by Alana Terry
A quaint, quiet town he’d never been to and no longer had any reason to visit.
CHAPTER 3
Susannah could lose herself so easily in the old hymns that she actually found herself siding with the octogenarians whenever the incendiary classic-versus-contemporary-music debate surfaced at the Orchard Grove church business meetings.
“There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Immanuel’s veins ...”
She could picture her Savior there, hanging on that cross, the blood on his brow like great beads of sorrow and love mingled together, testifying to his mercy and grace.
“And sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.”
She’d grown up at Orchard Grove. Listened to that old piano every Sunday for nearly two decades. There was another church on the other side of town. More contemporary. More young families. She’d tried it out a few times after graduating. Her mom had encouraged her, probably thinking Susannah’s chances of finding a suitable Christian husband were better in a congregation whose average age wasn’t over seventy-five. But Susannah had always come back here.
Not that Orchard Grove was perfect. They’d gone through more than their fair share of preachers over the last two decades, weathered a scandal or two, but the church still stood, its steeple pointing proudly heavenward in spite of its peeling paint and weather-worn siding.
God, I feel so comfortable here that sometimes I worry I’m going to stagnate completely.
That was Susannah’s biggest fear. Ever since she was twelve, since the day she went on that youth retreat and heard the speaker talk about the unreached people groups of the world, she’d known she was called to the mission field. While still in junior high, Susannah had begged her mom for a set of missionary biographies and promised to write a paper about each one as part of her homeschool studies.
She’d devoured those stories. God, you were so real to those people. You called them, and they followed you.
It sounded simple, really, how these men and women would receive their call, obey their call, and make church history in the course of a hundred and twenty pages or less. Susannah had assumed her own life on the mission field would be that straightforward as well.
What went wrong, Lord? She’d asked that question so many times she stopped expecting an answer. As far as she could tell, it was an issue on which heaven would remain eternally silent.
The worst part was wondering if it was somehow her own fault. Did she lack the necessary faith? Had she missed God’s direction at some point along the way? Allowed other idols to replace her calling? Or maybe the Lord had given up on her. Changed his mind and decided she wasn’t fit to become a missionary after all.
“E’er since by faith I saw the stream thy flowing wounds supply, redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die.”
As the singing continued, Susannah sighed, ignoring the tears that streaked down her cheeks. The people at Orchard Grove were used to her emotional scenes by now. It was fitting, wasn’t it, to still be crying four months later? Even if she wanted to, she couldn’t stop herself, couldn’t dull the ache in her heart that grew and swelled with each refrain of the familiar hymn.
“And shall be till I die, and shall be till I die ...”
Sometimes she wondered if God used the past year to give her a glimpse of heaven and then took it away just to remind her that this world was never meant to be her home. That was one way to explain the loss. The sadness.
She glanced around the sanctuary at the Christmas decorations, the pine-needle arrangements on the windowsills, the holly and ivy laid over the pulpit. Had it been a full year already?
She was looking for a summer mission program. Nothing more. A way to test out her calling to become a full-time missionary. A chance to step out of her little Orchard Grove comfort zone, to see if she could handle the distance, the separation from her family.
It was only supposed to be one little phone call. A ten-minute conversation where she could ask a few questions she had about the Kingdom Builders mission internship.
She would have never guessed it would lead to so much emptiness and confusion.
God, what did I do wrong? Please tell me so I can repent and be forgiven.
Even as she prayed, the words from the hymn covered over her doubts and sorrows. She knew that after the music ended, she’d have just as many questions, but for now, she would rest in her love for her Savior, no matter how silent he remained.
She shut her eyes and lifted her hands, refusing to think about the people behind her who would probably stare.
Redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die.
CHAPTER 4
Scott appreciated the extra afternoon service at St. Margaret’s Church. For starters, the parking lot after the other two services was too crowded for a pedestrian who didn’t want to get hit. Secondly, now Sundays were the closest thing to a true day off he’d experienced in years. Earlier that morning, after going through a few emails he knew he couldn’t put off, he’d popped in his earbuds and gone on a jog, with nothing but his thoughts and his Christian rock music to keep him company.
Sometimes he felt guilty. As if a missionary who ministered to nearly a thousand believers around the world should probably lead a more disciplined prayer life. He’d gone through spurts of praying off a list, but after a few weeks of asking God the exact same things for the exact same people, he found it impossible to keep sludging through the monotony. Besides, somewhere in the back of his head was the idea that the most effective prayers were spontaneous anyway. Whenever he went for his morning run, he set off with the best of intentions of spending that time with the Lord but inevitably wasted his mental energy daydreaming.
Usually about Susannah.
The music was his pitiful attempt to tune out her memory, but that was never as effective as he hoped it would be. No matter how high he turned up the volume, her voice was stuck in his head.
It was there this morning when his feet pounded the pavement, sending shock waves up his shins and radiating through his knees.
It was there now when the worship band at St. Margaret’s fired up their electric guitars and keyboard, when the music was so loud it surrounded him 360 degrees.
“Jesus, healer of my soul, comfort in my sadness.”
He heard the words, but all he could think about was that voice he’d listened to during those countless phone conversations.
Phone conversations long enough, intense enough that the sound of her voice would be forever trapped in his head. Playing and repeating like one of his grandfather’s broken records.
Telling him about that day when she was twelve — just a few years ago, really — when she’d received the call to become a missionary.
She was one of the lucky ones. Scott’s own path to the mission field was far more mundane. He was about to graduate Bible college with his two-year certificate and didn’t know what to do, so his professor suggested he attend the Urbana World Missions Conference, an event bringing together tens of thousands of missions-minded college students and young adults trying to hear God’s call on their lives.
Scott loved the Lord. Had loved him ever since he was a little boy sitting on his grandfather’s knee, listening to stories about Jesus feeding the five thousand with only a couple loaves of bread and a few fish. The stories were so real and his grandfather’s faith so strong that every time Scott caught a whiff of a certain brand of aftershave, part of his spirit was transported back to that day when he knelt by his grandfather’s bed and asked Jesus to forgive his sins and become the Lord of his life.
“Son, God’s going to do amazing work through you.” His grandfather’s voice was scratchy, strained after decades of preaching in churches and at old-fashioned tent-revival meetings. So gruff for a man that soft and lovable. “God’s going to do amazing work through you.”
Maybe it was a proclamation. Maybe it was just the kind of thing adults say to kids after they ask Jesus in
to their hearts. Either way, Scott wished sometimes his grandfather could see him now. Childish as it might sound, he wanted to make him proud.
“Calm the raging storms in me. Open my eyes and help me see.”
The words were simplistic. Scott had never heard the song before, but he could join in with perfect accuracy. He wanted something deeper, something to engage his mind.
Distract him from those omnipresent thoughts of her.
Sometimes he wondered if Susannah Peters existed at all. Was she a living, breathing person or simply an idea?
A phantom?
Sometimes when the disappointment grew too raw, too painful to endure, he told himself he’d made her up completely.
There is no Susannah Peters. She isn’t real.
After all, how well can you really know somebody who lives three thousand miles away? No matter how many hours you may spend every evening talking about missions, about theology, about the work of the Holy Spirit in your day-to-day lives, when you say good-night and hang up that phone, you haven’t been talking to flesh and blood at all.
You’ve been fellowshipping with a figment of your imagination. Because Susannah Peters as you think of her isn’t real.
So why is her voice in your head when you pray or read your Bible or schedule meetings at work if she doesn’t exist?
How can you miss her so much so that it becomes a physical ache? How can you mourn over losing someone you never knew?
How can you fall in love with a woman you’ve never even met?
CHAPTER 5
Susannah’s soul was saturated with God throughout the singing. It wasn’t until the sermon started that her mind began to wander.
Her stubborn, unruly mind.
God, I’m trying to take every thought captive. I really am. I know I must be a terrible disappointment to you, but please help me focus instead of complaining about all these hopes that can never come true.
That’s what made it so hard, though. The fact that whatever she once had with Scott — or at least whatever her little girlish mind had thought she’d had with him — was nothing but a dream, an impossibility.
She handed Scott over to God four months ago. Four months ago, as an early autumn overtook the fields of Orchard Grove, as the leaves fluttered on the branches before surrendering to their inevitable fate, she sat on her mother’s bed, now empty, and poured out her heart to God. Told him that she was willing to give this man back to him.
She didn’t realize it at the time, but even as she voiced that prayer of relinquishment, she’d cherished the secret hope that God would see her sacrifice, that he would recognize her willingness to fully surrender to him, and just like he did with Abraham when he placed Isaac on that altar, God would swoop down and tell her, Never mind. I see now that you will obey me. You passed my test.
And she and Scott would live happily ever after.
She should have never gotten her hopes set so high in the first place. Hadn’t her mother tried to warn her? It wasn’t that her mom was against her relationship with Scott. Cautious, maybe, but what mother wouldn’t be? Susannah was only eighteen when they met, only a year out of high school. She’d never dated, never lived on her own.
But even though she urged Susannah to proceed with a heavy dose of prayer and discernment, her mom was happy that her daughter had found someone with such a heart for missions. Her only request was that Susannah wait before entering into any sort of official dating relationship until Scott came out to visit and meet them all, the whole family, face-to-face.
Toward the end, it turned out to be only semantics. Scott wasn’t her boyfriend, but she loved him. They weren’t engaged, but that didn’t stop them from dreaming about their future together.
A future serving God on the mission field.
You know, Lord, it’s ironic, she’d prayed. When you first called me to be a missionary, I kept waiting and waiting for you to tell me where I was supposed to go. I read all those biographies, studied the lives of so many servants of yours, and all of them seemed to know so clearly where you wanted them to minister. I waited for you to tell me, but you never did. And now I know why.
Who would have thought God would bring a man into her life who traveled around the entire world? A missionary to missionaries. That’s how Scott described his job. As their relationship grew deeper, as it began to feel more and more certain that they were meant for one another, it all started to make sense. Why God had never given her a specific region where he wanted her to serve. It was because he had plans for her to go into all the world. Literally. She wouldn’t be preaching the gospel in every single area she visited. Her role would be more like encouragement and prayer support for the missionaries serving with Kingdom Builders, but she’d be involved first-hand in the lives of hundreds of front-line ministers, and she’d be working alongside someone as godly and mature in his faith as Scott.
It was a nice plan for as long as it lasted. Now, those childish fantasies were no more than a source of perpetual embarrassment.
What was I thinking, God? How did you let me give my heart away to someone I’d never even met? I should have listened to Mom. I’m sorry. Will you forgive me now?
She never knew if she was supposed to keep begging for forgiveness until the guilt disappeared, or if she only had to ask once.
She’d done far more confessing in the last four months than in the past ten years combined.
She’d been foolish. That much was certain. Falling in love with a stranger, making plans for a future together before they’d even met. She was young, but was she really that naïve? How could you think you know someone well enough to make a life-changing commitment when you’ve never sat across the table together and shared a meal? Never held hands and prayed together? Never worshiped in the same church building or even the same time zone?
Scott was all the way out on the East Coast, and whenever he’d tried to fly out to Washington to visit her, something came up. Talk about a warning sign. God was telling her even back then that it would never work, but she was too stubborn to listen, too head-over-heels in love to pay him any heed.
I’m sorry, Lord. Please give me your wisdom so I don’t make such foolish decisions again.
She stared at the leather-bound Bible in her lap. She’d have no idea what Pastor Greg preached about by the time his sermon ended. Yet another sin she’d have to repent of later.
Some people had the gift of prayer or the gift of evangelism.
It appeared Susannah was gifted in confession. She certainly had made enough mistakes lately to give herself the extra practice.
She opened to the front page of her Bible. Her mom’s handwriting was so distinct Susannah could shut her eyes and still visualize the exact height of each curve, the angle of each slant.
To my sweet daughter on her graduation day. “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord.”
Love, Mom
That was it. No long, flowery letter, no lengthy prayer or written blessing. No poignant words of wisdom. Probably because at the time, Mom assumed she’d have decades to keep on teaching Susannah. Keep on mentoring her. Discipling her. Encouraging her in the faith.
Who would have guessed it would all end like this?
You knew, God. For some people, it’s comforting to believe that nothing happens out of your will. Unfortunately, Susannah didn’t see it that way. From her vantage point, God had known what was about to happen and had done absolutely nothing to warn her. To prepare her for the trials and heartaches ahead.
Everything had been going so well. Perfectly. Scott had finally found a free weekend when the Kingdom Builders wouldn’t need him for any last-minute trips. He’d booked a flight into Spokane. Susannah was giddy with excitement. It had been almost nine months since their first phone call. Who would have thought that what should have been a ten- or fifteen-minute interview would have turned into such a deep, abiding friendship?
And more than a friendship, even though her mom
told her she wasn’t supposed to give away her heart until she’d met him face to face. Maybe Susannah hadn’t done a great job at that part, but she’d tried. And as excited as she was, she wasn’t the least bit worried about meeting Scott. There was nothing in her spirit warning her that he might not be the man she expected, the man she’d grown to love. Some things you just know, even if you don’t have a logical reason to explain why you’re so certain.
At least, that’s what she thought at the time as her whole family joyfully prepared to welcome Scott into their home for an extended weekend. Well, not quite into their home since he’d be spending the nights at the parsonage with the pastor and his wife, but it was basically understood that his waking hours would be with Susannah and her family.
She’d never felt so lucky, never thought before how proud she was to be part of such a loving, close-knit home. Even Derek, her stepdad of only a few months, asked dozens of questions about Scott’s likes and dislikes as he tried to plan a way for them to spend some man-to-man time together. When he heard Scott was a runner, he decided to invite him on the trail alongside the dried-up riverbed through Orchard Grove, and a few weeks before the visit Derek increased his regular workout routine so he could keep up with a “younger man.”
Nobody mentioned that Scott was closer to her stepdad’s age than he was to Susannah’s.
In the meantime, her mom had gone over meal plan after meal plan until she had every calorie for the weekend tracked down in her overstuffed daily planner. “Now, I know the two of you are going to want some time alone together, but the rules are just the same now as they were when you were in high school. No boys in the bedroom, and even when you want your privacy, it’s going to be with either Derek or me at home at all times, understood?”