Sharing Jesus (Seeing Jesus Book 3)

by Jeffrey McClain Jones

  Leonard looked up at Jason and put his phone back in his pocket. Though he clearly saw Jason coming, he said nothing. Such was the lack of comradery between them.

  Jason knew it was up to him to break the silence. “Hey, Leonard.” He said this in a tone that was more than a greeting, rather an opening.

  Leonard just nodded, looking a bit suspicious.

  “Tell him you liked what he had to say about Paul’s relationship to The Letter to the Hebrews,” Jesus said.

  That didn’t sound very revelatory to Jason, but it sure felt like a safe place to start. “I liked what you had to say there in the middle of the class, about Paul and Hebrews,” Jason said, feeling like he was matching Leonard in awkwardness, if not exceeding him.

  “Oh, yeah. Thanks. You didn’t say much,” Leonard said.

  That Leonard noticed him at all was a revelation to Jason. He grabbed for an excuse without thinking. “Spring fever and the last class of the year—it was hard to get too excited about the Apostle Paul’s friends and associates.”

  “Umhmm,” said Leonard, no sympathy in his low hum.

  Up close for the first time, Jason noticed that one of Leonard’s eyes was wayward, looking wide of where the other one was focused. It made eye contact challenging. But then, Leonard didn’t seem interest much in eye contact.

  “I can heal that,” Jesus said.

  “How?” Jason said aloud.

  Both Jesus and Leonard answered.

  Jesus said, “Just repeat after me.”

  Leonard said, “How what?”

  Jason improvised. “How do you feel about supernatural healing?” A glance at Jesus assured him that he hadn’t totally blown it, yet.

  “I don’t know. Never seen it myself.” Leonard focused more tightly on Jason now, perhaps searching for a joke, or mockery, in that tricky question.

  Jesus helped out. “Tell him that I say, ‘I healed his grandfather’s eyes and I can heal his.’”

  Taking a deep breath, Jason blurted before he could convince himself not to. “I think Jesus is saying that he healed your grandfather’s eyes and he can heal yours.”

  Leonard leaned back, trying to get another angle on this strange encounter. “My grandfather? How did you know about that?”

  “Word of knowledge,” Jesus said. And Jason repeated that.

  What Jason didn’t know, was that Leonard’s grandfather was the black sheep of the family, an itinerant Pentecostal preacher, who told wild stories of miracles and healings. He had claimed that he had been healed of severe nearsightedness at a revival meeting, when he was a young man. No one else in the family took his grandpa seriously, and Leonard couldn’t tell if those stories were true. Using the phrase “word of knowledge,” would have echoed things Leonard heard from that same grandfather, about whom Jason seemed to know something.

  Silent for five seconds, Leonard wavered between a look of derision and tears, an emotional battle ignited by the clash between his hopes and his doubts.

  Hearing no objection, Jason looked at Jesus. Jesus proceeded as planned.

  “Say, ‘eyes be healed.’ And just tap him on the forehead.”

  Now Jason wondered if Jesus was teasing him.

  “Don’t wait any longer or you’ll lose him,” Jesus said.

  Jason reached up tentatively and Leonard watched his hand as it neared eye level. Jason issued that simple command and reached for Leonard’s forehead. Leonard actually tried to get out of the way, dodging from the waist up, which wasn’t enough. Jason hit him just above the eye that was the stray.

  Stumbling backward, Leonard appeared perturbed for a second. Jason assumed that he had hit him harder than he intended and was about to apologize. At just that moment, Professor Snyder came out of her class room, stopping to see what was going on with this odd couple of students.

  From his perspective, Leonard had just received a cold bolt of metal in his forehead, planted by a guy who appeared to be unarmed. With that cold sensation, came a very clear picture of his grandfather’s face, and the notion of blessings passing from generation to generation. Leonard had staggered, not because Jason had hit him hard, but because something powerful was going on behind his eyes, and his deceased grandfather seemed to be connected to whatever it was.

  “Leonard, are you all right?” Professor Snyder said.

  Leonard turned his focus toward her and then froze in place. He dropped his leather brief case on the floor with an echoing thud. He raised both hands, as if he was going to reach for Professor Snyder’s face, and then retracted them toward his own head.

  “What’s goin’ on?” Jason said, growing less worried that he had done something wrong, and more hopeful that something good had happened to Leonard’s eyes.

  Leonard just stared at Professor Snyder. Jason saw in that fascination a hint of infatuation that he never would have imagined before.

  Finally, Leonard spoke. “I can’t believe it. I see…differently, now. It’s…just…different.”

  Leonard turned to look at Jason, and Jason nearly swore aloud, something he rarely did. Where Leonard’s eyes had been misaligned before, they appeared perfectly straight; both of his pale blue-gray irises pointed right at Jason.

  “It worked,” Jason said. “It really worked.”

  Connie Snyder had been looking at Leonard all semester, trying not to avert her gaze in reaction to the disturbing angle of his left eye. His eyes generally shifted nervously when he spoke, but they did occasionally come to rest, like a squirrel pausing to check the little treasure he had collected. Leonard had often checked for approval in the eyes of Professor Snyder, an attractive woman by his standards.

  Now Leonard looked squarely at Professor Snyder and smiled. “It did work. What do you think about that?”

  Even by healing his eyes, Jason had not entered Leonard’s solar system, a system that revolved around Connie Snyder’s intelligent eyes. Now Leonard locked his attention on those eyes again.

  Professor Snyder could clearly see the effect of the healing. She watched a merry-go-round of reactions flash across her conscious mind. Then she turned to Jason and smiled primly. “I’m feeling more optimistic now, about that message you gave me.”

  Jason smiled at her, seeing why Leonard was infatuated with her, and also knowing why she had accepted a bit more hope about her future. He looked at Jesus standing next to him, a gesture that appeared to Connie like he was glancing away shyly. She turned from Jason, and nodded to Leonard, before walking away. “Have a good summer,” she said, without even looking over her shoulder.

  Her departure left Leonard with Jason and Jesus. Leonard’s glances at them reflected his old habit of flitting his eyes from one thing to the next. Those eyes lacked the warm shine inspired by Connie Snyder’s presence. But he did pause and look hard at Jason for one second. “Thank you,” he said. Bowing his head in order to pick up his case, he turned and walked away. That was the last Jason would ever see of Leonard, in the flesh. In his memories, on the other hand, he saw Leonard many times.

  Now Jason could focus a bit longer on Jesus, who was regarding him like a wise father witnessing the astounding accomplishments of his favorite child. Jason had never seen that look from either his father or his mother. It was intoxicating and satisfying, enervating and hunger-producing. He could get used to the showcase of approval and acceptance that adorned the face of the man that no one in that hallway could see…no one but him.

  Chapter 17

  Continuing Education

  Kayla finished cleaning up after class, saying goodbye to the last remaining student. Laura had passed from the room with the tail of the departing class, still buoyed by whatever revelation she had retained after recovering her emotional control— tying down the sails and fixing her rudder—in order to make it through the rest of the class. Not an experienced counsellor or pastor, Kayla didn’t know what the proper follow-up with Laura would be. At least she would see her in class the next week. That would have to suffice.
r />   Carrying her large canvas shopping bag over one shoulder, Kayla walked with Jesus close by her side, an arm resting on her opposite hip. This felt so natural, that she wondered at herself and at her miraculous companion. It was as if she had done all this before, as if she had been in a school play, or something, in which she had performed this part before.

  He spoke with words and sound. “I have always been with you, dear. You knew it without having to see and feel me in the physical world. But you didn’t know anyone who would give you permission to react to me, or to talk about us together. It was our secret, and a hard one to keep.”

  His words made her blush and blink back tears, tears that had suddenly flashed to the surface. A surprising resistance rose inside her, a voice like a nagging nanny who is charged with enforcing good behavior, but doesn’t really care about Kayla—not so deeply as she knew Jesus cared about her. She felt as if she was scampering between the trenches of opposing armies.

  “How can I be so confused and conflicted with you walking right here next to me?” she said. She moved her mouth as frugally as possible, and kept her voice small. But someone saw her talking to herself.

  “Miss Stivers, are you talking on the phone?” said a stout, older woman, with steel-gray hair cropped just below her ears, and bangs held with barrettes on both sides of her round head.

  Kayla stopped and turned to her right, where Marjorie O’Hara approached her, with an apology painted over her entire body. “No. Oh, Marjorie. I guess I was thinking aloud. I didn’t see you there.”

  “No problem. Are you heading out to your car?”

  “Yes. You?”

  “Oh, yes. Can we walk together?”

  From where Kayla stood, Marjorie had just cozied up next to Jesus. He wasn’t relinquishing his spot by Kayla’s side, and certainly looked as if he didn’t mind the company. As far as Kayla could see, he seemed to have a special smile just for Marjorie—an odd thought, but one that fit with her observations at other moments, when people joined her and Jesus.

  “Of course,” Kayla said. “Did you have to park far?” Kayla resumed her pace toward the front doors. Then she slowed slightly, because Marjorie was no taller than she and about forty-five years older.

  “Not too far. I think lots of kids skipped school today to play outside.” Marjorie laughed at her own quip, just in case no one else did.

  Marjorie had taken the first painting class Kayla taught at the college, a night class, which included quite a few people older than the teacher. Marjorie wasn’t a very talented artist, no feel for painting, but she wasn’t looking for acclaim for her art. She was simply trying to continue a long life of learning. She had bonded with Kayla, when they began a series of passing conversations regarding faith. Marjorie was a very devout Catholic. Her interest in art came from an ambition to paint pictures of some of her favorite saints. She thought that the ancient paintings lacked humanity, and seemed to depict the great people of faith as ghosts or angels, not human beings.

  Kayla had been raised in a church that taught anything but respect for Catholicism, so it took her a while to overcome enough of her inbred suspicion to actually listen to what Marjorie was saying about her saints. By the end of that first semester, Kayla had concluded that what she learned about Catholics in church, or from the attitudes of her family, probably didn’t represent Marjorie, if it represented any real life person.

  “How is your family?” Kayla said, as they passed into the sunshine that had escaped a conglomeration of clouds just in time.

  “Oh, Frederick is doing quite fine. Getting used to retirement at last. And the kids are all thriving, it seems. All of those prayers seem to have not been wasted.”

  “I’m sure they weren’t,” Kayla said, looking across Jesus at Marjorie. She knew he had something to say.

  Marjorie looked at Kayla as they slowed down to step off the curb, checking for cars and then connecting with each other. “But, there is something going on with you these days, I think,” Marjorie said.

  “Something?” Kayla said. “What do you mean?”

  This actually gave Marjorie the chance to think about what it was she was feeling, even as it gave Kayla a buffer between her extraordinary experience and the risky prospect of discussing it.

  “I think you’re having some kind of spiritual awakening,” Marjorie said. This she stated with unusual gravity, yet with a spark in her eyes. “I think I feel Jesus right here with us, in a way that I have seldom felt him before.”

  Kayla stopped right there in the parking lot, on the warming black asphalt, her big pale green bag threatening to drop on the pavement. A shiver ran up her back. In fact, though she saw Jesus perfectly clearly with her own eyes, and heard his voice, Kayla still needed reassurance and affirmation. The notion that Marjorie, one of the holiest people she knew, could sense Jesus’s presence with her, felt like a hand offered on a climb up a slippery and steep trail.

  Jesus finally spoke up. “You should tell her.”

  Kayla swallowed hard. Her mouth felt dry, her heart beginning to race.

  During a slow meander to where Marjorie thought she had left her car, and then to its actual location, Kayla began to tell her what had been happening to her and Jason that week. And, in doing so, she returned a favor, offering validation to Marjorie’s sense of a unique divine presence. This, of course, is why Jesus wanted Kayla to tell her story, this and something more.

  “I have never heard of anything like this happening, not in this country, and not in this century,” Marjorie said, in a voice filled with the music of awe and wonder. “This is glorious!” She looked around and then examined Kayla for some sign of an answer written on her face. “Where is he now?”

  Kayla turned her eyes toward Jesus and said simply, “There.”

  As soon as she spoke, Marjorie released a truncated little bark of a scream. From the look on her face, and the focus of her gray-green eyes, Kayla could tell that Marjorie was seeing Jesus too.

  This made Kayla exclaim. “Oh!” she said, in a sort of echo of Marjorie’s scream. She had no idea she could share this experience with more than Jason.

  Marjorie stood speechless for five seconds, then Jesus reached out and stroked her face with the back of two fingers. “Hello, my girl.”

  “Oh, Lord,” said Marjorie, and she started to lower herself to her old knees.

  Jesus intercepted her with both hands, catching her elbows and standing her up straight. When she was fully upright again, Jesus wrapped his arms around her. And Marjorie began to cry.

  Though few people passed that way over the next couple of minutes, those that did might have noticed a woman, in her sixties, standing in an awkward position, crying her eyes out, with a pretty young woman standing by, crying silent tears of sympathy. It was the sort of scene that causes people to look away, for fear that it might be contagious. Kayla and Marjorie didn’t notice anyone else and didn’t give it a thought.

  Her whole life, Marjorie had longed for something like this, without daring to admit it, and certainly without any expectation that it would happen.

  By the time the tears had been wiped, sobs had turned to laughter, and the three of them separated far enough to see each other’s faces, Kayla had a question for Jesus.

  “Are you going with Marjorie, like you go with me and Jason?”

  Jesus smiled and looked at Marjorie. “Do you want me to?”

  Kayla had heard a preacher once speculate as to why the Gospels record Jesus asking things such as, whether the blind man wanted to be healed. Certainly, Jesus knew that, given a choice, Marjorie would say “yes.” Why did he bother to ask her? His tone, in fact, was tender as a groom dancing with his bride at the reception. But, still, he asked her.

  Marjorie looked like she was afraid to speak, like there might be a catch to this question. She had no doubt about what she wanted. What she doubted was whether she was allowed to say it.

  Jesus waited patiently, no sense of a one-time offer expiring soon
. He knew the hurdles Marjorie was facing. He was offering a way over, or perhaps right through, those hurdles with his invitation.

  Since she had sent her youngest child on her way, out into the world on her own, Marjorie had been praying for direction regarding how to invest the rest of her life. She anticipated grandchildren, with five children of her own, and three married by the time the youngest left home. But she suspected God wanted to do something more with her, beyond the praying grandmother that she would certainly be. Attending classes at the community college was part of Marjorie’s obedience to what she thought God was telling her. He was telling her to prepare for the rest of her life, instead of resting from the years that she had already accomplished.

  Walking around with a visible and audible Jesus by her side, was not only unexpected, it was impossible to believe. She had accepted Kayla’s story, as an amazing blessing for someone else, something Marjorie believed possible. She was still banging her shin against that obstacle that prevented her from believing such a blessing could accompany her life.

  Kayla saw all of this playing out in front of her, in living color. She sensed that she should say something.

  “You know, Jason and I are just regular people, who love Jesus and wanted to know him more. What Jesus is teaching us is about how much he wants that too, and how little it matters whether we feel like we deserve his love and attention.”

  Marjorie turned her blinking eyes on Kayla. She was still absorbing, and couldn’t yet locate words.

  Kayla continued. “Maybe we just have to be willing to fast from our self-doubt long enough to see how God has no doubt about us.” Kayla marveled at her own words. She hoped she could remember them later, pretty impressed with their clarity and truth.

  Jesus tipped his forehead toward Kayla slightly and gave her a wink. She laughed through her lingering tears.

  “Of course, I want you to be with me like this,” Marjorie said to Jesus, her tone implying that she might want to back out, as soon as she had time for some serious second-guessing.