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SAMPLE CHAPTER
Prologue
I sat there on the sofa waiting, staring intermittently at the clock, the one with the minute hand that seemed to be racing around its circular course faster than any timepiece should. I looked out the living room window, where I could see nothing but gray skies and stillness. I knew he was coming for me, and that he would arrive within the hour. He would come and this time, kill me. Addon and his followers would undoubtedly rejoice once I was gone. I was the one that they feared and despised, the one they held responsible for the many plagues they had endured.
Having long ago said our goodbyes to our families and the believers we had met since arriving in Jerusalem––the wonderful, glorious, holy city– Moe and I were ready. We had done all that we could to comfort our brothers and sisters, to assure them that we would see them again very soon. While all of them rejoiced with us that we were about to go be with the Father, some had left only when we told them that it would be easier for us if they did so. Even then, they left in tears for our sakes.
We knew that our waiting was almost over when far off in the distance we heard a low, faint, rumbling noise that seemed to be getting closer. The reverberating sound grew louder and more distinct as the source of the roar drew near. It soon became apparent that the noise was coming from the rolling tracks of a column of tanks. The house began vibrating with an ever-increasing intensity as the tanks drew closer to our home. Several paintings hanging on the walls in the living room began to rattle. They leapt from the walls and crashed onto the hardwood floor, shattering and sending shards of glass in all directions. Judging by the considerable contingent Addon had sent for us, we assumed that he knew what happened to our would-be executioners the last time someone had attempted to silence us before our time had come.
Moe and I looked at one another before rising unsteadily from our seats. We both nodded in unspoken agreement as we began walking toward the door. We were scared, but we refused to stay and cower inside, just waiting for our enemy to arrive. We would meet him outside and face him as the faithful soldiers we were. Each of us took comfort from the words, “greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.” We would not give the enemy the satisfaction of finding fear in our eyes when he arrived.
Our work was finally finished after traveling a long and difficult road wrought with many trials and tribulations. We had dutifully accomplished our mission by delivering the message that the Lord had sent us to bring, and we had warned the peoples of the Earth about the coming destruction. Our work was over; it was time for us to go home….
Chapter 1-The Beginning
“There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy”
—William Shakespeare, Hamlet
Life is only a brief stop on the road to eternity. Our loved ones, acquaintances, and strangers pass away before our very eyes on a daily basis. Yet each of us carries on with our lives as if we will live forever. This is merely an illusion; of course, as it is an inevitable consequence of life that each of us must die. Nevertheless, we blindly follow the music of the piper of this world, progressing steadily on our journey toward the end. We go about life in a dreamlike stupor, living only for the day and for the dollar. We live so entranced and enamoured with worldly pleasures and concerns that we become completely oblivious of what awaits us all. We ignore the truth of our mortality at our own peril when we choose to focus on this brief and temporary existence called life, while continuing steadily on our journey toward the eternal existence that awaits us all. It was when humanity lost sight of these truths that it became so susceptible to the deception that was to come, despite having already been warned of the coming apocalypse.
Of the billions of men and women that have lived and died on planet Earth across the millennia, I was one of only two men chosen for a unique and honorable undertaking. A rare gift bestowed upon us from above, though we did nothing to merit it…the unique privilege of being the last prophets of the Lord, sent on a mission to carry a most urgent message to a lost and dying world. The message: the world would soon end, and every individual should turn to the Lord while there was still time; that they should beware the power and the deception of the beast; and for them to prepare for the imminent return of the Lord Jesus Christ. My life, which had started out like any other, would soon end up taking a very different path.
Perhaps I should start from the beginning.
I was born Jonathan Elijah March, on a cold January morning in High Point, NC. My father, William March, was a firefighter and my mother, Elizabeth, worked as a nurse at a local hospital. We never had much money, but then again we never really needed it. We had each other, and somehow that always seemed to be enough. My father was a strong yet humble man who always taught us that financial wealth represented just one of many different kinds of prosperity. He said that while money may be the most sought after kind of wealth, it is also the least rewarding, and certainly the most fleeting. Both parents would often remind us that the gift of love was the greatest gift of all.
One Christmas Eve, when I was just five years old, money was especially tight at our house. As we all sat together in the living room that evening, my father, who had been frustrated with our financial circumstances, suddenly looked at me and smiled broadly. He then rose and walked into the kitchen before returning a few minutes later with a blank sheet of paper in his hand. After writing something down on it, he smiled at me once more, wrapped the small strip up in some plain brown paper, and placed it under the tree. “I am giving you something very special this year, Johnny, one of the most precious gifts that one person can ever give another,” he said.
I still remember sitting there quietly with my parents next to the fireplace, the flames
glowing and crackling in the silence. I kept trying to imagine what he could possibly have written down on that small piece of paper that was so special.
In my mind, I imagined a map to an ancient treasure, buried by some pirate long ago. I then saw myself standing alone on a small deserted island in the middle of a vast ocean, with nothing but a shovel to keep me company. I began digging away on the white sandy beach, where a large “X” marked the spot. After just a few moments of digging, the shovel struck something hard. I reached down and jerked a big wooden chest out of the ground. When I flipped the latch and opened the lid, my eyes opened wide as I looked upon the beautiful gold coins that filled the chest.
Filled with excitement, I jumped into my father’s lap and hugged him before telling him good night. After repeating the same ritual with my mother, I raced up the stairs, and after saying a prayer, I jumped into bed. I eventually fell asleep, dreaming of everything I would buy for my parents and myself, of course, with all of the wonderful treasure.
When I awoke the next morning, I immediately leapt out of bed and ran straight for the Christmas tree. It was the first present that I looked for and the last one I found. When I finally located the small present from my father at the bottom of the pile, I looked back at him and smiled big. With his nod of approval, I tore the small package open, nearly ripping apart the piece of paper inside in the process. Because I was still too young to read, I handed it to my mother, pleading with her to read it to me. She smiled as I climbed into her lap, never taking my eyes off the white piece of paper.
“Your father never shared with me what he wrote, Johnny,” she informed me, “so this is every bit as exciting for me as it is for you.”
I still remember being quite surprised to see tears welling up and streaming down her cheeks as she read the words from that special piece of paper.
“My precious son, Johnny,
I want you to know that I love you dearly, more than you will ever know. Today, I am giving you one of the most valuable presents that I can possibly give to you… my time. This note, worth one-hundred hours of playtime with Dad, is redeemable as of today. I hope that you will enjoy this gift half as much as I will!
I love you, Son, and I always will,
Dad”
I still recall the initial disappointment I felt that Christmas morning over the fact that there was no map and no chest full of treasure. After thinking about it for a moment however, I looked up at my mother and asked, “Does this mean that I get to spend more time with Daddy?”
My mother wiped the tears away from her eyes and answered, “You bet it does, Johnny.”
I looked over at my father, smiled, and yelled, “Yeah!”, as I jumped out of my mother’s lap and into my father’s waiting arms. Yes, our family may not have had a lot of money, but we did have a lot of love. Our home was filled with it.
Because my parents loved us so much, they made it a point for us to be in church each and every Sunday. I didn’t mind, because I always enjoyed going out on Sunday mornings. They were always a magical time for me as a boy. For some reason, the weather always seemed to be perfect. There could be rain, snow, and sleet for six days out of the week, but never on Sunday. It seemed as if every Sunday morning the sky would be bright blue and sunny, the air clear and crisp. My father said it was not the
weather that made them special, it was being in the presence of the Holy Spirit. I came to think it was both.
As devout Christians, both of my parents made certain that we were always in church. We read the Bible frequently and we prayed often, because they believed that these served as vital nourishment for the spirit. “People need to feed their spirits, children, just like they feed their bodies,” my father often said.
While growing up I always knew that my mother was one of the finest cooks on the planet, and every Sunday she made it a point to remind us. I would frequently wake up to the smell of bacon or pancakes in the frying pan. After returning from church in the afternoons, my mother would always go right to work in the kitchen preparing elaborate lunches of fried chicken, pot roast, or turkey and dressing.
On occasion, an hour or two after lunch, my father would take me out fishing, just the two of us, at one of the many lakes near our home. We usually fished from the bank, but every once in a while, he would take me out in a boat. When I was still very young, he would bait the hook for me so that all I had to do was to sling the hook out into the water. As I grew older however, he began allowing me to put the worm on the hook myself. Most of the time I did okay, but on occasion I would hook my finger instead of the worm, which taught me a painful lesson about the value of patience and a discerning eye, especially when the hook went in past the barb.
I spent most of my father’s gift of time on these fishing trips with him. They would prove to be special memories that I would cherish for the rest of my life.
I suppose that my life during that time was about as perfect as a child could possibly hope for while he walks the Earth. They were full of love, joy, and happiness. I wanted nothing more than to be doted upon by my mother, and to grow up to be just like my father.
Like so many other people, I took it all for granted, never realizing that just as all things have a beginning, they must also have an ending.