Soon

Soon

(If you like this story there are tons more here. You can also find a whole bunch of different books I’ve written right here. So, you’ve got a whole lot to enjoy. Check them out please. Thank you.)

“You want me to do what?”

“Race. As the final evaluation of your writing skill, we want you to race around this building four times.”

“How would that prove I can write?”

“Oh, we already know you can write or you would have never made it this far in the interview process. This is just one final little test our CEO thought up to weed out the Nancy Girls from the Wolverines.”

“Don’t you mean the weak from the strong or the brave vs the timid. Something like that?”

“See! We knew you could write. Ok. You ready?”

“No. Who am I racing against? A bunch of track & field stars?”

“Kindergartners.”

“Kindergartener’s can’t race. They’re too little “

“Yeah, we’ve found that out. But the boss is firm about their age.”

“Can they write?”

“Some of these kids still got diaper rash but they write like Hemmingway.”

“Hemmingway?”

“Hemmingway on a good day.”

“Wow. That’s gonna be tough to beat.”

“You’ll do fine. You ready?”

“No. I haven’t run in forty years. I’ll break a hip or something.”

“No time like the present to get in shape.”

“I don’t think I can do it. But thanks anyway.”

“You want to be a writer?”

“No.”

“No.”

“No?”

“No. I am a writer. You hiring me or not does not validate me. The two hundred books I wrote did that.”

“Yeah, and we loved them. So, come on. The race is about to begin.”

I walked outside the little red school house where my interview had taken place. Half a dozen little kids were milling around. Playing with pill bugs or worms or something. They didn’t look too tough. Maybe I could beat em?

“Go!” Shouted the dweeb interviewing me. I started to run. They started to run. Around the building we went. Then a second time. Then one of the kids stopped. He looked at something in the grass. A snake or frog or something and stopped racing. He walked away towards the taller grass. Mmm, one less perp to be beat.

But then the first strange thing happened. One of the little kids. He looked like he was maybe 12. Tall for a kindergartener. He starts running seriously. It was like watching a cheetah in slow-mo. He ran effortlessly. He passed me like an evening breeze. Like he wasn’t even trying. When this gazelle glided by me my heart leaped to see the beauty of his running. Then it sank because there was no way I would ever, ever, ever match or beat this young man’s speed. I was sunk and I knew it.

I raced on anyway. Then the second strange thing happened. The gazelle stopped running. Stopped walking. Just began to amble around aimlessly. He was no longer interested in running or winning. Something distracted him and he was out of the race.

Really? Wow! This guy cleaned my clock and now he drops out? Maybe he could only write like Faulkner or Asimov? Who knows what goes on in the mind of a tall kindergartner?

I dug deep and ran on. And with all these kiddos dropping out and losing interest as it turns out I won the race.

“I won God. I beat everybody else. I won against all of them sir.”

Then I woke up. It was just a crazy dream. Only it wasn’t. I realized it was all just a dream but I was still happy I won the race. I got the job. So, I told God, “I did it sir, I beat all those kids in my dream.” I don’t win at a lot of things so I like to crow when I get the chance.”

Then Jesus said to me, “You beat them because of your persistence, Frankie. They were better writers than you. More skilled. More talented but you won out over all of them because of your stubborn persistence. Good job Frankie.”

“Huh?”

See, I hate persistence. I want what I want not when I want it but rather I want what I want even before I know I want it. I want today’s distractions and desires yesterday served up on a gold platter, never mind any of those silver platters, thank you very much. But try as I might to deny it, living for Jesus these past 50+ years has taught me patience and persistence. Just last week I asked him for the zillionth time for something I wanted very much but he hasn’t given it to me yet. I been asking him for it for over 40 years. That’s a long, long time to be wandering in the desert of desire with no oasis to slake your thirst.

Two days ago, he answered that prayer and I was so surprised even as I was holding it in my hands I refused to believe and accept that it was real. That it was really there. I don’t want to be patient. It used to be when I had a problem I used to sit down in the mud puddle and tell myself, “I’m gonna sit right here in this mud puddle and not do one more thing until someone comes along and helps me.

And you know what?

No one ever came.

I’m right here. Getting cold. Sitting in this stupid puddle. What’s wrong with you, you’re not coming to help me? What’d I ever do to you?

Nada.

After a while I got up and went home and figured out how to do it myself. But I was angry that no one came to save me. Why didn’t God send someone to save me?

He did. He sent Jesus to die on the cross to save me from my sins. From time to time he sends someone to help me with this or that. But a lot of the times he holds back help cuz he wants me to grow in patience and maturity and persistence and the only way you get more of those things is going through all the crap that stretches your faith. And man I hate it.

I been a Christ follower for over 50 years now. When I was with him for 35 years Zig Ziglar was still alive. I read his book and Zig said his life completely changed in 1972 when he gave his life to Jesus Christ. I looked at the date of his conversion. I became a Christian the same year, two months earlier than Zig.

“God, what’s up? I been serving you just as much at Ziglar has, chasing hard after you every day since April 1972 but you ain’t blessed me like you blessed him. What’s going on?

He showed me what was going on. Suddenly I was in a field. Jesus was with me. It was night. I looked down and before me on the ground was a single grain of sand. Nothing special, just a single grain of sand. Then he and I shrunk down. As we shrunk down the grain of sand rose up. When we finally stopped shrinking, we were next to the tiny bit of sand. Only now in comparison to us it is as big as the great pyramid of Egypt. And at the base of that now monstrously large wall of silica was a tiny golden glowing light. My faith.

He said if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed you could move a mountain. Compared to my tiny spark of faith, a mustard seed was the Goodyear Blimp.

“That’s all I have? You should kill me!”

“You need more faith,” he told me.

Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. So, I read the bible and pray every day. And sometimes when I’m brave, I ask for more faith. But not often. Usually, that means going through some really hard things to stretch the little faith I have. So, I don’t pray that very often.

But here I’d won the race and God was telling me it was time. Or almost time. For him to answer my prayers he told me to pray years ago. “Frankie I want you to pray three things.”
“Yes sir.”

“Pray I will fill the world with your stories. Every people, every tribe, every tongue, every nation.”

“Nation. Got it sir.”

“Pray that you will nurture and encourage people.”

“Encourage people. God it sir.”

“And I want you to pray that you will grow and develop as a writer. That you will become a great writer.”

“Yes sir.”

“So, I pray for those things each night as I go to bed. Sometimes my mind drifts but I get ‘em all out. Then I drift off and begin that night’s adventures in dreamland.

And God gave me that dream about racing against little kiddos to show me, “The persistence I’ve given you through all I allowed you to go through will pay off soon.”

“Great. Now I only have one little problem. Two if you think about all that loot I’m gonna make as a world class author. I gotta pray God will help me not to be a complete idiot with mad cash. A partial idiot I’m expecting. Just not a complete one. That’s one thing. The other is his use of the word, “Soon,” The bible tells me, “A day with the Lord is like a thousand years and a thousand years is like a day. So, are we talking soon as I’m already 72 and not getting any younger up in here sir so this week or midweek next I’m gonna get the call, and the book and movie deals which would be very nice sir.

Or are we talking God inhabiting eternity and he can raise the dead or make old men young again like he did with Abraham. So maybe I’m 96 and can’t see good or can’t hardly hear anything anymore and my nurse or caregiver taps me on the shoulder and hands me something. I don’t know what it is but I take it anyway hoping it’s not a snake or a big spider or something bad. I lean back in the direction the hand came from and ask her or him, “What’s this?”

“It’s Tuesday. It’s pudding day.”

And I get very excited cuz I love pudding but I still gotta be careful so I ask them. “It’s not butterscotch, is it?”

“No. It’s chocolate.”

Then I say, “Praise the Lord. I love chocolate pudding. Now if I can only find my spoon.”

So, that’s not the kind of soon you have in mind for me is it sir? Like soon meaning just before I fall over dead you bless me with amazing book sales and movie deals and stuff and I ask the pudding boy. What’s he going on about? Did someone write a book? I thought about writing a book once. And by that time, by that, “Soon,” I forget that I’m closing in on 240 books on Amazon now. That’s the kind of, “Soon,” I’d rather not have if it’s all the same to you sir. Amen. The End.