That layman who served the wine called his wife to meet me and shared that I had just gotten born again. I didn’t pay attention to what he said about me as I was just happy to be happy again! My children and I were the last to leave the courtyard as I had such a good time talking to anybody and everybody. I don’t think it occurred to me to tell Dan about the events of my morning, but he must have noticed something different as the next Sunday, he attended church. During coffee, the layman’s wife pulled me into a little knot of women and asked if we could have a ladies luncheon at her home sometime before Thursday this next week. I mentioned a day I preferred, and the three of them immediately chimed in that they also had that day available. I noticed Dan speaking with the layman at the same time, but I didn’t catch that there was a plot afoot. Pleased to be invited out after such a long hibernation, I appreciated my hostess’ elaborate place settings and preparation for a ladies luncheon for just four women. Then the other shoe dropped. They explained they were graduates of a little course called Cursillo. It had totally changed their lives, and they said another one was taking place in three weeks’ time. Would I like to go?
Since my experience at the altar, things had been changing as if I’d entered some other dimension because it wasn’t me who now pushed me around from the inside. There was another force involved in my life. So I wasn’t too surprised when this other entity in me expressed a desire to attend; I just didn’t know how to work with this condition. So I hemmed and hawed around a “maybe” answer. Then my hostess dropped the bombshell. “The men’s weekend starts this Thursday night, and it is required that the husband attend a Cursillo before the wife is allowed to be a candidate.” What?!!! That deceitful wretch who ruined my life would be preferred before me? My consternation must have spread over not only my face but my entire body as my hostess hurriedly explained. “We have no trouble getting women to attend because they have a desire for the Lord, but if we don’t make the men go first, then we would have very few men attend. If the truth is told, however, it is the men who change the most, but we have to put the pressure of the wife on them to get them to go. Do you think Dan would attend?” I went home and asked. “Yeah. I’m already signed up. That guy at church called today, and I said ‘Yes.’” Suddenly, panic seized me. “Don’t do anything to embarrass me.” His eyes fired cruel hatred when he replied. “I want to get rid of this thing as much as you want it.” Dan was not allowed to do anything for himself. They picked him up, made him leave his keys at home, carried his suitcase, and off he went. Sunday night when he returned, I answered the front door and saw Dan and his “escort,” arms around each other, crying, standing like two wet noodles. The man pushed Dan through the door, closed it, and left without a word to me. Disgusted, I perceived the “escort” had been a closet homosexual, and the two had “discovered” each other. But when I reached out and touched Dan’s arm, it felt like my fingers sank into warm butter. And the softness wasn’t just on the outside. He led me into the bedroom and made the most exquisite love to me. Then he soaked in the bathtub for three hours, singing praises to God through his tears, finally coming to bed at one in the morning. He really didn’t talk to me for the next two weeks, but he gave me a key as to what happened to him. He said he simply sat back and observed, didn’t participate at all. But late Saturday night they took the men, thirty attendees, next door to a chapel. They gave each man a little piece of paper and a pencil and asked them to write down all their sins. Dan said he wondered how he could get all of his sins on such a small piece of paper. But he wrote something. Then they asked the men to come up in groups of four to the wooden cross they had laid on the steps to the altar, a cross about twelve feet high with at least a four-foot crossbeam. They gave each man a hammer and a nail and asked them to nail their sins to the cross. Dan watched for a while and then felt someone behind him put a hand on his shoulder. At about the time Dan was thinking, “Why not?” a voice asked, “Why not?” Standing, he saw no one behind him. When he came back to his seat, he started crying, and as far as I know, he kept right on crying. I don’t know what he did at work, but at home the tears flowed freely. The kids asked behind his back if anything was wrong with Daddy. I said, “No, nothing’s wrong and whatever has happened to him is really good.”
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Marty
Delmon Writer
Evangelist Teacher Writing has been in my blood, so to speak, but when I surren-dered my life to Jesus Christ and He told me to write, all my trepidations rolled away and I began in earnest! After all, if God Almighty says it was His idea that I be a writer, who am I to stand in His way? My hope is that you not only like what I write, but that your life is moved by it, and that your party to Jesus and with Jesus turns your life into days of Heaven on Earth.
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