What are we made of? Are our muscles of iron, or straw? Who are we . . . really? Down at the core of our beings, what beats in our hearts? The red blood of courage and dignity, or cowardice, selfishness, and greed?
This is also the story of the history of nations. And ours has just emerged from such a time.
Perhaps for the first time since 1776, we can truthfully call ourselves the United States of America, and can for the first time summon the maturity to look within ourselves, inside some collective place in our national heart, and ask, “Who are we . . . we who call ourselves Americans? What does it mean to be an American? And what kind stuff are we made of?”
Everything I was writing went down so deep into my own heart. For some reason my thoughts again turned to the mirror that I had mentioned before about the war, and realized that the old farmhouse at Bridgeville had been a gigantic mirror for me too—a mirror into myself and into the past. Sometimes those kinds of mirrors didn’t reflect comfortable things. There had been pain with some of the memories I’d just lived through, yet I knew the realizations that resulted from it all would make me stronger in the end. I hoped the same would be true for our country. Thinking about the pain and killing brought my thoughts back again to the war.
We have spent the last four years looking into a red-stained national mirror—looking at the enemy, all the while looking at ourselves.
The images from the mirror are far from pleasant. We learned that Americans are a people capable of killing, killing cruelly, and killing in huge numbers . . . and killing our own brothers.
We have learned, however, that though capable of great evil, there is yet a strength of fiber in the word American. This was no war fought by cowards—on either side. As the mirror revealed great flaws in the national character, perhaps it equally revealed a valor that will grow out of the blood spilled on the battlefields into a greater strength than the nation knew prior to 1860.
The war was fought to make this the land of free men and women, no matter what the color of their skin. Perhaps one of the greatest lessons of all is that it took brave Americans to achieve that freedom. This is indeed now, at long last, a land of the brave and free.
I put down my pen. I could write no more. I had begun crying softly even as I wrote, without even realizing it.
I suppose I was crying for the country, for the bloodshed, for Mr. Lincoln. No matter how I tried with my words to find a meaning to it all, a perspective that would see good in all that had happened, I could not forget Gettysburg and the hospital camps and everything else I’d seen. And somehow none of it seemed worth the horror and tragedy and enormous human suffering. Maybe the war had to be fought for freedom’s sake. I don’t know if I would ever know the answer to that. But it was too high a price to discover that Americans were a brave people. Bravery did not seem worth the death it had caused.
I put the papers away and stared out the window awhile, letting my tears come quietly and softly, dabbing my eyes every now and then with a handkerchief. I had been trying to find some positive lesson to be learned from the war, but it was still so fresh, I didn’t know if I believed the thoughts my pen had explored or not. It would probably take a long time to discover, as I had asked myself when I began trying to write my thoughts, what the war meant.
I still didn’t know.
Before long, however, Christopher began to intrude into my thoughts, mingling with all the images of the last two years. Not in a longing way, but just with a sadness that I would probably never see him again, and that he was just about the finest Christian man anyone could ever meet.
That sadness, along with the completely different sadness over the war, occupied my thoughts all the way to Pennsylvania, and I spent the rest of the day just looking out the windows.
It was definitely time for me to go home. Suddenly I was very, very homesick and anxious to see everyone again!
Back at the convent I immediately began gathering my things and making the preparations necessary for my return to California.
Now that the decision had been made, I was anxious to be on my way. I checked the train schedule in Lancaster and determined, if I was able, to be back in six days to board the westbound train to Pittsburgh.
I told Sister Janette and Sister Mary and the others that while I was in New York I’d realized it was time for me to go back home to California, and what my plans were. They all expressed regret at my words, yet none of them was surprised by the decision. I could tell that Sister Janette had expected it and even knew within herself that it was the right thing for me to do.
The next five days were ones of unexpected delight.
Knowing that these were my final days with the sisters I’d grown to love so deeply, I made every effort to make the days as full and rich as possible. We worked and prayed and laughed and sang together, and I accompanied whoever had any errand out in the community, no matter how small. I didn’t want to lose a single opportunity to fill my last week here with every possible memory and growing experience I could.
I wrote notes to myself about everything that had happened in New York to insure that I wouldn’t forget a single detail. But I didn’t want to take the time to write everything out in my journal just then. There would be plenty of hours on the train for that. It wasn’t likely I’d forget any of it anyway.
I got out the things I’d written on the war and General Grant and General Lee and read them over a few times, wondering if I could make an article or two out of them. Yet somehow my mind was already looking beyond the war, and it was hard to focus my attention on what I had written. Maybe when I got back home I’d show them to Mr. Kemble, and if he wanted to use them he could.
The day finally came. All the sisters wanted to go along to take me to the train. So two full wagons—with sixteen Catholic nuns and one young lady on her way back to California—jostled off northeastward toward Lancaster, singing and talking and laughing together. I don’t think there has ever been a time in my life I remember such pure, happy fun as that day’s ride.
We all spent the night at a church there. I was to catch the train westbound out of Philadelphia the next morning at 9:37.
I didn’t feel as sad as I had expected to. I already missed the sisters terribly, even though I hadn’t left yet. But at the same time a great thrill of excitement was coming over me, too, just at the thought of being home. Now that I had turned my steps westward again, I couldn’t imagine how I could have remained away from Miracle Springs so long without positively dying of homesickness. Suddenly I was so homesick I didn’t think I could stand it another second!
So the sadness of leaving was only in a small part of me, while the rest of me was eager and ready.
The next morning two wagonloads of nuns pulled up to the station at 8:30 with their passenger, and we all piled out, causing quite a scene in the small train station. I bought my ticket, while the station manager kept glancing around at all the sisters with an inquisitive look on his face.
We walked to the platform with my two bags, then stood talking and hugging and crying for the next forty minutes.
The train came.
I’d already said good-bye to Sister Janette, but again I found myself embracing her. “Sister Janette,” I said, “I’m so glad we met on the train two years ago!”
“So am I, dear Corrie!” There were tears in her eyes.
“The trip won’t be the same without you to share it with.”
“You will manage, I’m sure,” she said, trying to laugh but not succeeding very well. “You’ll be too busy thinking of home to be lonely for us. But we will be lonely for you, Corrie. Our wagon ride home, I’m afraid, will be very somber and quiet.”
“Oh, Sister Janette, don’t make me cry again,” I said, trying to laugh, but succeeding no better.
“The conductor seems to be about ready to make his announcement.”
“I suppose I can’t delay my going forever. I’ll miss you.”
“And we you, Corrie!”
I turned to go.
“Corrie,” Sister Janette’s voice said behind me, “I have one last thing for you.”
My hand trembled as I took the letter from Sister Janette’s hand.
I didn’t even need to look at it. I could almost feel the presence of its sender from the very paper itself, though the briefest glance downward at the handwriting told me everything I needed to know.
All the rest of my good-byes—stepping aboard the train, waving to all the smiling faces of the nuns out the window . . . everything is only a blur in my memory. All I was conscious of was a tremendous burning sensation in my hand! I couldn’t tell if it was the burning from a white hot flame or the burning of freezing white ice. But once I felt the bouncing of the track beneath me and knew we were underway, I looked at my hand again, almost surprised to see the envelope still intact and not smoking and burning right in my fingers.
I could hardly think what to do!
After all that had happened in New York—at the house, under the oak, and then while riding throughout the countryside—a wave of fear and confusion came over me briefly. I thought everything was done . . . over . . . settled. What was . . . what could this be about?
Almost the next instant, however, a slow sense of expectation began to replace the confusion. It sent me back to the anticipation I had felt that day as I rode back to Bridgeville when I realized that God had already ordered my steps according to his purposes.
“Lord . . . ?” I prayed, but I could say no more. Some feeling I had never known began rising within my breast.
Frantically my fingers tore into the envelope and yanked out the five thin sheets of paper inside!
Dear Corrie,
By now you are seated on the train, presumably heading west the way you came two years ago. I imagine you are clattering through the green Pennsylvania countryside, looking out the windows, probably thinking about hundreds of things. I can almost picture you, though I try to keep myself from dwelling on your face, for it causes an uncomfortable tightening somewhere in my throat. How I wish I could be with you right now, and look into your eyes, and say what I have to say. But as you will see, there are reasons why I cannot, why it must be said by letter, and why I asked Sister Janette not to give you this until you were well on your way.
What I have to tell you would probably sound utterly ridiculous to those accustomed to the ways and methods of the world. I hope and pray that it will not seem ridiculous to you. You are the one person in all the world I want to understand! It has been my goal for some time now not to weigh my actions by what the world thinks, but in fact to judge the rightness and wrongness of a thing by the inverse of its worldly acceptability. In any case, what I have done in these matters about which I will speak, I have done by attempting to follow what I perceived God instructing me to do.
My breath was coming in short gasps as I read. In vain I struggled to fill my lungs, but it was no use.
When men and women meet, especially when they find the bond deepening, the normal and accepted mode of their discourse and interaction often becomes such that gratification of each individual self is the sole ambition and motive. I have seen many marriages founded on such flimsy footings, and the edifices constructed thereon always end in misery.
My heart was pounding as I read. The mere words men and women on the page in Christopher’s flowing hand was enough to send chills and tingles all at once up my spine and into my neck!
I’m certain you recall the day, for you made mention of it in your letter from New York, when you said you didn’t belong here. You meant, of course, in Richmond . . . in the South. But even as you said it, your words smote my heart, and I know I was unduly quiet for a few minutes. Forgive me. But I had already begun to cherish a quiet and prayerful hope that perhaps you had been sent to me, and I to you, for reasons beyond our sight at that moment. The bonds of sharing that had already sprung to life between us went far deeper of root than any plant that had till then grown in the garden of my heart. And I must confess that I did not want to see it end.
Your words about returning to Washington fell icily upon my ears, like a quick frost on a tender green sprig. And a further chill swept over me to hear you say, “I don’t belong here.”
I wanted to cry out, “Oh, but Corrie, you do belong here! You belong with me!”
But I could not. For to do so may have been to inhibit the way of God’s appointed destiny that he had marked out for you to follow.
I could hardly keep reading! If I didn’t force them to stay inside, tears would well up and flood my eyes. I couldn’t let that happen, otherwise I would not be able to see the words on the paper.
I already sensed, Corrie, that there were several things which it was the Lord’s purpose to resolve in your life with him, and that for me to intrude could have been to prevent or delay that process. You can have no idea how many hours I spent at your bedside before you came to yourself, praying for this unknown life whom God had suddenly deposited into my care. Even then, in the tiniest flutter of your sleeping eyelids, sensations and thoughts and feelings unknown to me before began to come awake. I pondered your face, your every feature, knowing you after the manner of the Spirit of your Maker, even though I knew nothing about you. I knew that you were a daughter of the Most High God. I had a vague foreshadowing that your life would be intertwined somehow with my own, and yet I felt a sense of revelation as well that paths lay ahead for you that must be walked alone, and that for me to intrude prematurely would only be to inhibit the Lord’s greatest work which he desired to accomplish in you.
Before many weeks of your waking, I knew I cared far too much for you to lift so much as a finger or utter so much as a word that might sway your affections toward me before the Lord had carried out whatever that work was. I knew, therefore, that my duty before you was clear: it was simply to wait.
Oh, how many times during those final two days of yours at the farm—during those dreadful hours after learning of Mr. Lincoln’s death—did I long to shout out to you, “Corrie, Corrie, don’t go! Stay here with me! You belong here . . . with me!”
But I dared not. And thus in my silence I fear I offended you or caused you to think me annoyed with you. I wrote to apologize, but even that seemed pale and insufficient.
I was constrained to silence. I felt the hand of God upon my tongue, and upon my pen. Something required resolution before you would be ready to think and pray clearly about the things that were already filling my heart. I did not know what it was, but I knew that our mutual Father knew, and that he must speak to you before I would be at liberty to. His was the voice your deepest being needed to hear at this particular hour, not mine. How long I must endure the waiting, I did not know. By then I had prayed in the midnight hours of my lonely silence and had given you, as well as my full heart toward you, into the hands of our Father. But that did not stop the agony from pressing so hard against me that Monday when you boarded the train as to make me sure I was about to be crushed under the weight of it. How I ached to see you go!
The worldly-wise of our society would hear my words and consider them the rantings of a lunatic. “Take what you want,” they would say. “Don’t be a fool. Get what you can. Coerce people and events to suit your own designs.”
Therein lay the greatest trial of all. For I was aware that you cared for me as well. When eyes meet as ours have, many secrets are revealed. I was aware that one word from me might have turned you in a direction it would not have been right for you at that moment to go.
I was also aware that things are not always as they appear, and that the world’s perceptions are not to be counted on any more than ice an eighth of an inch thick is to be trusted to cross a winter’s lake. In the kingdom of which we are citizens, Corrie, only those things that we let go and give up to the Father do we truly possess after the manner in which the Father would have us possess. Therefore, I knew that to truly have you I must give
you to him, and to truly care for you, I must care more that you belonged to the Father than to me.
He had given you to me for a season. Then I had to give you to him for a season. For everything there is a season, and this was his time to carry out his purpose. I could not, I would not stand in his way. I have, in truth, been miserable since the day you left. Mrs. Timms, I fear, is about to fire me and cast me adrift among the carpetbaggers who are roaming the South to pluck it clean of every tangible scrap that yet has worth. But even in my misery, I rejoiced because I had known you, and in my heart of hearts I knew it was not the end.
The Lord revealed to me, I feel, that—whatever I may have wanted to shout to you—your sense of belonging had to come from him first. Beyond that, I knew that this was not your home. It was right that you pray through the things that were weighing on you about your family and your writing and how the Lord desired to integrate them in your life. I could not be in the way of his voice speaking to those concerns. For me to have spoken prematurely could have kept you from hearing him clearly in these other areas.
Oh, how I wanted to be part of your future, Corrie, and for you to be part of mine—but as our Father directs, not as our human emotions and even loneliness might. All we could do to keep from intruding with our own ambitions, while leaving matters to the care of the Father, would only insure that in the end we find ourselves in his house with all that belongs to him likewise ours to enjoy.
Your letter from New York came with such a sense of anticipation. Does it display weakness for a man to admit that he read a letter from one he cares for with trembling fingers and pounding chest? If so, then I fear I must admit to that weakness! A joyous trembling!
Land of the Brave and the Free Page 27