Sunday rolled around without any other unnatural occurrences so I went with my family to church. My little girl loved it. She ran to the Sunday school teacher with a huge smile on her face, having already captivated this woman with her beautiful personality. Then she grabbed the teacher's hand and dragged her over to meet me.
"This is my Daddy." She told the woman, "Daddy this is Miss Edna."
"Hello." I said, smiling and shaking her hand, "It's nice to meet you."
"It's nice to meet you, too. We enjoy having Mikayla in our class."
My wife elbowed me, "Bobb, we've got to go to the main service. Leave Mickey here and we'll come get her later." I followed her, but it felt like the time I walked away from her hospital room after we were told she needed a transplant.
"I love you, Daddy!" Mickey called after me. And I felt another sense of déjà vu.
"Love you, too, Baby Doll. I'll see you later."
The service started out with lots of singing. Praise to God and all that. I stood through it and listened as the voices all wove together in a harmony, good and bad melding together into one monstrously loud, yet beautiful sound. Then we sat down and the pastor came up to speak. I missed the introduction and I zoned out for the most of the message he was delivering. But the gist of it was that God loved everybody. He just wanted to help us. When the pastor said that I couldn't help but think, yeah, He wants to help us and that's why Mickey has a cancer that we can't seem to be able to get rid of. Come on, God, keep helping.
Towards the end of the sermon I heard one sentence loud and clear, "You must repent." There was that word again. Everywhere I go everyone was telling me I needed to repent. This man was telling me to repent before God. The other people just wanted to ruin my life. Then the man said something else, "God wants to help you, but He can't till you repent." Then came the invitation and the closing songs, but I just sat in my chair, wondering. Could God really help me get out of this mess? Is there a way He could save my baby girl from her cancer? If so, how and would He? I shook my head as if I could shake the thoughts completely out of my head as we want to get Mickey from her classroom. Who am I kidding? Any God would want me to turn myself in to the police. And I can't do that. I have a wife and a kid to support. I need to keep my job and keep my life the way it is. My mind flashed to the night at the hospital, the man, and the woman from work the other day. Well, almost the way it is.
