Blood of the Lamb

“Welcome, Reverend Caldwell,” King said. “Before we begin, let me say again how sorry I am about your daughter.”

“Thank you, Larry.”

“Now let’s meet our panel,” King said. “First, Rabbi Daniel Rosenberg, author of Abraham: Father of Faith, Father David O’Donnell, author of Abraham: Figure of Faithfulness, and Imam Syed Jumal, author of Our Father Abraham.”

As Larry King introduced each of them, their faces appeared on the monitor before me. Both the priest and the rabbi were handsome young men in their early thirties, dressed smartly in black suits, the priest wearing a Roman collar, the rabbi wearing a black yarmulka. The Imam was a thin black man in his fifties with graying hair, large glasses, and a white koofi.

“All three men can be seen on the PBS special Abraham: Father of Nations airing later this month.

“And from Florida, prison chaplain, John Jordan.”

Suddenly, the camera was on me, and it was my face filling the screen in front of me, as I assumed it was on screens around the world. It was an awkward moment. My first reaction was to smile, but then I thought it inappropriate, so I just nodded instead. The camera lingered long past the time it took me to nod.

“Okay,” King said, “first question is an obvious one: What was your little daughter doing inside a state prison facility?”

“Singing with her mother, my wife, Bunny, as a part of our evangelistic outreach.”

“But prison?” King said, turning his hand palm up. His eyes grew wide, his brow furrowing as his large glasses rose on his nose.

“Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, has called us to reach out with love to the least of these his brethern-the ones the rest of the world has forgotten about. We’ve done it all of Nicole’s life and never had an incident.”

“You’ve come under a lot of criticism lately for taking her inside,” King continued, “but there seems to be just as many supporters coming to your defense.”

“I think they understand Bunny and I are just doing what God’s called us to do,” Bobby Earl said. “And that we took every precaution.”

“What precautions did you take?” King asked.

Bobby Earl told him.

“So, Chaplain Jordan, Nicole was in your office when she was murdered?”

Suddenly, my face was filling the screen again.

“Yes,” I said.

When I didn’t elaborate, King smiled at my awkwardness and announced it was time for a break.

During the break, Susan walked over from where she had been standing against the back wall of the studio.

“Let the others talk, too,” she said.

I smiled. “I’ll try not to prattle on during the next segment.”

“Chaplain Jordan,” King said when we came back from the break, “do you know if there’re any suspects in the case?”

“Yes,” I said.

“There are?”

“Yes.”

“But no arrest?” he asked.

“No, sir,” I said. “Not yet.”

“Chaplain, are the Caldwells suspects?”

“No one has been ruled out,” I said.

“How does that feel?” King asked Bobby Earl.

“Just awful,” he said. “Anyone who knows us knows how much we loved Nicole, knows we could never do such a thing. But the good book tells us to expect to suffer for righteousness.”

“And Nicole was adopted, right?”

“Yes,” Bobby Earl said.

“But it doesn’t hurt any less losing an adopted child.”

“No.”

“Now, let’s bring in the rest of our panel,” King said. “They’re all members of the group discussing Abraham on PBS in an upcoming special. Reverend Caldwell, last week on your broadcast you compared yourself to Abraham, didn’t you?”

“Well, I think I was misunderstood,” he said.

“Let’s take a look at the clip,” King said.

The screen filled with Bobby Earl preaching in his New Orleans studio. And if there had been any question before, there was no doubt now-Bobby Earl had indeed compared himself to Abraham and Nicole to Isaac.

For the next few minutes, Bobby Earl tried to explain why he had made the comparisons between himself and Abraham and Nicole and Isaac. The longer he talked, the more defensive he became, until eventually he told Larry King that until God had tested him in a similar manner, he could never understand. No one could.

“Fair enough,” King said, and took another break.

“Rabbi Rosenberg,” King said after the break, “what is it about the story of Abraham and Isaac that makes it so enduring?”

“Well, first,” Daniel Rosenberg said, as his faced filled the monitor in front of me, “we must remember what having an heir meant to Abraham, his culture and religion-it was everything. And God had promised this childless man that he would become the father of nations. But for twenty-five years, his wife remained barren.”

“Think about how cruel that was,” Father David said, jumping in before the director could cut to him. “Twenty-five eternal years waiting for a child, all the while being called the father of nations.”

“And now,” Rosenberg said, “after all the waiting, all the testing, all the suffering, all the years of feeling like the biggest fool on the planet, Abraham is given a son-”

“Only to have God ask for him back,” Larry King said. “Right, Chaplain Jordan?”

“No,” I said, my face filling the screen. “God doesn’t just ask for Isaac back. He asks Abraham to kill him.”

As the camera cut back to King, my mind exploded with a terrifying thought: Maybe Bobby Earl had compared himself to Abraham because he had done what Abraham had been willing to do-kill his own child. Was Bobby Earl subconsciously confessing?

“‘Take your son, your only son whom you love,’” King was saying, “‘and go forth up to the land of Moriah and offer him up on a high mountain that I will show you.’ I mean this was the ultimate test, wasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Father David said, “and he failed it.”

“What?” Larry King asked in surprise.

“I think he failed,” Father David said. “I know everyone says what a great act of faith this was on Abraham’s part-how he was willing to sacrifice his only son-but the real test was how he would respond to God, or to the voice inside his head he thought was God. He should have said no.”

“Wow,” King said, “I never thought of it that way. But it’s kind of like a father sending his son off to war, isn’t it? No one wants to do it, but sometimes…”

“Wait a minute now,” Imam Jumal said, breaking his silence at long last. “We’ve got to view this from an eternal position. Obedience to God is all that matters. Whatever we give up or even sacrifice in this life will be given back to us a hundred-fold by God in the next.”

“Amen,” Bobby Earl said.

“Of course, the Qur’an teaches that it was Ishmael, not Isaac, that God asked for and Abraham offered.”

Bobby Earl seemed unable to respond to that, and we went to break.

“So you believe you’ll be back with Nicole one day?” Larry King asked Bobby Earl after the break.

“Absolutely,” he said, tears filling his eyes. “It’s why I can rejoice. My loss is heaven’s gain. God will reward me and Nicole for our faithful service.”

“But you know people can’t understand that,” King said. “If Abraham were alive today, and he told us God