Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: Write in the MYSTERY genre (04/05/07)
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TITLE: Home Again | Previous Challenge Entry
By Meagan Armar
04/11/07 -
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His curls of blonde fell over his eyes as he continued to scan the living room, and he could hear the mother quietly sobbing in the corner. He had missed church to come on this call that Sunday morning, for he felt that God’s work for this day consisted of finding a missing seven-year-old, lost from her family, just as we find God’s missing children, lost from the Light.
“Mr. Hammerick,” he asked the father, who stood beside him. “What fantasies has Katie been having lately? I know you told me earlier she loved making up stories and things of that sort. Do you remember anything?”
The man rubbed his beard in great thought before he answered. “She kept mentioning a place. A place where there is no pain or sadness or darkness. I always thought it was a dream world of hers. Why do you ask?”
“I’ve noticed you haven’t the first cross or Bible in your household, Mr. Hammerick,” Stephan replied.
“What does that have to do with my daughter’s disappearance?”
The hour was 11:49 A.M., and the girl had been missing since ten minutes until 11, the same time the closest church to their neighborhood started morning services. Was it possible that the child had wanted to go to church, dreaming of Heaven and wanting to go there, so she wanted nothing more than to learn of this paradise?
“Does your family go to church?” Stephan asked.
Mr. Hammerick shook his head. “Not since Katie was a baby. She’s mentioned going back someday, but we’ve never gotten around to do it.”
“Mr. Hammerick, let’s imagine for a moment that your daughter is out playing in the yard at night. Now, you don’t want her to play at night because she might get in the road or get hurt or both. So, of course, you call her back inside. If you called her, she would come back inside, would she not?”
He nodded, still confused. “Yes, my daughter comes to the sound of my voice, which is why I don’t understand why she left.”
“Just as God doesn’t understand why you stopped going to church, and I have faith that our Father has called your little girl back inside to the light of His house.”
After half an hour, the girl came back. An elderly lady had driven her back home after church, and the family invited her inside to thank her. It ended up that Katie had snuck out to go to church to learn about God, and she had been wanting to go for so long; but her parents kept forgetting to take her. She hadn’t meant to scare them, but they forgave her when they heard her story.
And that next Sunday, the Hammerick’s began to go to church, for they had faith in their daughter and gained a new kind of faith in God.
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