The Peace of Love

Darren had found refuge in his Father’s arms, outstretched and waiting for the wayward child to come home. Home to Him. Home. Home for the first time. This cell was not a home that Darren, aka Fester, had envisioned as a place to live out his life. Maybe, for his father, but never for him. The choice was initiated when he crossed that line between obeying the law and defying it. Learning no distinction, prison was ever in his subconscious to be his home one day, but only temporarily. He had seen what his father had done, oftentimes skirting around prison terms with unethical lawyers: those making big bucks for illegal dealings; making plea bargains and exchanging money in the meantime. Prison now was not his temporary home, but the place he would eat, sleep, and work for the rest of his life. But in reality, Darren Moore had already lived his life in prison; barred in by his actions long before setting foot in this federal institution. The prison he lived in for most of his life was the one he constructed himself. Picking up the journal Gabe had left behind, he flipped hastily through the pages. Though he tried to talk to God, it was difficult…never having done so before. Fact was, Darren had uttered His name only in curses. This way of living was strange to him, and Nathan had explained that it would be. There would be days he’d feel like a failure; and in such times, God would be there waiting patiently. Darren continued flipping through the pages when something suddenly caught his attention, begging him to that page. He knew it was not his doing, but something more that made that page stand out. “Father God, please help me. I don’t know if I can read this now…” As soon as he cried his utterance, a whisper sounded. ‘My son, start with little and much will be given you…’ Looking about his cell, he saw no one. Walking to the bars and peering through them was just as futile, for no person was there. Was he going crazy? Or was God really listening? Darren had heard whispers similar to these at the trial. Wiping his tear-filled eyes on the sleeve of his shirt, he glanced down and began reading.

To Fester Moore,

It has taken me most of my adulthood to write down the feelings I have toward you. At first, I hated you with a vengeance for what you did to Mom. You broke her spirit and made her feel worthless. No more! I know that hatred is of the devil, destroying all decency in a person. It took me a long time to come to terms with this, and in so doing…I have grown. No longer do you have that hold on me. I now know the richness and beauty of the love from a Father who will never leave me. He loves me unconditionally; something you would never do. How I wished you would! Even though it has taken me years…

The reading stopped. Darren could not go on; his emotions tugging at his heart. Never had he let them control him; rather, he controlled them. Always hiding the tears when they came, no matter how much the hurt. He learned this from his father. “But Daddy, it hurts. I can’t do it any more.” “What kind of son are you? You can’t quit on me, boy. There’s too many more loads of dirt to move and haul off. Don’t you quit on me, you hear…keep that wheelbarrow moving or we don’t get paid. Now, hush up and get moving.” Darren remembered the time; a time he’d much rather forget. He was only seven when his father took him to his job site forcing him to do work geared for a man…a man with strength and endurance that a young child did not have. “Other kids don’t have to work as hard as you do. You see, Fester boy, there’s those of us with no skills, so we take what jobs come. I don’t want to hear no more. You’ll do as I say. Because, boy, if you don’t, it’ll be a long night without eating. Hear me?” Darren remembered all too well the way he hurt. The wheelbarrow full of dirt was heavy, so loaded down it constantly stuck in the ruts made by the trucks that came on the site. It was only after the wheelbarrow tipped, losing some contents that Darren realized the intensity of the anger that was bottled up inside his father. He saw the rage in his father’s eyes and knew what most likely would happen next. But something constrained his father momentarily, holding his fisted hand from doing harm. It took Darren an hour and a half to do as his dad demanded. Thirsty beyond anything he had felt before, he walked to the truck without drink. It was hours later that his dad appeared, opened the driver’s side of the truck, and drove off…Darren holding on for dear life in the bed of the truck. ‘Hatred. The exact feeling I never was allowed to say, but I felt. Father God, I hated him so! You hear me…I hated him!’ As Darren thought through his feelings, crying out to God with his frustration, he heard it again. It was quiet with the same intonation as the last whisper: ‘But My son, I love you so…’ ‘If only I knew for sure…if only I knew for sure…’ Again, the message came: ‘In time you’ll know, for you will feel My presence…’ Closing his eyes, his body stretched out on the cot, Darren fell into a deep sleep. For the first time since the trial, he had no nightmares. There was a peace in his slumber, ending with the sound of the guard’s wake-up call; signaling the start of his work at the prison, now called home.