Flanders Nickels, a born again believer, was again reading his King James Bible. And he came to a most convicting threesome of Scripture verses in I Corinthians 13:1-3, wherein it is written the following: “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.”
Brother Gary died yesterday, and Flanders Nickels felt not grief nor mourning for his loss.
This made Flanders secretly feel like a cold-hearted monster. Where was his love that he should have had for Gary in his death that he had had for Gary in his life? Was Flanders’s hard too hard for a feeling and human person? Where was this Christian charity inside of him that this passage of three verses had convicted him of not having for his brother-in-Christ who had passed away? Surely there must be something wrong inside of Flanders’s soul that made him feel like this passing away was to
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him just one less person to share life with. Why did his spirit not feel sadness for losing his great friend and brother? Why did he think upon this sorrow without feeling this sorrow? What kind of man was he who did not miss this faithful friend who was the first at church to ever call him, “Brother Flanders?” Where was his Christian love? This “charity” mentioned in these three verses meant “love in action,” and he did not even have this love in thought. Whatever he had felt for Brother Gary in his happiness with him in his living years was no longer relevant now that he was deceased. He could well have felt love for faithful Brother Gary in their special Baptist church days together—indeed it was a most phileo-type bond—but yet his heart did not miss him now the day after he had passed away.
Gary’s wife was feeling the hard work of grieving over the loss of her beloved husband. Gary’s children knew that their lives were never going to be the same again. And Pastor sorrowed with God over the death of his great friend and usher. And Pastor’s wife was sad with a woman’s emotions. And the Holy Spirit comforted the born-again mourners with the truth that they would all see Brother Gary again in a grand coming home to Heaven after the rapture. But not Flanders Nickels. He was okay.
And he felt all right. But his callous heart convicted him of the sin of not caring now that he was gone from him. About God Himself? Flanders loved God with all of his heart and with all of his soul and with all of his mind and with all of his strength. The Bible called that “the first commandment.” But about his late friend now gone from him for the rest of his life? The Bible said that Christians are to love their neighbors as themselves. The Bible called that “the second commandment.” Flanders broke that commandment with Brother Gary in not missing him now for the rest of his life.
Guilty with sin in his heart, Flanders Nickels read on and discovered I Corinthians 13:13, wherein it was written, “And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.” That meant that love was greater even than faith and greater even than hope.
He dared to pray, “Lord, give this sinful Christian a heart of charity, if you would.”
Just then a breeze came through his three living room windows here where he sat at Bible
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study alone with the Holy Spirit. And he looked up and saw the wind open and close his French door that opened up to his little hallway of his apartment. He knew this little hallway well. This was the first thing one came upon in this apartment after coming through the heavy wooden door of this apartment and turning right. It had cheap K-Mart beige carpet and long walls and a narrow passage and a light fixture on the ceiling and that French door that had just opened and closed in the wind. Flanders got up from his Bible-reading table in his living room and came up to this French door to make sure that none of the panes broke from this wind. Yes, the glass was still unbroken. He paused to admire this entrance way of hallway from this side of the French door. It was cozy at night with the ceiling lamp on, and it was cozy in the day now with the ceiling lamp off. Just then the wind came up again and opened and closed the French door before where he stood. But he did not feel this wind upon his back from his living room windows. It was like the wind had come from the other side of the French door where there were no windows to the outside in that section of his apartment. How strange, he thought. The panes were not broken by this contact with the door frame either. And he saw his same homey hallway just as it had always looked through this glass pane door. Something told him to open this door between the living room and the little hallway right now. It felt more like Someone telling him to do this. It could be the Holy Spirit telling him. He would not tempt God. And he went ahead and opened it to step out into his familiar hall and did shut the door behind him.
Behold, a land of red dusk!
He was outside now in a new world of paradise with a red sun in the sky sometime after sunset
he knew not where. He turned to look back behind himself, and he found himself standing in front of a door of a red building in the countryside somewhere where he had never been. This door must have been the door that he had just shut in this world that had been the door he had just shut in that world from where he had come. But this door was solid and wood, and that door was glass and frame. Flanders Nickels was no longer in his apartment.
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He looked back out upon this red dusk. The red sun was reflecting upon a great sea. A multitude of wondrous clouds of dark blue and purple filled the firmament and patches of waning blue sky lay intermittently between the late evening clouds. He looked back upon the land, and he saw a shoreline nearby of rocky coast. Looking around where he was standing, Flanders saw also a little storage building and a picket fence and a little house and a white lighthouse with a sheltered passageway joining it to the house. Alone in this private heaven, Flanders wandered around in a blessed contentment with God. And he came up to the lighthouse. From its base, Flanders looked up to its top; it looked to be about two-and-one-half or three stories tall. He reached out to touch this lighthouse, but then drew back his hand. This lighthouse might not have been his to touch. He then walked around to its other side and saw a door. He reached out to knock on this door maybe intrusively, but then drew back his hand. He would not knock on the door of someone’s else lighthouse. And he came back to the first side of the lighthouse. Then he walked around the short green grass and looked out upon the red dusk upon the ocean beyond the rocks. Back in his world of before, sunset had always been his favorite time of his days. He was always the most alive when the sun was setting spring and summer and fall and winter. And with this summer-like dusk in this world of now, he felt a renaissance within like unto God blessing with divine peace from Above. He sat down upon the high rocks and gazed upon the red dusk of this land. And he sat there for a good half-hour.
And he suddenly realized that it was still red dusk in this land. The sun had not gone down an iota from this edge of the horizon. The sun had not lost any of its luminescent redness. And night had not drawn any closer in all of this time. And this land was still lit up with deep dim red that neither waxed nor waned. This red dusk simply continued unabated this whole while he was sitting here.
Confused, but delighted, Flanders got back up and came back to this little white lighthouse.
He then gave in to impulse, and he spread his arms and hugged this lighthouse.
Just then a pretty female voice called down from above: “What? Ho! Who’s touching my
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lighthouse?”
He quickly looked up and saw a pretty girl of about twenty years of age looking down to him from above. She was leaning over a black iron railing that encircled the top of this lighthouse. And her much abundant curves of her hair shone like the gold of Ophir mentioned in the Scriptures. And her visage was most comely. And her smile was most beckoning.
“I’m sorry, Miss,” he said. “I should not be embracing other people’s lighthouses like that.”
Yet in great pleasing hospitality, this young woman called down to him, saying, “Welcome to the Land of Red Dusk, kind sir.”
And then she disappeared from view and went back into her lighthouse. And right after, she came out of the door and presented herself before him on the land. And he saw that this attractive young lady was dressed in a long-sleeved women’s gymnastics leotard, all black top to bottom with sleeves of white. This girl of this Land of Red Dusk was truly a most supple and curvaceous and slender young woman. And she had nothing covering her feet. At first he could find no words with which he could speak to this beautiful denizen of this land. Whoever she was, this woman gymnast was even more beautiful than was this sun of red dusk.
Then she said, “Hello, Sir. My name is ‘Jenny Sentry.’” And she proffered her hand.
“My name is ‘Flanders Nickels,’” he said, now finding words. And he shook her hand.
They stood there looking upon each other for a moment. Then Flanders said, “What is this paradise in which you live, O Miss Sentry?”
“This is the land where the sun is always setting, but it never sets,” she said. “Do call me, Jenny, O Flanders.”
“Where are we, Jenny?” he asked.
And she replied with a wisdom that she knew as a dweller of this land, “Flanders, the light of this world as it is now is as it has always been and as it shall always be.”
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“It is beautiful here in this Land of Red Dusk,” he said.
“It is home for me,” she said.
“Are you an angel, Jenny?” Flanders Nickels asked.
“No, O Flanders. I am just a sinner saved by grace,” she said.
“So am I, Jenny,” he said.
“You’re a Christian, too,” she said.
“Saved by the blood of the Lamb,” he said about himself. “And you, also, Jenny.”
“Uh huh,” she said, nodding her head.
Miss Sentry turned to look at the red building from where he had come. He did the same. “I came from there in a way,” he said.
“Have you come from the land of day and night?” Jenny asked him.
“Yes,” he said.
“Then God must have sent you here because of a great spiritual need you have,” she said.
“Aye,” he said. “Aye.”
“Maybe God can use me to help you, Flanders,” she said.
And he confessed all, “I do not grieve over the death of a dear friend,”
“How come?” she asked.
“I do not know,” he said. “My heart does not feel like it should over Brother Gary.”
“You want to feel grief of mourning because it is the human thing to do,” she said.
“Yes, Jenny. That’s it,” he said.
“Well God can make that all right for you,” she said.
“Just like that, Jenny?” he asked.
“He is God, Flanders,” she said. “Nobody who comes to this Land of Red Dusk with a sin leaves this Land of Red Dusk with that sin still inside of him.”
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“That’s good, real good,” said Flanders with first hopes. “Nothing is impossible with God.”
She proffered her hand and said, “Would you walk with me in this Land of Red Dusk, Flanders?”
He took her hand in his, and they walked down the slopes of the rocks down to the sea. The gymnast girl sat down upon a flat rock at the edges of the sea and stretched out her legs and put her feet in the great waves. He sat down beside her upon that same flat rock and also put his bare feet out into the great waves. “It is peaceful here even in the roar of the waves, Jenny,” he said.
“Some of my happiest times are when I am here alone with God, Flanders,” she did say. “I think and reflect and remember and fantasize with God here before the sea and its deep red sun reflecting upon it.”
“What have you been praying about here with God the last time you were here?” he asked.
“I was remembering when I first came here,” she said.
“You were not born in this Land of Red Dusk?” Flanders asked.
“Like you, I, too, came from the little red building,” she said.
“Mine was a French door between the living room and the hall,” he said.
“Mine was an attic door on the third floor,” she said.
“Then you must have come from the land of day and night, just like myself,” he said.
“Yes, Flanders,” Jenny said. “Our native Earth.”
“Were you a woman gymnast?” he asked.
“No, but I love to dress up in women’s long-sleeve gymnastics leotards. They are just so comfortable a girl like me cannot take them off,” said Miss Sentry.
“It looks great on you,” he said. “And you look great in it,”
“Why, thank you, Flanders. Nobody told me that before in this land here. You flatter a lonely young woman,” she said.
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“What is it made of?” he asked.
“Oo, a girl like me knows these kinds of things about her gymnastics leotards,” said Jenny Sentry.
“Oo, tell me, girl,” he said.
“Part nylon and part spandex and part polyester,” she said.
“It shines,” he said.
“Oh, that I know,” she said. “I even go to bed in this,” She saw him looking her over in her blacks and her whites of her gymnastics leotard. She proffered her wrist covered in long white sleeve and said, “Go ahead and touch it, Flanders.”
He reached out his hand to her long white sleeve along her wrist and felt her sensual fabric. “It even feels shiny,” he did say.
“If you think that the white feels good, you should feel how good the black does,” she said. He gazed upon her belly covered in this sensuous black fabric.
“It is not for me to touch your belly, Jenny,” he said with a merry little smile.
“God did not send a cute guy my way here to make out with him,” she said with a flirtatious little grin and a tilting of her golden head to the side.
“So what brought you here to this Land of Red Dusk?” he asked her. “What was wrong with your walk with God that He had brought you here?”
“Well, I loved other people, but I did not love God as I should have, even though I was a born-again believer,” she said.
“I love God, but I do not love other people as I should,” he said. “Do tell me your story.”
“My story of my beginning of life here, Flanders, is all about good and holy Proffery,” she said.
“Do you want to hear it?”
“Oh yes! Definitely,” he said. “It will not get dark anytime real soon.” Both laughed at this
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unique trait of this land of hers and its sun.
And she told her story of how God helped her to overcome her lack of love for Jesus Christ in her life since having found salvation. “I opened the door of my parents’ attic up on the third floor, expecting to see a familiar hot and dusty and barren room as always. But this time I saw a beautiful outdoors paradise instead. And when I walked through, I shut the attic door behind me. But suddenly it was the door to ‘our’ little red building, Flanders, that I had shut. In a daze of great marvel I walked around the yard of green grass and around all of the buildings and fences and around this seashore and its rocks and around this great sea which we see before us. And I stopped and gazed upon the western sky and its post-sunset sun upon the horizon in its deep redness far far away. And the longer I looked the more it stayed and did not go down any farther. And even when I was not looking, this red dusk did not get any darker. Then a gentleman called out to me from behind, saying, ‘Young miss, welcome to the Land of Red Dusk.’ I turned to see this man who had called out to me, and I saw a fellow standing up high upon the top of the rocks of this shoreline right behind about where we are sitting now, Flanders. He said that his name was ‘Proffery Coins.’ and that God wanted to use him to help me to repent of my sin that so easily beset me as a Christian. At first I was embarrassed to tell a holy man like Proffery anything much about my most unholy hard heart toward the God Who died for me on the cross and rose again the third day. Sometimes confessing a sin to a brother-in-the-Lord is hard to do.
The Bible says in James 5:16, ‘Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed…’ But confessing our faults is one thing, and confessing our sins is another. About confessing our sins, we are to do that to the Lord Himself. We Christians need to confess our faults to other Christians; and our sins, to God alone. But I humbled myself and told this holy and godly Proffery Coins all about my bad sin, ‘I so love everybody, but I do not so love the Lord.’
And he said, ‘You do not love Jesus Christ, and you are a born again believer?’
‘I kind of love Him,’ I did say. ‘But not enough for what He deserves from me, Proffery.’
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Then I said. ‘That’s bad. And I am bad.’
‘All sin is bad,’ he said. ‘There are no such things in God’s eyes as big sins and little sins. All sins are big in the eyes of the holy God.’
‘Mine is the worst,’ I said.
‘Yours is easy for God to fix,’ he said.
‘I’ve been avoiding asking God to heal my hardened heart from how it is toward him, because I am so dirty inside being that way that I don’t like to think about it,’ I said.
‘Do you believe that God can help you to learn to love Him as He ought to be loved by one of His children?” Proffery asked me.
At first I said nothing back to him in answer, because I had come to doubt that God could help me in this after all of these months with my callous heart toward Him as it was.
‘All things are possible with God,’ Proffery quoted Scripture to me. ‘Do you believe, O young miss?’
‘I hope so, Proffery,’ I told him.
And he said, ‘You need to believe, O woman of God. Your Christian heart as a daughter of God needs to have faith in her good and great God.’
‘My faith in God is still greater than my love for God, O Proffery.’ I said. ‘If the impossible were to happen, it can only be because of my sovereign Lord.’
‘That’s better, milady,’ said Proffery. ‘I have just the Bible verse that can instantly change your hard heart toward Jesus into a soft heart toward Jesus.’
‘One verse from the Bible can make me fall in love with the God of love with no turning back?’
I asked with hope.
‘Only believe,’ he said. ‘There is great power in the Word of God for the saved and for the lost.’
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And I said then, ‘And there is great power in God’s Word for the spiritual believer and for the carnal believer alike, Proffery. Isn’t that so?’
‘That is so,’ he told me. ‘Listen to what God has to say from my lips from the Holy Bible and ponder and understand and repent.’
And then he said it to me: ‘We love him, because he first loved us.’”
“That’s found in I John 4:19,” said Flanders, hearing her tell her true story.
“Yeah! I John 4:19, O Flanders,” said Jenny Sentry in remembrance. “It is written therein indeed, ‘We love him, because he first loved us.’ That’s when it all became clear for me. I first came to understand that God the Higher Power loved me as a Shepherd loved His sheep. Once I learned that in my heart, what else could I do but fall in love with Him? So that’s what I did right then and there with Proffery Coins in this land—I fell in love for my first time with my personal Saviour Jesus Christ.
And I never fell out of love with Him again. And I never loved another as much as I loved the Lord again after that—not even one time for just a moment…not even my own self.”
“What a great thing to happen to a beautiful gymnast,” he told her. “The Good Lord took your heart lock, stock, and barrel.”
“And it happened here in this Land of Red Dusk, Flanders,” said Jenny Sentry. “And it will happen for you, too.”
“I will learn how to love another believer,” he said in reflections, “here in this wonderful world.” Then he said, “Do you think that it will happen for me from a Bible verse, Jenny?”
“That I do not know, Flanders,” she said. “God works in mysterious ways. And His ways are diverse.”
“What became of this Proffery Coins after that, Jenny?” asked Flanders.
“God brought him back to the world of day and night to serve Him there,” said Jenny.
“Do you ever want to go back to the world of day and night?” asked Flanders.
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“From time to time I think about it and wish to, Flanders,” she said.
“Why would any person want to leave this Land of Red Dusk?” he asked. “It is paradise.”
“This world looks like paradise, but it is not Heaven,” she warned him.
“It looks to be the next best thing to Heaven,” said Flanders.
“Flanders, this world we are in and that world from where we have come both have one thing in common: Both here and there there is spiritual warfare between good and evil.”
“Evil dwells here?” he asked, shocked.
“It takes the form of red dragons, Flanders,” she told him.
He recited, “’And there appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads.’ Revelation 12:3. Jenny this great red dragon in the Bible is the Devil.”
“And these red dragons in this Land of Red Dusk are demons, Flanders,” she told him.
“That’s the worst news I ever heard in my whole life,” he said.
“Do you want to good news about this world, Flanders?” she asked.
“Yes, tell me something good, Jenny,” he said.
And Miss Sentry said, “There are mighty knights in shining armor on great white horses who are not afraid of the red dragons. These knights fight them for us in battles. These are the good guys of this world’s spiritual warfare.”
“Are they angels, Jenny?” he asked.
“Our old world has angels; our new world has these knights,” she said. “Both serve our God with a will in perfect allegiance with His own will.”
“Is there the same Heaven waiting for the saints and the angels of our old world as there is for the saints and the knights in this world, Jenny?” asked Flanders.
“Yes. Heaven is the eternal resting place for all Christians and all angels of both of our worlds,
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Flanders,” said Jenny Sentry.
“And is the same Hell waiting for the lost and the demons of our old world as there is for the lost and the red dragons in this world, too, Jenny?” he asked.
“Yes again there, Flanders,” she said. “Hell is the eternal place of torments for the damned and for the demons of both of our worlds.”
“The Devil gets around,” he said.
“But only God is omnipresent,” she reminded him.
Just then the ground shook underneath their feet, and Flanders cried out, “Earthquake!” Jenny simply grinned at him and covered her grin with her hand. “You are not afraid,” he said in surprise.
“It is a knight riding a steed, Flanders,” she told him, knowing all about this land.
“Can I get to see him?” asked Flanders.
“If you want. They are about here and there in this land, doing God’s good work,” she said.
Afraid, nonetheless, Flanders climbed back up to the grassy lawn and stood and looked. And there it was, a behemoth in shining armor riding the biggest white horse that Flanders had ever seen.
If the giant Goliath were nine feet six inches tall, this knight in shining armor was just a little taller.
And this white stallion stood at least twenty-one hands tall at the shoulder. The rider held a jousting lance upward in his right gauntleted hand, and its tip reached nearly as high in the sky as did the very lighthouse itself. And when horse and rider went by, the wind that came up upon the two from this where they stood nearly knocked them both down. And just like that the knight was gone away.
And all was calm. His knees shaking, Flanders said, “We will surely die, because we saw God.”
With a laugh, Jenny said to him, “Those words are just what Manoah had said to his wife when the angel came and told them about their future son Samson. You saw an angel; you did not see God per se.”
“Whoa, what knights and what white horses run around doing God’s work in this Land of Red
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Dusk, girl,” he said. And his knees stopped trembling.
“You’ll get used to them if you stay here a while,” she said.
Just then a shriek as of a banshee filled the air right above them. Flanders fell down upon the ground and covered his head for protection. Then he felt foolish again. But then Jenny did the same thing. And man and woman feared this creature in the sky alike. “What is this?” cried out Flanders.
Jenny neither smiled not spoke good words. The shadow of this bane came between them and the deep red sun, and it hovered there for a long while. Flanders in due fear turned to look. There in the skies not far above was a reptilian winged creature all of bright red. It had scales and bat-like wings and lizard’s legs and a great tail and a draconic head of snout and red eyes and great open mouth of much teeth and black smoke billowing out. It was as big as an aircraft. Then it swooped down toward them and shot out fire toward them as it passed by overhead, intentionally missing them, and then gave forth another banshee-type cry and just like that left them there, scared and unharmed. “That, Flanders,” confessed Miss Sentry, “is one of our world’s great red dragons.”
“He could have easily killed us,” said Flanders.
“This one was only trying to scare us,” said Jenny.
“I am still scared,” said Flanders.
“And I, as well, Flanders,” confessed Miss Sentry.
“Do they run around here and there doing the Devil’s work as frequently as the good knights do the Lord’s work?” asked Flanders.
“That they do,” said Jenny.
“I don’t think that I will ever get used to the great red dragons if I stay here a while, Jenny,” said Flanders.
“One can never get used to demons in the skies like this, Flanders,” said Jenny more of her wisdom as a dweller in this land.’
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“Maybe we should escape back into our normal world, Jenny,” he said.
Both turned to the door of the little red building, and both considered strongly fleeing back into the world of day and night.
But Jenny Sentry said, “Our Lord has work for me to do with you yet a little while longer here in this Land of Red Dusk.”
“You have a man who does not feel love,” said Flanders in understanding.
“I must teach that man to feel love,” said Jenny Sentry.
“But I do not think it right to make you stay here with the dragons just to help me feel better about myself, Jenny,” he said.
“Remember, Flanders, I am also here with the knights,” she said.
“Come away with me back to the old world,” he said. “I am not that important.”
“Oh, but Flanders, Who do you think brought you here?” she asked.
He thought for a moment, then said, “God brought me here,”
“Don’t you think that you should stay here until God says that it is time for you to go?” she asked.
“I can see your point, Jenny,” he said.
“God wants me and you here for a little while longer. When God tells us to go back through that door of my little red building, then we are to go through that door of my little red building,” she edified him.
“But what if Beelzebub himself comes to us here?” he asked.
“Then God Himself will be here for us, Flanders,” she said.
“The Bible says in its own true way that God has Beelzebub on a leash.” said Flanders.
“If anything happens to you or me—us being born-again believers—it has to get by God first,” said Miss Sentry.
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“If Beelzebub tries to do anything, God has to let him,” said Flanders.
“Yeah. That’s right,” said Miss Sentry.
“Then we shall stay here together—you and I,” he said.
“Yes, Flanders,” she said. “Let’s.”
Just then the earth quaked beneath them, and this time the very house shook upon its foundations. Flanders sought to take comfort in knowing that this meant an angel was approaching. Yet it seemed to him to be more like many angels, so much more forceful was this earthquake than was that last earthquake. It almost seemed to him to be an unnaturally great seismic force even for this Land of Red Dusk with all of these knights and white horses around. In fun mimic, he grinned and then put his hand over his grin.
But Jenny Sentry said, “This is no joking matter this time.”
And Flanders knew that something unusual and not good was happening in this Land of Red Dusk.
Behold, a phalanx of knights in shining armor riding white steeds charging on by. Their visors were all down. Their lances were all pointed forward. They sat at full attention. And the sound of the hooves was like the sound of continuous thunder. Man and woman counted seven of them.
“Where are they going in such a hurry?” asked Flanders.
“I cannot tell,” she said, not knowing.
“What an assault we see here now, Jenny,” said Flanders.
“It looks to be not an assault, Flanders,” said Jenny, her face strangely pale with fear.
“If it be not an assault, what could it be?” asked Flanders.
“A retreat,” said Jenny.
“All of these angels are not pursuing, but rather fleeing?” asked Flanders.
“Yes,” she said. “I have never seen such a thing before in this Land of Red Dusk.”
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“What kind of devil can make them do this?” asked Flanders, suddenly very fearful.
“You just answered your own question,” said Jenny.
“Beelzebub?” he asked.
“I have seen such a phalanx of knights only one time before,” said Miss Sentry, “but until now I have not seen such a phalanx of knights fleeing battle for their lives.”
“Something has gone wrong in this Land of Red Dusk,” said Flanders Nickels.
“I’ve got to get a better view than I have down here. Let’s go up to the top of my lighthouse and see the whole countryside from up there and find out more about what’s going on here,” said Miss Sentry.
“Don’t you think that now would be a prudent time for a word of prayer between us?” asked Flanders.
“We don’t have time for prayer now,” foolishly replied Jenny Sentry, running toward her lighthouse.
Compromising his walk with Christ, Flanders ran after her toward the lighthouse, his lips giving a brief inadequate prayer saying, “Do help us, Lord.” And both ran on into the lighthouse.
Once inside, Flanders for his first time saw the inside of a lighthouse. Inside here it was dim and dank. Circular walls of concrete shut out all dusk light. Little wall lamps fastened to the cold walls gave light to this lighthouse. A black wrought iron spiraling staircase with black wrought iron railings climbed up the walls in here on toward the top. At the top was a trap door on the ceiling with a
little ladder leading up to it from the top of the stairs. Flanders spoke his thoughts, “I never saw the inside of a real lighthouse before, Jenny.”
“I do my best prayer in here,” she said, most ironically now in this while of exigency.
Following the woman gymnast, Flanders climbed the staircase, walked up the little ladder, came through the trap door, and stepped out into the balcony of the open air. She leaned up against the
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parapet. He leaned up against the parapet. She surveyed the land in search of knights and dragons. He looked out upon the sun.
“I see nothing yet, Flanders.” she said.
‘But I see something, and I do not know what to make of it,” he said.
“What do you see?” asked Miss Sentry.
“I think that I see the sun setting,” he said.
“It is perpetually setting, Flanders. We both know that about this Land of Red Dusk,” she said in some irritation from the stress of this moment.
“I mean that it is really setting, Jenny,” he did say. Lo, the red sun of dusk was one-quarter of the way below the horizon right now!
Jenny Sentry turned her gaze away from the countryside and onto the red dusk. And she gasped
in alarm.
“See what I mean?” he asked.
“This is impossible!” she cried out.
“This land is becoming ‘the land of night,’” said Flanders Nickels most gravely.
“My Lord and my God, what is happening to this Land of Red Dusk?” prayed Jenny Sentry.
“Beelzebub must be near,” said Flanders. “That is the only reason that I can think of.”
“What does he want with me?” cried out Jenny.
“Or maybe it is me whom he wants,” said Flanders.
“But why either of us?” she replied.
“Jenny, it is not too late. Let us go back down and escape into your little red building and go back home!” he said.
“I cannot leave. God needs me to stay here with you to edify you and teach you how to love.” she did say.
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“You cannot teach me how to feel love if we are both dead,” he said.
“The same Beelzebub who is coming after us in this Land of Red Dusk will easily continue coming after us in the world of day and night, you know,” said Jenny.
“Why are we way up here at the top of your lighthouse, leaving ourselves vulnerable to the Greatest Red Dragon?” he asked.
“God has assigned me the ministry of keeping this lighthouse,” she said.
“Why does God want you to keep a lighthouse in this far away Land of Red Dusk?” asked Flanders.
“I do not know,” she said. “Maybe for something that is yet to come. I don’t know.”
“If the Good Lord said to keep the lighthouse, it is good then to keep the lighthouse, Jenny,” he said.
Now the red sun was halfway down below the horizon.
“I have never seen darkness of night before all the years that I have been here, Flanders,” said Jenny. “I am afraid, Flanders.”
She rested her fearful head upon Flanders’s shoulder, and he held her in his arms to comfort her.
“God is here with us,” he said.
She sighed in encouragement and said, “God is good.” And she held Flanders in her arms for comfort.
And young man and young woman waited for the coming of Beelzebub.
And the sun was now three-quarters of the way below the horizon. “We should have a word of prayer,” said Flanders again.
“We better do that,” she said.
And Flanders and Jenny prayed for the Lord’s grace and mercy to protect them in this coming
fiery trial with Beelzebub the prince of the devils.
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And when they were done praying, Jenny Sentry said, “God spoke to me when I was praying just now.”
“What did He say?” asked Flanders.
“He said that I must die tonight,” she said.
“You must die?” he asked in great vexation.
“That’s part of why Beelzebub is after us right now,” she said.
“You’re leaving me?” he asked.
“And going to Heaven,” she said.
“You are young and beautiful and well,” he said.
“I shall wait for you in Heaven,” said Miss Sentry.
“i do not know what to say,” he said with a broken heart.
“Look, Flanders, the red sun is now all the way below the horizon,” she said.
He looked out toward the post dusk sky where the sun had always been. And he said in great sorrows, “Lo, the land of night, O Jenny.”
And for the first time in the Land of Red Dusk, a bright and large full moon appeared in this new nighttime sky. And it gave forth a ghostly white light down upon the new darkness of this world.
And twilight came upon this land in all of its blackness.
Behold, far off in the sky of full moon appeared something red, indeed something redder than the former red dusk sun, but something of great darkness of hue and great darkness of spirit. Man and woman both saw it coming toward them.
“Beelzebub,” said Flanders Nickels.
“Beelzebub,” said Jenny Sentry.
And Beelzebub quickly came in upon them. Whereas the other red dragons were the size of aircraft, this Great Red Dragon was the size of an airship. The color of red that endowed Beelzebub
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was the blood of Christian martyrs slain by him. His scales and his plates and his armor were impregnable like mighty castle walls. His eyes shone in demonic red. His teeth were as spearheads.
Out of his nostrils billowed out poisonous red smoke. Out of his mouth issued fire and brimstone. His great lizard wings stretched out left and right the same width as the very length of his draconic body.
And with his wings he forced a great wind to try to blow over the lighthouse where it was standing.
His fore legs were as iron. His hind legs were as stone. And as for his dragon tail—this tail once swept across the heavens in his great rebellion against God before time began and took one-third of the angels with him in this rebellion against God. These became the demons who served him ever since. And Beelzebub proceeded to blaspheme God and all things of God and all people of God.
Then Beelzebub attacked the lighthouse against whose parapet both Jenny Sentry and Flanders Nickels were holding onto for dear life. The Greatest Red Dragon swooped down to just above the ground and shot fire out of his mouth around the whole perimeter of the base of this lighthouse.
And then he lighted upon the ground with such force that the lighthouse fell upon a leaning to the side from where it was standing. And Jenny’s lighthouse burst into flames way down below from where she and Flanders were watching.
Behold, from the horizon, the sound of a tornado! And the two Christians caught in a culminating battle between good and evil saw from that horizon an army of eight knights in shining armor riding fine giant white steeds, the one in front a colossus of white knights even by this land’s standards. And they came charging Beelzebub in assault where he stood, proud and waiting for them.
And when the eight knights approached Jenny’s lighthouse, they stopped and stood there in a standoff with sole invincible Beelzebub. The knights spoke not for now. The Greatest Red Dragon spoke not for now. And the eight white horses were neighing and pounding the ground where they were standing, all eight eager for battle. This lead knight in shining armor was sitting upon what could be only the greatest white horse. This white steed must surely have stood over fifty hands tall at his shoulders.
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And the knight who sat upon him must have surely stood almost fifteen feet tall. Jenny and Flanders could recognize these seven other knights as the ones who had been running from the battle not too long ago today. They had come back for reinforcements. And this reinforcement was one knight—truly the greatest knight of knights of this Land of Red Dusk. And this most great knight in shining armor, as the lighthouse was burning, spoke now and declared himself, saying, “I am Michael, the great prince that stands for the people of God.” And at once the seven other knights surrounded the burning lighthouse upon their white steeds and did poke their lances down into the flames and soon put out the fires completely.
“Curse you, Michael!” cried out Beelzebub.
“The Lord rebuke thee, Beelzebub, the prince of the Great Red Dragons!” Michael said right back to him.
And overcome by the Lord’s rebuke from his near equal among all angelic hierarchy good and evil, Beelzebub took to flight and quickly sought to fly away from this lighthouse for his own welfare.
Yet in so doing, his great dragon tail knocked hard right into Jenny Sentry where she was standing up against the railing at the top of the lighthouse. And Miss Sentry was knocked over the railing by this most fell accident. And she fell three stories down to the ground. And she lay there and did not move.
And Beelzebub was gone away into the skies. And Michael said, “The Lord grieves for you, O Flanders.” And the eight knights in shining armor at once went on to continue pursuing so clever and
malevolent Beelzebub.
At once Flanders raced down to the ground in this night of full moon. And he quickly fell down upon his knees beside still and comely Jenny Sentry. And he begged the God of mercy that she yet be alive.
“I live, Flanders,” she was able to speak.
“You’re going to make it, Jenny,” he said.
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“For just a little while longer,” she said. “But not for long.”
“You’re going to be all right,” he said.
“My neck feels like it is twisted all over, and I feel pieces of bone all around it,” she said.
“My breathing seems to be blocked in my throat. And my head hurts all over. And I cannot feel my legs or my feet.”
“No. No. You will be okay,” he said.
“Flanders, you’re crying,” she said.
“I never cried before,” he said.
“Flanders, you have found charity,” she said.
“I would rather you lived than that I find charity come into my heart, O Jenny,” he said.
“Why, Flanders, you love me,” she said. “God has made you the Christian you need to be.”
“I fell in love with you, Jenny,” he said.
“And I fell in love with you, too, Flanders,” she said in her dying words.
“When you die, I will be grieving for the rest of my life,” he said.
“That is good to hear,” she said in whisper.
“I have discovered a heart of mourning,” Flanders Nickels said now.
“Tell me that you love me again, O handsome and kind Flanders,” she said.
And he told her just that, saying from the Bible, “Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.”
“Ah, I Corinthians 13-4-7,” she whispered final words, “the great love passage of the Bible.”
And the beautiful woman gymnast Christian died in Flanders’s arms where he held her. And the full moon became clouded over. And this world now became the land of dark night. And the beacon
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of the lighthouse suddenly flashed on for its first time. And Flanders wept over the death of a loved one as he sat there beside the form of Jenny Sentry.
All was darkness now in the land except for the lighthouse beacon. It shone out unto the strangely dark sea. The beam bounced off of the waves out there just as the red sun had done out there here for a very long time a seemingly long time ago. The ocean was not loud. The wind was gentle.
The temperature was comfortable. All else around was darkest night. And Flanders was no longer happy here now that it was never again going to become the Land of Red Dusk. Then he stood up.
He must bury his beloved girlfriend. He could go back now to his old world of day and night. He could take her with him back to their old world and have her buried there. In sorrow of heart, he picked up her form and carried her to the little red building. There was that door. He could still see this door even in this night’s darkness. All he had to do was to open that door, and go through its doorway and bring him and her back to the Earth. He would be happier now to forever be back in his old world of day and night than to ever come back here again. But thoughts of love for the girl made him to hesitate before this door of the little red building. This former Land of Red Dusk here was the land where he had discovered true love. This world here was to him “Jenny’s world.” He wanted to honor the memory of this woman who taught him the charity found in I Corinthians chapter thirteen.
In short, he loved Jenny Sentry too much to take her out of this land, even though it were a paradise gone bad. He thought upon maybe staying in this dark land just to be close to this beloved and never going back to his old world. He would not leave Miss Sentry’s land. She died here. He would continue living here. And with love in his heart over a woman who had passed away, Flanders Nickels turned back away from that door of the little red building, walked out toward the sea, and set her down on the sand. And in the light of the lighthouse, with fully human emotions, Flanders Nickels buried beloved Jenny Sentry upon the sand with the rocks from the shore beside the sand. And Flanders remembered the late Brother Gary, and he mourned over his passing away now as well. God had worked in
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Flanders Nickels’s life and had made him a man of charity. And Flanders praised and thanked the God Who does good work. And Flanders then vowed to God to stay here in the land of dark night for the rest of his life or until the Good Lord told him to go back to his old world.
It is written, “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.” I John 4:7.”
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