The Long Road Home

  28

  Ross and Abby spent most of the day on the bank of the river. He asked questions of her and Abby did her best to answer them. Time and again she wished for her Bible.

  “Do you get everything you pray for?”

  “No, it really isn’t like that. I try not to treat God like a magical being who I call upon when I need help. When I pray, I claim verses of Scripture. Like God’s promise that He died for all, well, I prayed then for you and your folks that maybe something I could do or say would help you turn to Christ.”

  Abby hoped she was making sense. Rarely did anyone question her with the newborn hunger that Ross displayed, and Abby felt all she could do was tell him of her own personal experiences.

  Feeling more and more excited with each passing hour, Ross remembered as Abby talked where he had put his Bible. The second he got home he planned to open it.

  Abby would cry sometimes in telling of her background, and Ross’ heart felt so tender toward her he had to fight the urge to take her in his arms. He could easily see what a wonderful pastor’s wife she must have been.

  “Abby, do you think you could ever feel any different about me, now that I’m a Christian?”

  “I don’t think you understand, Ross, how recently it happened or how sudden. Not too many weeks ago I was a happily married woman, praying for my husband as he went to help someone from our church. In less than an hour a man was at our door telling me Ian was dead. I still felt like a bride, and suddenly I was a widow.

  “I’m flattered that you care for me, but I’m not the woman for you, Ross. If God does have a wife in your future, He’ll show you, but I think I can speak with surety, Ross—I’m not that woman.”

  They ate in silence and Ross was surprised to find he was not devastated. He had asked the question with little hope, but she was so special he couldn’t resist checking with her one more time. He said a brief prayer thanking God for Abby and this chance to talk with her. He couldn’t believe how much better he felt after he had uttered the simple words to his newfound heavenly Father.

  Back on the first floor of the Beckett home, Paul was also talking with his heavenly Father, but his words weren’t those of thanksgiving. Mrs. Beckett had been in for both breakfast and lunch, along with occasional checks on him—all of which was enough to tell him his nurse was gone.

  “Why did you bring her here? Why?” Paul wanted to shout the words, but they were whispered to God. He had been building such a strong, impenetrable wall against his emotions, and then she came along and began to scale that wall. Her words to him yesterday would have slid off him like logs on a mountain if they had been said when he first arrived.

  But no, he had begun to soften. She was doing it to him with her kindness and loving care. Her soft words and gentle touch as she saw to his needs would have been enough. But when she confided that her husband was dead, causing pain to cloud those beautiful gray eyes, and he knew she was in the same state as he, it had been more than he could take.

  For the first time since Corrine’s death, Paul felt shame. “Did you think you were the only one to have pain?” Her words sent agony through him. He didn’t want to meet someone who was able to go on in spite of her pain. He wanted to be strong without God. But he wasn’t strong—not in the least. Each day his spirit grew weaker and weaker, and his need to turn to God pressed in with more insistency.

  Paul threw his arm over eyes that had begun to fill with tears, the pain in his troubled, rebellious heart nearly splitting him in two. “Please, help me, God,” Paul cried as his body began to shake with sobs, the first he had shed since Corrine’s death. “Please help me come back to You.”

  A few hours later when Lenore went in to give Paul his supper, she found him asleep. The evidence of tears on his face and lashes nearly started her own. She left the tray by his bed and went as soundlessly as she could from the room, wishing as she did that Abby was there. She doubted that Paul Cameron would ever admit it, but he needed Abigail Finlayson.

  It was a tired Abigail Finlayson climbing the stairs toward her bedroom that night. She wondered if Ian had felt this weary after a day of counseling someone.

  It took her a little while in her weary state to ready for bed. While she did so, she couldn’t help but wonder how Lenore had done with Paul.

  Renewed anger surged within her as their conversation of the day before came to mind. How could he leave his church? The thought was incomprehensible to her. What a waste! What a foolish waste! How in the world was she going to go on taking care of him when the very thought of him made her blood boil?

  Anger moved her a little faster toward bed, and soon she was beneath the covers. Sleep however, did not immediately come. With her anger stirred, she didn’t feel a bit tired.

  “Turning your back on your family,” her mind railed at him. “All the love they have for you, and you treat them as though they were responsible for your wife’s death. Foolishness, absolute foolishness!”

  “Paul’s sin of bitterness is against God, Abby, not yourself. You have no right to be angry. God has the right, but He’s not angry. He still loves Paul and waits patiently for him to return to his heavenly Father.”

  Abby didn’t know where the words came from, but they drained the anger from her like water through a sieve. Tears clogged her throat when she thought of herself trying to deal with Ian’s death on her own. She would never have made it. But that was exactly what Paul had chosen to do. Rather than put his hand in God’s as he walked the path of hurt and loss, he had chosen to go alone.

  “Oh God,” Abby cried, “please help him. I’m sorry I was so insensitive to his plight. Please cover him with Your love. Show him that without You he’ll never get over the hurt. He’ll never be used of You as he was meant to be.”

  Abby cried long and hard then, her heart and mind unable to form sentences. She cried for Paul and for herself. And she cried tears of joy for Ross’ newfound faith.

  Her tears were healing ones and, though she did not know it, her prayers were desperately needed for the man downstairs who was wide awake and starting down the road to a recovered heart.

  29

  Surprised to enter Paul’s room the next morning and find him still asleep, Abby felt a bit of concern. He was usually wide awake and starving.

  “Mr. Cameron,” she called softly, a little afraid of having him take her head off. “Mr. Cameron,” she called again, this time reaching out to touch his shoulder.

  Paul reached up with both hands and scrubbed furiously at his face in an effort to get his eyes open. Abby thought he looked exhausted when his eyes met hers.

  “I wasn’t expecting to find you asleep. I thought maybe you were ill.”

  “No, just tired,” Paul answered, thinking as he did that he had been sure he was never going to see this woman again and if by chance he did see her, she certainly wouldn’t be the kind, gentle person standing by his bed.

  Abby’s surprise was no less than Paul’s. The eyes looking at her were tired, but there was no anger or remoteness like the last time she had seen him.

  “Would you like to sleep some more, or do you want breakfast?”

  What I want, he thought, is for you to sit down and talk to me and be near me the rest of the day. But all he said was, “I’ll eat, thanks.”

  He watched her leave with regret and praise. Praise because she wasn’t gone as he had thought. And regret because he wanted her to stay so he could share what had gone on in the last day.

  He wanted to tell her of his night of confession and surrender, his night of tears and the giving over of his will to God. And then God showering him with verses and hymns from his memory, telling of God’s love, patience, long-suffering, power, might, strength, compassion. The list was endless!

  Paul’s heart overflowed again in the morning light as he thanked God for drawing his attention back to Him. Every day the Spirit of God had beckoned to him with open arms, and Paul’s heart was full of praise that He hadn’t given up
on him.

  Abby returned with the tray and suddenly Paul felt ravenous. She looked at him strangely when he thanked her, and he felt shame at the way he had treated her.

  After breakfast Abby held the mirror while Paul shaved. She nearly dropped it when, wiping his face, he handed her the towel and said, “Abby, can you get me my Bible?”

  Staring into his eyes in astonishment, Abby waited for the cynical gleam to appear, but he met her look squarely without a trace of the barrier he usually kept between them.

  “You want me to get your Bible?” Abby’s voice shook and her eyes continued to search his. What she saw made her lower lip tremble and her eyes fill with tears. He was so vulnerable at that moment.

  “Hey, Red,” he said softly, his voice like a caress, “you didn’t really think God would give up on me, did you?”

  It was too much for Abby. She dropped the mirror onto the bed and buried her face in Paul’s wet towel. Paul felt helpless as he watched her cry. Were he able to get out of the bed, he would have taken her into his arms.

  The thought of holding her made him want to have her closer. He reached and caught hold of the towel she was adding wetness to and pulled her to the head of the bed.

  As Abigail began to contain herself, Paul took the towel and wiped her face. He held one of her hands and tenderly dried her wet cheeks. When she hiccuped, Paul laughed.

  “Your nose is red. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you’d been drinking.”

  Abby smiled a very watery smile and said, “You took me so totally by surprise. I mean—”

  “I know what you mean, no need to explain.” He gently squeezed her hand and then released it.

  They looked at one another in silence. “I prayed for you last night, confessed my anger. I gave it and you over to God,” Abby said softly.

  “I did some confessing of my own and God was waiting, Abby, with arms outstretched, to draw me back into His fellowship.”

  “If you ever want to tell me all about it, I’ll listen.”

  “Thanks.”

  Abby moved to the wardrobe and retrieved Paul’s Bible from the shelf where she had placed it after finding it in his things. He thanked her when she handed it to him.

  “Where were you yesterday?”

  Pausing in the gathering of shaving gear, Abby replied, “Ross and I went for a drive and a picnic.”

  “Are things getting a little serious between you?”

  “No, it’s nothing like that, but it was an exciting day. Ross trusted in Christ. He’s a new Christian.”

  “That’s great,” Paul exclaimed, his face alive with excitement. Sitting up straighter in bed, he eagerly demanded, “Tell me everything!”

  Abby described Ross’ conversion and Paul was thrilled. When she finished, Paul asked, “Will you tell Ross I’d like to talk with him sometime?”

  “Sure,” Abby said as she moved to the door.

  “By the way, Abby,” Paul’s voice stopped her, “thank you for being here when both Ross and I needed you.”

  Abby smiled at him and didn’t answer, but she went out thinking, “I had to be here, Paul. I have a promise to keep.”

  30

  Ross was perched on a kitchen chair and Abby sat in the rocker. They were in Paul’s room, and the three of them had their Bibles opened to Romans 12.

  Paul read verses 1 and 2: “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”

  “What’s a living sacrifice?” Ross wanted to know.

  “It’s when we give our bodies and lives to Christ.”

  Ross looked a little confused, so Paul went on. “You see, Ross, God gives us choices. He doesn’t take our free will—He asks us to give Him our bodies for His work and service.”

  “And if someone doesn’t choose to serve Him?” Ross wanted to know.

  “Like I said, Ross, the choice is our own, but that person will be miserable, I can assure you,” Paul answered him soberly.

  “I had dedicated my life to God, but then in my bitterness I walked away from that commitment. I was about as far as I could get from presenting my body as a living sacrifice.

  “But it doesn’t have to be as drastic a move as mine was. I know Christians—people who claim to have trusted Christ and attend church regularly—that don’t put Christ first. God, for some of them, is just a Sunday duty. They are not praying and studying His Word. The people they work with or live with don’t even know of their faith because it’s not evident in their lives.

  “Abby is a perfect example of the way God wants it to be. You saw a difference in her because she has given her life over to God.”

  Abby felt humbled at Paul’s words and added, “You can’t lose your salvation, Ross. Never think that.”

  “Abby’s right, Ross. Nothing can separate us from our Savior. Nothing. Not even ourselves in our willfulness. But the Scriptures also say that in Christ we are new. It should be our desire to serve Him, if there’s really been a change.”

  It was the second time the three of them had met together to study God’s Word. On the same day Paul asked Abby for a Bible, she also told Ross that Paul wanted to see him.

  Asking humbly for Ross’ forgiveness for the way he had acted, Paul told him a little of his situation in Bayfield and about losing Corrine. Ross had been sympathetic and was fascinated with Paul being a pastor. When Paul asked Ross about studying the Bible together, the younger man nearly shouted with excitement.

  Abby considered it a privilege when Paul asked her to join them, but she also told Ross the first time they studied that should he ever want to meet with Paul on his own, he had only to tell her.

  Now, as they finished up for the day and Paul closed in prayer, Abby began to hope she would always be included. Paul had a wonderful grasp of the Scriptures, and Abby knew she could listen to him all day. It was also obvious when Paul prayed that he and God were not strangers.

  The next few days Paul, Abby, and Ross sat in the garden for their Bible study and prayer. One day after the study concluded Ross maneuvered Paul’s chair back into the house and went to see his dad.

  Paul had hoped for a few minutes alone with Abby. He watched her straighten the bed, pick up the room, and open a window before he spoke.

  “Do you have a minute, Abby? I have something I’d like you to read.”

  “Sure,” Abby answered as she came to stand expectantly by the bed.

  “I’ve written to the church in Bayfield. I wondered if you would read this and tell me what you think.”

  Abby sat in the rocker with the letter Paul had given her, while Paul lay back with closed eyes, wanting to give her some time to read.

  “Dear Lloyd,” it began, “I’m writing this letter to you because of the friendship and support you offered while I was serving as your pastor and living in your home. I ask you from the bottom of my heart and in Christ’s love to forgive me for the way I treated you, May, and the congregation, and I hope you will share this letter with them.

  “I believed then with all my heart that if my faith had been strong enough, God would have spared Corrine. It never really occurred to me that she would die. I see now that my faith was immature. It was my will that Corrine live, not God’s. The pain she endured her whole life is over now, and she is in His arms.

  “The time I have been gone has been a painful one. I have suffered much, both spiritually and physically, but am on the road to recovery. I am currently in Hayward laid up with two broken legs. There is so much more I want to say, but I want to be there in person.

  “As soon as I’m able to travel, I’ll be coming to see all of you and beg your forgiveness for deserting you. I’m praying for you every day and hope I can be there soon. Paul Cameron.”

  Paul opened
his eyes when he heard Abby move by the bed. Her eyes were brilliant with unshed tears, and she reached to take his hand. Without uttering a single word, she gave him comfort.

  It was enough for Paul, and he began to talk. “Corrine was so sick. I’m not sure she really knew how bad it was. I certainly didn’t. We knew each other such a short time, and I fell so deeply in love with her. We were married in her room because she was too sick to move out of her bed. She never did get out of that bed.”

  There were tears in Paul’s eyes now, and Abby’s began to flow. Her heart broke for this man. To love and be married but never share a bed must have been almost more than he could bear. It was painful to lay in bed at night and wish that Ian’s arms were around her, but at least she had that memory.

  “I’m sorry, Paul, so sorry that you had to watch her die.” Abby spoke the words with deepest compassion, and Paul felt comforted by her presence as well as her words. Her next words surprised him.

  “Your letter to the folks in Bayfield is wonderful. It’s obvious you love them. When you’re ready to go, if you want, I’ll go with you.”

  Paul couldn’t know in his own surprise that Abby was equally amazed. She never planned to make any such offer, but the words just came out. She knew if he asked her she would go.

  What else was God going to ask her to do? First she traveled up here unescorted, and now she offered to travel alone with a man who was not her husband. She wasn’t sure she could do that.

  Abby left Paul’s room with her heart in a quandary. She fretted about the future all the way to her room. Then she remembered the verses she had read with Paul and Ross a few days earlier: “Present your bodies a living sacrifice.” Abby had made this commitment years ago and worked daily at living as that sacrifice. Not once in all those years had God let her down. Abby was certain then if Paul asked her to go to Bayfield, she would trust God and go. Her Savior was taking care of her, and knowing this she could leave it in His hands.