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But no. Janie had waited until Hunter had dug beneath the layers of his own livid resentment and found that it’d been love turned wrong side out the whole time. She’d waited for him to see that she was it for him, forever.Thenshe’d decided to try dating again . . . with someone else.
Was she doing this on purpose? Was this calculated torment?
Not his Janie, the sweet girl who had given him comfort when he’d been barely a young man. Not the tender one who had come up to histrash-can trailerand took his side about the lodge, even when it meant crossing her best friend. Not the generous woman who had readily volunteered to cater his groundbreaking party only days before . . .
But maybe the woman he’d labeledvampirein his contact list last fall.
Rolling his fists, Hunter brought them to his forehead and groaned against the agony of this twisted mess.
“God, I’m a weak man. A broken man.” His lips trembled as he whispered into the dark emptiness of his room. “I don’t know how to handle this.” With a shuddering breath, he lay his hands flat against his face. “I don’t think I can. Not without being ugly.”
He let that honest confession settle into the chill of the autumn mountain night. It felt desperate and hollow, and he yearned for the hope that had filled him when he’d asked Jesus to save him to pour back into the empty places.
“Please, God . . .” His hands slid from his face and rested on his chest. “Walk this hard path with me.”
Not knowing if the King of everything would lower himself to such a unworthy request, Hunter let it lie there in the vacancy between this lonely Montana night and the kingdom of heaven.
Surprisingly, he drifted to sleep, the ache still there but the untethered recklessness abated.
Nineteen
Sittingatthebackof the small church felt strange for several reasons. The first was that it’d been years since Hunter had done such a thing. The second, he sat alone in an old wooden pew near the far west stained-glass window located nearest the exit. When he had attended a service, it had always been in company with Mama B, Hazel, and Janie. Third pew, east side, near the aisle. That had been the standard seating arrangement.
That hadn’t changed for the Truitts. There both women sat, Mama B at the end of the pew, her lovely grown daughter at her side.
Hunter swallowed, his eyes resting on that glossy dark hair. Thick tresses hung just past Janie’s shoulders, curling at the ends. She rarely wore it down. Hunter’s fingers twitched with the desire to feel the soft fullness. Once upon a time he’d owned the privilege to run his rough hands through the length of it. He used to love tugging her ponytail free. It didn’t take much for him to remember the scent of sweet apples from her favorite shampoo. The smell of anything apple—from candles to cider—had since taken him back to her.
Inhaling, half expecting to pick up the scent of apples even though five pews and a three-foot aisle were between them, Hunter experienced a contradiction of relief and disappointment at the almond-vanilla that hit him instead. Likely that came from Jeremy’s wife, Leslie, as the couple sat directly in front of him.
Man, he needed to move his mind away from Janie Truitt. He’d come to church to learn more about God. And truly, he knew a hunger for knowing more. It shouldn’t be this hard to set his mind on the preacher at the front.
When reaching for discipline failed though, Hunter let his attention slide back to Janie and then onto the broad shoulders belonging to the man on her left.
Grady Briggs was a church man apparently. Or he came to impress Janie. Hunter didn’t know the other man well enough to know which would be the likelier case, but the snide, ugly part of him wanted to assume the latter.
And why are you here?
Ah. That. The sharp thought finally did the job of redirecting Hunter’s attention. Not to impress Janie. Not to stare at her and speculate about Grady. He’d come to worship the God who had brought salvation to his soul.
The man at the front adjusted his glasses, ran a finger along the page of his open Bible, and began to read. “‘Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.’
“Hear the word of the Lord from Psalm 37. Let us set our minds on it, determine in our hearts that we will listen. Lord, let us hear Your voice.” Pastor Dunham lifted his eyes from the page and scanned his small flock. The building would hold barely more than fifty, but the seats were full. This man had served tiny Luna as a spiritual guide for as long as Hunter could remember.
He wondered, when Pastor’s slow gaze passed over Hunter, if the man knew who Hunter was. For some reason he hoped so.
“Sometimes it is easy to take the Word of God and make it say what we wish, don’t you think?” Pastor tapped the page he’d read from, then chuckled. “This verse here, for example—‘Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will grant the desires of your heart.’” He shook his head. “Ah, my friends, if you knew the way the younger version of your pastor had twisted that . . . you perhaps would not think much of him as a pastor! I used to think that meant that if I made sure I didn’t swear while I played football, and I made sure I said that God gave me the athletic gift, then He’d make sure I was successful.”
Taking both sides of the pulpit, Pastor leaned forward. “Guess what? I played one year at Montana State, and then I was cut. Lost my scholarship—which I was pretty sure was God’s payment for my being such a good Christian athlete—to a guy who swore like a sailor and took all the credit for his playing skills for himself.” He stepped back and folded his arms—which still held the bulk of an impressive lineman—and shook his head. “That didn’t seem very fair of God at all. Nor did it match what I had made this verse out to be. And you know what? I wasmadabout it. Me and God, we had a pretty good standoff.”
Amusement sparkled in his eyes as he leaned back toward his congregation. “Guess who won?” He laughed. “Here I am, so it shouldn’t be much of a mystery.
“Here’s the thing, my beloved friends. We have to take all of what God says, or none of it. So in this passage here, we need to hear the whole of it. Let’s look at the verbs.Trust. Do good. Delight. Commit. Trust, again. Sounds like a little more like a lifestyle and not so much like a trade contract, doesn’t it? And what does it say God will do? Look at the end of this list—He will make our righteousness shine. That’sHisendgame. He wants whatever we do, and whatever we go through—and make no mistake, Heallowsus to walk those paths, whether hard or easy—He wants the end of our stories to be the kind that bring Him glory because He makes us better people for His kingdom. That’s a little different than I give a few nods to God and He gives me what I want, isn’t it?”
Pastor rubbed his thinning hair and sighed. “To be honest, guys, sometimes I still wish He’d have let me be the all-star ballplayer I had wanted to be. But then I have to step back and take stock. If I had been, would I have ended up in a crisis of faith that eventually led me to deeper study, and that led me to seminary and then ministry? Would a path of football glory taken me here, to you?” He shook his head. “I don’t know, but I can say that it wasn’t in my game plan for God. See, He had something for me to do that I didn’t understand. I couldn’t have even imagined it. But standing here now, having been with you all for over twenty years, I can tell you honestly, I wouldn’t change what I’m doing, the life I have now, and most importantly, the walk I enjoy with God.
“So what does that mean for you? I don’t know—I’m not here to tell you to stop chasing your dreams and ambitions. I don’t know if they are God’s dreams for you or not—that’s not for me to say. The only way you’re going to know is to listen to Him. To do what He says here. Trust Him. Do good as you go. Delight in Him—just in being in His presence. Let it fill you with joy. Commit to following Him—whether He takes you to your dreams or a different way entirely. And trust Him to complete the good work He has started in you. To make you worthy of His kingdom, useful to His plans.
“A trophy of His grace.
