Previous Challenge Entry (Level 4 – Masters)
Topic: QUESTION (S) (05/30/19)
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TITLE: The Core Four | Previous Challenge Entry
By Jack Taylor
06/01/19 -
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Dilly Walker shifted his basketball behind his back and hunched over a quivering young woman to comfort her. “Megan, no one should have to bury their lover to deal with their core four.”
Megan stretched in her high heels and reached up to hug the neck of the star center. With her dress threatening to ride up her thighs she settled for resting her hands on his shoulders. “Whatever are you jabbering about Dilly?”
“Girl, I know you and Winston had a faith thing going on and that he kept your heart on a string. He sent me a picture of the ring he bought a second before that drunk T-boned him.”
“I told him a hundred times not to text and drive.” Megan lowered her gaze. “It was supposed to be tonight. Instead, I’m laying roses on a casket. What did you mean by the core four?”
“The four core questions.”
“I still don’t get it. Dilly, don’t play with my mind. Not today.”
Dilly pulled the basketball out front and held it to Megan. “Hold this. The four core questions are questions everyone has to answer in life. Winston was going to ask you those questions when he proposed.”
“Just tell me what they were.”
Dilly lifted his face to the sky as the first drops fell. He snuggled his Warriors cap a little tighter. “This is the way I heard it from Winston. ‘Who are you? Where did you come from? Why are you here? And Where are you going?”
Megan shuffled under the canopy as spots of moisture dotted her black dress. “Identity, Origin, Purpose and Destiny. Yeah, I remember him trying to hammer those things into our heads at Bible study. I don’t remember him calling them the core four.”
“So, did you ever fully answer the questions? Winston said you’d had some hard conversations and he needed to make sure where you were at.”
Megan slumped into a chair and cradled her temples in her hands. “Why did I wait so long? He’s been asking me these questions for two years now. I went to church almost every week, I went to his Bible studies, I even put money in the offering. It was never enough.”
“All he wanted you to know is Jesus.”
“I get that. He wanted me to say I’m a child of God and Jesus made me just the way he wanted me to be. He wanted me to say I’m here to love Jesus and that one day I’m going to be with Jesus forever.”
“Why was that so hard to say?”
“Because it wasn’t true until last night.” Megan stood and hugged herself against the wind. “Before then, I just wanted to be with Winston. I grew up in an Atheist home and majored in science. I never had to deal with those questions seriously until the accident.”
“So, now you know.”
“I’m not sure what I know. Right now, I just want to cry and scream out to God, “Why?”
“I’m sure he’s listening.”
“Why should I answer his questions before he answers mine?”
That’s a good question.”
“Why should I love someone who takes the one I love?”
“Another good question.”
“If I’ve got so many good questions, why doesn’t anyone have good answers?”
“Sometimes we have to trust and wait. The best I can do is to sit with you and say he loves you even now.”
Megan leaned into Dilly and let the tears flow. “Everyone at the service talked like they were so sure they were going to see Winston again. Even his sister said that because of Jesus’ rising from the dead that she was more sure she would see her brother again than she was sure that she would get home again today.”
“You can be just as sure.”
“Dilly, I know Winston didn’t want me to answer his questions just to make him happy. For him, it was about loving Jesus first. I guess he showed me enough.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I guess I need to answer my core four. I just have one question.”
“What’s that?”
“Will you help me find the answers?”
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