Susanna nodded. She’d thought they had someone on duty.
12
The weather turned rainy for several days, which seemed to take newcomers by surprise, but Owen knew it wasn’t unusual for September. At least with the rain, the temperatures dropped. They would have a better time of it now. The fall and winter months would make for much easier work at the shops. Owen hoped it would even help Gary get a better handle on what he was doing. As it stood, the kid wasn’t going to have a job much longer if he couldn’t figure out what was required of him.
As Owen dressed for church, he wondered what he was going to do about Gary Ragsdale. The young man was wholly unqualified to do much of anything. His parents had spoiled and pampered him to the point of uselessness, and now he had trouble learning even basic new skills. Owen wanted to help Gary, but nothing seemed to work. Owen had even tried taking him aside after working hours to show him various things, but Gary’s mind was less and less focused. Owen had tried to talk to him about it, but Gary wanted no part of such intimacy and only told Owen that he would try harder.
It was the same thing Owen’s brother had pledged. Owen couldn’t help but hear his brother’s same childlike pleadings.
“Owen, I promise I’ll do better. Just give me another chance.”
“Give him another chance,” their father had demanded. “Everyone makes mistakes.”
“But most folks learn from their mistakes, and Daniel seems not to care enough to learn.”
Owen remembered the conversation as if it were yesterday. Maybe because it was the last real conversation he’d had with his father and brother. He walked to church still hearing their voices.
“Just tell them it was your fault, Owen. The foreman won’t fire you. You never make mistakes, and this will be no problem for you. If you tell them it was Daniel’s doing, he’ll lose his job.”
“I’m not going to lie.” Owen had looked at his father and then his brother. They honestly expected him to lie. The truth was in their expressions.
“If you don’t, Daniel will lose his job.”
If Owen was honest about Gary, the boy would lose his job. It wasn’t an easy situation. Owen was starting to have strong feelings for Susanna, and Gary was her brother. If he fired Gary or let him be fired, would she be angry at him? Susanna didn’t seem to be that kind of person, but then, Owen hadn’t expected his father’s reaction either.
“This is your brother, and you have to stand by him. Daniel will do better next time.”
But he hadn’t. In fact, the next time Daniel messed up on the job, it resulted not only his own death but also that of another man. Owen could still see the look on his father’s face at their funeral. He blamed Owen. They never spoke about it, but the accusation was there in his father’s eyes. Truth be told, Owen blamed himself.
That was five years ago, and the following year, his father had died when his engine derailed. When word came, Owen was almost relieved. Somehow, just knowing that his father was no longer alive to blame him for the death of his brother took a burden off Owen’s shoulders.
What kind of man felt relief at the death of his father and brother? Owen had never been able to forgive himself. He had sworn he’d never again take the blame for someone else, that he’d never again let an employee pass on substandard work, yet he was in that position with Gary.
And it wasn’t because of Susanna that Owen allowed it. The truth of it hit Owen hard. He was letting Gary get away with things as if it might somehow make up for his brother’s death. Some part of Owen blamed himself for the horrible accident that claimed Daniel’s life, and without realizing it, he was trying his best to right that wrong.
The congregation was already singing as Owen slipped into the back pew. He opened a hymnal and pretended to sing along, but the realization of what was going on troubled him in a way he couldn’t understand.
Pastor Lewis took to the pulpit after two more songs and the offertory. Owen opened his Bible but found it impossible to focus. He’d been praying for answers, and all morning this was the only thing he could think about. He needed to do something about Gary, yet he found it impossible. How could he fire the young man?
“Sometimes God calls us to uncomfortable situations,” Pastor Lewis began. “Sometimes we want to do the right thing, but it won’t be an easy or popular thing. A lot of times, doing things God’s way is an unpopular choice. The Bible is full of stories that show these kinds of situations. If you’ve spent any time at all in the Word of God, you know it to be true. Still, we wrestle with right and wrong as if there might be a third solution that will somehow get us out of making an uncomfortable choice.” The pastor grinned. “I’m here today to tell you there isn’t.”
“God has always been pretty much to the point. He doesn’t often veer off to the right or the left. As Mr. Bevins often says, ‘There’s a right way and a wrong way to do things. There’s no sort-of-right or sort-of-wrong way.’”
Folks in the congregation chuckled at this, and Mr. Bevins, an older man who worked in the clerical offices of Santa Fe, nodded enthusiastically as the pastor continued.
“That could have been spoken from God Himself. In other words, God has a way, and God clearly shows us the way. For example, He doesn’t make a mystery of how to be saved from our sins. He offers us salvation through His Son, Jesus. There isn’t another way, and I feel compelled to talk about that today.
“See, in the old days, folks had to make a lot of animal sacrifices to make themselves right with God. They had to bring in all sorts of offerings to the priests. There were ceremonies and animal sacrifices, and stayin’ on God’s good side was hard. There were laws—hundreds and hundreds of ’em that folks had to follow—and if you have ever stopped to read through Leviticus, you might be surprised to find that we break a lot of those laws every day. It was and still is impossible for us to be saved on our own behavior.”
He smiled down on the congregation. “Thank God, He has a better plan. It’s just one plan. One way. But it’ll save us from eternal damnation and hell’s fire.
“Now, I know some of you don’t think that’s fair. There ought to be options, some folks say. It ought to be that a fella could have a choice. Well, the fact is, you do have a choice. You have a choice to be saved or be condemned. It’s pretty simple.” He shrugged. “We try to make it hard, but the truth is the truth and never changes. We try to alter things so that we can get our own way. We try to maneuver around the rules and make exceptions for special situations. But there are no exceptions and no special situations. Even the thief on the cross beside Jesus knew that. He knew his time was short. He saw there were only two choices, and he wanted the one that would save him.
“Do you want that? ’Cause there is only one way. Turn to John fourteen.” He waited a moment for people to reach that place in their Bible.
Owen knew the pastor was speaking of salvation, but he couldn’t help thinking about his situation with Gary. There really weren’t a lot of options. He could either keep Gary as he was and deal with the problems that created, or he could move him to another job. It was up to Owen to make a decision, and the longer he put it off, the harder that decision would be.