Come to the Lake

by Macarthur, Autumn

  Being out in creation, seeing the lake and the mountains and the sky, surely inspired more genuine worship than even the finest cathedral. No manmade building could compare to this.

  Pastor Roberts reached out his arms as if he wanted to hug everyone there. Somehow, it didn’t seem hokey. The chatter around him stilled. “Thank you for being here today. Let’s get ready to open our hearts to God and to each other before we break bread together in remembrance and thanks for what Jesus did for us.”

  Samantha Rose wriggled around until she faced the preacher, and everyone standing moved to sit. Daniel lowered himself onto her picnic blanket. If it wasn’t for the article Meg would publish on Tuesday… if it wasn’t that he’d already decided which road he had to take… he’d reach for her hand.

  To stop himself reaching for it anyway, he bent his legs up in front of him then gripped his knees.

  “First,” the pastor began, “let’s give thanks. Thank you, Lord, for bringing us here today. Thank you for the privilege of knowing you. Thank you for all you do for us. Thank you for being our true father, a father who only wants the best for us. Please, fill us to overflowing with gratitude for your blessings, especially the gift of grace you gave us in your Son, Jesus.

  “We come to you empty, and you fill us. We come to you broken, and you make us whole. We come to you poor, and you make us rich in spirit. Not because we deserve it. But because you love us, even though we don’t deserve it. Because Jesus died for us and took our punishment, you give us your mercy and your grace.”

  Grace and mercy? They were never mentioned in his old church. Dad preached nothing but sin, sin, sin.

  He glanced at Samantha Rose. With eyes closed, her face lifted to the sky like a flower seeking the sun. A sweet smile curved her lips. Her expression of pure joy showed the preachers words matched what she believed about God.

  Pastor Roberts resumed speaking directly to the congregation. “Before we can come before God, we need to admit our need for him. Our brokenness, the ways each of us falls short of being the person he created us to be. We need to accept his gift of grace and ask his forgiveness. Let’s take some quiet time now. In the stillness, we can confess to God whatever we need to, knowing he keeps his promises and he will forgive.”

  The pastor fell silent. In his silence, the gentle ripple of children’s laughter, the lilt of birdsong, the whistle of a soft breeze rustling the reeds, and the tranquil lap of the lake against the shore wove through the air, creating a choir all their own.

  For the first time, Daniel prayed. A real prayer, not the rote words his father taught him. And not with a still heart or mind. Instead, he flung questioning words at God.

  God, I’ve done wrong things in my life. Dad told me what they were often enough. I’m fine with confessing that. But I don’t know what the truth is here. What this pastor says isn’t what my father taught. He said you’re always judging us, biding your time, and storing up a list of our sins till you give us the punishment we deserve. But now, I’m hearing the opposite. That because Jesus died you don’t give us what we deserve at all. That you want to forgive us, not punish us. I’m open to knowing a different version of you, but which version is the truth? The loving God this pastor talks about can’t be the same vengeful, punishing one Dad preached. I believe in justice. I don’t know where mercy and grace fit in with that.

  Part of him yearned to feel forgiven, to have the faith Samantha Rose did. The hurting little boy still living inside his adult body wanted so badly to know this loving God as his Father. No reason not to doubt everything Dad told him was a lie, not only what he’d said about the charity.

  But he needed to know the truth. And he couldn’t reconcile this concept of grace with the justice he lived for.

  The pastor’s voice resuming the service interrupted his thoughts.

  “When we break bread together, we’re remembering what Jesus told his disciples, the night before he took the punishment we deserved on himself, by dying for us. This is what he said:

  “And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me.’ In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.’”

  Pastor Roberts opened his arms wide. “I invite you now to come forward. Come to the table just as you are and choose to break bread with me and with each other. As you do, accept for the first time or accept all over again the sacrifice Jesus made for you. Accept that he defeated death. Open your heart that bit more fully to him. Trust that, in his death and resurrection, God’s justice and mercy are fulfilled perfectly, giving us forgiveness and new life.”

  Samantha Rose stood, along with her neighbors. When he didn’t move, she gazed at him, head tilted to one side. “Coming?”

  He hadn’t intended to.

  Not till he decided if he agreed with all the pastor said. No matter how much he wanted to feel the love and forgiveness he’d never felt from his father, it was too big a shift from his driving principles. The things he lived his life by.

  The pursuit of truth and justice. Exposing cheats and hypocrites so they didn’t get away with it the way Dad had. That was the path he’d chosen — had to choose. The familiar path he knew. His entire identity lay on that path.

  So where and how did mercy and forgiveness fit? And if they did, where did that leave justice? Had God let Dad get away with it after he died, too?

  Too many unanswered questions.

  But Samantha Rose smiled down at him, holding out a hand, inviting him to join her at the table. Despite his doubts, despite knowing their paths led in opposite directions, he grasped it and walked forward hand-in-hand with her.

  He still had all his questions. But he wanted to know her God. He wanted to have what she had. A quiet inner faith, and a very different God from the one his father preached.

  Opening his heart and mind to this new way of seeing God might be the only way to find the answers.

  Chapter 10

  The doorbell rang as Sam slid the pie into the oven, and she groaned. Surely it couldn’t be Daniel here for their dinner already? She glanced at the clock.

  Seven thirty, precisely.

  It must be him. The butterflies dancing in her stomach all afternoon donned hobnailed boots. How she’d manage to swallow even a single bite of the food she’d prepared, she didn’t know.

  Somehow, the food was ready in time, though it took working nonstop since rushing home from church to do it. Thankfully, Maddie whisked the girls to the store for a sleepover, so Sam could concentrate on cooking.

  It helped. The appetizers chilled in the fridge. She’d pan-fried then cooled the chicken fillets, her salads were prepared, and everything was nicely plated ready to serve. The table she’d set in the coolness of the screened porch looked every bit as pretty as she’d hoped.

  But she hadn’t had time to tidy up the kitchen or change her clothes. And though she hadn’t had a chance to peek in a mirror, either, she guessed she looked no better than the kitchen did. So her appearance could be described in a single word.

  Disaster.

  All she could do was pray, hand both the meal and the mess over to God, and trust Him to take care of the outcome.

  Besides, maybe despite the chaos in the kitchen, the food would taste fine. Maybe the mess wasn’t really that bad. Maybe she could blindfold Daniel before leading him through to the porch? Even better, maybe she could blindfold him through the entire meal?

  She guessed not. Worth a try.

  At least her ridiculous thoughts meant she could open the door to him with a smile.

  Daniel’s suppressed laughter and quirked eyebrow suggested the mess on her clothes was every bit as bad as she’d suspected.

  “That bad, huh?” She scrunched her nose.

  “You’ve obviously been busy.” Smiling, he reached out and touched her nose. “You have flour on your nose and have developed
purple freckles since this morning.”

  “Oh no.” Her hands lifted to scrub at her face. “Any better?”

  “Nope.” He grinned. “No matter. I wasn’t expecting to find you wearing a frilly apron over a pristine pink dress, with your hair and makeup done like you’d stepped out of a salon after a makeover.”

  A glance down at her jeans and T-shirt showed liberal splatters of berry juice, topped with flour smears. A sigh escaped her. So she’d flunked How To Impress A Man You Want To Have A Future With 101, right along with her second attempt at passing Homemaking.

  Still, she managed to laugh. Her future was in God’s hands. And any man who’d judge a girl for a few splashes of berry juice simply wasn’t the man for her. “I’d better ask for my money back. The salon I went to gave me a make-under instead.”

  Daniel’s chuckle gave her all the answer she needed. “Don’t worry, you look fine. I hear berry colors will be in fashion this fall. You’re just ahead of the curve.”

  “Thanks for trying.” She rolled her eyes. “We’re eating out on the screened porch. I don’t suppose I could ask you to close your eyes as you walk through the kitchen?”

  “That bad, huh?” He mimicked her earlier words.

  “Definitely that bad. Maybe worse. Okay, leave your eyes open. You may as well see everything.” She led him toward the kitchen.

  As soon as he stepped through the door, he loosed a guffaw, and then quickly straightened his face. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have laughed. You’ve clearly worked hard here. But it looks like the aftermath of a particularly gruesome murder of a victim, one with blue blood. All that’s missing is the ‘crime scene, do not cross’ yellow tape.”

  She snorted and rolled her eyes — again. “CSI hasn’t been alerted yet. That’s why the tape is missing. Since the news team has arrived, they won’t be far behind.”

  Despite her jokes, his description wasn’t too far wrong. Trust God or not, she had to laugh so she didn’t cry.

  “So what happened?” The concern lowering his voice sounded real. As if he really wanted to know, and not just so he could catch her out in a lie.

  Could it be that after church this morning, he intended to temper justice with mercy? She’d prayed so hard for him to open his heart to God. Not so he’d write a different story, but for his own sake.

  But if a different story happened to be a side effect, she wouldn’t complain.

  Please, Lord, let it be so!

  She surveyed the damage.

  Berry juice covered the stove top. The saucepan still sat unwashed in the sink, so plenty of sticky berry juice splattered that side of the kitchen, too.

  The juice everywhere wasn’t the only mess. She’d sprinkled flour on the counter before rolling out the pastry the way Liz showed her, but wads of discolored pie dough still stuck everywhere.

  Not to mention the cream cheese filling for the appetizer smeared more places than she thought possible, and the scraps of torn green lettuce leaves fresh from the garden, now wilting on the counter and the hardwood floor.

  Chuckling, she shrugged. “I didn’t want to waste precious frozen huckleberries, so I tried cooking up frozen blueberries and chopped apples for the filling. The saucepan boiled over while I was making the starter.”

  He just stood, shaking his head, a slight smile twitching his lips. “I appreciate your honesty in letting me see this. That’s brave.”

  She didn’t want to be brave. She wanted to be able to prepare a meal without making the kitchen look like she’d been blowing up food, not cooking it.

  “It’s all clean-upable.” Unable to completely stop a defensive tone from snipping through her voice, she crinkled her nose. “At least, I hope it is. I may need to buy Maddie a new saucepan if I can’t scrub the one I used.”

  “Hope so.” Blue eyes twinkling, Daniel gestured toward the door leading to the screened porch. “How about we go out to the porch and pretend I did close my eyes when I walked through the kitchen?”

  “Please.” She let her tight shoulders soften as she scooted toward the fridge. “I’ll get the pitcher of iced tea.”

  At the threshold, Daniel stopped and glanced around the porch. Approval gleamed in his eyes. “Lovely.”

  Something she got right. The room did look pretty. Simple, but pretty.

  She’d bundled away the clutter, borrowed a white tablecloth to cover the old round table, used Maddie’s best silverware, and picked a few pink roses from the garden for a centerpiece.

  The golden pre-sunset light helped, too. In light like that, just about anything could look good.

  Ice cubes clinking, she carefully poured a tall glass of iced tea each as Daniel sat in the chair she indicated.

  “Nice.” He grinned at the pitcher. “Flowers decorating iced tea make a lot more sense than flowers decorating burger and fries.”

  She smiled. “Thank you.”

  Daniel didn’t need to know the ice cubes with flowers embedded in them she’d seen on Pinterest hadn’t worked — the flowers didn’t show. But the clusters of mint leaves and blue star-like borage flowers from Liz’s herb patch floating in the pitcher were Pinterest-worthy enough on their own.

  “I’ll fetch our appetizers. I hope you don’t think I’m cheating, but Liz suggested making it and the main course chilled, to save the stress of trying to get everything cooked and ready at the same time.”

  “Wise plan.” He nodded. “Even I’m not mean enough to insist it’s cheating.”

  She carried in the two small plates from the fridge and placed them on the table.

  Four cream-cheese-stuffed nasturtium flowers nestled in a lettuce leaf shell on each plate. Getting the filling into them was harder than she’d expected. The yellow and orange flowers were a little bit mangled.

  Okay, a lot mangled.

  Raising his eyebrows, he chuckled. “You’re determined to get me eating these things, aren’t you?”

  “I decided that lunch at the resort to serve these.” She grinned. “Real men eat flowers. Though you don’t have to if you don’t want to. We can skip straight to the main course.”

  “I’m game to try.”

  “I’ll just give thanks.”

  Without prompting, he bowed his head and closed his eyes. That was the biggest thing of all to give thanks for.

  Thank You, Lord. Thank You!

  No need to say more as gratitude flooded her heart.

  Daniel opened his eyes, and then lifted a flower. “Here goes.”

  Resisting the childish urge to cross her fingers, she sucked in her lower lip, pinching it between her teeth as he chewed and swallowed, then blinked his watering eyes before taking a large gulp of iced tea.

  That was not supposed to happen.

  “Interesting flavor,” he choked out.

  Frowning, she nibbled on one and nearly spat it back. “Hoo boy. Those are way spicier than I expected. The flowers at the resort weren’t nearly so strong.” She stood and picked up both plates. “I’m so sorry.”

  “At least I can say I’ve eaten flowers now.” He smiled gamely. “Though once may be enough for me.”

  “You’ve definitely won your ‘real man’ credentials. I’ll get rid of these and bring in the next course.” As she carried the plates back to the kitchen and emptied the contents into the trash, she prayed the mains would be okay.

  They looked fine. Thankfully, the pie in the oven looked fine when she peeked at it, too.

  The mains weren’t fine. Daniel began to cut into his chicken, then left off and went for the tomato salad instead. She discovered why when she cut into hers. Or tried to. She’d need a saw, not a table knife to cut this. Anxious to make sure she cooked it long enough, she must have overcooked it.

  Then Daniel poked suspiciously at the mixed green leaves and lifted something off his plate. “Let’s just put this little guy back in the garden.” As he stood, he held up a tiny snail.

  “But I washed it all so carefully,” she wailed. Clearly, not carefully
enough. Babbling more apologies, all she could do was pray.

  Lord, can anything else go wrong? If it can, please make it happen now, so I can get it over with.

  It happened.

  Smelling smoke, she dashed into the kitchen. As soon as she opened the oven door, smoke poured out, setting off the alarm. Eyes burning, coughing from the fumes, she opened the doors and windows wide. Daniel rushed in from the yard and found a broom to push the reset button, stopping the earsplitting screech.

  More than the smoke stifled her breath as she peeked in the oven.

  Her lovely pie had exploded, the pastry collapsing and fruit filling erupting over the sides of the pan to bubble and burn on the bottom of the oven.

  Lord, please shrink me small enough to disappear through a crack in the floorboards!

  She guessed her chances of that were unlikely. At least there wasn’t anything left to go wrong.

  Except for Nancy coming to snatch the twins away once she discovered Sam hadn’t quite developed the homemaking skills she’d hoped for.

  She gazed at Daniel. His mournful grimace reminded her he had to tell the truth. Exactly what she’d expected all along. After this, the best she could hope was for his article not to paint the truth too Technicolor bright.

  Though whatever he wrote, she deserved it.

  “I’m sorry.” What else could she say?

  “How about we go sit by the lake till the smoke clears?” he suggested.

  At least he wasn’t going to emphasize the inevitable by talking about the disaster their meal turned into.

  They headed to the picnic table she’d taken him to the day they met, and sat wordlessly gazing over the lake. Sunset tinged the mountains, and the reflections in the water glowed a soft purple. One by one, stars popped into the sky.

  A romantic setting.

  But she wasn’t feeling any romance. Only a heart-deep regret.

  Finally, he broke the silence. “I should go. I still need to pack.” He stood, but didn’t make any move to leave.

  If she’d cooked the meal right, this might be the start of a long-distance relationship. Instead, it was goodbye.