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I mean, the topic is very broad. It could be as simple as showing the leaves of a tree withering and dying, or the spiritual death and resurrection of a new believer. It doesn’t necessarily mean you have to show someone dying–and even if you do, there’s a way to handle it in a way that doesn’t glorify it.
@ellette-giselle With that said, maybe it would be worth changing the topic to something like “death and new life” that leaves a positive note?Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again. ~ C.S. Lewis
I would have, and that’s what I have in mind, but I was limited to one word. 🤷♀️
Man is born for the fight, to be forged and molded into a sharper, finer, stronger image of God
Ohh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know that was a rule. 😅
Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again. ~ C.S. Lewis
Ooh, this is a good topic. I will try to get a story out.
"No! Monkeys should have pets, all monkeys should have pets!"
I mean, the topic is very broad. It could be as simple as showing the leaves of a tree withering and dying, or the spiritual death and resurrection of a new believer. It doesn’t necessarily mean you have to show someone dying–and even if you do, there’s a way to handle it in a way that doesn’t glorify it.
Yes, that’s how I was thinking about the prompt. Death is a part of a Christian’s life since we constantly have to “die” to ourselves. So, the prompt “death” doesn’t have to mean physical dying.
"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."~ Jim Elliot
Exactly.
Again, i was limited to one word, but that almost makes this topic broader.
Man is born for the fight, to be forged and molded into a sharper, finer, stronger image of God
Lol. This is hilarious. I finally wrote a short story I would consider submitting for this and it’s just 179 words long. Back to the drawing board. XD
You have listened to fears, child. Come, let me breathe on you... Are you brave again? -Aslan
Okay! Here’s my story! I hope it fits under the prompt!
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KRKHdtUymxACwVnKGswOJq6yXCThk_mA4qnmq0SLmYo/edit?tab=t.0
"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."~ Jim Elliot
Thanks! I just requested access
Man is born for the fight, to be forged and molded into a sharper, finer, stronger image of God
I can’t seem to get into your document, and I requested access twice……..
Man is born for the fight, to be forged and molded into a sharper, finer, stronger image of God
I just gave you access. However, I’m going to paste my whole story here. I will be pretty busy today cooking for Thanksgiving, so I won’t be able to give everyone access that quickly. So, I’ll post it here where it’s easy to read!
Life from Death
“Truly, truly, I say to you, the one who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.”
John 5:24
The broken glass crunched under my boots. I couldn’t help but wince slightly, old memories flashing back. I stood in the doorway of the small mobile home. Its interior was a mess. Bottles strewed the lone table, cards littered the floor, and dull shadows hung about the walls though it was day outside.
Like usual.
I took a few steps, closing the door behind me. Silence. It was utterly silent. I looked ahead, my eyes searching beyond my body, towards the open adjoining room. There, I saw her.
Mommy.
As the thought entered, I couldn’t help but smile. Somehow, though I had grown up, I could never stop calling her that.
She lay on her bed, covers drawn up, eyes closed in sleep. The same picture that always met my eyes upon entering. At least most of the time.
But the cast on her arm was different and new.
I sighed, not with sadness or weariness. I felt a quiet calm, a silent stillness within me. This strange, sweet Peace was something that had only recently found me.
Taking up a chair from the table, I quietly walked towards the room. Her eyes were still closed. She hadn’t heard me. I suddenly stopped a few feet from the door.
Sing for me, Ash.
I remembered her request from the last time we talked. She’d asked, but I didn’t comply. I was too angry. Too upset about what she’d told me. What she hadn’t told me. That I wasn’t her child. That I wasn’t Daddy’s child.
I remembered it all, and now I was sorry for not singing. I couldn’t change the past, but I could change the future.
I walked into her room while singing softly, setting the chair beside her bed.
“The lilies white shine by the dark, deep banks,
Calling their songs to thee,”
Her eyes opened and looked up at me. They filled with joy and sorrow. The left half of her face warped and twisted, utterly marred with scars and bruises.
“They beckon bowing down their necks,
Urging you to sing.”
“Ash.”
My voice trailed away as I sat beside her. Taking her left hand, the uninjured one, I covered it with both of mine.
“I’m here, Mommy.”
“You came,” she whispered.
“I should have come sooner,” I said, giving her pale hand the gentlest squeeze.
She abruptly turned her head away onto her pillow. “I’m hideous.”
“I don’t care.” I gazed over her shoulders to her nose. I couldn’t see her face with it turned away. “Mommy, it doesn’t matter.”
She suddenly turned back again, her eyes filling with tears. My heart leaped, though I hardly knew why.
“Ash—why do you even care?” She blurted out, tears rolling down her half-smooth, half-scarred face.
“I—” I began.
“Why would you come back for me at all?”
“You’re my mother,” I replied firmly, though tears threatened to flood my face as well. I hugged her hands. “I love you. And, I’ve come back to take care of you. And, I’m sorry for not singing when you asked me to.”
“Oh, Ash!” She buried her face into my hands.
I sat there, holding up my mother’s face, her tears sliding through my fingers. I leaned into her carefully, not wanting to jar her broken arm at all.
Sniffling, she slowly raised her head. “I’m sorry for not telling you about your parents.”
Your parents.
Despite myself, my heart clenched at the words. It still hurts.
“I do wish you’d told me sooner,” I said with a gentle smile, dispelling the hardness desiring a place in my heart.
“But—your name,” she continued, her voice still rough from the many smokes and recent lung damage, “—your name fits you.”
I wasn’t sure what she meant. I looked at her hand still held between mine. Now, I could see the wrinkles and creases etched in from age, abuse, and despair. Mommy was no longer fair and young like I remembered her to be. Somehow, I couldn’t see that when I’d last been with her…at the hospital…after the crash.
I locked my eyes with hers. “What do you mean? My…” I hesitated, “my birth name?”
“No.” She faintly shook her head. “The one your father gave you. Remember those years ago, when we rode horses together?”
I nodded a lump in my throat at remembering my childhood memory.
“I said your name, Asha van Morte, meant ‘life from death’.” She gazed at me, her face in simple earnest. “It’s true.” She removed her hand from mine and placed it on my cheek.
I stared at her, hope rising within my heart.
“It’s true,” she said again, tears in her eyes again. “You’ve changed. You’re…different. You’re not like me…you’re not like you anymore. You are life from death.”
I leaned against my chair, letting her hand slip from my cheek. I caught it with both of mine.
“Jesus changed me, Mommy.” I smiled.
For the first time, she smiled at the mention of the One who’d found me. The One who had turned my life upside down. The One who had rescued me from all the darkness I’d once lived in..from the darkness my mother was living in.
I squeezed her hand.
She wasn’t done. “The drugs, the alcohol, the attention…it doesn’t…it doesn’t…” She broke off into a flood of tears, weeping again. I sat caringly beside her, just holding her hand and being there.
“It doesn’t fill,” I finished softly.
“I should have been a better mother,” she sobbed.
“I should have been a better daughter,” I replied. “But, Mommy,” I tenderly lifted her wet face up. “We can’t change the past. It’s the past. But the future doesn’t have to be like the past. I’m proof of it! He can change us.”
“Ash—” she broke. My heart started thumping.
“You…think,” she whispered,“it might just work for me?”
Joy flooded within me, nearly bursting my heart. This was my mother speaking! She was actually saying those words. Words she said she’d never say.
“Yes, Mommy! I promise you, He will change you.”
I suddenly broke into a song, one I’d sung for her many times before, but never with these words, and never with such meaning as now. My heart never before had flowed with such a melody.
“The Lily White shines by the dark, deep banks,
Calling His Song to thee,”
He beckons bowing down His hands,
Urging you to sing.”
He was doing it! He was working in her! Like He’d said He would! He was answering my prayers! Tears welled up in my eyes as I sang. Joyful tears.
When my last note died, my mother looked into my eyes.
“You think…He will?” she asked.
“I know He will,” I replied without a shadow of doubt. “I know. He will give you life from death.”
The End
"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."~ Jim Elliot
Thanks!
Man is born for the fight, to be forged and molded into a sharper, finer, stronger image of God
@liberty oooh I loved that!
"When in doubt, eat cheese crackers."-me to my charries who don't even know about cheese crackers
Here’s my story, sorry if it isn’t great, I kind of rushed it lol.
The Final Minutes of a Dying Man
Eyes closed, he began to think.
And now, to death I go. The pain had subsided now, he couldn’t feel it much.
And as for life, what I have i to say? I laughed, cried, feared, failed, conquered, and loved. I saw many things, such lovely things, met so many different people, gained so much love and wealth. And all for what?
The smell of decay wafted through the air, and the man knew it would be the last thing he would ever smell. It was not only decay, of course, on the field. Dirt, blood, sweat, smoke, and all kinds of smells mixed into an indescribable concoction of scent, one that the man had gagged on the first day but now had become accustomed to.
Yes, it is all vain. Life in all, a vanity. A passing breath, a drop of water in the great ocean known as time. From birth to death, it all passes so fast, and then is gone. Why should my Father care for man if he breathes and dies in a blink?
Bullets flew overhead, machine guns fired; and shouts, cries, yells sounded from the men. The lull of gunshots never ended, a constant noise within the man’s ear.
And to what end do we fight? To what end do we fight and kill and die? Are we not all brothers and sisters under our Father in Heaven?
The sky was grey, smoke ridden. A fighter plane flew overhead. Around the man lay the bodies of men, many men, splotches of blood about their clothes. Most were dead, others dying. It didn’t matter.
As the man lay there, he began to recall his life. He remembered the early days of school, when life was light and jolly. He remembered the days in high school, not too long ago, when he and his friends would play baseball in the fields.
He remembered his family, his brothers and sisters, mother and father. He remembered his first sweetheart, his dog at home, his prized phonograph.
And what he remembered most vividly was the times he fought with his siblings, yelled at his parents, hurt those close to him, and the lack of time he spent with his loved ones. He felt a deep longing to go back in time to spend with them.
Funny how that happens. We think we have so much time on earth to spend it as we wish, and then when we reach our end we suddenly wish to do all the things we never did and not have done all the things we shouldn’t have done. And all the whole, thinking we have time to fix things, make them right. Oh! How foolish I have been! And here I was my whole life, thinking I had so much more left, assuming I would!
And then the doubt set in. Was God really there, with the man?
Lord, why leave me now? Where are You?
He whispered, staring at the sky, “God, where are You? Have you left me?”
And all in a moment, he felt a final throb of pain. “Lord, save me! Do not leave me!”
He felt his body stiffen, then a peace settled over him. It was over, he was leaving this earth. He shut his eyes, and exhaled.
There was darkness, then a brilliant light more real than any he had ever seen. And then there was a voice, one so filled with love and goodness the man knew immediately he was home.
“Well done, good and faithful servant.”"No! Monkeys should have pets, all monkeys should have pets!"
thanks so much!
I wish I could say things, but I’m keeping my mouth shut until I judge lolol.
Man is born for the fight, to be forged and molded into a sharper, finer, stronger image of God
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