John 3:16 (a short story by Robin Lynn Davidson)

Mary opened her eyes, but remained completely motionless. Something felt wrong. She couldn't put her finger on what it was, but it was there in the air, prickling the hairs on the back of her neck. She listened intently for any sound that might give away what it might be, but there were no sounds. Maybe that was it--the lack of sound, the heavy stillness in the air. She looked around and saw only darkness. She couldn't even tell if the room she was in was familiar or not. Memory eluded her. It was that moment of grogginess after waking, when you aren't sure of anything--where you are, what time it is, or even who you are. Yet that moment seemed to stretch on indeterminately.

Mary rolled to her side and tried to blink away the feeling of unease and peer through the gloom. She determined she was laying on a mat on an earthen floor. She decided that lying there was cowardly, so she pushed herself up to a sitting position and then struggled to stand up. She tripped over an oil lamp, so she trimmed and lit it. She explored the house she found herself in and found it to be deserted, save for a mouse in the corner, who was cleaning his whiskers, making her glad she had decided to get up. She found some bread on the table and ate a little before venturing from the stone house. She found a crude pitcher near the door, so she assumed there must be a well somewhere. She started down the dusty street, looking for another woman to point her in the right direction, but there was no one about. The sky was becoming lighter and lighter so surely people would be up and about before the sun's unforgiving rays would begin to beat down upon them. Before long, she found a well in what appeared to be a town square of a rather large city. She drew out some water and started back the way that she had come.

Mary was becoming more and more alarmed at the absence of sound and human sightings in such a large metropolis. Where was everyone? She was beginning to feel as though everyone were in on a joke that she had been left out of. Could they all be around a corner, laughing at her? She had been the butt of jokes before, but surely the whole city could not be involved in such a prank! Was it a Sabbath day? No, as near as she could figure, it was a Friday. A feast day? No, she had a brief recollection of Passover being celebrated yesterday. Had the entire town gone somewhere? No, she couldn't recall any logical reason why no one should be about.

When she reached the small house, she set about with some chores to keep her mind busy and the panic at bay. She fed the chickens, gathered eggs, milked the goat, swept out the house, tidied up, and did some baking.

As the day wore on, the alarm welled up inside of her. She walked out of the house and no longer cared if she looked silly or if anyone laughed. She marched to the neighbor's house and called at the door. No answer. She walked in and saw no one. She searched every nook and cranny and still found no trace of any neighbors. She went to the next house and the next house, finding no one and still no one. The further she went, the more afraid she became until she was terrified. She ran through the empty, still streets, sobbing and calling out for anyone who might hear her. But there were no returning answers. She wandered aimlessly for a long while and eventually returned to the little cottage and sat, not knowing what else to do. She buried her face in her hands and wept softly.

"Jehovah-Shammah," Mary whispered. "Do not leave me alone in this world. Do not abandon your daughter. Please, El-Roi."

Who am I kidding? Mary thought to herself. Jehovah-Jireh has probably sent his promised Messiah in the night and left me behind. I am no one. A poor, ignorant young girl with nothing to offer his kingdom. Elohim loves his people but I am just one among many, easily forgotten.

Suddenly Mary heard a noise, like a great crowd of people shouting. She jumped in surprise, then recovered quickly and took off running towards the direction of the noise. She ran so long and so hard she thought her lungs would burst. She ran to the other side of the city, to a hill, and then she stopped. That was where the noise had been coming from, but there was no crowd. All she saw there was one man. And he could not have been making that noise.

She sank to the ground in weakness and sorrow. Mary's shoulders sunk and her head drooped. The sight of the man had drained all of the energy out of her body. He was obviously being punished for something. Even if he deserved some sort of punishment, Mary couldn't think of anything the man could have done that would have warranted the treatment he was receiving. But, just by looking at him, she could tell that the man had done nothing wrong. She could see it in his eyes. One glance and she could bear it no more--her gaze fell away from his and she covered her face with her hands. In that glance, she felt as if he had really SEEN her and knew her.

"Daughter," said a gentle, yet strong voice. "Do not look away."

Mary reluctantly looked up to the man again. This time, when she looked into his eyes, she saw a love there that she had never seen before. But, the love wasn't just spelled out in his eyes. It was also written in the blood that was spilling from his body, from the crown of thorns on his head, from the nails that were piercing his hands and feet, holding him to a cross. She gasped.

"Who is he?" she whispered, in awe.

"He is my beloved son, in whom I am well-pleased."

"Jehovah-Yahweh..." Mary's voice was barely audible. Her eyes were wide and her mouth was dry. She swallowed past the lump in her throat. "But...why is he...dying?"

"Because I loved the world so much that I gave my one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. Have you not learned the prophet Isaiah? He is pierced for the world's transgressions, crushed for their sins, the punishment that brings them peace is upon him and by his wounds they are healed."

"But, where is the world? I mean, where is everybody? I have looked all day and I can find no one."

"Today, my child, you are the world. You mean the world to me. My son came to die for you."

Mary thought she might faint. The knowledge of that was too much to wrap her mind around. Before she had time to think, she was on her feet and running. She found herself at the foot of the cross, sobbing.

"No, no, no! I am not worth it! My life is not worth your life! How can you love me so much that you would die for me? Don't you know that I am nothing?"

"Of course I know you, child. I made you. I created your inmost being and knit you together in your mother's womb. I have watched you grow. I have a purpose for your life. And you are worth it to me. I love you enough to send my son to die for you. Not just the whole world, but you alone. You individually. If you were the only person on earth, he would still die for only you."

"Why?" Mary nearly screeched wretchedly.

"Because without his taking the punishment for your sins, we would be separated forever, my child, and that's not something that I can live with. I want you with me. For all eternity. This is my gift to you. Will you accept my gift?"

Mary's heart suddenly soared at the sound of the voice and the love she felt enveloping her completely. She felt a warmth permeating her entire body and would not have been surprised to have found herself glowing. She had never felt love like this before and was sure that she never would again. Yet, she was sure that this love that was being offered to her would carry her through her life and beyond the grave. She looked up into the face of the man dying for her alone, her face still wet with tears, but gratitude written on every inch of her expression, and whispered, "Yes!"

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This is a work in progress. I am debating about how to write this story. Another option would be to nix the confusion that Mary starts off the day with and make her just go through her normal day, except for the weird fact that everyone is missing. She might think more about her missing family, which would, in a round about way, incorporate other characters. My other idea for this story is that the "Mary" is a modern day girl who wakes up in Israel at the time of the crucifixion with no knowledge of how she got there or why or where anyone else is. The reason that I am thinking about writing the story that way is to make it easier to relate to the character because this story is about everyone. Jesus did die for the world personally, not corporately. If you have any comment about it one way or another, please share.

Family Reunion 2010

This year's Cooper Family Reunion was really fun. I had hoped that this camping trip would be quite simple, but it turned out to be more complicated than I had planned. The kids were supposed to be at their dad's, so packing and cooking for two is much easier. However, their dad never called, so I had to pack for all five of us. It takes a lot to entertain the three kids. And much more to feed them. And my husband decided he didn't want to live on hotdogs and hamburgers for the weekend either, so he devised all sorts of meals, which made packing food and supplies a little more difficult. And I had forgotten about our dog Jesse. So, we decided to rent a U-Haul trailer to haul all of our stuff out there.

Scott had gotten his vacation time during Labor Day weekend, so we took the children out of school and headed down to Oklahoma on Thursday. We left later than we had planned to (which is always the case). It is a five hour drive from Kansas City to Heyburn Lake. As we got nearer to our destination, we saw lightning and dark clouds. We arrived just before dark and began to set up our campsite. Our rented site was next to the nice bathrooms/shower house, in front of the swimming beach, but the bathrooms were locked, which made us angry since that was the whole reason we rented that spot. We were clear on the other side of the camp from my family and quite a way from the other, smaller bathrooms. Kimmy and Billy had both been throwing up prior to our coming to the reunion. As we were furiously putting up our campsite, my mom and my Aunt Janie drove over and Janie offered us her campsite since they had played musical campsites. We hurriedly took down what we'd done and drove over to the other side and put everything up by them. It was dark by then, but we had help from my cousins Jill and Jimmy. There was lightning on both sides of us, but still no rain. We got everything set up and got the kids in their tent and in bed. We finished up and went to bed ourselves. We had been in our tent about five minutes when the storm started. The thunder and rain was deafening. My mom texted that if the kids were scared, they could come over and stay in the camper they were in, but I said we would get soaked just going the few feet from our tent to theirs, let alone across the street to their camper and that I hoped the kids were asleep. Somehow through the roar, Scott heard one of the kids say "mom". We tried to look through the window and saw flashlights on in their tent, but couldn't hear anything. I yelled, "I can't hear you! Lay down and go to sleep!" The seams on our tent were leaking a little and we had a couple of puddles and my blanket got a little damp.

The next day, we visited with family and Scott, Janie, and I went to the store to get groceries and supplies for the family reunion, while my mom stayed with the kids. The kids swam in the blow up pool we had at the campsite. I liked being on the family side of the camp this time because the kids could run around and visit and play and not get into too much trouble. Everyone watched out for everyone else. My great-uncle Gary and great-aunt Bessie came and brought their grand-daughter Courtney and she and Arrena really hit it off. After that, those girls were off on bikes around the camp the rest of the weekend. The problem started when the kids' dad's mom called me and said she was coming to pick up the kids. Chris and I had discussed this weekend the last time we talked and he said he would call me and arrange picking up the kids. He had not called and now here they were, looking forward to the weekend with us. They had hoped that he wouldn't call because they wanted to go to the family reunion. They were furious when their grandma called and they thought they would have to leave. They called their grandma back and asked to talk to their dad. He called them back and Arrena told him that they didn't want to go. He asked to speak to me and I told him that they had thought they were staying at the family reunion since he hadn't called like he said he would and hadn't shown up for his last weekend like he was supposed to. He backed off and said they could stay and the kids were happy. Janie and us combined forces and made up hamburgers and hotdogs to feed everyone that was coming in and setting up camp that night. We sat around a campfire and made s'mores.

Saturday was the family reunion. After breakfast and the morning visits, playtime, etc., we went up to the pavilion and started setting up. Family that hadn't camped started trickling in. It was nice to see lots of cousins I haven't seen in a couple of years. First we had lunch, then the kids got their toys. Then the annual auction started. We brought home a horse clock for the girls' room and some blue champagne glasses that my aunt is etching our names on. After that, the guys had their horseshoe tournament and the women did their "cake" walk. I thought Scott was going to win the horseshoe tournament for a minute--he made it to the final round and was ahead for a while, but my cousin Tammy's husband Randy beat him in the end. I won the second cake walk and got a kitchen prize basket. My mom and my brother left before I knew it. I thought I had longer with them and was disappointed that they had to leave so soon. I had brought an angel food cake and watermelon for my mama and hadn't gotten it out yet! Family started to leave and we started to head back to our campsites.

Sunday, we hung around, visiting. The kids went to pet a horse. They are putting in an equestrian trail behind where we were camping and we talked to a lady that is a part of it quite a bit, so she let the kids pet her horse. We learned from her that the bathroom problems we have had for years were because of the old caretakers and there is a new caretaker that just came in about six weeks ago and has already started changing things around there. He would have had the bathrooms fixed, but the plumber that came out to do didn't have the right licensing and had to come back later. I got my baby "fix", holding a cousin's baby girl named Eland. Then we took the kids down the the lake to swim. Arrena and Courtney were broken-hearted when Courtney had to go home. They had become good chums in three short days. We had another combined dinner with tacos and chicken chili and more fussing over Eland. Then we had an unwelcome visitor. A tarantula walked into my aunt's campsite. Not a good camp to visit, as she is deathly afraid of spiders of any sort. I have to admit that I am not too fond of spiders after that one unknown spider bit me and made me very unwell several years back. A large fuzzy tarantula doesn't appeal to me either. My great-aunt Ruthann said, "Jill, look out." My cousin Jill stood up from the picnic table she had been sitting at and I looked and there was a tarantula on the ground crawling towards her. Jill shrieked and jumped up on the bench of the table. She said that she would have run or jumped up on the table, but she was holding her dog Alexis, who was on a chain, hooked to something and she couldn't go far. In her hurry to get away from the tarantula, she nearly wrung Alexis' neck off! Janie jumped up and stood at a distance, I think trying to judge which was was the best direction to run. I laughed because she had been trying to convince me to look for one out on the road to poke with a stick because she had heard that they jump ten feet. I said, "Hey, don't you want to see if they jump ten feet?" Well, when someone started poking at it, it ceased being funny and I decided that was my cue to leave my chair, in case they DO jump ten feet. The poking was meant to get it to go back the other way and leave, but the stupid thing went the wrong way and came TOWARD us. It ran under the picnic table, causing a wave of panic and then went up the picnic table. That caused Jill to bolt. Somehow she got Alexis loose and managed to get away. Scott asked her later if she would have sacrificed her dog to the tarantula and she said most definitely. Janie, in the meanwhile, hightailed it into the trailer and stood peering out of the window. Jennifer and Jimmy managed to corral and scoop up the tarantula and took him out to the street and released him. I wish I had thought sooner and gotten the whole episode on video. Whether it was the same one or a different one, I don't know, but about an hour or so later, a tarantula returned to Janie's campsite and was again scooped up by my cousin Jimmy and taken back to the street and released. In the twenty-three years we have been out there, we have never seen a tarantula out there before.

Monday, we spent the morning visiting and packing up our campsite. Everyone was leaving, so we were all saying our good-byes. We finally left around lunch time and got home about dinner time. The weather was so beautiful the whole time we were there. The high temperatures were only in the 80s and with the breeze off the lake, it was lovely. It was even chilly early in the morning and in the evenings. I wish I had checked the forecast for the lows and packed the kids some jackets at least. We couldn't have asked for better weather. It was getting a little warm on Monday, I think in the 90s, but the wind was so strong, we hardly noticed.

I am beginning to think that I am allergic to camping at Heyburn Lake...or my family. I have camped down there twice and both times ended up with a migraine. The last one I got while I was down there, this one I got two days after I got back and has lasted five days so far. Wonder if I got bit by a migraine bug. Is there a repellent for that?