A New Kind of Zeal

by Michelle Warren

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE: Rest and Peace

  John stood in St Peter’s Cathedral.

  Joshua was there – his body lying in an open wooden casket. John stood next to him, in the aisle, before the pulpit – facing the cross. He laid his hand on the white linen over Joshua’s chest – he trembled a little. Under his hand, under the linen, were the bullets – still in Joshua’s body.

  John lifted his eyes to Joshua’s face. He was clean, now – no stains of blood. His brown curls fell loosely around his white face. The vibrant eyes were closed – the tender voice was silenced.

  Grief gripped John in his chest. He reached his fingers to Joshua’s face – he was at peace now! It was finished! It was done.

  Tears filled John’s eyes – his vision blurred, but he didn’t care. The tears fell down his cheeks, and onto Joshua’s body.

  A woman’s hand took his. A little surprised, John looked up at her – standing on the other side of Joshua. This was his mother! Dear God, his mother! Her brown eyes held his – her brown hair framed her light brown face.

  “Madam…” he whispered, “I am so sorry…”

  Her hand tightened on his! Tightened, while his body was flooding with regret! While her eyes were flooding with tears.

  “It was meant to be this way,” she whispered.

  “Meant?” John choked.

  “From the beginning,” she said, “he was different! From the very beginning…”

  John swallowed. “You knew he was going to be killed.”

  Her face contorted with grief. “I knew,” she whispered, “I just didn’t know when.”

  Astounded, John began to weep – but now Rau’s hand was on his shoulder.

  John tightly shut his eyes. Pain was engulfing him, now! The vision, on Mt Victoria! Joshua, in agony, under the tree! And then, just outside! Staggering, under the crown – staggering, under the darkness. The evil was smothering him! And then, the shots – then, his body thrown back, choking…choking, and dying…

  John groaned, and choked – and Rau’s arms drew him away, to a chair.

  “You were there,” Rau whispered. “You felt it all.”

  “I couldn’t leave him,” John whispered back. “I knew! I knew how bad it would be, but…I couldn’t leave him…”

  Rau was silent alongside him. Where had he been? John didn’t know – caught somewhere in the crowd, surely.

  Rau grasped his hand, now – lifted him again to his feet. He was the leader! John had known it for a while: Rau was their leader.

  John watched him. Rau cast his eyes over the Cathedral. Reverend Choo was standing at the pulpit, preparing for the service. Mark Blake was standing near her, in his full regalia. John would have resented those robes – but now, suddenly, he realized, looking at his face: he was wearing them out of respect for God. It had nothing to do with Mark himself. It was their way! Richness and beauty, worn to express the richness and beauty of God.

  Rau turned, then, and looked to the back of the church. Tristan was there: standing next to a back chair, arms wrapped tightly around himself. He had come! John admired him – that took courage. What pain was in him! What regret! He couldn’t come closer – but he remained, as always he had actually remained.

  Rau moved down the aisle, to speak with him. John watched, as Rau said a few words – even gently punched Tristan in the arm, his face breaking into a grin. Tristan managed a sad smile, but still shook his head. He couldn’t do it! Rau let him be.

  Sadness filled Rau’s face, as he walked back up the aisle – a sadness that seemed to reflect Tristan’s own. And then John suddenly thought – where was Rachel?

  He had last seen her arguing with Mark Blake! He remembered…

  “Everything about me is wrong.”

  She had run! She hadn’t come back.

  “Where are you?” he murmured, with fear – and then he turned.

  Eun Ae Choo began the service. John listened to her Korean voice – gentle, as she recited the set words.

  “We have come together to remember before God the life of Joshua Davidson, to commend him to God’s keeping, to commit his body to be…”

  Now she hesitated, and Mark looked at Joshua’s mother. “Buried, or cremated?” he asked quietly, and more tears filled her eyes.

  “Buried,” she whispered.

  Eun Ae continued. “…to commit his body to be buried, and to comfort those who mourn with our sympathy and with our love; in the hope we share through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.” [25]

  Her brown eyes were alive, though also sad – her Korean face reflected joy, though also grief. John was surprised at her – so very different from himself, and yet, in those moments, wholly one.

  Now Rau was standing tall, next to Joshua, facing the congregation – facing John, and Tristan.

  “Hear the words of Jesus Christ our Saviour,” he said, “‘Ko ahau te aranga, me te ora: ko ia e whakapono ana ki ahau, ahakoa kua mate, e ora ano: e kore ano hoki e mate ake ake ake nga tangata katoa e ora ana, a e whakapono ana ki ahau.’”

  Joshua’s mother began to cry, with the words John did not understand, and Rau began to translate:

  “‘I am the resurrection and the life,’” he said, quoting Jesus, “‘even in death, anyone who believes in me will live.”

  “The boat, again,” John whispered, “for the tsunami…”

  He began to tremble, then, looking again at Joshua’s face. Would he live? Would Joshua actually live? He had faith in God – would that faith be enough to raise his spirit into Heaven to be with God?

  A resurrection? God raising Joshua’s spirit? Yes – John could bring himself to trust in this.

  He sank down to his knees, in the church – he closed his eyes. Faith, in death, was painful! Why was it so painful?

  “Set your troubled hearts at rest,” Rau continued – and John knew he was looking at him. “Trust in God always; trust also in me.”

  Trust…John took into a trembling breath, and let it out again. Trust.

  “‘God so loved the world that he gave his only Son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.’”

  John could trust that God would not let Joshua perish.

  With relief he looked up, still on his knees. Rau was smiling gently at him, as he continued.

  “God our Comforter,” he said, “you are a refuge and a strength for us, a helper close at hand in times of distress. May your Holy Spirit lift us above our natural sorrow, to the peace and light of your constant love; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

  John rose to his feet. He could trust in that light, and love, for Joshua, though not for himself. Joshua would be safe! Joshua would live.

  “Our Father in Heaven,” Rau began to pray, “hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven…”

  Here John’s mind drifted again, into his own grief – into his own exhaustion. His eyes drifted closed – he swayed a little on his feet.

  “…Save us from the time of trial, and deliver us from evil. For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and forever.”

  “Amen,” John whispered instinctively – and now Eun Ae’s voice sounded again.

  “Now, therefore, Joshua Davidson,” she began, and John’s eyes opened with new tears. This was it! This was the end. “We commit your body to be buried, earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust…”

  His mother’s voice lifted now into an open wail, and John’s grief rose up in sobs to meet hers.

  “…in the sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord.”

  “Amen,” his mother and John said, as one.

  It was over.

  John stood, still and stiff, as Mark now walked up to the coffin. He looked at Joshua’s face – his own face contorted.

  “Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord,” he murmured, “for they rest from their labours.” And then reached down, lifted the lid of the coffin and
placed it over Joshua’s body, sealing him in.

  John stared at the coffin. It was being lifted, now! Mark himself was lifting it, onto his shoulder, and Rau. John rushed forward to help them. The three struggled with the weight! They struggled! And then suddenly Tristan was there. He glanced across at John, with a grief stricken frown – he lifted the coffin onto his shoulder also.

  They carried Joshua down the aisle, through the glass doors, down the steps to the street – they turned to their right and passed through a gate, and were in the little private graveyard, alongside the cathedral.

  A fresh grave had been dug out – with a large heap of soil alongside.

  John swallowed, looking at it. The four men lowered Joshua’s coffin to the ground – and then lowered it, heavy, into the hole. Another man was waiting, wearing a suit – he leaned over the coffin: he sealed it shut, with hammer and nails.

  Eun Ae was there, at the foot of the grave: Joshua’s mother was standing next to her.

  “We have entrusted our brother Joshua into the hands of God,” Eun Ae said, as the man reached for a spade and began to throw the soil back down over the grave. “We now commit his body to the ground.”

  Soon the coffin was covered – soon it was buried.

  “‘The Lord is my shepherd,’” Rau said, “‘therefore I shall not want.’”

  “‘Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,’” Joshua’s mother murmured, “‘I will fear no evil.’”

  “‘Surely your goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,’” Mark said.

  “‘And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.’[26]” It was Tristan.

  Surprised, John looked at him. Tristan? He searched his eyes. The words were familiar to him – where from: another funeral? John saw it in him: his mother’s funeral. Did he believe? Not a full belief, and yet…and yet, somehow, in that moment, a partial belief: in that moment, somehow, a trust for Joshua’s wellbeing with God, and the wellbeing of his mother.

  It was over.

  The funeral director moved his hammer and spade away from them – he left them in privacy. Eun Ae moved amongst the men, gently grasping each hand – and then she also moved away. Mark looked at each one in turn – he smiled sadly, grasped Tristan’s hand, and led him away.

  All that were left now, at the grave, were Joshua’s mother and John.

  She looked at him – she touched his face. “You were his brother,” she said, and John cried.

  “I don’t want to leave him,” he whispered.

  “Then stay,” she said. “It is the Maori way.”

  “Stay?”

  “Stay here.” She gestured to the grave. “Stay, and keep watch over his body.”

  “If the Army find out,” John whispered, “they might take his body away.”

  She nodded – and then she smiled sadly. “Don’t worry, John,” she said, “he is safe in Atua’s hands now.”

  John watched her bow her head, and then move away from him, through the gate and out.

  He was alone.

  The grave was there – fresh, and silent. John gazed down at it. Other graves were there – old graves, with large engraved tomb stones. Joshua’s had no expensive stone – only a simple wooden cross pressing into the soil over his head.

  John sat himself down next to the grave. It was next to the tall white stone wall, which hid the graves from the outside – he leaned against the wall. The stone chilled his back – he shivered, and closed his eyes. Joshua! He remembered him – he slipped quickly into a restless doze, remembering him. Time passed, he couldn’t tell how long. One time he awoke it was dark, and cold! He looked up to see Mark Blake – he was laying a blanket over him, and had brought him some food.

  John wasn’t hungry. He left the food on the plate, on the ground – he fell back into sleep.

  Exhaustion had its way with him. Dreams, and nightmares, wrestled in his heart – dreams of Joshua alive, and the light in his eyes; nightmares of his staggering, his cries, his body jerking back into death…

  He woke again – another morning had come. Joshua’s mother was there.

  “It’s all right,” she said, “I’ll look after him.”

  John frowned, and felt his body’s needs. She sat, and he rose, and stumbled out through the gate. His legs were stiff! They hurt! Mark was there, without the robes – the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up.

  “Come,” he said, grasping his hand – and John stumbled after him. Mark led him back into the church, and down the side aisle – into the changing rooms. Robes were hanging up! There were toilets, and showers…

  “Am I allowed in here?” John whispered, and Mark smiled gently.

  “You are now,” he said.

  Mark had arranged a change of clothes. Surprised, John stared at them.

  “Why are you doing this?” John asked, and Mark laid a hand on his shoulder.

  “I can’t fix what I did,” he said. “I can’t bring Joshua back. But I can help his followers.”

  Tears filled John’s eyes. “Thank you,” he choked, and Mark patted his shoulder.

  “Get ready,” he said, and John obeyed him.

  Refreshed, John walked out of the robe room.

  The Cathedral was silent – empty. John wandered down the side aisle, toward the glass doors, but then he hesitated. He instinctively turned, and slipped between the chairs into the centre of the church – into the central aisle.

  The cross was far away, in the inner sanctuary – a tiled picture of Jesus painted hanging there. John gazed at it, and wandered closer and closer – up the steps, toward the railing: toward the table before the cross.

  Someone shifted with discomfort, near him. It was Mark, sitting in a wooden chair on the inside of the railing, near the table.

  “Should I not be here?” John whispered. Mark opened his mouth, and closed it again. His eyes passed over John, and then moved to Jesus on the cross.

  “The veil has been torn away,” he murmured to himself, and John did not understand him. Then Mark rose to his feet and ushered him in.

  “Come,” he said – and John entered into the inner sanctuary.

  The table was there, with white linen – a silver cup and plate, with wine, and wafers.

  “I never understood Communion,” John murmured, reaching tentatively out to touch the silver. “Not really.”

  “Neither did I,” said Mark, his voice sounding wry.

  John lifted his eyes over the table, to the cross – up, up, to the picture of Jesus hanging there.

  His eyes, his face…

  “He looks sad,” John murmured quietly.

  “He’s carrying the sins of the world,” Mark replied.

  “Sin is such a judgmental word,” John said, with some pain. “It makes it sound like God hates us – like he wants us to go to Hell. Like he wants to punish us.”

  “No,” Mark said, and his voice was choking – and John quickly looked at him.

  “What is it?” John asked.

  “Something I didn’t understand before,” Mark replied.

  “What?”

  “The love.”

  “Love?” John asked, and he shrugged slightly. “What does it even mean? It’s a cliché – all the doorknockers use it.”

  Mark was silent – and then he rose to his feet, and wandered closer to John, standing side by side with him. Mark’s eyes went up the cross, and John followed his gaze – back up to Jesus.

  “That’s why he did it,” Mark whispered, “to show us! To show us what God’s love actually means.”

  John frowned, gazing at him. “A man, hanging on a cross?” he said. “I don’t understand.”

  “What about a man shot?” Mark asked. “Do you understand that better?”

  Grief gripped him again – hard, stinging. His body, thrown back! Bleeding, bleeding!

  John gasped, and now Mark was grasping his shoulder.

  “You know why he did it, John,” he said. “You
told me, in this very place! All the ‘crap,’ you said – he died to take it all away! He died for God to forgive us, and fix us.”

  “All the darkness,” John whispered, staring up at Jesus’s face. “So much darkness!”

  “He has carried it all,” Mark said. “‘It is finished.’”

  John reached up to touch the bottom of the cross. “I think I get it,” he whispered. “I think I’m starting to get it.”

  “You get it for all the darkness of the world,” Mark said, “but do you get it for yourself?”

  John frowned. “For myself?”

  Mark walked now behind the table – he lifted the silver cup and plate.

  “That’s what these mean, John,” he said. “That’s why he gave them to us. They represent his body given for us, so that we could live. And when we eat and drink, we take into ourselves what he has done – we trust in it, and we confess our own darkness, and we live. No more darkness! No more guilt. Time for the light! Time for goodness, and fullness of life – eternal life, here first, and then forever.”

  John looked at the bread and wine – the body and the blood.

  “Do I have to eat bread and drink wine,” he asked, “to be safe? To be right with God? To live forever? Do I have to eat these to live?”

  “No,” Mark said, “these are symbols. In our hearts and minds, we need to know it! In our hearts and minds, we need to receive it. These symbols are one way, but there are others…”

  “Other ways…” John murmured, looking at the silver cup and plate. “If he was here right now, how would he express this? What would he use?”

  “To place the truth into your body – to place it into your mind and heart?” Mark said. “Such intimacy, John! To offer one’s own body and blood to save another – do you see it?”

  “I do,” John said, “but it’s not our language! It’s not our way.”

  “Then find it in your language,” Mark said. “Find it in your way. Find it, John – and then pass it on.”

  John gazed at him, and then came the familiar tears. “Who am I?” he asked, “to find it? It’s not my body – it’s not my blood! It was his! His…”

  And grief took him again, and he ran – away from the altar, away from the cross, out of the Cathedral and back into the graveyard.

  The day passed slowly. John sat with Joshua’s mother next to his grave – he sat, and thought about Mark’s words, and remembered the sad face of Jesus on the cross, and remembered the pain of Joshua’s death. He had died for everyone – John knew that! He had died to carry the dark thoughts, and actions, of everyone! But how to explain that, to a nation in upheaval? How to put it into the right words…?

  And how to explain the tragedy of the death – the finality! The scape goat, gone: the injustice, with no resolution.

  Twilight was upon him. Joshua’s mother had gone. John’s vision was fading, his stomach was groaning.

  “Eat,” Mark’s voice said. “You haven’t eaten since he died.”

  “Can’t,” John whispered. Mark’s hand was offering food to his mouth – John obeyed him, but choked on the crumbs. Mark was sitting with him now, offering him water – John swallowed. He sat against Mark for a while – he felt faint. Mark offered him more water, more food – John followed.

  He sank into sleep. It was a new kind of sleep – strangely new. He felt in a different place. He breathed, and turned, and rested, and then heard a voice.

  “John.”

  Was he dead? He felt relief – dead? Could that be the resolution?

  “John.”

  He shifted, on the ground. The ground! It was still there, but he felt different! He struggled to follow the voice – and then felt a hand on his shoulder, and gasped: it couldn’t be!

  “John.”

  John opened his eyes, and looked – and Joshua’s face was before him. His hands were grasping his arms.

  John stared at him. His smile! Oh, dear God, his smile – so wide! Joy in his eyes! Joy in his face! John trembled, and reached out to touch his face – such a vivid dream! Such a wonderful vision – the yearning of his own heart! The longing of his soul. It had never happened! The death – it had only been a nightmare.

  John sank against him, and laughed, but then cried. No! No – the death had happened! It was this that was not real! This that he could not trust…

  He straightened, on his knees – he drew back, but now he was being shaken.

  “John!” Joshua’s voice said. “John!”

  Surely another face was about to appear – Mark’s face! Surely it was another shaking his body.

  The face remained – the eyes changing to intense purpose. His hand was being grasped – he was being lifted to his feet, and moved a few steps, next to…to the…

  The grave had been disrupted. The soil was sitting again in a pile alongside the grave – the coffin was open, with the lid on top of the soil, and…and the body was gone.

  “My God,” John breathed, “the Army – they must have come! Stolen the body.”

  “While you were sleeping?” Joshua’s voice murmured. “And they left you to sleep?”

  “They don’t care about me,” John explained to the one he was certain was only in his mind. “They only care about you.”

  “They’ll care about you soon,” Joshua said, and John stared at him. Those were words John’s mind would not have created.

  “What do you mean?”

  Joshua was smiling again, a wide grin, and for a moment John didn’t fight it – for a moment he allowed himself to believe he was actually there. He reached in wonder to touch his face again, as a child – and then there were running footsteps.

  John turned to look – and it was Rau. His face looked stunned – he was staring at Joshua! As though he was there! And then he fell to his knees before him.

  “Master!” he said. “Ariki!”

  “Rau,” Joshua said, laying a hand on his head.

  Rau began to sob, and John couldn’t understand why – surely it was all a dream! Surely all of it a vision.

  “Do you love me, Rau?” Joshua asked, and Rau’s face contorted in pain.

  Joshua’s face turned back to John. He was grasping his hand again – and, with his other hand, he was unbuttoning the clean white shirt he was wearing.

  “Look, John,” he said, and he drew John’s fingers in between the unbuttoned shirt edges. There were bullet wounds in his chest! Cavities, and yet healed! Scars, healed…

  Joshua pulled his fingers over the scars – into the cavities.

  John stiffened, and was jerked out of his daze. Dear God – his bullet wounds! His wounds, still there – real! Real…He could feel them! He was touching them…

  And now Joshua reached into his clean jeans pocket, and pulled out the five bullets. He reached for John’s hand – he laid them on top of his palm.

  John swayed, staring at them. They were disfigured bullets! Used! Crushed. They were out of his body now! They had been removed.

  John’s wonder shifted in that moment into terror. He was alive? Actually alive? Not only a spirit, even – physically back?

  Shock filled him. He was sinking! Sinking back to his knees. Joshua caught him, and lowered him gently to the ground.

  “My God,” John whispered, “Master – you’re alive? You’re alive?”

  “I am,” Joshua murmured over him, “and now you must tell the others.”

  “Tell them?” John breathed.

  “Tell them,” Joshua said, “and I’ll catch up with them soon.”

  He stepped back away, glanced again at Rau, and then suddenly disappeared.

  John was fixed to the ground, on his knees. He stared up at Rau, whose face was serious.

  “I’m dreaming,” he said, “I have to be dreaming.”

  Rau shook his head. “No,” he said, “I knew this would happen.”

  “You knew?”

  “It is written.”

  “What did he mean, asking you if you loved him?”
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  Rau’s face clouded – and then he turned, and ran away.

  John was alone. He noticed, now, the early morning light. He noticed the fresh cool of a new day. The soil was tidy, in the pile! The lid of the coffin was neatly placed on top, upside down – the nails all pointing straight, through the lid, as if unused.

  There were no signs of any disruption in the graveyard at all.

  Had it been a vision? Had Rau himself been a vision? No, Rau’s grief – it had been real! And…and the bullets were still lying in his hand…

  John trembled, now, looking at them. Five bullets. He was dead, but now alive! Buried, but now back again!

  The injustice of the death had been undone.

  Something thrust John onto his feet, now – a sudden surge of hope. Life had overcome death! Light had overcome darkness!

  It was finished! It was over! And now…now there was no going back.

  John placed the bullets safely in his own right pocket, and strode out of the graveyard.