Transplant, Chapter Seven

I could hear voices in the room. "She looks so much better!" whispered one. "See her improved color?"
"Listen to her regular breathing!" said another. "And have you noticed how even the pulse on the monitor is?"
I did not feel better! I hurt everywhere. I wondered what they meant.
"I think I might have that surgery," murmured one voice.
"I'm thinking about it, too," said the other.
I couldn't believe it. These people were crazy! How could they look at this bloody, bruised, broken mess, and want to have the same surgery?!
Jesus put one cool lhand on my forehead and checked my pulse with the other. "How are you feeling?"
I looked into His eyes, and remembered why a person would want the surgery. "Better," I said.
Little by little, the pain began to fade. Recovery room nurses with gentle hands tended me carefully. They helped me to sit, and then to stand. Lo and behold, my heart really did beat evenly. With my nurse beside me, I could walk and not feel dizzy or out of breath. It was amazing! I was getting well.
Surely the story was almost over.

To be continued. . .
Repairing the Breach,
Debbonnaire

Transplant, Chapter Six

My apologies. I have been away for a week and a half, and didn't remember what a cliffhanger I'd left this on! Forging onward:

For three endless days, He lay dead. With Him, I lay dead, too.
Then His Father called Him, and to the singing and shouting of angels, He stood again, a long scar the only sign of His ordeal, and put His own perfect heart in my chest.
Tears pouring, I decided to try His medicine. My voice shook, but I sang. And I learned it was true - the pain did not go away, but it became bearable.
"My heart is steadfast, oh, Lord," I wept. "Before the nations, I will sing. Awake my spirit, awake my spirit. I will awake at dawn of day." I could hear angels around the table singing with me, and whispering encouragement.
Stitch by careful stitch, Jesus began to connect His heart to my arteries. Sometimes I forgot to sing. "Oh, Lord, how long?" I wailed. "Can't You go faster?"
"No, My dear one. I won't risk one wrong stitch in you. Sing!"
I shut my eyes and sang. The tears didn't stop. But now I knew I had something to sing about. "Forgive me," I whispered. He smiled gently. And kept stitching. It seemed to last for years. Sometimes I faded in and out of consciousness again.
Finally I awoke and found myself in the recovery room. Disoriented, I tried to look around, but I couldn't see very well, and tubes seemed to sprout from me like weeds in a neglected garden.

To be continued. . .

Repairing the Breach,
Debbonnaire

Transplant, Chapter Five

Did I! I wanted nothing more in life than for Him to stop. The tears of hell seemed preferable. I opened my mouth to say yes. Then I saw His face. His lips trembled, and tears of anxiety stood in His eyes. "Please don't make Me stop," He whispered.
"No," I gasped. "Don't stop."
"Then sing."
"About what?" I demanded. "I don't have anything to sing about!"
He sighed.
I wept, He worked, and at long last, He lifted that ugly, stony, useless heart from my chest. Then He bared His own chest and cut a long line down its center.
I screamed again, in shock. "What are You doing?"
Through His own pain, Jesus gasped, "I'm going to give you My heart."
"But, Lord! What will happen to You? Will your own heart grow back?"
Jesus looked into my eyes and hesitated. "I believe it will," He said at last. "But if not, I am willing to die forever, if it means that you can live."
And I watched in horrified silence as He cut out His own heart, and fell to the floor, dead.

To be continued

Repairing the Breach,
Debbonnaire

Transplant, Chapter Four

"No, child," said Jesus. "I need you awake for this operation. You are the only one who can tell Me how far I may go with you. If you insist that I stop, I will do so. However, I will give you an effective medicine against the pain. If you sing praises, you will find it can be borne. You do want a new heart, don't you?"
I shut my eyes, gritted my teeth, and whispered, "Yes."
The angels held me immobile, and the Surgeon cut down the center of my chest right to the bone. I screamed. His hands never wavered. He split my sternum and held back my ribs with retractors. I shrieked and cried and sobbed.
"Sing praises," pleaded Jesus. "Sing, child!" His voice trembled with shared grief, but His hand never did, as He reached for my bulbous, diseased heart.
Sing praises! Impossible! Ridiculous! Angrily I screamed, "How could You do this to me?"
"Do you want Me to stop?"
Of course I did! Oh, how I wanted Him to stop! "No," I groaned.
One by one, He began to cut the connections that held my old heart to my body. But, oh, it took so long! When would He be finished? I faded in and out of consciousness.
He asked again, "Do you want me to stop?"

To be continued

Repairing the Breach,
Debbonnaire

Transplant, Chapter Three

When I next looked at Jesus, He was wearing a white lab coat. My smile faded in bewilderment. This had never been included in my imaginings of heaven. Angels came toward us pushing a hospital gurney, and Jesus picked me up and laid me on it.
"Lord," I faltered, "what are you doing?"
He nodded to the angels, and they began pushing me. "It's time for your heart surgery," said Jesus, and we went through a door I had not noticed before, into a brightly lighted operating room.
Heart surgery?! But - I had had the new birth! I was a whole new person! Now that He mentioned it, I knew it was true that my heart was not very regular, and breathing sometimes came hard for me. But I hadn't felt any pain since He had picked me up, down in that pit. Surely I would be all right now. Heart surgery?
Tubes and lines of life support were attached to my body. I turned my head and saw the tray of shining instruments. Scalpels of circumstance, of providence, some I couldn't identify, and of course, large and double-edged, so sharp its edge glinted in the overhead lights, the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God.
Terrified, I saw Jesus pick up a knife of circumstance and hold it over my bared chest. With a scream, I reached up to grab His hand.
"Lord! Aren't You at least going to put me to sleep?"

To be continued

Repairing the Breach,
Debbonnaire

Transplant, Chapter Three

When I next looked at Jesus, He was wearing a white lab coat. My smile faded in bewilderment. This had never been included in my imaginings of heaven. Angels came toward us pushing a hospital gurney, and Jesus picked me up and laid me on it.
"Lord," I faltered, "what are you doing?"
He nodded to the angels, and they began pushing me. "It's time for your heart surgery," said Jesus, and we went through a door I had not noticed before, into a brightly lighted operating room.
Heart surgery?! But - I had had the new birth! I was a whole new person! Now that He mentioned it, I knew it was true that my heart was not very regular, and breathing sometimes came hard for me. But I hadn't felt any pain since He had picked me up, down in that pit. Surely I would be all right now. Heart surgery?
Tubes and lines of life support were attached to my body. I turned my head and saw the tray of shining instruments. Scalpels of circumstance, of providence, some I couldn't identify, and of course, large and double-edged, so sharp its edge glinted in the overhead lights, the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God.
Terrified, I saw Jesus pick up a knife of circumstance and hold it over my bared chest. With a scream, I reached up to grab His hand.
"Lord! Aren't You at least going to put me to sleep?"

To be continued

Repairing the Breach,
Debbonnaire

Transplant, Chapter Two

. . . He scooped me up in His powerful arms and carried me away with Him.
He carried me to heaven. To heaven! Right into His holy Father's presence. I hid my still-crying eyes in His shoulder against the blinding light, but Jesus set me down, and I stood there trembling. Angels hurried toward us, and when I sneaked glances at their faces, instead of seeing the disgust I expected, I saw such shining joy that I was blinded again.
The Holy Spirit wrapped me in arms of tenderness and peace, like the love of a thousand mothers in one Being, and between them, Father, Son, and Spirit took away my putrefying rags and burned them.
A stream of water like melted diamonds rushed and flashed from the mighty throne, and They immersed me in it, scrubbing with tender but thorough hands. I watched as the accumulated filth and crust flowed away from me and was lost forevcer. I was taken out of the water, dried in life-giving light and warmth, and dressed in a white robe that I fingered in awe. Soft as satin, thick as wool, light as. . . light! The same thing Jesus was wearing, in fact.
Then They made me drink from the water, too, glass after sparkling glass, until I felt the bubble and flash of new life flowing through every vein and capillary. Standing once more before the Father - before my Father - I wondered, was this really me? Would I wake up and find it was only a delusion?
Nervously, I looked around, and for the first time, saw clearly the faces of those who surrounded me. Every face was wreathed in smiles of delight and joy and love. The angels wrapped themselves in their wings and bowed before the throne, and I bowed with them. Then they burst into songs of praise, and through new tears, I sang too.
It was true! This was the real, new me!
I thought the story was over.

To be continued

Repairing the Breach,
Debbonnaire

A New Direction

Frequently, when I tell a children's story at church, adults come up to me to thank me, telling me that my way of putting the principles of faith and God's love into visual images helps them, too. So some years ago I had the idea of beginning a series of small booklets called Pictures of Salvation: For People Who Don't Like Big Words. I have three of these written, and several more in my head, but never quite knew what to do with them or how to market them. Today is your lucky day! I've decided to publish them in serial form, here on my blog, free for all. If you should decide you would like a booklet of your own, you may contact me for information and I will send one for any size of donation to cover my postage, handling, paper, and ink.
The first one I'm going to publish here was actually Book Two, but it fits with what I've said so far in this meandering journal. It's a "told" story, not in my usual fictional style as the others will be.
Warning: It's pretty intense. Some people don't like it.

TRANSPLANT
copyright 1999
Please do not use any portion without permission. Don't worry - I'll likely give it. I just want to know.

Once upon a time, I was in hell. For me hell was not a place of flames and heat, but of bitter cold, deathly blackness, slime and smell and heartbreaking loneliness. It was a place where I huddled into myself, a place where breathing and sobbing meant the same thing.
Jesus has been to hell too. I know because He came there to get me. He came right through that thick, black, slimy wall as if it weren't there, and with Him came light and warmth. Hell was uglier than ever now that I could see it in His light. I looked around in revulsion, and then down at myself. I realized with horror that I was filthier and uglier and bloodier than my surroundings.
Miserably, I tried to scuttle back into a darker corner so He wouldn't see me, but He came directly to my side and held out His arms to me. I stared at Him, uncomprehending.
"Come here, child," He said gently.
I held up my arms like a baby, and He scooped me up in His powerful arms and carried me away. . .

to be continued

Repairing the Breach,
Debbonnaire