fight outside Sam’s Pub several years back. Brian was flirting with a married girl and I saw her husband pull a gun. I thought for sure we were dead. His gun jammed though, and I grabbed it from him and threw it. Brian never saw any of it, but that night I had a ‘come-to-Jesus’ moment. From then on, I slowed down.”
“As the years passed, Brian never had a ‘come-to-Jesus’ moment. Since I was slowing down, he started hanging out with other people who would still drink with him. I would still go out and have a beer or two, but I’m pretty sure he would go out again after I went home. Like Erica, I haven’t heard from him since Sunday. And to answer your question, no, I’m not surprised.”
Mark crossed his arms and looked back at the girls in the other room. “Brad,” he asked, “how’s your marriage?”
Brad looked out at his wife and answered, “It’s good. It’s getting better. You can ask her and she’ll say the same.”
“Look at me Brad,” Mark was suddenly very serious. “Do you need to step down from the praise band for a while?”
Brad smiled, “No” was all he said.
“Okay.” Mark replied. “I trust you.”
“I’ll go see Brian tomorrow,” Brad stated as he poured some coffee, “and we’ll make sure Erica has everything she needs for as long as it takes.”
Brad poured two more cups of coffee and took them to Jessica and Erica. As Mark followed him into the room, Brad turned to him and said, “If you all need to go, we’ll stay with her.”
Lisa gave Erica one last hug and said, “If you need anything, let me know. I’ll bring some dinner over tomorrow night for you and the boys.”
Erica thanked her and said goodnight. Mark added, “We’ll be by to pick you up in the morning.”
The next morning, Mark and Lisa showed up at Erica’s house first thing. She was dressed and ready to go; the boys had walked over to Uncle Brad and Aunt Jessica’s for the day. Not much was said as Erica got in the car and Mark drove to the jail house. Upon arriving, they signed in and let the guard know who they wanted to see. Mark had notified the guard that they wanted to see both Justin and Brian. After waiting for several minutes, the guard announced that Erica could see Brian. Mark asked about Justin and was told, “He doesn’t want to see anybody right now.”
Erica went into the visitation room and was escorted to a window with a phone. She waited for a few minutes before a guard brought Brian in, he was wearing an orange jumpsuit and looked rough… really rough. He had no expression as he sat down at the table on the other side of the window and picked up the phone. Erica picked up the phone on her side and opened up the conversation.
“What do you want me to tell the boys?” she asked.
Brian kept looking at the floor and grimaced, rubbing his forehead with his hand. “I need a drink…” he mumbled.
Erica smiled a cold smile and said, “The withdrawal has started already? My, that was quick.”
“I need a drink.” Brian said again, this time more clearly and looking up at her. His eyes were sunken and he obviously hadn’t seen a razor in at least a week.
Erica’s smile left, but she continued to meet his gaze as she said, “How about I tell the boys that daddy’s sick, and he can’t come home until he’s well?”
Brian smiled and glanced over at the guard, then looked back at Erica and said, “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
“Enjoying what?” she asked. “Justice? Karma? The will of God?” She leaned in closer to the window and spoke low into the phone. “Now you listen to me Brian Williams, you take stock of yourself while you’re in there sobering up. You think real hard about your life and the direction you want to take with it, because I’m just about done. If you come out of there the same man as when you went in, then I and your children will not be there when you get home.” The tears started to fall and her voice got a little louder as she continued, “I’m willing to give you one last chance while God works on you in there, but so help me Jesus if you don’t come out a profoundly different human being, you’ll never see me or the kids again. Is that clear?”
Brian measured her briefly and then said, “Crystal”.
Erica hung up the phone and stood up. Walking out past Mark and Lisa, she said, “I need you to take me home now…”
Mark looked at her, then over at the visitor’s window where Brian was hanging up the phone. He looked over at Lisa, who mouthed the words “Let’s go.” So he pulled his keys out of his pocket and followed the girls out to his car. Erica didn’t say anything on the way home, but Mark would occasionally look back at her in the rearview mirror. She had a blank expression and the tears didn’t stop falling the entire way back to her house.
Lisa walked Erica up to her door from the driveway and Mark could hear her saying, “Now I’ll bring supper over tonight, and some of the other ladies from church have the rest of the week covered as well. Do you need any money for bills?”
“No,” Erica said, “we’re okay financially.” Lisa asked if Erica wanted her to stay for a while and Erica reassured her, “No, I just need some time to process everything by myself. Thank you though.”
Lisa came back to the car and got in, and Mark began driving off. “So what are you going to do now?” she asked him.
“What do you mean?” he pondered.
“You’re three days away from Christmas service and you don’t have a drummer or lead guitarist,” she reminded him. “What are you going to do?”
Mark sighed and thought for a moment. Then he said, “Well, Lexi was supposed to try out tonight anyway, and I told her we might need her to play for the actual Christmas service if we couldn’t get hold of Brian.”
“Ted leaves tomorrow for vacation,” Lisa said. You know there’s only one other guitar player you can ask.”
Mark smiled an odd smile. Then he shook his head and told Lisa, “I think it’s pretty amazing how God works.”
“You don’t mean to say that God is doing this to Jeremy and Brian do you?” she said.
“No, I don’t think that.” he clarified. “But I do think God saw this coming and set other things in motion to provide Lexi and Cody.”
“Hmmm…” she smiled, “I think you’re probably right.”
As soon as they got home, Mark started preparing for the meeting that night. He had contacted everyone on praise team earlier in the week and they had all agreed to have a Bible study before practice started. Mark wasn’t waiting until January to start his New Year’s resolutions. The incarceration of Justin and Brian only solidified his resolve to be more involved in the lives of his team.
Before he left, Mark grabbed a catalog off of his coffee table. He also stopped off at the dollar store on his way to practice and picked up a few things. When he got to the church, he set his bags of goodies in the cafe area and pulled a dozen chairs into a circle. As the praise team members began arriving, he asked them to sit in one of the chairs in the circle. Once everyone was seated, Mark began.
“It seems I haven’t been a very good leader to you all. I don’t know what’s going on in your lives, I don’t know what’s going on in your hearts, and God has been telling me lately that that’s not going to work from now on.” He walked over to Ted and reached into his bag of goodies, pulling out a DVD and handing it to Ted. “Ted,” Mark began, “I remember you telling me at one time that ‘The Good, The Bad and the Ugly’ was your favorite western movie, so I got this for you. But I don’t know what you need prayer for today. Would you please share with me what’s burdening your heart today?”
Ted seemed pleased by the gift, but uncertain about the request. “Um…” he said, “Well, I’m kind of concerned about my flight tomorrow night.”
Mark pulled out his phone and started typing on it. “Okay,” he said, “we’ll pray for that tonight.” Then Mark moved on to Cody. “Cody,” he said, “first I need to ask you if you’ve been prac
ticing the Christmas Special music.”
“Yeah,” Cody replied, “I’m feeling pretty good about it.”
“Good,” Mark said, “because I need you to play the actual Christmas Special this weekend.”
“But I don’t even have a guitar I can use…” Cody started to protest.
Mark looked at Ted, and Ted said, “You can use mine until you get your own.” Then everyone looked at Ted, shocked. “What...?” Ted said looking back at them. “It’s just a guitar.”
“I asked Ted to bring Bathsheba with him,” Mark added, “it’s here for you to practice with tonight.”
“Okay.” Cody acquiesced.
Then Mark pulled out a guitar catalog and handed it to Cody. “Second,” he said, “I know you love playing guitar and you need one, so I brought you this. But I don’t know what you need prayer for right now.”
“How about for playing this weekend?” Cody said, and Mark typed into his phone.
Moving on to Kat, he pulled out a fashion coloring book and colored pencils. Handing them to Kat, he said, “Kat, Lisa tells me you like using coloring books to come up with pattern and color combinations for the store, so I got you this. But I’d like you to tell me what else is going on with you that I don’t know about.”
Kat replied, “I’m trying to be more caring about people, would you pray for God to work through me to be kinder to people?” Mark smiled as he typed into his