Page 140 of Sing with Me

He didn’t see anyone he recognized.

Oh, well.

He sat down at the last row, and checked his phone. Malik had texted him a few times. He’d been in touch with Detective Jeong and had taken to summarizing the situation for Mom and Diehl. While Diehl would like to know every single detail of the big search for his daughter, he was more the CEO type. He was most concerned with the results.

Did you or did you not find my daughter?

Skye had told her that God knew where Elisa was.

Tell me where she is, God.

He closed his eyes, trying to feel God’s answer. He sensed nothing at all. It was like he was staring at a blank wall.

He wasn’t sure why his belief back in college hadn’t carried through to today. What on earth had he believed then?

He recalled his conversation with Mom, how he had told her about his own spiritual condition.

I’m closer to God now than I ever was, but I think I am not yet in His family. I feel like I am still outside the fence, looking in.

Truly, his thoughts had been about Skye. He wanted to be with Skye, but would she go out with someone who was not sure about God or where he stood with God?

Diehl felt that perhaps he should spare her from himself. He was no good for her. He would never be good enough for her.

Even though he had given up those bad-boy days when he met Isobel, she had damaged his heart and emotions so much that he was not sure if he could ever love another woman—especially Skye—with the care she deserved.

The piano began to play.

Still no sign of Skye.

Just as well.

Throughout the congregational singing, Diehl found himself unable to participate with his whole heart. He did not feel like the hymns were his—that he could own the words to the songs or that the lyrics were his own praise to God. He mouthed the words and waited for the songs to be over so he could put away the hymnal.

He felt like a fraud standing here singing to a distant God.

A casually dressed Pastor Gonzalez took the mike to pray. “Father God, if there is anyone here with unconfessed sins, let them confess to You now so that they can worship You with a free heart for the rest of the service. This evening we’re going to study 1 John 1. Let Your Word shine in our heart so we might know the truth of God. Your truth sets us free. In Jesus’ Name, I pray. Amen.”

Your truth sets us free.

Quietly, Diehl prayed to God. He wanted God’s truth. He wanted to be free from the bondage that had tied up his heart for so many years.

He wanted to be free to love Skye with God’s love. If he could not love her with His love, then he would not love her at all. But how? What was God’s love?

After several teenagers sang a song that Diehl had never heard of, the Pastor returned to the podium. “Turn with me to 1 John 1. My focus tonight is on verses five to ten, but I want us to read the last part of verse four as well. ‘And these things we write to you that your joy may be full.’ Christian, is your joy full?”

I have no joy.

“Has the enemy stolen your joy?” Gonzalez asked. “Let us examine our hearts and get back on the right track with God. Broad is the road that leads to destruction. The narrow road is where we want to be on because it’s the only path to joy in the Lord, which Nehemiah tells us is our strength through tough and hard times in life.”

Diehl sat there, trying to absorb all that Pastor Gonzalez had said. It seemed like a lot to take in.

Perhaps tonight’s sermon might be why Skye was not sitting next to him. If he was right about the trajectory the pastor was going with his sermon, it was about to get painful in a minute. Diehl would rather Skye not see his reaction.

“What is this narrow path I just mentioned?” Pastor Gonzalez put his Bible down on the lectern. “One word: Jesus. Listen to what our Lord told Thomas in John 14:6. ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.’ He is the only path to God. Do you doubt that?”

Diehl wondered if he was a doubting Thomas.

“Jesus is the path of light to God. ‘This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.’ Do you believe 1 John 1:5 when it says that there is no darkness in God? God is all light.”

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