MR. BEATITUDE (Part Seven)

The Eighth Beatitude: The Persecuted

The road narrowed. Mr. Capable had been warned that it would, but the warning never prepared him for how narrow it actually was — or for the fact that on either side of it, people were watching, and most of them weren’t friendly.

Word had spread, from the City of Self-Sufficient to the town of Respectability to every settlement on the road, that Mr. Capable was walking the path to the Kingdom.

A large and hairy man named Mr. Contempt stood at the roadside and yelled,

“You’re a naive fool, Mr. Capable!”

Then a woman with mismatched clothes and a name tag that read Ms. Marginal came up close to Mr. Capable and patted him, “Don’t you think you’ve gone far enough, dear?” she said.

“You’ve changed quite a bit. That’s good. I’m sure your family will appreciate it, but this road keeps going into a very dangerous place. Why not stop here, where things are well?”

“I can’t.” Mr. Capable said as he pushed past her.

Then came Mr. Whitewash again,

“You don’t have to abandon the journey,” he said.

“Just stop doing so much. You’re embarrassing yourself! Don’t make people uncomfortable. The King can still be part of your life without all of this.” Mr. Whitewash pointed down the road.

Mr. Capable stopped and looked at Mr. Whitewash for a long time.

“What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?”

Mr. Whitewash had no answer for this. His face turned white and then he spit on Mr. Capable.

“You fool.”

Mr. Capable kept walking.

The road continued narrowing.

Mr. Capable soon met a group of people who were walking the narrow road in the same direction he was. They had been on it longer. They were thinner and looked as though they had lost so much. Many of them were bruised and seemed lonely. Some without mothers and some without husbands.

Mr. Capable hurried to catch up to them. As he got closer, he noticed a large mark on the back of the elderly woman in front of him.

“Excuse me, how did you get that mark?” Mr. Capable asked.

“I bear the marks of the king.” She said.

“You have one too, dear.”Her trembling hands pointed to his neck. Mr. Capable touched his neck. His fingers glided over a large scar.

The woman looked at him.

“We all have the mark of knowing the king.” She pointed. As Mr. Capable looked, he saw the scar on everyone around him.

“They’ve lost many things.” She continued. “But the things you’re afraid of losing will, one day, be made right by the king.“

“How?” Mr. Capable asked.

“The kingdom,” she said.

“The King is coming.” She pointed down the narrow path.

As Mr. Capable looked at her, he believed her. He touched the scar on his neck again. The ladies trembling hands touched him. He saw the hope in her weak eyes. What she carried wasn’t given to her by the people who were now opposing her.

And she was certain that they could never take it away from her.

He walked on with the group. The road was narrow and hard. People spit and laughed at them as they passed by.

At the end of the narrow road was something that Mr. Capable could only describe as light.

“What is that?” He asked.

The old woman beside him shielded her eyes. “Those are the children of light,” she said. “The light of the world. The city on the hill that can’t be hidden.”

There were thousands of them, maybe hundreds of thousands, gathered in an open place at the road’s end. They were brilliant. The people who were opposing them could hardly look in their direction. As Mr. Capable travelled closer and closer to the light he realized why they were shining. They were shining because of what was in the middle of them.

“It’s the King!”

[To Be Continued…]