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“I hadn’t thought of it that way.”
“I’m just asking. You know, God can work everything out for your good and His glory, even accidents that aren’t really accidents, if we allow it. Now, Peter will probably have pain for the rest of his life, broken bones often do that. And he might have issues with his concussion or other things we don’t even know about. But those might be things that God wants Peter to learn to deal with. And He just used this as the vehicle for Peter to be in a position where God wanted him. I mean, do we believe that all things work together for good?”
“All things. As in everything. That’s a good point. Even accidents that happen on purpose can turn out for our good. Even things that feel like they shouldn’t happen, like Peter being in pain, I see what you’re saying. I just... You know you want someone to blame. You want someone to take responsibility.”
“And Norma Jean should, if she was the one who opened the gate. Or whoever did. If it was on purpose especially, but taking the blame, taking responsibility, and facing up to what you did are all good things. And I wouldn’t say that she shouldn’t do it. But I am saying that you don’t want to spend your life bitter and angry because something happened to you. You want to accept the fact that God allowed it.”
“Right. I’m glad you said that, because while I don’t think I am upset to the point of bitterness, I do think that if Norma Jean opened that gate, she needs to... I don’t know.”
“You need to let God handle what lesson that she needs to learn, right?”
“Sometimes if we’re not punished, we keep doing things. I guess that’s what my problem is with forgiveness. I feel like people should be punished.”
“I can see that. I mean, a parent punishes their child so that they don’t continue to do wrong things, but it’s not an adult’s responsibility to punish another adult.”
“Unless they committed a crime.”
“True. Although, I feel like Christians can say that if they feel like the person is remorseful and regretful, that there doesn’t need to be a punishment. God will take care of the vengeance. After all, you can’t take the accident back.”
“True. I guess... If the government requires punishment, it’s okay. But it’s not up to a Christian to punish other Christians?”
“You might be getting in a little bit over my head.” Lana knew there was a line there, but she just wasn’t sure where it was.
“Mine too. Because I keep thinking of Old Testament law, and there were definitely punishments for crimes. But Christians are supposed to forgive. We’re not supposed to exact vengeance. That’s supposed to be up to the Lord.”
“Those are the things that we know. Things I can say for certain.”
“It’s not really my position to make a decision anyway. That’s Peter’s place.”
“If I’m not mistaken, you’re going to have a good bit of influence over Peter.”
Sally huffed out a bit of a laugh, and Lana squeezed her. “I don’t know. I do really love spending time with him. He is...funny even when he’s in pain. In fact, he seemed to make a concerted effort to not be grumpy. I kept thinking that if I hurt as bad as he must, I would hardly be fit to be around, but he kept cracking jokes and making me laugh. Which I hated because then when he laughed, he hurt his ribs, and he would groan almost every time.”
“Men. They’ll do anything to make a girl laugh.”
“Really? Any girl?”
“No. If you’ve got a good man, he’s only concerned about making one girl laugh.”
“I think Peter is a good man.”
“I think you’ve got yourself a good man too.”
“Oh, he’s not mine,” Sally was quick to point out.
“You don’t think so?”
“No.”
“He’s letting you take care of him, isn’t he?”
“Well, yeah. So far. But he doesn’t really have anyone else.”
“Oh, Peter could hire someone, so could Franklin. Neither one of those boys are struggling for money. And there are plenty of ladies in town who wouldn’t mind going out and earning some extra.”
“If you say so.”
“I do.”
