A.D. 33 (24 page)

FOR TWO DAYS Saba and I wasted in the desert east of Petra, where smooth, rolling sands met the base of a large red cliff. From the top of that cliff, we could see endless dunes south, in the direction of the deep deserts of Arabia. The massive rock face protected us from the wind and gave us shade from the high sun in the heat of the day. The cold nights showed us stars that twinkled high above, unmovable in all their distant glory, and then the sun rose to offer us warmth.

It was perfect.

It was death.

For two days, I wept on Saba's shoulder and in his arms, overcome with the finality of our predicament.

He told me how he had been held in a cell also, but that cell meant nothing to him. His mind was only on me and on Talya, fearing for our safety. We were both alive, and for this, he was grateful.

He would not accept Talya's fate, you see? Nor ours. Not for those first two days. He was too stubborn. He was like the cliff above us, always there for me and for Talya and for himself. His faith could not bend; his heart pumped certainty through his veins.

He spoke little because he knew that words could no longer console me. And he could offer me no power to see because his own sight was gone. He only clung rigidly to his belief that Yeshua could not have lied to us. When the time came, we would know what to do.

Of course, the time had already come and gone.

Yeshua himself had already come and gone.

The warrior I had once known in Saba was gone, replaced by this tower of rock at my side.

We both knew there was no way to save Talya, even with the sword.

I staggered up the dune east of us on the second day, and there I fell to my knees and wailed at the sky, demanding the Father's mercy. When Saba came to comfort me I ignored him, because I already knew all of his answers. There was nothing new to say, nothing new to ask.

Neither the sun above nor the sands beneath were moved by my tears or my words. They, like the Law of Moses, only accused me. The world was set, as was fate.

In the end we would all die.
So then, let me die now.

I left that dune a shell of the woman I had once been, finally drained of my humanity. But truly, I had been drained at Golgotha, when Yeshua died.

That afternoon I kept to myself, silent and numb as Saba quietly tended to our needs, offering only his presence because I could not hear his words.

But on that last night, as I lay on my side, dumbly gazing into our small fire, I let myself hear him again.

“We have to wake before dawn to be in Petra by morning,” I said.

“I will wake us.”

I swallowed my bitterness. “We return to the very arena where I had power. Why must we always lose what we find in this life, Saba, round and round, returning to our own vomit, like dogs? Why did even Yeshua fail? Why, if now my son must share his fate?”

Saba was seated by my head, and his answer was what I expected of him, spoken in a low, sure tone.

“He did not fail. We only misunderstood his teaching that he would not die, but this does not mean that the sovereign realm is not real.”

“Then his kingdom is like all religions,” I said, staring at the flames. “They all offer escape from the suffering in the afterlife by appeasing a deity far away, but give us nothing for this life. This wasn't his teaching.”

He wasn't quick to respond.

“His power is still in the air, even now. I've seen too much of it. I've felt it and heard it. In seeing him, we have seen the Father.”

“Fine. So then we are saved in the afterlife. But there is no more power to see peace in the midst of the storms or to move the mountain now. Is there, Saba?”

It was an empty statement, not a question. But Saba was a rock.

“There is power, Maviah.”

“Then show me. Save Talya.”

“We show Yeshua's power by loving the way he loved, without condition. By giving to those in need, because giving is receiving. By judging no man, because in judging we only judge ourselves—this is for God alone. By being light in the darkness lest we become blind. By—”

“No, Saba,” I said softly. “Show me this power. Show me how to love in this way. Show me how to ask anything in his name—in his identity. How is that possible if he is dead? Even if he had not died, how is that possible? He is he and we are we.”

Another great pause. I knew he didn't have true answers to these accusations. I don't know why I bothered to ask.

“He said he would send us a helper to comfort us. His Spirit.”

I stared at the flames, speaking in a whisper. “Then show me his Spirit, Saba. Show me.”

“We must surrender all—”

“
No
, Saba. I don't want Talya to surrender his life.” The night was perfectly quiet. “I don't want to hold him of no account. I don't want to hate my life or take up my cross. I just want to live in a small tent with you and Talya, away from all of this death. Is that too much to ask of a God who made me to live on this earth? Why must we suffer?”

For a long time I heard nothing but the soft popping of dying coals licked by lazy flames. Finally, Saba had no words. His silence was answer enough. And so I had no further questions.

I heard a soft, muffled sob, and I blinked. Saba's sobs grew more pronounced and when I finally lifted my head I saw him lying on his belly with his hands over his face, weeping into the sand.

I didn't know what to do. I had no more tears to give. I didn't know if he was weeping for Talya or for me or for himself or for Yeshua. It didn't matter anymore, because we had all become the same. I only knew that death could not comfort death, and that we were all dead or dying. Indeed, the moment we had been born, we had begun to die.

But when his weeping grew louder I finally pulled myself up, crawled over to him, and lay down beside him, facing the stars. There, I put my hand on his back and closed my eyes.

Slowly, after many minutes, his sobbing subsided. The night became still once again. Saba lay as though dead, and although I thought I should get up and move closer to the fire, I couldn't find the strength.

In seven or eight hours I would rise to see my son's execution at the hand of Kahil. How that viper would kill him, I didn't know, and I tried desperately not to think about it.

Lying there on my back with my eyes closed, suffering with Saba, I was mercifully pulled into the deep waters of sleep.

Darkness. Sweet darkness, vacant of thought.

THE DREAM CAME to me in that darkness, and in my dream I saw a star streaking across the night sky above our camp, where I stood barefooted. Not any star, but a massive ball of fire that suddenly turned toward me, slicing through the air with lightning speed.

Surprised by its rapid approach, I came alive there in the dream, thinking it might not be a dream at all! I stepped back, heart in my throat. Surely a star could not strike me.

But it kept coming, now with a roar that shattered the still night. I had to run! It was coming too fast and directly for me.

Before I could move more than two paces, the white ball of fire covered the last of the space between us and slammed into the same dune on which I'd wept that afternoon.

A blinding flash lit the night, perfectly silent now, sending a ring of light out from that point of impact in all directions, like a ripple from a stone landing in a pool of water, only faster, much faster, turning night into day.

I could not breathe.

The moment the wave of light hit me, I felt its power blow through my chest, through my heart, through every fiber of my body, and I staggered back. I expected the roar of a consuming fire, and me in its blast, turned to ash.

Instead it filled me with a single tone. Only one note, beautiful and pure. A note I'd heard before.

Talya's song, I thought. Eden.

I gasped, sucking the light into my lungs, and with that breath my body began to tremble. Not with fear, but with pleasure. Peace and joy as I'd never known them flooded me from the inside out.

I watched, stunned, as grass sprang from the white sand, and vines exploded with grapes, and small saplings grew into large trees heavy with green leaves. Not fifteen paces from me, the ground opened to form a well of clear blue water. On the rolling hills beyond the well were camels and lions and lambs and foxes, and other wonderful creatures that I didn't know. Many birds flew through the sky.

All of it unfurled in the space of only a few breaths.

And with each of those breaths, I inhaled the light so that it became a part of me, and I a part of it.

This was the Eden that Talya had seen in the distance from the high ledge. But now…Now it wasn't distant. Now I was
in
it, knowing it.

I suddenly knew that I had been here for a long time. I knew it as my home. I knew the man, Adam, though he was not present now. I knew the Creator, I knew the fields and the birds and the beasts, and I knew I had dominion. I knew about the tree called life and about tree of knowledge nearby, and I spun around with arms spread wide, lifting my voice to join Eden's pure song.

Here, I experienced each note as if sung for the first time. Each breath as a miracle unto itself. Each sight as a work of wonder.

The water there in the pool drew me, so I hurried to it. The grass caressed my bare soles. I became amazed at such a simple thing as being able to walk, and I was also aware of the infinite complexity behind such a staggering experience.

This was Eden, the realm of God, and I had been fashioned in God's likeness so that I could experience life as he would experience it.

The blue-green water in the pool glowed with light down in its depths. I stopped at the edge and gazed into the glimmering water, and as I did, words from my life outside of my dream filled my mind.
Whoever drinks the water I give will never thirst. From your innermost being will flow rivers of living water to life eternal.
This was Yeshua's teaching, for he was one with the Father in this realm.

I lowered myself to one knee and slowly reached out for the water. Even before my finger touched its surface, I could feel its power, a gentle vibration that warmed my fingertips.

A hiss sounded behind me and I twisted back.

Only then did I see the large black serpent with green and yellow and red stripes sliding through the grass, not ten paces from me. I stared at it, wondering at the beauty of this exotic creature. Had I seen it before?

The serpent slipped through the grass, flicking its tongue, eyeing me with golden eyes. I took a few steps toward it, but then stopped when its hiss extended and grew, louder now than the pure song in the air.

Interest pricked my mind. It was curious, because that sound both repelled me and attracted me at the same time.

It hissed again, and this time a voice filled my mind.

What is it that you shall not do?

Surprised, I blinked. But I knew the answer immediately, and I said it without thought. “I will not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil at the center of the garden, lest I die.”

The serpent's tongue flickered.

You surely will not die. If you eat, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.

This was confusing to me. Wasn't I already like God? Had he not glorified his identity by making me in his likeness?

“I am already made in his likeness. How can you say I will become what I already am if I eat the fruit of knowledge? You deceive me in saying I am not in his likeness.”

The serpent hissed, agitated, eyes flashing. It coiled as if to strike. For a few moments, it said nothing. Then it repeated itself.

You surely will not die. If you eat, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.

I immediately thought of the tree of life in this garden. It gave me life. Yet the serpent said I would
not die
if I ate of the knowledge of good and evil. That I would be like God, though I already was.

Did he mean I would be a god myself, apart from God?

The serpent slowly opened its jaws wide. I watched, stunned, as a round fruit rolled out of its mouth and onto the grass. It was half-white and half-black—not just white like the sand, but white like that star that had struck the dune. And not just black like shale, but black like a bottomless hole in one's soul.

Fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

I was drawn to the fruit in a way that both confused me and intoxicated me at once. What had once been a mere fruit that I'd seen many times before suddenly seemed to contain fathomless power.

I was compelled to pick it up to see more closely. To touch it and feel it.

As the serpent backed away, I stooped and picked up the fruit.

The light from one half glowed around my fingers, while the darkness from the other half seemed to swallow my thumb. What power there must be in this fruit of the knowledge of darkness and light! Could I be a god myself by eating it?

A new thought crossed my mind. The will of the Creator had said not to eat, and I had always shared that will. But now I found another will pulling at me. My own.

Was I made in the likeness of the Creator? I was. So then could I place my will over his? I could. And if I did, my eyes would be opened to know more than I knew.

So I thought,
not your will, but mine
, and I lifted the fruit and bit deeply.

Immediately, a deep and terrifying dread washed up from my bowels and pressed through my chest, then rose up over my face and my eyes like a veil. Darkness as I had never encountered it blinded me.

I could no longer see the garden. My ears filled with a thundering silence, and I was deafened to Eden's song.

I spun, crouching with the fruit still in my hand, terrified. From the corner of my eye, I saw the serpent dart at me from the darkness.

Before I could move, I felt its fangs strike deep into the bones of my heel. Raging pain rushed up my leg and I dropped the fruit, screaming, grasping at my leg.