“Help her—how do you mean?”
“She was an unbelieving woman, sir.”
“Oh, I see.”
“And she always resented his choice of profession,” the housekeeper went on. “That’s what she told me once when she was visiting. And none too kind she was to me either, sir, or to Mr. Diggorsfeld. A hard lady, she was, and now she’s gone to see what the fire can make of her there, that she wouldn’t let be done by more comfortable means down here.”
“Oh . . . hmm, I see. Well . . . thank you, Mrs. Alvington. I shall see Mr. Diggorsfeld when he returns. Good day.”
Charles turned and walked away pondering what the woman might mean by such a strange remark.
————
The mail arriving at New Hope Chapel the day following his return from the north contained a most unexpected letter. Timothy Diggorsfeld opened it eagerly, for he had already grown extremely fond of Charles Rutherford. As yet, however, even after their many visits, he was not yet fully aware what an important man his occasional visitor was.
Dear Timothy, he read.
As you know I have often mentioned my desire that you and my wife Jocelyn have an opportunity to meet. Thus far, however, she has not been to London since my first visit to New Hope Chapel. Truthfully, she is not altogether fond of the city, and so no trips are planned in the near future. From your good Mrs. Alvington I learned of your recent grief in the matter of your mother, and it strikes me that a few days in the country away from your normal routine might do your spirits good. We are therefore hoping you might be able to visit us here at our home in the near future.
June is a lovely month in Devonshire. Might you be able to spend two or three days with us, a fortnight from now, coming down perhaps on Monday so as not to interfere with your Sunday services? If you can arrange it, I will take the days absent from my duties at Westminster, and return to the city with you.
We hopefully await your reply.
Yours sincerely,
Charles Rutherford
Heathersleigh Hall,
Milverscombe, Devon
Diggorsfeld put down the letter with a smile. Many times he had resolved to begin paying closer attention to current affairs, but he hardly ever even glanced at a paper. And now a Member of Parliament had been visiting him for two years and he hadn’t been aware of it! He had known Charles Rutherford to be a sensitive and caring man, as his invitation clearly revealed.
Within ten minutes a reply was in an envelope and ready for that afternoon’s post. He would happily accept Mr. Rutherford’s kind invitation.
————
When the pastor of New Hope Chapel arrived at Heathersleigh, the remnants of his ordeal still showed on his face. His countenance was haggard and his expression drawn.
Charles saw his approach and ran out the front door.
“Timothy!” he said, reaching his friend before he was halfway across the drive from the carriage. “I am so glad you have come.”
The two men shook hands and gazed into one another’s eyes like old friends, which in truth they were on their way to becoming.
“I appreciate your kindness more than you know,” replied Diggorsfeld.
“I am deeply sorry about your mother.”
“Thank you,” smiled the pastor with a thin smile.
“You look tired,” said Charles. “I hope we will be able to help you rest and regain your spirit.—But come, let us go inside. I want you to meet my family.”
Jocelyn was already out the door after her husband, and now approached with a smile. “Welcome to Heathersleigh, Reverend Diggorsfeld!” she said warmly.
As they approached one another, the newcomer could not prevent his eyes from glancing toward the obvious red blemish on his hostess’s face. Having seen her till then only through the loving mind’s eye of her husband, he was momentarily surprised. He faltered for only the briefest of instants before returning her smile.
Jocelyn saw the response. Her eyes flitted away as Charles completed the introductions. But she recovered as quickly as had their guest, and the two shook hands.
“I am delighted to meet you, Lady Rutherford.”
“And I you, Reverend Diggorsfeld. But please, call me Jocelyn. We are not particularly fond of the sir and lady around here.”
“As I have come to realize,” laughed Diggorsfeld, already feeling invigorated by the warmth of the company of friends. They all now began making their way back toward the house together.
“It was not until I received your husband’s invitation,” their guest went on, “that I began to grow curious. I investigated and what should I discover but that he was a Member of Parliament. That he is Sir Charles and lord of the manor are facts I found out this past week by even further sleuthing of my own.”
“What!” Charles exclaimed in laughter as they entered the Hall. “You’ve been spying on me?”
“Only catching up on my reading in some past issues of the Times. You cannot imagine how woefully illiterate I am concerning the whole political sphere.”
“Well, I hope you will forgive me,” said Charles as they reached the main staircase and started up. “I meant no deceit. I only wanted to be no more nor less than just myself when I visited you. Surely you can understand.”
“Of course. But I still feel taken in by a good joke. And you let me babble on in my office about political parties!”
Charles could not help laughing.
“In any event,” said the minister, “knowing who you are only gives me all the more reason to respect you. Jocelyn, you will, I hope, do me the like courtesy of addressing me as Timothy. I’m probably less fond of the Reverend than you are the lady.”
Jocelyn nodded her assent.
“Good—I am glad that is settled,” laughed Charles, “and we all know who we are!”
“Well,” said Jocelyn, “we have arrived at your room. We shall have your bag brought up. Shall we meet you downstairs in the drawing room in, say, five or ten minutes for tea?”
“That sounds wonderful,” replied the pastor. “But how will I find my way?”
“I will send Sarah to fetch you. She is the closest thing we have to a butler around here, but don’t let her know I said so,” she added with a laugh.
“Agreed.” Diggorsfeld paused, and his face became serious. “I really very much appreciate your invitation,” he said after a moment, addressing both Charles and Jocelyn. “It has been an extremely difficult and draining month for me. Your kindness means a great deal.”
47
The Other Side of the Door
The following afternoon Charles and the pastor, two men of divergent backgrounds but now common objectives in life, walked about north of the Hall on the grassy expanse of lawn stretching out toward the wooded slopes in the distance.
“As prepared for death as you try to be,” Diggorsfeld was saying, “there is always an element of surprise in it when it comes at last.”
“Is that because it is the one human experience a person can never truly prepare for, since it is so foreign to anything we know in life?” suggested Charles.
“Perhaps. Yet I consider it an enormously beneficial thing to attempt to prepare for it, both our own death and that of those we love. Death is the final culmination of life. It has always seemed to me that we ought to look it in the face rather than shy away from it.”
“Look it in the face,” repeated Charles. “How do you mean?”
“I mean confront it confidently, with an attitude something like, ‘Death, you may be unpleasant, you may bring tears. But I know the Lord of death and life. Thus I shall do my best to rejoice in both in their turn, and not be alarmed when you visit me, as you surely shall, or when you take my loved ones from me. I know you are but a door into more life. I know the sadness I feel comes only because I do not see through to the other side. If I could, my tears would be those of happiness.’”
“What about your father?” asked Charles. “Is he still living?”
“No,” replied Diggorsfeld, “he died when I was young. I was but five and have only scant memories of him. His passing did not affect me as deeply as that of my mother three weeks ago.”
“Your housekeeper took the liberty of telling me that you and your mother were not close.”
“It is a sad fact, but true,” replied the pastor. “Neither of my parents were believers. Actually, that fact troubles me far less in regard to death than it does many Christians.”
“In what way?”
“I do not believe that death suddenly slams an impenetrable door in the face of God’s sovereignty over his children, nor shuts out his love and omnipotence altogether.”
“His children,” said Charles with puzzled tone. “I understood you to say that your mother was not a believer.”
“You heard me correctly,” rejoined Diggorsfeld. “There are obedient children and rebellious children, but God remains the Father of them all. He made every creature and thus is Father to all, whether certain ones acknowledge the relationship or not.”
“That sounds like something the McFees might say!” laughed Charles.
“Ah, yes—your old friends who led you and Jocelyn to the Lord,” said Diggorsfeld. “I do hope I shall have the opportunity to meet them.”
“Indeed, you shall,” rejoined Charles. “Bobby is fond of speaking of God’s immediate family, on the one hand, and his distant relations who do not acknowledge the familial bond on the other.”
“An excellent concept. I like it! Yes—I must meet this brother.”
“When I told him you were coming, he had the same reaction. I have told him as much about you, as you know about him. We will go out to the cottage for a visit tomorrow.”
“Excellent.”
“But back to your comment about God’s children. I remain curious how you meant the term.”
“Will you object if I shock you?” asked Diggorsfeld.
“I don’t know,” laughed Charles. “Try me.”
“All right. I will answer your question by saying that God is even the devil’s Father.”
“What!”
“I will admit it a theological conundrum inquiring more deeply into the extent of God’s love than many individuals care to contemplate—and that I scarcely know what to make of myself!”
“I should say so!” laughed Charles. “I don’t know where to pigeonhole such an outlandish statement as that!”
“That is one of Christendom’s most glaring problems,” rejoined the pastor, “—the great need its advocates seem to feel to pigeonhole truth. Please take no offense. I mean only that the principles of our faith are not always so easy to fit into compartments as our human brains would like.”
“But the devil!” repeated Charles.
“God created him,” said Diggorsfeld. “That fact can hardly be denied.”
“I suppose not.”
“To my thinking, that makes God his Father. But I suggest we leave it at that. It is a pointless issue to contend over if it troubles you.”
“I must admit, it does,” said Charles, still bewildered. “I’ve never heard the like before. I’m not sure I can go along with you on it.”
“No matter. The only point I would try to make is that in my mother’s case, or anyone’s, unbelief is merely a testimony against their own foolishness and blindness. But it cannot undo the cord of fatherness between God’s heart and their own existence. They may shut their eyes in denial of that central fact of the universe. However, the Father who begat them remains, and continues pulsating life into them regardless of their denial.”
“You do have a way of explaining things that is somewhat out of the ordinary,” laughed Charles.
“So I am told!”
48
The Mystery of Our Hope
A thoughtful silence followed. It was Charles who next spoke.
“That reminds me of something I had been meaning to ask you,” he said. “Your housekeeper made a most curious statement when telling me about your mother—something I could not make heads or tails of. Perhaps you could illuminate me as to what she meant.”
He now repeated that portion of his conversation with Mrs. Alvington.
The pastor smiled. “She is referring to perhaps the central mystery of the Christian faith,” he said, “what Paul often refers to as our hope. It is a truth obscured from most eyes by God himself for reasons which I must admit I do not altogether understand.”
“Will you explain it to me?”
“I think now is not the proper time,” replied Diggorsfeld, “if you can trust me with such a reply. As in the question of what might be the extent of God’s fatherhood over his unbelieving children, his distant family, as it were—such things are not matters to be spoken of lightly. I would not desire a dispute of theology to arise between us and cause us to digress too far afield from our present discussion. When the time is right.”
“I will trust you with that reply,” nodded Charles.
It fell silent for a few moments as they continued to walk.
“Yet you say your mother’s death was hard for you,” said Charles, returning to the previous thread of the conversation, “in spite of this more expansive view of death you hold.”
“Very hard. I had hoped she would recognize the truth on this side of the door. It is always infinitely better that way. It grieved me that my mother’s heart remained hard, not only against her God, but also against her son. I am a sensitive human being, Charles, no different than you or anyone. It hurt that she harbored much against me. It pained me that I was unable to love her with the love which lay in my heart, because of her bitterness toward life. The tears I wept at her grave were not because she was one of the lost, as some might say. They were simply the tears brought on by the pain of the unrightness of the human condition—the unrightness between her and me. She never forgave me for who and what I was. That is a burden of sorrow I will have to bear the rest of my own earthly life.”
They walked for some time in silence.
“I am very sorry,” said Charles at length.
“It is part of my own story,” said Diggorsfeld softly. “God carries my sorrows in his heart with the rest, and all is well. He even has sorrows of his own. We must be willing to bear our own share.”
“Sorrows—what sorrows could God have?”
“We killed his Son,” replied the pastor.
“Ah, yes . . . I see. Of course.”
“What sorrow must that have brought to the heart of the Godhead. The rebellion of Satan has not made of the universe a happy place, for God or his creation. There is happiness within it, of course. It is a good creation. But not everything in it is happiness.”
“Good . . . but not happy—an interesting distinction,” remarked Charles.
“A vital distinction for us to understand,” rejoined the pastor, “if we are to walk in peace with our God. And all will yet come right in the end.”
The silence which followed was lengthy. It was again Charles who broke it.
“You know,” he mused, “since the Lord guided my steps to you, and back, I should say, to Maggie and Bobby, and since Jocelyn and I gave our hearts to him, everything really has changed. It has only been two short years. Yet my former life seems a century ago.”
“That is often the way people feel following a conversion.”
“I must admit I had not thought much about death before now. I had to face it, of course, when my own mother and father died. I loved my father and still miss him. But their passing did not contain, as it were, the dimension of spiritual pain you have spoken of. Now that I consider it, however, as you and I have been talking, I think that if the Lord told me I was going to die tomorrow, I would not grieve for myself. I would be content. That is not to say I do not love life, for I do, or that I would not weep to be temporarily parted from my Jocie and others I love. I only say I would not feel a sense of grief over not having accomplished what I hoped to in life. The fact that I now know my heavenly Fath
er lends a great peaceful covering over it, such that death no longer seems a separation or an ending to what I hold dear.”
He paused and laughed lightly. “I don’t know exactly what it is I feel. Have I made sense?”
“You make perfect sense, Charles. I understand completely. You would not choose to die. At the same time, you trust your Father so completely that death seems no more fearsome. If it came you would meet it with a smile.”
“Exactly.”
Even as he said the word, however, the expression on Charles’ face changed.
“There is one thing,” he said, “wherein I am not ready to leave this world.”
Diggorsfeld glanced toward him with inquisitive expression.
“That concerns my daughter.”
“Which one?”
“The older of the two.”
“Amanda?” said the pastor. “She seems a charming and delightful girl.”
“Indeed, she can be that—and more. But a change seems coming over her which Jocelyn and I cannot help but be anxious about.”
“She is becoming—what . . . disobedient?” asked Diggorsfeld.
“Not anything so stark as that exactly. It’s just that an undercurrent of dissatisfaction seems gradually more evident in her countenance. We so badly want Amanda to become what God wants her to be. But I’m not sure she wants that.”
“It is sad,” remarked the pastor, “that so many young people grow dissatisfied. It is not something, I confess, I thoroughly understand, not having gone through such a stage myself. I took a different path from my mother by becoming a Christian and choosing the ministry for my profession, which irritated her greatly. But as to the rest, I do not find within my own history that which makes me understand the conflicts many young people have with their parents.”
“I did not experience such with my father, either,” added Charles. “I was always grateful for how he planted my feet and set my vision in life.”
Wild Grows the Heather in Devon Page 24