May 26
I was sitting in the weathered leather chair in Charlie’s office, trying to decide how best to approach this. The chair belonged to his mother’s father. The great captain of industry had sat in this chair amassing a fortune. He was a financier. He bought, sold and traded companies, like pieces on a chessboard. He was born wealthy, so I didn’t think acquiring more wealth was necessarily any great accomplishment. But to hear Livia, Charlie’s mother, tell it the man walked on water.
Charlie was a theology professor by trade and volunteer youth pastor. He’d come to Christianity late in life, a confirmed atheist and bachelor. His views on the world and his faith were different from most. He held degrees in Chemistry, Physics, and most recently Theology. So his faith was founded in math and science. I admired his ability to debate the existence of God without ever quoting the Bible.
“You can’t use the Bible as an argument if your opponents don’t believe in it,” he’d say.
He’d spent years studying math and science, sure in his believe that God didn’t exist. He felt a sort of quiet superiority over those of “faith”. But after all those years of study when he was graduating with his first PhD, his convictions become less clear.
Charlie decided to take an extended trip to clear his head. He was really looking for answers he couldn’t find in a classroom. He didn’t travel to Europe and the civilized world as his mother would have liked, but to primitive areas. Places that could only be reached by the heartiest jeep, horse or on foot. His travels took him to remote villages in Latin America, Asia and Africa. Places no one had heard of, that weren’t in travel guides, where five star hotels and post cards didn’t exist. It had started as a spoiled kid looking to “find himself”. People without money don’t have time to find themselves. They have to be happy with whatever self they have.
Early in his trip, he met up with some missionaries bringing medicine to the remotest of villages. At first they tried to convince him of God’s existence, to save his soul. But after several unproductive arguments, they gave up, though they still let him tag along.
In many places, the number one killer was starvation, but Charlie was surprised at how many people still died even with enough food. Impure water was another big killer. Even though the water wasn’t clean, the people had little choice but to use it.
Something happened during that trip that math and science guy was never quite able to explain. All of his questions and doubts, all of the quiet whispers in his head began to come together and he knew. For the first time since he was a boy, he just knew. God existed and had something for him to do.
He came back ignited with a passion to find a way to clean the water of villages like these around the global. His parents were excited about his new found passion, though they felt it would be better directed at his career, but at least it was something.
This trip did more to Charlie than create a passion, it turned him from a spoiled kid with too much time on his hands and no direction into a man of compassion and purpose. It would be nice to have that kind of passion and certainty in what you’re doing. At times I envied him. Why couldn’t I feel that same certainty in what I was doing?
Have been following your installments all along now and this one is my favorite so far although they’re all terrific. Charlie could be a whole novel all by himself!
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Hi Kathy,
I hadn’t considered that, but you’re right. Dee
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Worth a read.
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Thank you. I appreciate it. Dee
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Wonderful. Fabulous. Captivating. 😀 ❤
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Thank you. I wish you were a literary agent. Dee
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Me too! 😀
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I find, compelling, your story, primarily, because of the hint of a need, in the world, for the time being, of an ‘artificial god’, which Charlie may, in his travels, have ‘happened upon’ – much like money – an artificial construct, which ‘works’, because it is a social agreement, that we agree upon. Much good can be arranged, in short order, to the good of humanity, if, upon the moot-ness, of the actual existence of a “God”, we can agree.
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Thank you Tim. Our life’s work is so dependent on small things.
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Loving it.
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Truly inspiring. Your writing has seriously opened my eyes. Courtney 😊
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Thank you Courtney. I appreciate your nice comment. Dee
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Charlie is one of my favorite characters now! Very inspiring couple.
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I love him too. Of course he’s based on someone I know. Dee
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