The next day was Sunday, and I felt good as my family and I went through the usual “get-ready-for-church routine.” It was the first time I had been to church in a few weeks, since all the Swiftriver drama. It wasn’t over yet, but at least it had calmed down a little. I didn’t know for sure if there were any bad guys still after us, but at least for today, nobody seemed worried about it. I knew that, because Flip and Fawn didn’t wear their “disguises.” Flip actually showed up dressed in nice, unwrinkled pants and a dress shirt, and Fawn wore a casual pair of khaki capri pants, tan flat sandals and a white blouse. Her smile looked brighter than the blouse. Maybe that was because Matt was holding her hand. I was surprised that Fawn was joining us, since when we first met she told me that she doesn’t go to church. And Flip — well, he did come to church once when I invited him, but he just ate a muffin and left before the service started.
Our group couldn’t all fit in Chuck’s SUV, so Dad offered to drive our family and Rusty in the red Jeep that belongs to the Stevens’ resort.
“Is Sunday coming?” Brady asked.
“Yes,” Dad said. “A little later though, toward the end of the ser vice. His parents want him to sleep in a little.”
For some reason, I felt a little funny as we pulled into the parking lot of Glacier Christian Church. Maybe it’s because I’ve never gone anywhere but Riverglen Community, or maybe because I knew I wouldn’t be seeing TJ or Sean (with my donut). Even though it had only been a few weeks since I’d been at church with them, I wondered if they were going to get used to me not being there and maybe try out the scary youth group and leave me behind as a children’s church helper for life.
“Riley.” A woman’s voice.
“Riley.” A man’s voice.
“Hey!” My brother’s high-pitched squawk pulled me out of my thoughts. “Are you going to answer anybody?”
“Oh, sorry.”
“No problem, Honey,” Mom said. “We just want to know if you want to take the cookies in now or later.”
“We better bring them in now,” Rusty said. “Don’t want the chocolate chips to melt.”
We ended up leaving the cookies in the reception hall, but we brought Diane’s gift plate into church with us, so no one would eat her cookies by mistake. I’m not sure that was a good idea, because they smelled so good, I wanted to eat them during the church ser vice.
Focus, Riley.
I normally sit with my parents for the singing and the announcements, and then I go with the kids to children’s church during the message. Today, I had to sit through the whole thing. The pastor had been talking about forgiveness and some math problem: seventy times seven. I figured it out in my head. Four-hundred and ninety. We’re supposed to forgive that many times, Jesus said. Or maybe he meant more. I wasn’t sure about that. I looked at my watch. Eleven o’clock. How long was this message going to last, and more importantly, how long would I last with these cookies sitting next to me? My stomach growled. Not one minute longer. I grabbed a cookie and snuck a bite. Rusty giggled.
Brady wasn’t distracted at all by the cookies. He was busy drawing Bible maps on the backs of everyone’s offering envelopes. Mom grabbed one from Brady to show my dad. “Paul’s second missionary journey,” she whispered.
Dad shook his head. “Amazing.”
“Who’s Paul?” Rusty asked.
“He’s a guy from the Bible. He traveled around —”
“Shh!” Mom looked at us and pointed toward the pastor, who was smiling right at me and Rusty. I smiled back and then wondered if I had chocolate on my teeth.
“If you have your Bible with you, please turn to Romans, chapter twelve, verses one and two.”
I thought at first that the pastor was talking to just me, and I almost said, “okay” out loud. Then I heard pages turning all around me. Of course, he was talking to everyone in the church. He just happened to be looking at me when he said it. I looked down and flipped madly through my Bible, hoping that he would choose someone else to stare at before I looked back up again.
“I didn’t bring my Bible,” Rusty whispered. I knew that at least Rusty had a Bible. A little girl named Ava in our children’s church had given Rusty hers when she visited the first time.
I scooted over close to Rusty and let her look on with me.
The pastor began reading, and I made sure to follow along carefully. When the pastor closed his Bible, three people came up the aisle of the church dressed in white robes. A little boy, an older guy with gray hair, and Diane. All of them were smiling big.
When they got to the front of the church, the pastor led them through a door on the side of the stage, and they all disappeared for a minute. Then the back of the stage opened up, and they appeared again, standing on a platform that had steps that led down into a clear-sided pool.
Brady stood up and looked around. “Where’s Sunday?”
Mom pulled him back down onto his seat.
“But she’s getting baptized now, and he’s not here.”
We all looked around then, but we didn’t stand up like Brady did. I didn’t see Sunday or his family anywhere.
I admit that I didn’t pay any attention to what the little boy and the gray-haired man said before they got dunked. People took pictures and clapped after each one, but that’s all I noticed. I was too busy worrying that Sunday was going to miss Diane getting baptized.
Then Rusty pointed to the front. There was Sunday, holding a microphone!
“What’s he doing up there?” Brady asked.
“Shhh, just listen,” Mom said.
Sunday smiled real big and took a piece of paper out of the pocket of his orange sweat pants. Yes, he was wearing the orange shoes too.
Before he started reading, he said: “This next person is my good friend, Diane. God brought her to me as my nurse when I was in the hospital. She asked me to read a story of how Jesus saved her life.”
Jesus saved her life? That had my attention.
Sunday began reading while Diane stood in the water with the pastor. Even though it was Sunday’s voice, I could imagine Diane talking . . .
“My name is Diane, and I have always believed in God. But I thought he didn’t like me much. Maybe it was because my parents got divorced when I was young. I figured that God didn’t think I was good enough to have a happy family. So, for most of my childhood, I thought I was a bad person, and then in my teen years, I chose to do some things that were bad just to prove myself right. One of the things I did was to abuse alcohol, and I soon became an alcoholic. My addiction destroyed my life. I lost my family, my friends, and everything good . . .”
I looked around the church. Everyone was silent, and all eyes were fixed on Diane, who had tears streaming down her face.
Sunday continued reading:
“Thankfully, the God I believed in as a kid really did exist. And I found out that not only did he like me — he loved me! One day, when I had run away from everyone and everything, I ended up in a Dairy Queen here in Montana, of all places. A nice couple named Chuck and Carmie noticed that I looked lost, and they offered me a place to stay for a while until I could get my life back on track. They invited me to attend a recovery group at this church, and after I had been sober for a few months, they offered to help me through nursing school.”
Rusty nudged me and whispered, “Lucky Chuck.” I smiled and nodded.
“As good as that sounds, the best was yet to come. After I became a nurse, I met a young man from Africa named Sunday.”
Sunday stopped reading for a minute and said, “That is me.” He smiled and laughed his contagious Sunday laugh, which made the church laugh too. Sunday’s mom gave him a stern look and pointed to the paper he was supposed to be reading.
He smiled again and continued.
“Sunday shared the Good News with me, and I finally asked Jesus into my heart. You see, here was a boy who had a tough childhood like I had. His parents weren’t divorced like mine, but he had leukemia — a serious illness that could take his life at any time. And even though he was suffering, inside I could tell that he had a peace that could not be taken away by anything. He said it was because of Jesus. He also told me that Jesus wanted to give me that same peace.”
I looked over at Rusty and noticed she was catching tears dripping off her chin.
“So, here I am today, to be baptized, and to tell all of you that I love Jesus. My life isn’t perfect, and I still do bear pain from the consequences of my sinful life, but I know that God has forgiven me through Jesus and that he has made me into a new person.”
Sunday folded up the paper and scanned the crowd. We were all still. It was like we wanted to hear more. “That is all,” he said, and he sat down on the front of the stage.
The pastor spoke. “Diane, because of your profession of faith in Jesus as your Lord and Savior, I now baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”
Diane held her nose as the pastor pushed her backwards into the water. Because of the clear panels surrounding the pool, we could see her when she was all the way under. Her rust-colored hair spread out and swirled all over, and her eyes were closed. Then she popped back up, pushed her hair back from her face and let out a huge “Woo-hoo!”
Next thing, we heard a splash. An “orange” kid had joined the celebration in the pool.
Sunday’s mother covered her face with her hands and shook her head.
Maybe she should have brought Sunday some orange swim trunks.