Pulling up a chair, he sat at her bedside for only a moment before she turned to him with wide blue eyes.

She blinked sleepily and said, “Sorry… They’ve got me on something for the pain.”

Carefully, he reached out and cradled one of her hands. “How’re you feeling?”

“Tired…” And then she smiled, a small gentle smile that said she was glad he was here.

“Karen, I’m so sorry that I didn’t get to you sooner.”

She sensed the unspoken concerns.

“Paul, he never came near me.”

He gulped. “Oh… Well, that’s good then I guess.”

Why were things so awkward between the two of them? He had no idea what to say next.

“Well, I know you need your sleep. You must be exhausted.”

“I am… so tired.”

He stood, wanting to say so many things, but having no words to express them.

“Good-bye then, Karen,” he said softly.

Though half asleep, she turned to him and murmured, “Paul, thank you. Thank you so much.”

After a sleepless night, Paul couldn’t muster the energy to care about the election, but his mother turned on the news anyway.

“Oh, Paul quit. You might be on the news.”

He was moping, and he hated it. Flopping down on the couch in front of the TV, he let his mother tune to a news channel.

Our top story this morning concerns the Denver Mayor’s Election. Startling new events have left lead candidate Tom Delaney all but without a hope. He was arrested without incident last evening for his part in organizing an illicit coalition that includes some of the most influential business and civic leaders in the city. Detective Michael Transom, who was once considered the lead candidate for appointment to the office of the Director of Public Safety, was also arrested without incident last night. He is accused of conspiring to murder local political strategist Karen Cook. Cook is apparently recovering from her injuries at a local hospital. Another prominent political personality, Jack Jenkins was also arrested for attempted murder…

He quickly pressed the off-button. “All’s well that ends well, right?” Paul’s manner was depressed.

Glenda took one look at him and knew that there was nothing she could do for him right now. This was something he was going to have to work out on his own.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?”

Paul looked up, confused. “What am I forgetting?”

“You have a meeting with the church board this morning.”

“Well, that shouldn’t be a problem. I never did anything wrong, and now it’s all over the news. What else could they want?”

Glenda nodded thoughtfully. “Honey, this isn’t over yet. In the meantime, why don’t you go over to the church and get ready for the meeting?’

Paul nodded and headed out the door. He could’ve cared less at the moment, but he knew that regardless of what had and particularly what hadn’t happened between him and Karen, he still had grave responsibilities to the church, despite the massive chasm inside of him. But this was different. His heart ached and he couldn’t stop thinking about Karen. This emptiness seemed to reach into dark regions that Paul had never known existed.

Paul walked into the church through the door that had been shattered the night before. Steve had apparently taped it up before calling a glass replacement company. He walked up the stairs and into the chapel, noticing with half-hearted verve that someone had cleaned up the mess from last night- at least the physical signs of it.

He sighed. Paul still hadn’t heard a word from anyone about what had conspired here. He had heard next to nothing about Jack Jenkins or the reason he had tracked Karen here. He knew nothing about Tom Delaney, or who this mysterious ‘source’ was. Wasn’t he entitled to something at least?

Sitting in the first pew, Paul leaned his elbows on his knees and put his head in his hands.

“Lord, I don’t know what to feel right now. I’m angry and frustrated. And for some reason, I don’t even care what the church decides today. I feel off, Lord. In my head, I know that You have this all in Your hands- that I shouldn’t be worrying about anything. But everything’s changed now. Lord, I know it’s only been a few days, but,” Paul gulped, “I think I’m in love with Karen. I know she’s not a believer, and I would never tell her. But I don’t know what to do with this.” Paul paused there, his fists clenched in frustration.

Someone cleared his throat at the back of the church. Steve stood there alone.

“Sorry, man. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

Paul stood quickly. How much had he heard?

“No problem… What’s up?”

“The board is waiting downstairs. Are you ready?”

Paul nodded in resignation, “I guess so.” And the two headed down the stairs to face what would define Paul’s immediate future.



In the hospital room, Karen lay sleepless. She had been tormented by fragmented dreams- dreams where Jack and Paul flashed in and out of her line of vision. As she lay there, she had nothing to do but think.

Karen no longer doubted in the existence of God. As a matter of fact, she felt uncomfortable with the idea that God might actually be there, looking down at her, judging her thoughts and actions. On the other hand, Glenda and Paul were the kindest human beings she had ever known in her life. And what was their God like? He must be something special to cause them to be so… at peace.

Karen wanted to know. She wanted answers and she hated wondering like this. Leaning over and picking up the phone on her bedside table, Karen dialed information and asked for Paul’s number. The call was put through almost immediately, and Glenda picked up.

“Hi Karen! It’s wonderful to hear from you!”

“Hi Glenda… I was wondering, well, is Paul there?”

“No, I’m sorry. He had a meeting over at the church.”

Karen had forgotten. “Of course he does… Glenda, are you busy right now?”

“No, not at all. As a matter of fact, I was sitting here wondering what to do. It’s kind of hard being in someone else’s home, you know?”

“Yes,” Karen laughed half-heartedly. “I know exactly what you mean. Listen, would you mind terribly coming over here? I had something I wanted to talk about.”

“Sure thing, honey. I’ll be there in two shakes.”

Glenda arrived about twenty minutes later.

She was smiling when she walked in and pulled a chair to the side of the bed.

“How are you feeling?”

Karen smiled just a bit. “I’m okay I guess. Tired, more than anything. I, uh… I had some questions I wanted to ask you.”

Pausing to gulp down her nervousness, Karen dove in. “Glenda, could you tell me about God?”

Glenda looked taken aback for a moment. “Tell you about God… Well, what exactly do you want to know? What He’s like- Who he is?”

“I don’t understand why you and Paul are the way you are. I look at Tom Delaney, who says he’s a Christian, and I get that. I understand that. I’ve always equated Christians with hypocrisy. But then I meet you two, especially Paul…” her voice drifted off.

“And you’re wondering how people who supposedly believe in the same God can act so differently?”

“Yes… exactly.”

“Well, the best answer to that is that if you keep your eyes on the Christian, rather than Christ, you’ll always be disappointed. Christians are just human beings like everyone else. They have the same struggles, the same problems…”

“Don’t you see though? I don’t want a bunch of religious rhetoric. I want the truth. What does that mean in real terms- keeping your eyes on Christ. It sounds like a term designed to make you constantly feel like you should be doing something but you’re not quite sure what you should be doing. That’s what Christianity is to me.”

Glenda took Karen’s issues very seriously, and thought hard to find an answer that would really get to the heart of her questions.

“Karen, have you ever heard about Jesus Christ?”

Karen thought for a moment. “I know he lived a long time ago. He got killed for… something or another.”

Glenda knew she needed to keep this brief and to the point.

“Mankind is sinful, and God hates sin. We needed help. So God sent the only Son he had- Jesus down to earth where he took on a physical body, just like ours. He lived here for thirty-three years, preaching and teaching. He was, in a way, a true revolutionary.”

Karen could relate to that. Glenda continued, “According to Hebrew law, sin could only be taken away by the shedding of blood. So priests would sacrifice animals in their temple, but the sin was never really taken away, it was just covered. When Jesus died, he shed his blood so that our sin would be taken away completely.”

Karen followed up, “So since Jesus took away the sin, we can be close to God again?”

“Well, yes. But that’s only part of it. He promises us life from the second we accept Jesus. Jesus never gave us a list of actions to live up to, because He knew there was no way we could. God looked at us, saw how decrepit we were and loved us anyway, enough to send the only One here to die so that we could be with Him again. Jesus was perfect, blameless, but he loved us enough to give up his own life so that we could live.”

“Okay… Are you saying that Jesus came down here to die just for Christians?”

Glenda shook her head. “Jesus Christ died for everyone individually. For you, for me, for Paul, for the people sitting at the bus stop every morning. We are all sinful, and He chose to take that on himself so that we could know Him and have a real relationship with him.”

“But there are a lot of good people in this world. I just can’t buy that every single one of us is that bad.”

Glenda smiled sadly and replied, “Honey, I’ve lived on this earth for sixty-eight years and if I’ve learned anything, it’s that every one of us is capable of anything under the right circumstances.”

“But you’d never…”

“You’d be surprised at the things I’ve done and said and thought. Unfortunately, the truth is that I have never met a perfect person and that’s what God created us to be… perfect. And through Christ, we are new creations- perfect in His sight.”

“But doesn’t God still see what we do? Doesn’t he still condemn Tom Delaney for all the hurt he caused his wife? That’s not fair that he could get away with it.”

Glenda thought for a moment before trying to answer Karen carefully but truthfully. “Jesus said that there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ. If Tom Delaney is sincerely sorry for his actions, the Bible promises he will be forgiven. But even so, we usually can’t escape real repercussions for our actions here on earth.”

Karen tried to absorb what Glenda had to say. No one in this day and age could miss the religious discourse that evidenced itself everywhere. But now, for some reason, Karen wanted to at least hear it… to truly listen to the facts and decide for herself. She thought of one more question- the one that was at the heart of what she wanted to know.

“Glenda, why are you a Christian?”

“I guess when I heard what Christ had done for me, I couldn’t turn my back on it. I couldn’t believe that one person would go through such humiliation and agony and torture so that I could someday live again. God knew who I was and what I was going to do before I even existed, and sent Christ so that I would have a chance to live.”

“You mean, Jesus loved you?”

“No, honey. He loves me. Present tense- Jesus is alive, and he loves me, he loves you.”

“How could He love me?” Karen’s voice choked for a split second. “My own parents didn’t even love me.” A tear ran down her face, unbidden.

Glenda sat closer, moved by Karen’s quiet admission. Swallowing her own tears, she laid one hand over Karen’s.

“He loved you long before you even came into this world, Karen. He loves you so much, he died rather than lose His relationship with you.”

There was a war in Karen’s mind over all of this. She believed what Glenda had to say… but Karen didn’t know what to do about it. Karen swallowed her emotion, not willing it to be so obvious. Folding her hands in her lap, she again turned to Glenda.

“So when you decided not to turn your back on it, what did you do?”

“I prayed the prayer that all Christians pray.”

“And what is that?”

“Well, it goes something like, Dear Jesus, I believe that you were sent to take away my sin and that you died for me. I pray that you would come into my heart and into my life. I want you to live in me. Thank you for dying for me and thank you for your gift of salvation. In Your name, Amen. But Karen, the point isn’t the words…” Glenda searched for a moment, straining to convey the depth of meaning. “God sees your heart. He is only interested in each one of us coming to him in sincerity- He wants us to mean what we say, not just look or sound like we know what we’re doing.”

Karen could respect that- she herself hated life’s human masquerade. But… still, she wanted to know more. “And then what? Did you feel any different?”

“No… not really. Although some people say it was an immediate difference. For me, it was more like… I don’t know. Peace and relief, I guess. I felt so uncomfortable with the whole idea at first that when I finally made that decision, a burden was lifted off of me.”

Karen nodded, silent and withdrawn. Glenda would never know by looking at her that she wanted to pray that prayer, because there was a part of her that was embarrassed. Despite going through so much in the last few days, she was still the same independent woman. If Karen took that route, she wanted to do it privately, where she could just be without anyone seeing her. It was just her way.

Finally looking up, Karen said, “Glenda, thank you for coming down here today. I really appreciate it.”

“No problem. You just focus on getting better okay?”

“I will… Thanks.”

Glenda walked from the room after a quick hug, and Karen felt emotion roiling under the surface. It was like a volcano coming to life after a long period of dormancy. Karen had never been an openly emotional woman but for the last few days, she had been physically and emotionally bruised and battered until she no longer knew which way was up. She felt like the end of her rope was frayed and slippery- like there was a giant precipice with no safety net below her.

Karen thought back to the night before- the parts she could bear to think about. When she had been alone in the dark, she had reached out to Someone and been answered. Here she was sitting in this hospital bed, alive!

Karen leaned back and looked at the ceiling, although she didn’t really see it. Swallowing, she began stiltedly, “Uh… God? It’s me again- the one from last night. I wanted to, um, thank you for helping me- to find that door and to get away from Jack.” She inhaled deeply, ready to jump off the cliff and hoping like mad there would be something to catch her when she fell. “I want to pray that prayer, but I’m pretty sure I’m going to mess it up somehow. So please bear with me. Thank you, for dying for me and for wanting me enough to make that kind of a sacrifice. No one’s ever loved me like that.” Silent tears fell unchecked down her cheeks. “I do want you to come live in me. I don’t want my other life any more. Paul and Glenda both said you wanted to give me life. That’s the life I want. If there’s something I’m missing, please let me know.” Karen waited for a few moments, not sure if there would be some supernatural occurrence. “Alright, I guess that’s done then. Thank you again… Uh… Amen.”

Karen looked around the room- only her eyes moving. Physically, she didn’t feel any different. Her side still ached from the stitches she had had last night, and her whole body felt battered. But inside her heart, she felt elation, like choruses echoing. Her heart began to beat wildly and tears flowed freely down her cheeks.

A nurse came running in, “What’s the matter? Your vitals are going crazy.” She stopped when she witnessed Karen, laughing and crying at the same time.

“I’m fine! I’m wonderful. Honestly…”

The nurse turned around after checking Karen over quickly, and left the room muttering, “Patients get stranger and stranger every day…”




HEY! and don't forget to e-mail Kendra Cornell if you have a comment! She would really like to hear from you.





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