A Story about the Spiritual Journey

by Sharon Garlough Brown

  Maybe what Hannah needed was some perspective and distance from her own struggles. How would she advise someone who complained about battling distractions in prayer? How would she counsel someone about a Nathan Allen?

  The answer that came to mind surprised her. Maybe what you call a distraction is exactly what the Spirit wants you to see.

  But that didn’t make sense. What did Nathan Allen’s intrusion have to do with any of the work God was doing in her? She couldn’t see it. She just couldn’t see it.

  Closing the pages of her journal, Hannah shut her eyes tight and pretended to be deep in prayer.

  Together

  Charissa sat in her high school cafeteria, listening to the girls at her table gossip about Teresa Gallagher. “I heard she’s keeping the baby,” one of them said.

  “Seriously?” another asked.

  “I heard she doesn’t even know who the father is. She’s slept with so many different guys.”

  Charissa glanced over to the table in the corner where Teresa sat alone, reading a book. Their eyes met for just a moment before Charissa looked away.

  She could remember when she and Teresa were in elementary school together. Teresa was always trying to join Charissa and her friends at recess, so they would tell her to hide. Then they would all run away to find another game to play, leaving Teresa waiting in her hiding place until the bell rang. Teresa eventually figured out the rules of the game and stopped asking if she could play. Charissa was glad. Teresa wasn’t the sort of girl she wanted to be seen with. When Teresa began to mix with the wrong crowd in junior high, Charissa wasn’t at all surprised.

  “Be careful who you associate with,” Mother always told her. “If you lose your reputation, you lose everything.”

  John was waiting near the portico when Charissa, Meg, Mara, and Hannah exited together at noon. Charissa kissed him and then turned to Mara. “Mara, have you met my husband, John, yet?” John smiled as he shook Mara’s hand.

  “Nice to meet you,” Mara and John chorused.

  “How was the pilgrims’ progress today?” he teased, wrapping his arms around Charissa’s waist. Charissa shrugged a reply.

  Meg said, “Sometimes I feel like I’m not getting very far. Or like I’m traveling around in circles. Then I look back at where I’ve come from, and I guess I should feel encouraged.”

  “Man!” Mara exclaimed. “I thought I was the only one who felt that way! I get dizzy, walkin’ around in circles.”

  Hannah decided to change the subject before they asked her any questions about her own experience with circular motion.

  “Are you sure you two won’t join us?” she asked Charissa and John.

  Hannah had invited all of them to the lake for a picnic. Of course, she had extended the invitation before she found out about Nathan Allen. Much as she wished she could just go back to the cottage by herself, she was determined to be a gracious host.

  “I don’t want to crash the girls’ day out,” John said. “But hey! Why don’t you go, Riss? You won’t get many more days like this to be outside.” Charissa looked tempted. “Go on, hon. I’ll survive a few hours without you. Maybe I’ll head over to the university for some tailgating. It’s a great day for football!”

  “As long as you’re not playing! If I have to worry about you throwing a ball, John, I’m not going anywhere. I’m serious.”

  He kissed her. “Don’t worry. I’ll be good.” She scrutinized him. “I promise! Go have fun!”

  “It is a perfect autumn day, isn’t it?” Charissa said. “And I haven’t been on a picnic since I lived in England.”

  “Fresh bread, imported cheeses, fruit, cookies. I’ve even got English tea,” Hannah said, reaching into her bag for her car keys.

  “Okay, sold!”

  “Wonderful! You can ride with me if you’d like.” Hannah looked at Meg. “Have you guys got directions if we get separated?”

  “All set,” Meg answered, turning toward Mara. “You’re riding with me, right?”

  “You bet, girlfriend!”

  “Be good, John.” Charissa kissed him before he got into the car.

  “Yes, ma’am. I’ll keep my phone on so you can check up on me. Have fun!”

  Hannah hadn’t intended to talk with Charissa about Nathan Allen. That wasn’t why she had invited Charissa to ride with her. Definitely not, she told herself. But as she listened to Charissa talk about her studies, all of Hannah’s thoughts swirled around Nathan. She began to wonder if Charissa suspected something. Was that why Charissa wasn’t mentioning him by name? Hannah decided it might be better if she expressed casual interest in an old peer. Maybe she could find out information without seeming too eager.

  “So what kind of teacher is Nathan?” Hannah finally asked. It wasn’t what she most wanted to know, but it seemed a safe place to begin.

  “He’s really gifted,” Charissa replied. “He has this amazing way of bringing texts to life—he just sees things most people don’t see. And not just on the written page. He also has this uncanny gift for reading people.”

  Hannah hoped she appeared more composed than she felt. She waited to respond until she thought she could modulate her voice correctly. “Sounds like he would have made a good pastor. Has he ever said why he switched to literature?”

  Charissa shook her head. “Not to me, anyway. I just know he’s been at Kingsbury for a few years now—since my junior year.”

  The car filled with silence. Hannah didn’t want to call attention to herself by asking more questions, and Charissa seemed to be debating whether or not she should give unsolicited information.

  “I don’t know much else about him,” Charissa finally said. “Except that he’s divorced.” Hannah inhaled. “And he’s got a teenage son.” Hannah stopped breathing.

  “A teenager! Really?” Had her tone given her away?

  Charissa said, “His name’s Jake. I’ve met him a couple of times. Nice young man.”

  Hannah was worried that her face wasn’t cooperating with her mental command to appear nonchalant. “That doesn’t seem possible,” Hannah mused, trying to adjust her expression to easygoing curiosity. “Are you sure his son is that old?”

  Charissa shrugged. “I know he’s in junior high, so I’m thinking he’s thirteen or fourteen.”

  Hannah felt herself grow faint, and she gripped the steering wheel hard. Maybe it was a different Nathan Allen. It had to be. But everything she had heard about him pointed to her former friend: the sailing, the seminary training, the gifts of discernment and teaching. Hannah directed all her effort into sounding detached and disinterested. “I wonder if I’ve got the wrong Nathan Allen. What else can you tell me about him?”

  Charissa thought for a moment. “He’s shorter than I am—maybe five-eight or so? He’s got dark hair, starting to gray a bit. What else?” Charissa appeared to be concentrating hard. “Oh—I know! He was an English major at Kingsbury. And he spent a year at Oxford before he went to seminary. He specialized in spirituality and literature.”

  Hannah’s whole body constricted. Of course. How could she have forgotten that piece of his story?

  It was definitely her Nathan Allen.

  Meg followed the others down the stairway access from the cottage to the beach, gripping the handrail tightly. She didn’t want to lose her balance and go tumbling with the picnic basket, so she stepped carefully.

  Something was strangely familiar about this scene—the staircase, the sand dunes, the water, the wind. Though Meg had lived her entire life less than an hour away from Lake Michigan, she had spent very little time there. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last time she had been at the lake.

  As she pondered her sense of déjà vu, a single image materialized. She wasn’t even sure it was an authentic memory. She was little—maybe three or four years old—and she was climbing down an outdoor staircase, tightly gripping someone’s hand. She was worried about losing her balance, so she was concentrating intently on each step.

&
nbsp; Then she heard a man’s voice: “I’ve got you, Meggie. Keep comin’.” Hard as she tried, she couldn’t see a face. She only felt the grip of a hand and heard the sound of a voice.

  Was it her father?

  Meg possessed only shadowy images of him, and most of those had been influenced by photographs. She was only four when he died. Rachel, who was ten at the time, had many happy memories of “Daddy.” Meg had always been jealous, though she had never confessed it aloud. Over the years Rachel had spoken happily, freely, even boastfully about their father and how he had loved her. Meg did not have the same gift.

  But what was this image? Was she actually remembering a moment she had shared with her dad? Maybe she could ask Rachel if she remembered a trip to the beach before their father died.

  “Hey! You okay?” Mara’s shout interrupted her thoughts. Meg hadn’t realized she had stopped halfway down the staircase. She waved to the others, who had already laid down a red tartan blanket near a sand dune.

  “I’m coming!”

  Hannah walked back over to the staircase and reached for the picnic basket Meg was carrying. “Here—let me take that for you.”

  “I’m okay. I’ve got it. Just had a weird bit of déjà vu—that’s all.”

  “What about?”

  “Something about coming down a staircase to a beach. I’m probably making it up.”

  “Making what up?” asked Mara as Meg and Hannah reached the dune.

  Meg set the basket down on the blanket. “I was coming down the staircase, and something about the sand dunes and the lake felt really familiar. And then I saw an image of myself as a little girl, holding really tightly to someone’s hand. To a man’s hand. I’m wondering if it’s an actual memory or just my imagination.”

  “Your dad?” Mara asked, unpacking some of the food.

  “He died when I was four, and I don’t have any memories of him: only stories my sister, Rachel, has told me. But I don’t know. I guess it could be real.”

  Hannah said, “Maybe Rachel would remember a trip to the beach.”

  “That’s what I’m wondering. But I don’t want to plant a false memory in her.”

  “Ask her if your family used to go to the lake when you were little, and see what she says,” Charissa suggested.

  “It sucks growing up without a dad,” Mara commented as she held out a loaf of bread to the others. “’Course, mine left before I was born. Abandoned us when my mom was six months pregnant. Cowardly son-of-a—”

  Charissa narrowed her eyebrows and turned her back toward Mara. “What happened to your dad, Meg?” she asked.

  Meg spoke the words matter-of-factly. “He was cleaning one of his guns, and it went off.”

  Hannah gasped. “Oh, Meg! I’m sorry. That’s awful!”

  “I guess it was.” Meg took the bread from Mara. “But I don’t remember any of it.” She couldn’t even remember missing her dad. Odd, how disconnected she felt from her own history. But Hannah was right. It must have been absolutely awful for her mother. Unspeakably horrible. Maybe that’s why her mother had never talked about it.

  The shock mirrored in Hannah’s eyes unlocked something in Meg, as if Hannah were the surrogate, seeing and feeling what Meg did not. Could not. Would not?

  Meg wasn’t sure she was ready for that kind of sight or feeling. Not sure at all.

  “So, Hannah,” Mara said, assembling another sandwich. “I’m kinda confused about this whole sabbatical thing. You’re on a paid vacation because your church wanted you to have a break?”

  “Basically.” Hannah leaned back against the sand dune and stared up at the white underbelly of a gull hovering in slow motion above them. “They said I was overdue for one. I tried arguing my way out of it, but they won. So I’m here.”

  Mara whistled. “Man, I’ve heard of professors getting long sabbaticals, but not pastors. You must have a really generous church.” Hannah did not respond. “And I’ve never asked you about the rest of your life,” Mara continued. “I mean, life’s more than the church and work, right?”

  Hannah shrugged. “Not much to tell. For the past fifteen years the church has been my life.”

  “Married to the church, huh?” Mara pressed. “No husband? Boyfriend? Ex? Nothing?”

  “Nope.”

  “Ah, it’s not too late for that. You’re still young, right? What are you? Forty?”

  “Almost,” Hannah said, smiling slightly. “Don’t remind me.”

  “See, there’s still time for you to fall in love and have a family. Right?” Mara turned to Meg and Charissa. “Do you guys know any eligible bachelors we could set her up with while she’s here?”

  “That’s okay, Mara,” Hannah said quickly, watching a pained and helpless expression flit across Meg’s face. “I’m not looking for a relationship. I’m just not interested in falling in love.”

  “Seriously?” Mara seemed shocked. “Never?”

  Hannah shook her head back and forth in a slow, definitive motion. She had given this answer many, many times before. “I made my choice a long time ago. I decided I couldn’t serve Christ and have a family. Even if I wanted to change my mind, it’s too late. For kids, anyway.”

  Mara wasn’t going to give up that easily. “Oh, I don’t know about that,” she said. “I had a friend who gave birth to a beautiful, healthy boy at forty-three.”

  Hannah hesitated a moment and then replied, “I mean, I can’t have children. I had a hysterectomy last year.”

  Meg leaned forward. Charissa cleared her throat. Mara turned crimson. “Oh, man—I’m sorry. I’m so sorry! There I go with my big mouth again. I just don’t know when to shut it all off. I’m sorry, Hannah . . . So sorry . . . ” She looked as if she wished the sand would part and consume her.

  “No, it’s okay. I get asked about it a lot. Don’t worry.” Hannah took hold of one of the long blades of reed grass and used the fine-tipped point to scribble in the sand. “It was all very straightforward,” she said. “After years of trying all kinds of ways to control my symptoms, surgery became the inevitable solution. And I’ve felt great ever since. Really great. I’m grateful.”

  There was silence around the circle as each of them seemed to be searching for an appropriate response. “My mom had a hysterectomy a few years ago,” Charissa ventured. “And she says she can’t believe how much better she feels. Still, Hannah, I’m sorry. That must have been hard.”

  “Thanks.” Hannah stopped scribbling and pulled some chocolate chip cookies from the picnic basket. “C’mon, guys. Eat up! I can’t have all these leftovers to myself.”

  Confident that no one around the circle would have the courage to ask her any more questions, Hannah effortlessly steered the conversation for the rest of the afternoon. Mara eagerly divulged the details of her story, and The Pastor knew how to ask the right questions to keep her talking. In fact, Hannah was so skilled at manipulating that she was almost unaware she was doing it.

  Almost.

  “I talked too much,” Mara despaired as she rode home with Meg and Charissa. “I’m so sorry. I completely dominated the whole afternoon. I just don’t have an off switch, do I?”

  That’s for sure, Charissa thought. She was still trying to process everything Mara had disclosed about her past.

  Meg kept one hand on the steering wheel and placed the other on Mara’s shoulder. “I was so touched by your story, Mara,” she said. “Thank you for trusting us enough to share what God’s doing in your life. I wish I had your courage!” Meg turned briefly to smile at her. “When you were talking about the woman at the well, I started thinking about my own life and all the different wells I’ve tried to drink from.”

  “Really?” Mara asked, tearing up. “But you certainly don’t have a past like mine, Meg.” She wiped her nose on her sleeve as she fumbled around in her bag for a tissue.

  Meg said, “We’ve all got pasts, don’t we? Things we hide, things we’re ashamed of, things we regret. I know I do.” Charissa was mute. “You�
��ve given me something to think about today, Mara. Thank you.”

  In the backseat of the car, a battle was raging. Charissa had listened to the details of Mara’s story with shock, horror, and disgust: the teenage pregnancy, the abortion, the affairs, the illegitimate child, the sexual promiscuity, the marriage of convenience, the expectation of divorce. Charissa had spent her life avoiding people like Mara, unwilling to be guilty by association.

  But just when Charissa was beginning to congratulate herself for her own righteousness and moral purity, some words from Scripture came to mind. “It’s not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick,” Jesus had said. She exhaled more loudly than she intended and drummed her fingers against the car window. She was still a Pharisee. Here she was, face to face with an honest-to-goodness sinner, and she had failed the test. She couldn’t believe she had failed the test.

  Then again, what had Dr. Allen said? “The spiritual life is a journey, Charissa, not an exam.”

  She sighed heavily.

  If only she didn’t have so far to go.

  Meg

  Nine-year-old Meg was awakened by the sound of a man’s voice echoing in the foyer. Looking out her window, she saw a police car in the driveway. She tiptoed to the landing and sat down where she could hear without being seen.

  Meg didn’t understand everything the officer said, but his voice was stern. She caught the words “party” and “drinking.” He said he was giving Rachel a warning; but if it happened again, he wouldn’t be so generous. Mother’s tone was icy as she thanked him for bringing Rachel home. When Meg heard the front door shut, she held her breath.

  “How dare you!” Mother thundered.

  “What’s the big deal? I wasn’t the only one busted, you know.”