forgiveness that led straight to Jesus Christ, He saw slaughtered sinners, immolations, decapitations, and crucifixions. He saw the virtuous rejoicing at the passing of the wicked, wielding weapons of pain in the war of the righteous, the pure and the chaste granting welcome release to the tortured souls given them by the Almighty.
Wheeler found himself buoyed by the images, suddenly filled with strength, but still it took all of his courage to raise his head and address Jesus directly. 'I bought some things for the church,' he said. His voice was little more than a cracked whisper. He turned and fumblingly opened the door to the storeroom behind him to display what he had purchased in Phoenix.
The fetters. The rope. The bear trap. The knives. Jesus smiled, and the radiant glow which always seemed to surround Him grew brighter.
Wheeler sensed in the Savior a hunger, a craving, an almost tangible desire. Christ's gaze took in the assembled instruments of bondage and pain, and He looked upon Wheeler with approval, eyes shining. 'You have done well, my son.'
Again, the minster was filled with an almost unbearable sense of pride.
His actions had pleased the Lord!
'You have forty days,' Jesus said. 'Forty days to complete your task.'
Wheeler nodded dumbly. Forty was the Lord's favorite number. When he destroyed the earth the first time, wiping the slate clean of wickedness and iniquity with the flood, it had rained for forty days and forty nights. When Christ went alone into the wilderness, he went for forty days and forty nights.
Now Jesus was giving him forty days and forty nights to complete His church.
Woe to him if he failed.
Jesus turned away and, for a brief second, Wheeler thought that the Savior looked like his father. He saw the familiar heavy lantern jaw, the thin delicate nose. A wave of cold washed over him and he shivered, unnerved by. the resemblance. Then his attention was distracted by a black shadow that interrupted the rainbow glow, flitting past the series of stained glass windows.
When he looked back, Jesus was gone: There was only a soft vague luminescence in the air where He had been.
Wheeler's eyes were filled with tears, his heart with joy, and he knelt down to kiss the floor where Jesus had stood before closing the door to the storeroom and locking inside the blessed instruments with which the Lord's will would be done.......... The shell of the Baptist church arrived early Friday morning in twin flatbeds, a third truck with an attached crane carrying the interior fixtures and other nonstructural items in its half van. There were three volunteers from the ACCC in addition to the truck drivers, and Wheeler had engaged two workers from Worthy Construction for the day. Four other men from the parish had volunteered their own time to help reassemble the church.
Wheeler stood next to the crane operator, a burly dark tanned man wearing a CAT hat, as the flatbeds were maneuvered into position on the vacant lot next to the existing church. The crane operator frowned as he watched the proceedings. He turned to the pastor. 'Where are we going to put the structure?'
Wheeler pointed to the empty section of property on the north side of the existing church. Ten parish members had spent the better part of the week clearing and leveling the ground. 'Right there.'
'You got no foundation. You got no hookups.' 'We're going to put it there.'
The crane operator looked around, then turned suspiciously hack toward Wheeler. 'You got any permits? Building permits? Structural permits?
Electrical permits?' .::i
'We're going to put it there.' Wheeler smiled calmly at the man.
'You can't do this. You have to go through the proper channels. You have to follow the proper procedures. I'm going to talk to Davis. The council can't deliver a church to a location without any permits.'
'Talk to Davis,' Wheeler said. The permits were all in order, he had obtained them from the county several days ago and had already shown them to the coordinator, but he was not about to tell that to this ignorantly officious nonentity. He watched the crane operator stride across the dirt toward the trucks, then looked slowly around in satisfaction. He saw the town as it had appeared in his vision, the hard desert ground covered with soft grass and beautiful flowers, the dusty, run-down buildings restored better than new with gleaming fresh paint and clean, shining windows. At the center of this new town, at the center of the new world, he saw the Church of the Living Christ, a glorious monument to the greatness of God.
He smiled benignly at the group of onlookers who had gathered in the street to see what all the fuss was about. They would soon be dead, he knew, consigned to the pit of hell by the wrath of the Almighty. No more would they dog his heels with their petty annoyances, intruding into his life with the mundane strictures of their secular world. They would be dealt with by the hand of God. He saw in his mind Lang Crosby flayed alive, his eyes white and bulging bug-like in his bloody red-muscled face. He saw Jane Page with a ragged hole ripped between her legs where the source of her sin originated.
He breathed deeply, feeling good. This was going to be a special day.
' =
A very special day.
Even with the help of the ACCC workers, the church volunteers, and the men from Worthy Construction, it took all morning and most of the afternoon to attach the two sectional halves of the building and get the shell set fled in place. There were a few minor mishapsa window broke when the crane dropped the first sec don too jarringly on the ground, and a small portion of the lower east wall was accidentally damaged when a corner of the flatbed bumped against it--but for the most part things went very smoothly, and by nightfall the reconstructed church, on the outside at least, looked almost the same as it had when he'd viewed it back in Phoenix.
It was after dark before Pastor Wheeler finally told everyone to call it quits. The bulk of the fxtures still remained in the third truck, but the two flatbeds were empty. The first phase of the work would be completed tomorrow. , The ACCC workers were put up in the homes of willing parishioners for the night, and Wheeler saw them to their hosts' houses, giving each his hearty thanks. Afterward, he returned to the church. He picked up his plastic iced tea cup from the hood of one of the trucks and walked into the empty husk of the new addition.
The wooden floor had been placed directly atop the dirt, and while he had been lectured on the disadvantages of such a move by all of the construction workers and ACCC men, it looked good. In the next few weeks, they would tear out a portion of one wall and connect it to the existing church. In his mind, he saw the completed project, the finished Church of the Living Christ, a house of worship so large and unique that it would appear on the desert horizon taller than Apache Peak, more substantial than the surrounding bluffs, acting as a beacon to the multitudes who would come to praise God.
He felt a tingle of excited anticipation course through his body. On Sunday he was going to tell his flock that the Lord Jesus Christ had returned. He was going to tell them what he had seen, what he had been told. He did not know how they would take the good news, but that only contributed to his excitement.
This would separate the wheat from the chaff in his congregation. This would determine the future of his flock.
He took a sip of his iced tea and grimaced as something grainy and foul-tasting rode the wave of liquid over his tongue and down his throat. He pulled off the plastic lid and held the cup toward the refracted light that streamed through the door and windows. On the single floating slice of brown lemon were dozens of small furiously crawling flies, each about the size of a pinhead. More small specks floated in the dark tea between the ice cubes. Some sort of fruit fly, he assumed. He was about to walk outside and toss the contents of the cup on the ground when he realized that, like everything else, this too was part of God's plan.
If Jesus hadn't wanted him to drink the flies, he wouldn't have allowed them into his tea.
Wheeler thought for a moment, then gave a short prayer of thanks, replaced the lid, put the straw to his lips, and drank.
The last hour at the restaurant had been slow, so they'd eaten pork fried rice and an order of chicken chow fun that had been phoned in but not picked up, and had cleaned up early. Sue and John wiped the tables and swept the floor in the dining area, while their mother and grandmother washed dishes. Their father took care of the woks and the cooking area. They left on time for once, and it was only a few minutes after nine when they pulled into their driveway.
Although it was dark out, Chris Chapman and Rod Malvern were standing on the strip of brown grass that separated their properties, talking, and Sue waved at them as she got out of the car. They waved back and returned
