Love Finds You in Nazareth, Pennsylvania

by Melanie Dobson

  The driver tugged the reins on the horses to slow them. “The road is a bit bumpy,” he told the women.

  In spite of her pain, she smiled at the understatement of his words. How could he call this overgrown path a road? There would be a lot of changes in this new country, but it was the small, unexpected things, like the rutted roads through the wilderness instead of gravel or smooth stone, that reminded her of how they were no longer in Europe.

  Their friends in Philadelphia had said the village of Bethlehem rose above the forest like the stone turrets of a castle, so she tipped her head back and tried to look above the covering of leaves. Soon she would be in a place where she could rest. She only had to stay strong for a little longer.

  Catharine pushed back her hood. “Do you see anything?”

  “Not yet.”

  Her friend scanned the trees. “My mother told me there are wolves in the Colonies…and snakes.”

  Rebecca shifted beside her. “Don’t forget the Indians.”

  “There aren’t any Indians in Nazareth,” Catharine said. “And I’m staying in Nazareth.”

  A chill raced through Susanna. She rubbed her arms to ward it away, closing her eyes. Catharine wouldn’t be going into the wilderness like some of the others—Elias had been sent to help oversee the building of the Disciple’s House in Nazareth for Count Zinzendorf and his family.

  Susanna had no desire to stay in Bethlehem or Nazareth or any of the Brethren’s villages. As soon as she was better, she wanted to go to the Indian women and tell them how much God loved them. She’d heard the stories of the darkness that shadowed so many of them, of the witchcraft that bound them. It was the light she wanted them to hear about, a light that chased away the shadows.

  Susanna knew she would miss her friend when she and Christian left for the Indian settlements. She didn’t know how often they would return to Nazareth, but she guessed it wouldn’t be often, if the journey back to Nazareth was as grueling as their journey during the past five days.

  The wagon splashed into a creek, and Susanna opened her eyes. Rocks glistened pink and orange, and the colors reminded her of jewels sparkling in the sunset.

  Catharine shook her arm and pointed upward. “Look!”

  Her gaze rose from the beauty of the rocks to the twinkling lights above them, and tears soaked her eyes and tumbled down her cheeks. After months of journeying, they had finally arrived.

  Faint strains of music greeted them as they rode up the hill, and a crowd of men and women flocked around the wagons. Susanna wiped away her tears as she scanned the group, longing to see a smile on her husband’s face, welcoming her…but she didn’t see Christian among them.

  Elias stepped forward and took Catharine’s hand.

  “He must have been detained,” Catharine whispered.

  Susanna pulled her hood over her head. “Of course.”

  Catharine descended into Bethlehem like a noblewoman stepping out of her carriage, but Susanna didn’t move. Every muscle in her body ached and shook under her cloak.

  Instead of leaving her in the wagon, Elias held out his arm. “May I help you, Sister Boehler?”

  Her legs trembled as she tried to stand. Looking behind Elias, she searched for Christian. She found his face in a window above the street.

  Her head bowed, she took Elias’s arm and stepped off the wagon, glad for the help of Catharine’s husband since her own husband didn’t greet her.

  When she released her grip on Elias, her legs wobbled on the firm ground. Catharine reached for her hand, and together they walked into the stone Gemeinhaus, or meetinghouse.

  A man was playing the organ in the front, and while the Saal wasn’t nearly as grand as the one in Marienborn, it was a welcome sight. White benches were lined up on both sides, and a candle glowed at the end of each. Catharine guided Susanna toward the rows for the married women, and when Susanna sat down, she pushed back her hood.

  The women worshipped in song as the men unloaded the trunks and bags of food for the love feast. They praised their Savior for bringing them safely through this journey. They sang about the beauty of His faithfulness, the strength of His love.

  Even in her sickness, Susanna knew her Savior loved her. Even when she didn’t understand His direction, she trusted Him to use her life as He saw fit. Though it sometimes hurt terribly, she would follow His guidance, even if it felt like she must travel this path alone.

  Closing her eyes, she rested her head on Catharine’s shoulder. The rocking from the boat had stopped, but her legs were sore from the bruises wrought by the wagon. And her muscles continued to ache.

  Catharine gently elbowed her side, and Susanna sat up as fifty or so men walked through the doors and sat on the benches across from them. She didn’t know most of the men, but she found Christian’s face among them. He was looking at the front of the Saal, and she glanced away, worried that he might see her watching him.

  Women dieners filed into the room after the men. Dressed in white, the dieners passed baskets of sweet rolls down each row for the men and women to eat for their love feast. Cinnamon and brown sugar dusted the top of the bread in Susanna’s hands, and melted butter pooled in the middle. Her stomach rumbled as she sniffed its sweet aroma.

  An elder prayed for them, and she bit into the roll and relished the warmth of the dough, the sweetness and butter. She’d never tasted anything quite as good.

  Male dieners passed by with a tray of coffee mugs, and Susanna sipped the black coffee as the others sang.

  “Not Jerusalem, lowly Bethlehem ’twas that gave us Christ to save us.”

  A single trombone accompanied the song along with the organ, and in the dim light, Susanna found Christian’s face again across the Saal as he sat among the brothers. This time he was looking her way.

  She searched his face, and his eyes were intent, an expression of fascination filling them and something else. Desire, perhaps.

  Her heart leaped. Perhaps her husband did love her after all.

  A smile stole across her face, but when he didn’t return her smile, she ducked her head. And the bench felt like it collapsed under her.

  Something was happening inside Christian Boehler. Something she didn’t understand.

  Chapter Three

  Faint light crept through the solitary window in the hallway on the third floor of the Sisters House, but the dawn of morning did nothing to calm Christian. Pausing before Susanna’s door, he listened for sounds of life, a foot shuffling or a voice praying. At the silence, he began pacing the floor again.

  God had given him Susanna Fritsche as a wife, and while he wanted to serve her, he didn’t know what to do with such a delicate and gentle woman. She deserved a husband who adored her, a husband who knew how to care for her in her sickness, but he’d failed to protect her, and he didn’t know how to care for her now. He wanted to love Susanna as Christ loved the church, but even in his desire to love her, his heart warred within him. And envy plagued his very soul.

  Stopping, he banged his fist on the wooden wall. He was commanded to love his wife and yet he couldn’t stop himself from thinking about the woman he should have married, the woman he’d loved before the lot rejected his request to marry her. He desperately wanted to break free of this longing that gripped him. He felt trapped within himself even as he wanted to do what was right and love the woman God had given him.

  Outside the window, the men were loading two wagons bound for Nazareth this very morning. For the past two years he had felt God’s strong calling on his life to travel on a mission to the New World, and finally he had been sent from Marienborn as a messenger to the Indians—he and Susanna had both been sent to deliver the good news. But now the others were leaving for Nazareth without him and Susanna. And he didn’t know when they would join them.

  What if the others were commissioned in Nazareth and sent to the Indian villages before Susanna was well again? Where would the elders assign him to work if he remained in Nazareth or even in Bethlehem?
The Brethren in these villages either traveled to the Indians or labored as a community to support those who had been sent.

  His eyes had been on Catharine across the Saal two nights ago when Susanna had collapsed an hour after their journey ended. Many of the women became sick from exhaustion after such a long journey—David said it sometimes it took the women weeks or even months to recover after arriving in Bethlehem. But what was he supposed to do for months, waiting for a woman he didn’t know to regain her strength?

  He worried about the fragile woman on the other side of the door, wanting her health to return to her quickly…but part of him, the darker part he would admit to no one, was frustrated. Not at Susanna but at himself, for agreeing to marry before he came on a journey that he knew would be riddled with suffering and hardship. God had ordained him to travel to the Indians, to take the Gospel across the swamps and bogs in this new colony. The elders had said he needed a wife to accompany him, and at the time he had agreed with enthusiasm. Glancing back out the window, he watched Elias Schmidt walk toward the wagons with the woman Christian was supposed to marry.

  Catharine was intelligent, educated, a talented seamstress, and—Elias was right—she was very beautiful. The laboress of the Single Sister’s Choir had confirmed what Christian already knew. If Catharine ever went on a mission, she would be able to learn the language of the Indians quickly, perhaps even faster than he could. And her charm would help him win over even the most hostile Indian.

  Why had the lot matched Catharine with Elias, a godly man for certain, but one who wasn’t destined for the mission field?

  He stepped away from the window and leaned back against the wood. Elias didn’t know that a week prior to his and Catharine’s engagement, Christian had gone to the elders and they had agreed with his choice to marry Catharine Weicht. Elias didn’t know that Catharine had almost been Christian’s wife.

  He’d never forget the day in the castle chamber when he’d joined with three other elders to pray and select the lot that would determine the future for Catharine and for him. He’d held his breath as the elders had drawn from the lot, waiting for God to approve the marriage that everything within him desired. Everything that Catharine once said she desired as well.

  But on that summer evening, as the elder unfolded the paper, the answer stunned him.

  Nein.

  God didn’t even give him the option to wait and see if he and Catharine were meant to marry later. Instead, God had taken her away from Christian and given her to Elias.

  Surely Catharine had to question the lot like he had. Elias believed Catharine loved him, but Christian’s poor friend didn’t know the truth.

  Christian had prayed in earnest for a strong wife who was devoted to their Lord, and he had desired a beautiful and smart woman who would be just as comfortable in the hut of an Indian as she was in the castle at Marienborn. The laborer at his choir house had told him that Susanna Fritsche was anxious to go on a mission to the Indians, but no matter how strong she was in spirit, how was Susanna going to endure the trials of their wilderness journeys, the dangers of being among the Indians, when she was so weak in body? And how was he supposed to care for this woman and do what the Lord commanded of him at the same time?

  The door of the sick room squeaked as it cracked open, and Christian sprang forward.

  “Come in,” David’s wife, Sister Marie, said as she greeted him.

  He slipped through the doorway and glanced at the young woman, his wife, who was asleep on the narrow bed. “How is she?”

  The sister closed the door. “She has the chills.”

  “Will she be all right?”

  “I believe so, with much prayer and rest.”

  Relief filled him along with a revival of hope. “When will she be ready to travel?”

  “A week, perhaps. Or two.”

  Christian turned so Marie wouldn’t see the disappointment in his eyes. “What can I do to help you?”

  “Pray for her health and her spirit.”

  Christian stepped toward the door, but before he could leave the room, the laborer of the Married Brothers Choir joined them. “The wagons are almost ready.”

  Christian nodded. “I watched them prepare for the journey.”

  “Sometimes as followers of Christ, we must do hard things.” Abraham pinched his smooth chin as he spoke. “Sometimes we must leave the ones we love to pursue what He has for us.”

  Christian studied the man’s stolid gaze. “What are you saying?”

  “There is no reason for you to stay in Bethlehem—”

  “My wife is here,” he interrupted.

  “Susanna will be well cared for by Marie and the other sisters, and you would be—” He glanced over at Marie. “Well, you would be in the way.”

  Christian weighed the man’s words, wondering if he really might be able to leave without her. His spirit tugged within him. Should he stay with the wife the lot had given him to love or proceed with the mission ordained by God?

  “There must be—” He paused. He may not love Susanna as a wife, but he wanted to do what the Savior required of him. “There must be some way I can help.”

  “The only thing you’ll do here is worry, I’m afraid, and that will be good for no one. You can pray for her in Nazareth as earnestly as you pray for her here.”

  Could he really go on to Nazareth without his wife? Should he go?

  Christian glanced at the darkened window beside Susanna’s bed and then back to her face. Her eyes were closed, her face covered with sweat. She looked so helpless lying there. It was his duty to protect her, yet Abraham was right. Marie and the other sisters would care for Susanna much better than he could.

  What did God require of him? Even if he knew his wife, even if he loved her as more than a sister, God might still want him to go on this mission while she recovered.

  “If I go—” He drummed his fingers on his legs. “How would she get to Nazareth?”

  “When she is well again, David or one of the other men can bring her.” Abraham stepped toward the door. “I will tell the others to wait for you.”

  Christian rubbed his palms together as he moved toward the door to follow Abraham. But Marie stopped him and pointed back to Susanna. “You don’t know when you’ll see her again,” she said softly.

  Nodding, he turned again slowly, and when Marie shut the door, he moved toward the bed. It was the first time he’d ever been alone with his wife.

  He’d watched Susanna on the ship, but he’d never studied her before, not like he had studied Catharine during the worship ceremonies and in the privacy of her English manor. Susanna’s hair tangled around her face, like the vines that adorned the trees in the Black Forest. Her light skin was unblemished, her small nose tipped at the end, making her look more like a child than a woman. She was pretty in a simple way. Pure.

  The elders said Susanna was a woman of faithful devotion, uneducated but smart in her own right. They said she was renowned for her compassion and strength. He was glad for her faithfulness, glad for the skills God had endowed her with, but he wasn’t certain how she would fare in the hut of a drunken Indian or eating strange foods from a kettle. He’d heard the stories of hardship from the other messengers, and he wondered if Susanna had heard them as well.

  Gently, he placed his hand over hers. It was so small compared to his, so fragile. He prayed quietly that the Lord would heal her sickness and give her strength—and he prayed even more quietly that God would give him strength as well.

  A lock of hair fell over her eyes, and he reached out to push it aside. But just before he touched her, he yanked back his fingers.

  He had no right to touch her face or her hair, no right to even be here, not when he couldn’t stop thinking about Catharine.

  Shaking, he stepped away from her.

  “Good-bye, my wife,” he whispered as he left the room.

  Susanna stirred in the face of the daylight, and when her eyes crept open, she searched the stran
ge room around her. It was a bedchamber of sorts. A washstand stood under a large dormer window, and there was a bureau next to the door. Sunlight waffled across the wooden floor beside her bed, and the simple coverlet on top of the bed was stitched with green and white.

  The room wasn’t rocking in rhythm with the waves on the Atlantic, like it had on their ship. But if she was no longer on the Irene, where was she?

  Pushing against feathers and sheets, she tried to prop herself up with the pillows, but her strength collapsed under her and she couldn’t manage to lift herself even a couple of inches. Falling back against the pillows, she glanced out the window beside her bed.

  Across the street she could see the gray stone of a medieval-looking building. Her muscles ached and she was terribly cold, in spite of the blankets piled on top of her. She couldn’t remember the last time she had awakened in a room by herself, without the beds of her sisters lined up along the walls beside her.

  Why was she alone this morning?

  She closed her eyes. Not long ago she had crossed the rough Atlantic on the Irene. They’d traveled through the dense forest, and then they had made it to Bethlehem.

  Her eyes sprang open again. She was in Bethlehem; the people here had celebrated their arrival. Hours ago, or had it been days now, they had arrived. Her head had pounded, her whole body aching with each step, as she and Catharine had gone into the Gemeinhaus to worship with the others. There was the taste of the sweet rolls and coffee and the wonderful singing.

  When she had looked across the room, when she had tried to meet Christian’s eyes, she thought he had been looking at her, but then he didn’t return her smile. She didn’t remember anything else.

  She blinked in the sunlight, struggling with her memories, wondering at the intensity of Christian’s gaze in the Saal. Perhaps he hadn’t been watching her at all. Perhaps he had been meditating in prayer, oblivious to anyone on the other side of the aisle. In her wistfulness, she had hoped he was looking at her, but his focus was on the Savior instead.