Sacred Scrolls; Chapter 36

 

Sacred Scrolls; Chapter 36

© 2021 by Amber Wright

INSIDE THE PRISON

“Here?” Lucius felt his old sneer returning.

“The guards say I can sleep here if I feed the prisoners,” Eli told him importantly with a tug on his hand. “So I do. Come on. It’s safe.”

Safe to sleep inside a Roman prison? Lucius felt his sneer deepen. Oh, the irony. I suppose it won’t hurt. No Roman hounds would think to look for me here—in one of their own prisons. He stifled a laugh at the thought of seeing his face just now. It was probably pale, drawn or flushed red. However horrible he looked, he hoped his face would not give him away. He was not a criminal, but the Romans thought all Christians were. At least, the emperor thought so and he pulled the strings to how things went in the empire.

Lucius calmly followed Eli as if he slept in prisons all the time. Actually, it would be his first and he dreaded it already. How strange life had become.

At the door, Eli explained to the guard that he had brought a friend.

“How old are you?” the guard asked him.

Lucius met the man's eyes bravely. “Fifteen.”

“You could enter the Roman Militia School. Have you considered?”

“I,” Lucius felt his face grow hot and he grasped his mind for the rights words to say. “I never thought about it.”

Before the guard would ask him any more questions, Eli was yanking on his hand. “We have to feed the prisoners. Excuse us, sir.”

The guard smiled, “Excused.”

“Up here's the kitchen,” Eli pointed to the spiral staircase lined with torches.

They were taking the first few steps when a girl in an orange robe came walking down the steps with a tray of food. Her hair was light golden and her pink cheeks contrasted her pale, thin features. Lucius blinked, backing up against the wall to let her pass. She gave him a thankful smile as she passed him and he felt his heart leap into his throat, trying in vain to smile back. He stood there gaping stupidly and never managed even a hint of a smile much less a nod of greeting. He watched her silently walk down the steps with her tray, her orange robe swirling and her head disappear into an arched stone doorway.

“We have to feed the prisoners!” Eli was yanking on his arm again.

Lucius blinked again—this time back to reality. Yes, time to feed the prisoners and sleep inside these Roman prison walls. As long as they don't chop my head off when I'm asleep! A yawn escaped him as he climbed the steps to catch up with Eli. The boy had been a fast walker when he had been a cripple and now he was even faster.

“Eli?” Lucius felt as tired as an old man, stifling another yawn.

Eli only glanced back at him with a peppery smile, “Yes, she's very pretty, isn't she?” before bounding up the steps and out of sight.

Lucius sighed. That was not what he had meant—then. But he was so tired, he didn't care to explain to the little boy. Time to feed the prisoners. Get some sleep. Where were his feet muscles when he needed them the most?

~

Whiffft the wind whistled through the cracks of the clay and straw of the hut where Demetrius slept. Unnerved by the grating noise, he sat up on the cot, stretched his upper torso and flung his feet to the drafty floor. His arms and legs ached, the combination of overworked muscles and the cold weather. Whiffft the wind whistled louder, colder, fiercer.

Less than a week had passed since he had been in Patmos and already it seemed like a hundred weeks had faded by. He felt that old, decrepit, wasted. How he was awake he did not know. Every bone in his body ached, not including his muscles. He knew what hard work was but this was madness. From dawn until dusk, they worked the mines. I never expected that being a prisoner made you feel wise. You've been through things that you'll never forget. Like never breathing free air. Being bound. Trapped inside this Roman cage. To live in rocky Patmos surrounded by water—and, most likely, no escape. He glanced around at the inmates in the hut. They were all asleep. He should be, too. But he felt too restless, achy, tired in body but too awake in the mind. Ignoring the aching of his knees as he stood, Demetrius moved to the little window facing the mostly full moon and pulled back the leather flap to get a better view. It was a beauty, etched into a sky of black, speckled with white stars, wispy clouds passing over it. Even the moon was free. Why couldn't he be?

Outside, the mine was as silent as the catacombs and just as eerie. Jagged rocks and their shadows made the place look haunted, a mist rising from the cold earth. The wind whistled yet more strangely through the towering rocks and surrounding caves, even from under the earth's surface where the lower mines started. The island was one large piece of rock. How far could they mine before the entire land caved in?

Demetrius took one last look at the moon. It glowed through a mystic-like mist now, the milky air chilling his face. He silently breathed, hoping his muscles would relax and he could get some sleep. Dawn was only mere hours away.

The scene before him captivated him. If he had not been a prisoner, he would have found this rocky island to be a very interesting place to relax, explore and unwind from a busy day working with a thin quill beneath his tense fingers. But this rocky island was his prison and his place to die, become dust, be forgotten among the other dead who had been here before him. The thought jarred him and he found himself gripping the windowsill with a frantic fit of blinking. Soon he too would be a memory to those who knew him—if they were even alive. He blinked that thought away. No reason to be alive if they were dead, he sighed. Soon, with time, he would be another corpse's dust to mingle into this dirt of Patmos. Bile rose in his throat.

“Please no, God.” Demetrius lowered his head onto his twisted fists, his whisper echoing into his ears and a nervous pain shooting through his sides, “Can the dead praise You? Can the dead declare Your Name unto the lost? This is my reason to live. I will live for this!”

Chilly wind ruffled the hair over his forehead and blew against his closed eyelids. Whiffft, the noise surrounded him. For a moment he could not think as he listened to the whirling wind sing its wordless song. The bile and pain in his stomach calmed. The nerves in his forehead relaxed, were soothed.

Words trickled into his mind from the John Scroll, the same scroll he had given to Junia mere weeks before. Behold the hour...is now come that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own... These things I have spoken unto you that in Me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer I have overcome the world. He felt his skin prickle. Were those words only his subconscious? Or was it a voice whispering to him? They felt so real, those words. A surreal peace rushed inside him, calming all of his fears. He would conquer, in time. “Be of good cheer, I have overcome—and I shall overcome.”

~

When the last prisoners had been fed, Lucius sighed in relief. Sleep would soon arrive.

“I’m almost ready!” and Eli ran back up the stone steps to the prison’s kitchen to return the last tray.

They had fed all the prisoners but one. That prisoner had been fed by the girl who had come down the steps. She was still in there, talking to an old man sitting on the pallet on the floor. The old man's voice sounded familiar as his words drifted from the cell in spurts. Lucius could not make out what he was saying so he edged closer to the cell, trying to get a good look at the man who was half hidden by the girl. She stood there, silent, listening, respectfully, the tray hanging at her side. Who was she? And who was the old man prisoner?

When the old man prisoner looked up, the weary blanket of fatigue ripped from Lucius and two thoughts pounded into him, Is my journey at its end? And will my search die within these walls? He felt cold iron beneath his fingers and realized he gripped the cell bars. “Elder John?”

“Yes, Lucius.” Elder John gave him a smile, crinkling the edges of his blue eyes. “I was expecting you.”

Lucius felt his jaw drop. From nowhere, a rush of tears blinded him. Elder John had been expecting him. God valued him that much—Lucius, son of the traitor Demas—that He told Elder John he was coming. The thought shook his entire being as he stood there, tears dripping down his face and a feeling of worthiness roll through him. He was valued. He was cared for. God cared. Or did He? Everything became a blur. The only thing he could see was the girl's orange robe.

Hands gripped his shoulders, and Lucius looked up to find Elder John peering at him through the iron prison bars with a thoughtful expression.

“Lucius,” Elder John's voice was gentle. “Your search has ended. And Jesus is always waiting at the end of every journey. Never forget. Take heart.”

A hotness rolled through him and he gasped for air, overcome with the moment. Elder John was right. But what about his mother? Elder John's imprisonment? The dead Christians? The rest? Did God will that to happen? Had God been at the end of their journeys, too? If so, why had He not helped them? Confusion whirled inside him.

“But m-my mother—she's dead!” Lucius felt his voice choking him, every emotion piling out from him at once. His words tumbled into a blubber, “How can Jesus be waiting for me on this journey?”

“How was she killed?”

“St-stabbed by m-my father,” Lucius closed his eyes and his head flopped against the prison bars. “Demetrius of Ephesus, robber, murderer, traitor!”

Elder John gripped onto his shoulders more tightly. “Lucius, the pain is never easy but every pain has its reward. Always remember, out of pain comes life. And you will see your mother again.”

Lucius sniffed against the cold iron bars in reply. It's no use trying to comfort me when there's nothing to comfort me with.

“That morning,” Elder John continued, “when the Master was nailed to the cross, He endured the pain. Why? Because He knew it would bring forth life.”

Why tell me this? I know it all. But Lucius moved his eyes up to look at Elder John. The old man's face was trembling, eyes alight. Something deep inside Lucius moved him.

“And it wasn't just the pain of nails and thorny crown that He felt, that killed Him.” A pause. Elder John's voice cracked but still he went on as if the story had to be told—even if saying it hurt him, killed him. “No, it was the pain of our sins. My sins! That broke His heart. That killed him.”

Lucius watched Elder John close his eyes, sigh painfully and open his eyes again.

“We killed him—our Savior, our Redeemer! The One Who only is life. The One Who healed us and raised our dead. But what did He do?”

Lucius gripped the iron bars even tighter.

“He gave us His life in exchange—for us.”

Lucius felt his heart pounding strangely now. He thought it had been the Romans who had killed Jesus. He thought it had been the Jewish priests who had cried for His blood. But no, I killed Him with my sins? How did I? His painful thoughts spiraled through space...through time. Was he guilty or free? He heard his strained voice ask, “What happened then?”

“What happened then?” Elder John's voice sounded faraway, as if he was still in that distant land where Lucius had never been. “We were standing there, beneath Him, watching Him die, cursing the Romans and the Jewish priests from inside our hearts and then...” His next words were shaking, “And then Jesus looked down at us—His friends!—and spoke those words. Pah'tehr,

forgive them for they know not what they do.”

Lucius felt his mind scream. He had called his father a murderer and yet he, Lucius of Lydia, had murdered the Life-Giver—with his sins, by not fully believing that Jesus was always there for him as He had promised. His forehead vibrated against the iron bars of the prison...and he felt the chains of his inner prison cell jingle. In his mind, he saw a Man holding the keys to unlock the iron door of his heart. It was Jesus, waiting patiently at the end of his long and dark journey, ready to set him free.

“My God!” Lucius felt his knees jar onto the stone floor, his hands sliding down the iron bars, his whisper piercing into his ears, “Forgive me, Pah'tehr!”

~

They were making the huts now. Junia noticed Tiria seemed to be enjoying every minute of it. The girl actually looked happy working.

“This is fascinating!” Tiria examined her mud-caked palms. “It’s amazing how this sticky mud sticks everything together.”

“Like God’s love.” Junia smiled, rubbing her palms across the new hut wall to smooth it. The sticky mud sucked in all the loose ends of the sticks and thick boughs, smoothing it all into a nice, flat wall. “It builds, protects and preserves.”

“When it is dry,” Dalmatia explained to them, “inside the hut will be warm, dry and sturdy no matter how many storms enters the cavern.”

“Who gets this one?” Tarsus tugged at the hardening piece of mud between her fingers.

“I don’t know.” Dalmatia thrust her hands into the bucket of water again. With slick hands, she smoothed the walls evenly with the others.

“Anyone thirsty?” Judith walked up with a bucket of drinking water and a gourd. “I’ll pour it into your mouths.”

Junia started choking as Judith dumped in her mouthful of water. With long, slow breaths, her breath soon steadied. “Thank you.”

~

“Then you must go—quickly,” Elder John told them. “All of you.”

“But—” This was the reason why he had come to Rome—to bring Elder John back to Ephesus with him. Lucius felt panic through him, words jumbling out from him.

Elder John held up a hand to quiet him. “I am in God’s hands. Do not worry about me.” He abruptly nodded once, but with a smile.

Lucius looked back at the slave girl who had fed Elder John. Her eyes were rimmed with red and her shoulders jerked with hiccups. She had overheard Emperor Domitian telling one of his officers to arrest her father. Now, the girl’s parents were waiting in the alleyway just outside the prison secret door, packed and ready to go. They only had one chance, and that was now. But he could not leave Elder John here, could he?

“God be with you, John.” The girl shook Elder John's hand with a shaky voice.

“Aren’t you coming, too?” Eli tugged on his sleeve, looking strangely frightened for the usually fearless boy.

“Yes,” Lucius mustered a smile. “And you come with me, right?”

“Right,” Eli turned to tug on the slave girl’s sleeve. “We’re coming with you to protect you.”

“T-thank y-you,” the girl tried to smile as she stuttered.

“Lucius.” Lucius shook her trembling hand.

“I’m Eli.” Eli said proudly, smiling. “What’s your name?”

“Julia.”

“My prayers will go with you.” Elder John told them, clasping each of their hands warmly. “And God will walk beside you, hiding you in the shadow of His wings. Shalom.”

“Shalom,” Lucius swallowed both the lump forming in his throat and his pride. He was going back. Back to the Lydian mountains where the others were hiding. Back to where his father was. He was going back—without Elder John.

“Thank you,” Julia’s voice was a raspy whisper.

“You are welcome.” Elder John’s smile twinkled. “Now go. God’s blessings be upon you all! Give my love to the brethren.”

Lucius watched him wave from his cell, and the last image of this kind but firm disciple of Jesus’ was a smile across his weathered face. He swallowed again, Will I ever see him again? He blinked the thought away. Julia’s parents were waiting for them. They still had a long ways to travel until they would be safe. For now, their thoughts—his thoughts—had to be of escape, plans to survive, always moving forward, get back alive.

A Few Greek Words:

Fil'os: friend

Meh'tehr: mother

Pah'tehr: father

Adher'fi: sister

Adher'fos: brother