Tribulation House: Reloaded

Chapter 53

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 How long did I drive around? I don’t actually know. It couldn’t have been too long. I tried to relax. Tried to slow down my breathing. Tried to slow down the pounding of my heart.

I had fled the scene of a man’s death. Was that wrong? If it was an accident, did anyone really need to be around? Someone would eventually show up at the church. For a meeting. For prayer. For maintenance.

Someone would find the body of Reverend Daniel Glory. Come to the only realistic conclusion: It was an accident. They say that millions of people die from falling in the tub every year. Surely there was a similar precedent for people falling in their office.

It is obvious what happened. The Reverend Daniel Glory, eaten up by guilt that Jesus had not come back on schedule, was recalculating his numbers. He had all these papers strewn about all over the floor. He slipped on one of these Bible maps and hit his head.

Probably on this prophecy award sitting on top of his desk. Open-and-shut case.

There was no reason for me to hang around. I was an innocent bystander.

As I drove through the evening traffic, I was vaguely glad to be in my wife’s beat-up old car. It blended into traffic very well. My shiny red truck would have been a beacon, pointing everybody right to me.

During that drive, I prayed long and hard. Lord, how could you let me down like this? First, you failed to show up on schedule, and now you failed to intercede when Reverend Daniel Glory attacked me. You saw it, Lord—I had no choice. It was him or me.

I honestly don’t know how long I was gone. I don’t know how long I prayed for deliverance.

But it finally dawned on me: the security camera. Back at the church. In that little control room, there was a video recording of me picking up that award and smacking Reverend Daniel Glory in the back of the head.

I had to go back. Had to cover up my presence at the scene of the murder. I was relieved that I had not already called the police. With any luck—with God on my side—I would be able to slip back in before anyone noticed what had happened.

The whole trip back, I continued praying. Continued praying for deliverance from this temptation. Praying for victory over the ol’ devil and his plans. All things work together for good, I told myself. What the devil means for harm, the Lord means for good.

These were the promises I was clinging to. I knew if I just held onto the promises, everything would be okay.

When I got back to the church, I don’t think all that much time had passed. There was nobody parked in front. The front doors were locked, so I used my keys to get in.

Inside, I listened to make sure it was safe. Reasonably sure the place was empty, I crossed the lobby and went straight through the sanctuary, all the way to the little room at the back. The door was locked and I did not have a key. I took a music stand and whacked on the doorknob until the lock broke.

The small room was even more alien than I remembered. It took me a few minutes to reorient myself, analyzing the sound board, the banks of screens, the various boxes and wires and plugs. Trying to reconstruct what cute little Sandra Robertson had told me when she gave me the guided tour.

The various video screens were on, cameras silently absorbing every move all over the church. Right now, they were recording empty rooms. Everything neat, everything orderly, everything in place.

Except in the office of the Reverend Daniel Glory. On the tiny screen, I saw the body lying there on the charts and graphs and magazines.

I needed to find the recording device. Needed to remove the video recording of the events in his office.

I held my breath and listened. At first, all I could hear was what must have been the air conditioner. Eventually, a whirring sound revealed itself. I tracked the sound to the recording device. Everything that had happened in Reverend Daniel Glory’s office was on one of its tapes. If they got hold of this evidence, the police would see the identity of the murderer instantly.

I looked for switches or buttons, but just could not figure out how to stop the machine. I also had no way of knowing which of these tapes was recording the events in that office. Impatient, I grabbed a screwdriver and began prying the tapes out. One by one, there was a cracking of plastic and a grinding noise in the machine and then a tape broke and was on the floor, in pieces.

I removed all six in this fashion when I heard a beep—someone had entered the church. Holding my breath, I looked on the bank of screens. In the lobby, two uniformed police officers had entered. Guns drawn.

I had not called for the police. I had not set off the alarm. How did they know? How could they know?

Gathering up the streams of videotape and fragments of plastic casing, I stuffed them in an offering bag. The monitor showed the officers headed around the side of the sanctuary, for the stairs to the offices. The sanctuary was safe. For the moment.

Offering bag in hand, I snuck out. Got to the car. Drove away. Clean.

The Lord had at least answered this prayer.

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There are 70 chapters for Tribulation House. You can purchase the whole eBook from Amazon, Apple, Kobo, B&N, and more! 

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