Heidi Breed –the Christian ‘mythological girl ‘–and her Christian boyfriend Flanders Nickels take upon a journey across a one-mile long footbridge over a great wide river, upon which they shall be tested by God. If they pass all of the tests on this bridge, then their special prayer request for themselves will come true. Flanders wields a sword called the ‘StraightSaber,’ which was wrought by God, and with this sword he will do wonders on this pilgrimage
THE MYTHOLOGICAL GIRL
By Mr. Morgan P. McCarthy
The boyfriend-and-girlfriend-in-Christ stood before the most lengthy footbridge that passed over the wide river. The park on this side of the river was called the, “Park of Prayers Asked.” Off onto the other side of the river was the park called the “Park of Prayers Answered.” And between both parks was this sturdy and powerful wooden footbridge that stretched for a mile over the deep river way below. This river was called, “The River of Testings.” And this footbridge was called, “The Good Lord’s Footbridge.” The Good Lord walked spiritually with the believers who walked this footbridge. This Lord’s Footbridge was five feet wide. Its walking surface was made of big logs roped together most sturdily with hemp rope; and these big logs were in turn spiked to eight-by-eight lateral beams along the right edge and the left edge, each lateral beam the length of a telephone pole. For a railing, the Lord had made to both sides of this footbridge wooden green round posts, each four feet high, and each about one foot apart one from another. Between these thick round posts were one-foot-long two-by-four boards joining post to post along their tops. And for support, God had made sequoia tree trunks
that held up the bridge, these mighty trunks reaching down to the river and deep into the river’s bed
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beneath the water. This Good Lord’s Footbridge formed an arc above the river at its midpoint. This bridge was for pilgrims, born-again Christians seeking the Lord’s will in a matter that needed prayer for the born-again believer.
The boyfriend-in-the-Lord said to his girlfriend, “Heidi, you are pretty girl. God is good to me for having brought you into my life.”
“I shall always be pretty for you, Flanders,” said the girlfriend-in-the-Lord to her boyfriend.
“Heidi, you are so pretty that you are almost ‘mythological,’” said Flanders.
“I am?” asked Heidi, looking for more compliments.
“Very much so, O Heidi Breed,” he told her.
“Then that makes me ‘a mythological girl,’” said Heidi happy with praise.
“You are ‘my Mythological Girl,’” bragged Flanders Nickels on her.
“I’m a myth,” she said. “But a real myth.”
“Even the way you dress is magical like mythology, Heidi,” he said. “Every day the same thing, each day more and more exciting to me.”
Once again on a date with Flanders, Heidi Breed had on today a long-sleeved blue plaid dress shirt of cotton and a blue denim ladies’ vest with metal buttons all buttoned up, and a blue denim ladies’ skirt that flowed as she walked, reaching down to the knees, and ladies’ burgundy penny loafers with pennies in them and no socks. Her long and straight brown hair blew about friskily in the breezes up here. And her tall stature made her head a little higher than his head with his short stature. And her voice and her features and her form were all comely with no flaws in his eyes. She was, in essence, “My girlfriend,” and that title in his life never belonged to any other girl. This Mythological Girl was a blessing from the God of blessings for him. She was a lady, and he duly treated her as a lady. And he was a gentleman, and she ever regarded him as a gentleman. Both were happy together in the Lord as their personal Saviour.
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Heidi Breed said to Flanders right now what they both knew and for why they both had come here, “We need to only cross this footbridge for our God, and our prayers are answered,”
“Some Christians make it all the way across. Some Christians do not make it all the way across,” said Flanders.
“Some pray for the wrong thing; some pray for the right thing,” said Miss Breed.
“Some have enough faith in God; some have not enough faith in God,” said Flanders.
“One mile is not too much for God to ask of His prayer-warriors to walk,” said the mythological girl.
“It can be the longest mile for a saint to walk,” said Flanders.
“We will be called upon to endure testings from God,” said Heidi.
“And God will not test us beyond our endurance,” said Flanders.
“Our Good Lord will not give us more than we can handle,” said Miss Breed.
“He will be carrying us across the river up here,” said Flanders.
She sighed, then asked, “Are you ready, Flanders?”
He nodded and asked, “Are you ready, Heidi?” She also nodded in reply. And Flanders Nickels said, “Let us pray that the Lord’s will be done.” The two Christians nodded their heads in agreement.
And the mythological girl prayed and said to the Lord, “Dear Father, I pray that You give back to me in my tract ministry souls to be won. I am still on soul CCXCIX on my list of souls won for you. I have been stuck on that for months now. Everybody is listening to me telling them about You, but nobody wants to pray the sinners’ prayer with me and get saved. I ask for soul CCC to be written down in my wondrous little list. I pray that the next soul to whom I share the Gospel is fruit ready to be picked for you. And I pray that I continue to win souls for you right after that and that I can continue bearing fruit for you with humble and sincere and searching souls looking for the truth. Jesus is truth.
The Bible is truth. Salvation is truth. In Jesus’s name I pray. Amen.”
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Next, Flanders Nickels prayed his prayer before undertaking this walk of trials across this bridge. First he unsheathed his StraightSaber and held it on its edge against his chest where he stood. And he said to God, “Dear Father, I used to love to write stories and novels that did glorify you. I called it ‘My canon ministry.’ I had the one canon full of short stories, and I had the other canon full of novels. But, of all things to happen to me, O God, for some reason I have fallen upon a queer writer’s block. My prayer here is that you can bring back to me my love for creative writing. Myself, as a writer, can say, ‘I have given the muse a rest.’ But now, myself as the writer speaking again, I want to say, ‘I am working my muse hard.’ I have most uniquely given out Your Word in a most unique way. May I do that once again. Your will be done with my canon ministry, O Lord. In the name of Jesus I pray this. Amen.” Having prayed thus, Flanders put his StraightSaber back in his scabbard along his hip.
This daughter of God and this son of God looked at each other. The woman was ready. The man was ready. And Flanders Nickels stepped out upon the footbridge, and Heidi Breed stepped out onto the footbridge behind him. And they began their walk in Christ, the man leading the way for the woman. The walk started out surprisingly benign and comfortable. And the footbridge was strong and sure. And the warm fall sun shone down upon them with its warmth.
But then a little white cloud came into the sky and did come in front of the sun, and it brought a little cloudiness to the sunny day. It was not an innocent cloud. It was a cloud that would bring temptations to the two pilgrims. It was a cloud that would get worse. It was a cloud that would bring a fierce storm. And the cloud got bigger and darker. Soon it was a large gray cloud that completely shut out the sunlight from this bridge. And after a short time, it became a black cloud that covered the whole sky all around and all above. And winds of gale came upon the two believers up here on the footbridge. The waters of the river way below became torrents of rapids. And man and woman feared what they saw as they looked down over the edge of the railing. They could almost feel the sprays of
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river water way up here upon their faces. And the bridge seemed to be rocking or shaking underneath their feet. They held on tight to the railing. Flanders said, “God calls us to go forward with Him.”
“I do not want to go backward from Him,” agreed Heidi.
“Were we to go backward on Him and walk back to the beginning of this bridge, that would be officially ‘backsliding.’” said Flanders.
“I refuse to backslide on my Heavenly Father, Flanders,” said the mythological girl.
“I as well,” concurred Flanders. “Let us go forward for Him on this bridge and grow in the Lord thereby.”
Behold, now the sky above was turning green!
But the two Christians continued walking onward for Christ upon this footbridge. Flanders, in front, was looking off the west. Heidi, in back, was looking off to the east. And Flanders saw an act of God take place in this dire weather. Lo, a tornado descending not far away right into the wide and deep
River of Testings. A waterspout had formed off to the right of this bridge. But Miss Breed saw the same thing happen in front of herself as well off to the left not a long way away. The mythological girl herself saw a waterspout forming upon the River of Testings before her very eyes, too.
“Waterspout, Heidi,” he yelled out, turning back toward her.
“The, same for me, too,” exclaimed Heidi, turning back to him.
Their focus on Jesus, the Author of all weather, the two pilgrims went ahead to look left and right and left and right repeatedly. And the girl said what the guy was also thinking, “The waterspouts are both coming right to where we both are, Flanders.”
“And not only that, Heidi,” said Flanders. “But they shall both get here upon us at about the same time.”
“We are not doomed,” said Miss Breed. “We have God.”
“And I have my StraightSaber,” said Flanders. “I got this from God Himself.”
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“These waterspouts are getting kind of close now, Flanders,” said the mythological girl. “Don’t you think that it’s time to draw your sword?”
He then drew his StraightSaber out of its sheath, and he held it in the air above his head. This sword wrought by God had a straight blade one-and-one-half feet long and three inches wide. It was made of the Biblical gold of Ophir. And it was fastened to a haft of gopher wood from before the Great Flood. It was forged by the dwarfs of the Andes Mountains. And it was tempered by the elves of the plain of Megiddo. And it was sharpened by the giants of the Old Testament—the children of Anak. Most of all, just as the Holy Spirit of God indwelt Flanders and Heidi and all other believers, the same Holy Spirit of God indwelt this StraightSaber, as well. God was in this sword He had made.
“Flanders, the waters of the waterspouts are getting us all wet,” said Miss Breed.
All-confident in the God of testings, here above the River of Testings, Flanders remembered when he had first seen his mighty sword from the Almighty: He was sent by God to the North Pole and was told by the Lord to wait for a penguin to come along that would lead him to a cave. Flanders knew that penguins were native to the South Pole, and not to the North Pole. But he did not doubt God. There in the northernmost Arctic in Canada’s cold pole above the Baffin Bay just west of northern Greenland, God brought the Arctic’s only penguin Flanders’s way. As soon as Flanders saw it, he followed it, and it led him to a cave. Flanders followed it into the cave, and there stood a man whose hirsute face of red beard and red mustache covered all of his face except for his eyes and nose. He said, “Welcome, young Flanders. I am the penguin keeper.” And the penguin came up to its master as penguins walk, and the penguin keeper picked it up in his arms and hugged it gently, and set it back down again. “I have come for a great sword,” said Flanders. And the man said, “I have the sword to give to you.” And the man of red hair took it out of a wooden box in the back of this cave and gave it to Flanders. “Do you know what to do with this, Mr. Nickels?” asked the man. And Flanders replied, “I am called of God to do great things with this.” And the penguin keeper said, “Well said. Go and do
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thus, O mighty man of the Lord.” That was how Flanders had found his StraightSaber.
Then he heard his girlfriend’s voice saying to him, “Flanders, this bridge is about to break apart from underneath us.” It was Heidi Breed. And he remembered now the two converging waterspouts.
“It is time,” said Flanders Nickels. And he turned toward the east and did swing his efficacious sword in a right-to-left stroke right through the waterspout to the left. Lo, this tornado on the water was cut into two pieces, and these two pieces came apart, the lower piece falling down into the waters, and the higher piece ascending back up into the sky. And right after he saw this happen, he turned to the west and with a left-to-right swing he cut this waterspout to the right also into two pieces, again the lower part falling down into the river, and again the higher part returning back up to the clouds.
Behold the storm stopped; all was quiet; the sun was out; it was nice outside again.
“Whoa, Flanders,” said Miss Breed. “That was a close call.”
“To God be the glory of His StraightSaber,” said Flanders.
“Another trial like that, and I’m liable to unravel,” said Heidi.
“You have scary dreams at night about tornadoes, Heidi,” he said.
“Yeah! Yeah!” said the mythological girl.
“God is more powerful than waterspouts,” said Flanders in encouragement.
“And I can see that you are right,” said Miss Breed.
“I remember you before you got saved, Heidi,” said Flanders. “You were the high school senior who had a thing for prom gowns.”
“I remember you when you were still unsaved, too,” said Heidi. “You were the high school senior who wanted to marry a Collie of some sort up in Heaven.”
The two pilgrims continued their trek across the Good Lord’s Footbridge. Heidi retold Flanders all about her days before Christ, her lost life as a girl of much dirty sin. The time was around 1989 and 1990. Prom dresses mesmerized her then in their fashions of that time. Prom gowns in those days
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were made of a fabric called “acetate.” And they were made by a company called, “International Ladies Garment Workers Union.” And they shone in luster of all manner of alluring colors. Some were red. Some were black. Some were purple. Some were blue. Some were white, Some were green. All such prom dresses had made the former Heidi Breed more of what she was then even more than what her skirted and vested and shirted outfits did make her now. As the unsaved girl of prom dresses, Heidi did seek to make every night like unto a seedy prom night just as promiscuous prom goers make them on the one official prom night of the school year. First the prom gown tempted herself. Then the prom gown tempted her date for the night. Then she tempted her date for the night.
Then she committed immorality. The former prom dress girl had a whole closet full of such elegant dresses. It was her special menagerie. And, though she saw herself dressed in such to be “an elegant lady in an elegant dress,” her reputation spread throughout the high school as “fast and easy.” The prom gown girl was like a call girl for all the high school boys throughout all the days of the year. Indeed, many of the prom dresses that she had amassed into her menagerie were gifts from older boys and younger men just to have a good time with her at the expense of her body. They “bought” her for a night with a prom gown from the mall. And she got to keep the prom dress for herself.
But then one day, Proffery Coins, the Christian upperclassman of the high school, found a burden for the lost soul of this prom dress gal. He thought that she was quite pretty, and he liked her.
He wanted her to become saved. He saw her popular and reputed urges for prom gowns to be of the Devil. Prom dresses in themselves, Proffery knew, were indeed most attractive dresses for girls of his age. But this Heidi Breed sinned in twisting such garments into toys for personal immorality. And Proffery and God saw this as “the lust of the flesh,” mentioned in the Bible. And “lust of the flesh, “by definition, meant “perversions of natural desires.” And he dared to come up to her in school that one day and to tell her, “Fair Heidi, all of your prom gowns are sending you to Hell.” This offended her.
And in revenge and in attempt to seduce the good man of school, Heidi Breed said, “Oh, but
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you know what they say, Proffery: ‘Off like a prom dress.’”
But Proffery’s face was undaunted by her lascivious and nasty little comment. Nor was his heart daunted. Instead he recited a most effectual Scripture verse that made her ashamed for her first time about her diversions and her menagerie. Good and godly Proffery said to her, “It is written, comely Heidi, “’And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.’ Jude 23.” Proffery Coins the Christian was right. Her prom dresses were sending her to Hell. And her black and white prom gown that she had on now at school made her feel embarrassed now all of a sudden.
Proffery then said to her, “I’ve been praying for you, Heidi.”
And Heidi asked him, “Why have you been praying for me, Proffery?”
And Proffery said, “Because I care about you, Heidi.”
“You care for me, Proffery?” asked Miss Breed.
And he said, “You are a sheep who needs the Good Shepherd, pretty Miss Breed.”
“Tell me Who this Good Shepherd is, O Proffery,” she requested of him.
And he said, “Jesus is.”
She then asked, “And I am a sheep?”
“A lost sheep, O Heidi,” he said.
“I want to be a found sheep,” she said.
“Seek the Good Shepherd,” he said.
“How can I go about to do that, Proffery?” she asked sincerely and humbly.
And right then and right there, Proffery Coins shared the Gospel with her—that Jesus died for her sins and arose the third day. And he told her that in order to get saved, she had to ask God for His free gift of eternal life. And then he told her, that for her own good, were she to pray and get saved, she needed to repent of her sins with all of her prom gowns. Lest her menagerie become a stumbling block
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for her in her walk with Christ. And to his most happy surprise, the worldly Heidi Breed said, “Yes,” to all three of his stipulations. She confessed with an understanding and honest heart the Gospel of salvation before him. She willingly asked him to lead him through the prayer that would save her soul from going to Hell. And he led her through the soul-changing sinners’ prayer line by line unto her own true and valid so great salvation. And she promised Proffery that she would go and get rid of her licentious prom gowns out of her closet for forever. And that she did. So great conversion upon one that Proffery had led to salvation in his most holy witnessing life was never so life-changing and so complete and so encouraging to Proffery as was this conversion of the prom dress girl that he had led to Christ that day. She even became his disciple. And he even became her mentor. And Heidi Breed had kept her young woman’s body undefiled any further after she had become born-again. The prom gowns were gone. The boys and young men quit coming to the house. And the “young harlot” had now become the “young lady in Christ.” And Heidi Breed was now treated by fellow students and by all the faculty with a respect due to a woman of God who was living for God. And she was living the life of a daughter of God most spiritually, excelling at witnessing to others by giving out salvation tracts and by living the Christian life of a mighty prayer-warrior and by going to the Baptist church down the road every time the doors opened. Yet, despite this great testimony as a born-again believer, Heidi Breed could never seem to get around to reading her Bible every day. It was a King James Bible, given to her by the righteous Proffery very soon in their life as brother-and-sister-in-the-Lord together.
But then the day came when Proffery Coins had to go on to Bible College. He pursued the ministry as a Baptist church planter. And God was sending him to Pensacola Bible College over a thousand miles away from here in Wisconsin. He promised to keep in touch with her. And she promised to keep in touch with him. He kept his promise. But she did not. Yet she continued unceasingly her labor in Christ in her tract ministry. And she never went a day without lots of prayer. And she still went to the little Baptist church down the road every time the doors were open. And,
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unfortunately, she was still slack with her Bible studies. Beware, Heidi. And the day came when she said to herself, “I want a prom gown.” And, without praying about this, Heidi Breed went shopping for a prom gown. And she got it. And it was all lustrous black acetate. And she put it on. And it felt good. It felt real good. And she felt as if she “had come back home.” She never wanted to take it off ever again. But the Holy Spirit of God was a most persuasive God in her. Now that she were a born again believer she faithfully resisted that old time immorality, even with this fetish back in her life. She gave in to the temptation of prom dress, but most completely resisted the old temptation of fornication and adultery. Heidi Breed, a good Christian lady, kept her temple of the Holy Ghost pure now that her body belonged to God. Nonetheless, a woman like Heidi was not a woman who ought to have a prom gown in her new life in Christ. It was all that was wrong in her old life of sin.
Just then Heidi and Flanders, on this Good Lord’s Footbridge, heard up ahead a grating gnashing of many teeth. Heidi looked on ahead. So, too, did Flanders. There stood a most hideous and ludicrous little man. “Flanders, what is that?” asked Miss Breed.
“I don’t know,” said Flanders. “It looks like a troll.”
“It does,” said Heidi. “It looks like a troll.”
This troll stood there before them, and it bounced upon its feet side-to-side, seeking to intimidate the two people. Then it spoke, “Young man, young woman, get off my bridge.”
“Troll, this bridge belongs to God,” said Flanders. This sword fighter for God drew his StraightSaber.
“He does look kind of dangerous,” said Heidi.
The troll then opened his mouth, still seeking intimidation of these two strangers to his kind. His upper mouth had a good fifty teeth, all pointed and gnarled and uneven. His lower mouth had a good seventy teeth, all teeth as gruesome and not well and yellow as the ones in his upper mouth.
Heidi dared to address this strange novel troll, saying, “Why are you standing there and not
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letting us go by?”
The troll answered her, saying, “Tall girl, I will eat your hand for lunch; and your foot, for dinner; and then I will have dessert.”
“You would eat a woman?” asked Miss Breed, nervous.
“Milady, eating a woman is easier on my stomach than eating a man,” said the troll.
This troll was so absurd in head and in face and in stature that Heidi was not afraid of him. She leaned and said in Flanders’s ear, “Look at his hair!”
“I heard that, vixen,” said the angry troll.
Flanders said, “All we ask is that you let us continue our trek to the other side of this bridge.”
“I will do that,” said the troll. And he stepped off to one side to give the walkers room to pass him by. Then the troll put himself in the middle of the way once again, and he said, “Short gentleman, first you must put down your sword into your scabbard.”
“Don’t do that!” cried out Heidi to Flanders.
His StraightSaber still in his right hand, Flanders said, “For some reason, foul troll, I do not trust you. I will not put my saber back in my sheath.”
“Then I shall stand here and keep you here and make you never get across, young fellow,” said the troll.
“Do you want to lose your head?” asked Flanders, ready for battle in the Lord.
“Do you want me to hurt your lady?” asked the troll in reprisal. Then he resumed his swaying from side to side in mockery and in challenge.
“I will give you five seconds to let me and my girlfriend pass you by so that we can have our prayers answered by God,” said Flanders.
Not moving an iota, and standing like a wall, and sticking out his ugly tongue, the troll said, “We have a stalemate, O man of God.”
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In battle for the Lord, Flanders took one step forward toward the troll. Ten feet now stood between Flanders and his adversary. Suddenly the troll leaped off of his feet and came in unto Flanders in this one jump. A Christian soldier with a formidable saber, Flanders swung his sword in a right-to-left sweep in his right hand just before the troll could bite down upon him. Behold, the troll’s head went one way, and the troll’s body went the other way.
“He’s dead,” said Heidi in relief. She gaped at the troll carcass; then she leaned her head over the railing and threw up sickness down into the river.
Flanders had to keep himself from doing the same thing. And he successfully held it back. “Are you okay, Heidi?” he asked.
“I think I am now, Flanders,” she said. “How about you?”
“I felt sick, too, but now I’m better,” he said.
“Let’s not look back upon what’s left of him,” said Miss Breed.
“Let us continue our pilgrimage,” he said. And he looked back at the dead troll and said, “We have a checkmate, O troll.” The two Christians continued their journey across the River of Testings.
And as they walked, Flanders told her his story of how he had been led to Christ by Proffery Coins himself also. She already knew about his story, just as he already knew her story. But he never tired of hearing how she had gotten saved, and she never tired of hearing how he had gotten saved. And this was the testimony of his own salvation from the work of the soul-winner they both knew so well: Before Flanders had seen his need for Christ, his love was a demon Collie dog whom he had assumed to be an angel. Her name was “Zack.” And though he had never met her and had never seen her, he loved only her, and she “loved only him.” And he believed in unshakable blind faith that Heaven for him was to run the meadows and run the seashores of Paradise with his beloved she-collie for ever and ever. In his life down here on Earth as an unsaved man, he ever delighted to write and to rewrite many fantasy stories about his dear Zack. He called her “the Wizard of the Heavens.” And he
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proudly called his short stories and his short story writing “Wizardry.” And he told everyone about his Collie dog angel waiting for him in Heaven. And he unreservedly also told Proffery the Christian about his special she-Collie Zack. But the Bible says in Job 34:3, “For the ear trieth words, as the mouth tasteth meat.” And Proffery Coins judged Flanders’s words and inquired further into this matter with his spiritual wisdom. He visited Flanders at his home and asked him, “What does this Zack look like?”
And Flanders told him, “I never saw her, but she told me what she looks like.”
“Tell me,” asked Proffery in Christian love.
“She is a blue Merle Collie dog,” began Flanders to say in all confidance. “And she has a front left leg all white. And she has a front right leg all black. Her tail is full and all black. And she has great red wings like a dragon or a bat. And she is so beautiful that my word for her is ‘resplendent.’”
“How did she tell you this?” asked Proffery in compassion of Christ.
“I lay on my bed and got peaceful thoughts from her into my head,” said Flanders confidently.
“Did she tell you other things, too, besides what she looks like?” asked Proffery gently.
“Oh yes,” said Flanders, thinking of telling Proffery some of his secret wisdom. “She has told me in my head most of all, ‘Do not worship Jesus the Son of God.’”
In warmth of Christian heart, Proffery Coins asked, “Could I pray for you, Flanders?”
Flanders had not expected this request, but because it was Proffery asking this and because what he was asking for was so holy and good a thing to ask for, Flanders was flattered by this query. And he said, “Why, yes, Proffery. I would be glad for you to pray for me.” This made Flanders like Proffery all the more now than he already did.
“I’ll pray for you in my quiet time alone with God this night, Flanders,” said Proffery.
“May God answer your prayers quickly,” said Flanders. Flanders did not know for what he was asking. But God indeed answered Proffery’s prayers for Flanders with great Godspeed.
That night in bed, Flanders could not sleep. He tried to gather in some of Zack’s thoughts into
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his head as he lay underneath the covers, but this time no thoughts came from her. And he did not find that peace that he had always found fulfillment in doing thus. And Zack disappointed him this time.
He then began to seek to think his own thoughts. Maybe such a reflection from his own heart might make up for the lack this night of Zack’s reflections. And he came up empty here, as well. He could not find satisfaction now from any thoughts. Then he turned to God in prayer for his first time, asking Him, “Lord, talk to me.” Maybe he could find contentment trying this instead for his first time. And the Holy Spirit of God spoke one most cogent message in His traditional still small voice. And what God said to him was an introductory six-word question and a concluding seven-word question. God asked Flanders Nickels, “Does Zack look like an angel? Does not Zack look like a demon?” And the Holy Ghost spoke no more. This enlightened Flanders with a brand new understanding. Zack was not a good angel waiting to take him up to Heaven with her after all. Zack must instead be an evil angel waiting to take him down to Hell with her. She had claws on her demon Collie feet, and she had teeth in her demon Collie muzzle. Why, she was a fallen angel who could this very night come to him finally for her first time and tear him and slash him with her claws and her teeth. She could literally kill him and take him down to Hell. No, she had never loved him. And he had definitely loved the wrong one. And Flanders feared Zack now as any sensible unsaved person should fear Hell. He was scared of her now. He was scared to death. He needed a Saviour. Maybe he should learn to worship Jesus the Son of God after all. And he felt now with great spiritual wisdom, “My offense at Jesus is not worth going to Hell for.” And he jumped out of bed and knelt beside it on his carpet. He had heard about this Jesus before, and it had stuck in his head most disagreeably. But now Jesus was a most agreeable need for his soul. And he took what he had about Jesus in his head, and he moved it down a foot to his heart. And he prayed a most sincere and apt and spontaneous sinners’ prayer right there, his words guided by the Holy Spirit: He confessed his egregious sins of the occult; he confessed the good news of the Gospel; he asked Christ to become his personal Saviour. He then got to his feet, turned on
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his bedroom light, and gathered all of his Zack stories in bundles for repentance. And he went downstairs to the family’s living room, threw all of his dog stories into the fireplace, and set them on fire, and watched them all burn up into ashes. There was no turning back. He did it. For his prayer for salvation had gotten him saved. He belonged to God now. And it was morning now.
And the first thing he did was to go and visit Proffery to tell him what great things had happened for him. The first thing he said was “Proffery, I gave up Zack!”
“Amen! Amen! Amen!” said Proffery.
And the second thing he said was, “Proffery, I found Jesus!”
“Amen! Amen! Amen!” said Proffery.
That was how Flanders Nickels had become a born-again Christian.
As he finished telling his girlfriend-in-the-Lord Heidi Breed on this bridge this most unusual testimony of salvation, the woman said, “It is just as you always tell me, Flanders: ‘You were taken out of the jaws of a devil dog and taken in under the wings of the Lamb of God.’”
Just then a crisp breeze as of mid-autumn came upon them from up ahead. It was yet mid-summer here. And the two pilgrims looked on up ahead on this Good Lord’s Footbridge.
There stood another adversary to test them. It was ugly and grotesque like the troll, but it looked like a fairy. “Flanders, what might that be?” asked Miss Breed. She hid behind Flanders’s back and pointed at it in repugnance.
“It looks like a goblin,” said Flanders.
“Oo, go after him with your sword,” said the mythological girl.
“He hasn’t done anything,” said Flanders.
“Oh, but he will,” said Heidi most assuredly.
“Heidi, do you see his shadow?” he asked.
“Uh huh,” she said. “It stretches behind him a good fifteen feet.”
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“And would you say that he stands about five feet tall?” asked Flanders.
“Yes. I would say that,” said Miss Breed.
“Look up at the sun,” said Flanders. “What do you see?”
“I see the sun of high noon right now,” she said.
“This goblin ought not to have any shadow at all,” said Flanders.
“Go after his shadow with your sword, Flanders,” recommended the mythological girl.
“Do you mean instead of going after himself?” asked Flanders.
“This goblin’s shadow can only be of the Devil,” said Heidi.
Then the goblin began to march toward them, raising his feet high in stalking. Flanders drew his StraightSaber. “Stop advancing, O goblin, or I will cut up your shadow into pieces,” warned Flanders. The goblin refused to stop his assault. But the goblin’s shadow suddenly stepped out in front of the goblin. Flanders felt the shadow’s frosty cold upon his body where he was standing.
The mythological girl said, “I feel winter on my body.”
This shadow was only five feet away from where they stood. And this goblin did not slow down his steady attack in marching. Flanders swung his StraightSaber down upon the bridge near his feet to hack at the shadow’s neck. Behold, the head of the shadow was decapitated from the neck of the shadow, and it fell over the edge of the bridge and landed down into the water far below with a splash.
And the beheaded shadow of the goblin remained there upon the base of the bridge right before them.
The two pilgrims looked upon the goblin’s physical self in hopes that his physical self was duly beheaded by this saber from God. Not so. The real goblin was still whole and intact and with his head.
“Go get his arms, Flanders,” said the mythological girl.
“You mean the arms of his shadow,” said Flanders to make sure.
“Yeah, Flanders. Both of them,” said Heidi Breed.
Flanders’s sword hand was white with cold from this shadow, and he swung his StraightSaber
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down twice with the force of God in this sword down upon the headless shadow. And first he cut off the shadow’s right arm, and second he cut off the shadow’s left arm. The arm shadows were severed from their shoulder shadows. And the rest of the shadow continued walking toward the two pilgrims, the arm shadows left behind now and lying upon the bridge.
Yet the real goblin still had both of his arms still quite connected to his shoulders. And he did not even slow down from his slow and steady stalking.
“Maybe you should get his legs, Flanders,” said the mythological girl. “The legs of the shadow I mean.”
“My fingers are numb,” said Flanders in dismay. “My hands have felt that shadow, Heidi.”
“I feel like I am in a walk-in freezer, and I am outside in the nice summer day,” said Miss Breed.
“My right hand can barely feel my sword handle,” he said.
“Maybe you should try with your left hand,” said Miss Breed.
He took up now his StraightSaber into his less cold left hand. “I am not left-handed, Heidi. Wish me luck.”
“God will give us the victory over this goblin,” said Heidi.
“Indeed, girl,” said Flanders. “The God Who made my left hand can use my left hand to His glory and honor right now on this bridge.”
“My head feels so cold that my eyes are hurting now,” said the mythological girl.
Flanders swung his mighty sword from God twice with it in his inexperienced left hand. With his first swing, he cut up the shadow’s right leg from the shadow’s right hip. And with his second swing he cut off the shadow’s left leg from the shadow’s left hip. Lo, the shadow legs that had stretched out in front of the goblin, now dismembered from the shadow’s torso, now lay upon the base of the footbridge. And the shadow could no longer walk in front of its physical body. And the remains
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of the shadow of the goblin—just the shadow of the torso—could no longer advance in walk. And this torso shadow lay upon the bridge. This freezing cold shadow could harm the two pilgrims no more.
Miss Breed asked, “Flanders, is this goblin shadow actually dead?”
“I believe so, Heidi,” said Flanders.
But the real goblin still had his legs joined to his upper portion.
Behold, the real goblin, alive and intact, stared down upon his five five pieces of shadow on the bridge that had not fallen down into the water. Then he looked down over the edge of the railing to where the head of the shadow had fallen down into the water. And the numbing cold goblin gave forth a shriek like a banshee. And he quickly gathered up his five pieces of shadow upon this footbridge, and he threw them into the two believers. Caught off guard, Flanders sliced them up with his sword, and Heidi batted them away with her arms. And the goblin laughed in guffaw at them. Then he finally spoke words to them, saying. “I must go and get my shadow head, man and woman of God. I had enough of the both of you. Are you both a little cold? Christians like you offend me.” And just like that he stepped out onto the top of the railing of this footbridge, and he leaned forward, and he jumped down into the River of Testings in search for his shadow head. And just like that, the goblin was gone from them.
Flanders said, “We are now halfway across our Good Lord’s Footbridge, Heidi.”
And the mythological girl said, “And we are halfway across this River of Testings below.”
“Three trials down, and more trials to go,” said Flanders Nickels.
“God has given us the victory, and He will continue giving us the victory,” said Heidi Breed.
”Our God is an awesome God,” he said.
“I will get to win souls for my Saviour once again,” said Heidi her prayer for which she was on this pilgrimage.
“And I will get to be able to write again as I always had,” said Flanders his prayer and his
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reason for this pilgrimage.
Suddenly a stentorian voice spoke from the right side of the bridge, saying, “Young lady, behold!”
Behold, a giant whose feet were in the river and whose head was above this bridge! Flanders fell back against the railing on the other side of this bridge. And Heidi fell down upon her hands and knees upon this bridge.
The giant said then, “Lo, O miss.” The two pilgrims got back to their feet in fear. Heidi looked face to face with this giant. Flanders drew his sword. Then the giant held up a garment in his giant hand. It was on a normal hanger held up by an index finger bigger than the woman’s whole arm.
It was Heidi’s secret prom dress that she had never told Flanders about—the one prom dress that she had purchased after she had repented and become born-again. This giant then hanged the garment’s hanger up upon the railing of this bridge, the elegant shiny black prom gown up against the railing on Heidi’s side of the bridge and right in front of her. This illicit little fetish of a dress she had secretly kept in her closet, and now this giant whom she knew not had brought it here on this bridge over the River of Testings to test her. It was calling out to her now with the lure of black acetate. What would she do with it now? How much did she really want to get her soul-winning back on track? Did she now have to choose irrevocably between winning souls or wearing her prom dress? Was this prom gown the reason for her unfruitful witnessing life? Then the giant waded away nonchalantly and did not come back.
Flanders, understanding, said, “That prom gown is the real giant. Isn’t it?”
“I never told you about this, Flanders,” she said. “I thought that I was getting away with it. But I kept it. And lately I’ve been getting my thoughts back about what I used to do with men with my prom gowns. And I…well…I’ve been considering you. Yesterday, I wanted to put on my prom dress just for you and for…”
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“Shame on you, woman!” rebuked Flanders for this temptation to take away his virginity.
“I’m sorry, Flanders,” she said. He was not happy with her right now. “Let’s go back from where we have come on this bridge and let me flee my temptation here on the hanger, Flanders,” said the mythological girl.
“We cannot go backwards on the Good Lord’s Footbridge; that would be backsliding on God, Heidi,” he told her. “We must continue on forward, and then our prayers can be answered.”
“Could you help me, Flanders?” she cried out.
“I can help you, Heidi,” he said in compassion as a boyfriend. “Take my hand, and we will walk past it together, and we will not look back at it.”
She took his hand. “Okay,” she said.
“Promise me that you will not put it on,” he said.
“I promise,” said the mythological girl.
“Promise me that you will not pick it up,” he said.
“I promise,” said Miss Breed.
“Promise me that you will not reach out for it,” he said.
“I promise,” said Heidi.
“And promise me that you will not touch it or let it touch you,” he said.
“I promise, Flanders,” she said.
“Let us walk past it together,” he said. “Do not look at it.”
And the mythological girl and her boyfriend-in-Christ went ahead and proceeded forward and quite did successfully pass by the prom gown idol. “Well done, girlfriend,” he praised her.
“But God would have me do better, Flanders,” said Heidi.
“What would God have you do to make it better?” asked Flanders.
“This,” said the mythological girl. And acting according to the will of God, Miss Breed
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grabbed a hold of the mighty StraightSaber in Flanders’s scabbard with both hands and drew it out and attacked the prom dress with it in a savage assault. And just a few moments later, there lay pieces of black acetate all over on the bridge. This prom gown was never going to tempt the mythological girl again. It was a prom dress no longer for forever. Her godly zeal satisfied, Miss Breed then came back to Flanders and returned his StraightSaber to his well-trained hands.
And when all of this was done, Flanders said to her, “Very well done, girl!”
“I will never buy another prom gown again, O God,” she vowed to the Lord as she looked up to Heaven. “It is all wrong only for myself.”
“Amen!” said Flanders. “Amen!”
“When I get home from this journey across the river, Flanders, I think that I will pick up my King James Bible and read it for a few hours.”
“Heidi, I never heard you do anything like that before,” said Flanders, seeing a major step of growth suddenly in his girlfriend’s walk with Christ.
“I go and pray for a few hours lots,” she did say. “But I never did that with Bible study before.”
“You have found a love for the Word of God,” said Flanders. “And it happened right after you repented of that extant prom gown of yours, O Heidi.”
“Yeah. You’re right, Flanders,” said the mythological girl.
“Shall we resume our trek, girlfriend?” he asked.
Without turning back, Miss Breed said, “We have more trials on this footbridge for us to conquer together, boyfriend.” And the mythological girl marched forward, bold now in the Lord.
“Mine could well be next,” he said. And he continued onward on this Good Lord’s Footbridge as well.
“Do you have any idea what it might be?” she asked.
“I think that I will have to find out from God when it comes,” he said.
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“Mine was the prom gown. Yours could be the devildog,” said the mythological girl.
A silent while passed. Then Flanders said,“I began to write a story some time ago.”
“I thought that you could not write any more stories,” she said.
“I began to write a story some time ago,” he reiterated in convictions.
“Oh. Flanders, You did not write a good story about God. I’m right. Aren’t I?” she asked.
“You are right, Heidi,” he said.
“You went and wrote a bad story. Didn’t you?” she asked.
“Yes, Heidi,” he said.
“What was the name of it?” she asked.
“’Zack—To Save A Soul,’” he confessed.
“Wizardry!” she exclaimed.
“But I never finished it,” he said.
“When did your stories for Jesus start to fail you in your writing life?” she asked.
“Right after I backslid with writing the beginning of that dog story,” he confessed.
“Did you quickly get rid of it—that piece of dog story?” she asked.
“It is still there in progress in my desk drawer. It waits for me to finish it. But I refuse to look at it again. And I promised God that I would never add another word to that Wizardry story as long as I lived.”
“But why don’t you just go and throw it out or burn it or shred it?” she asked.
“I remember how I used to feel for her,” he said. “I cannot go and betray her like that.”
“You are sinning against God with spiritual infidelity, Flanders,” she said.
“You mean that I am cheating on Jesus,” he said.
“Yeah. I do,” said the mythological girl.
“I really need to talk to God about all of this,” he said.
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“Do you really expect God to change his mind about this after you are done telling him your side of the story, Flanders?” asked the mythological girl. “You know what you need to do. You need to rip up that big dog story with your StraightSaber from God.”
“What I mean is that I have to talk to God about all of this and to apologize to Him and to ask His forgiveness and to repent before Him,” said Flanders.
“You are really going to do that?” she asked.
“I want my Christian stories back now so bad that I will do anything to feel God’s Holy Spirit write my writings for Him as I move my fingers upon the keyboard,” said Flanders.
“It sounds to me like you want to pray to God now really bad,” she said.
“I hunger for a two-hour prayer the first thing after I get home,” he said. “I have so much to tell Him that my heart pants after the water brook in my great thirst for prayer now.”
“Flanders, how many two-hour Bible studies have you had in your days as a believer? Lots indeed! But how many two-hour prayers have you had in that same time as a Christian? None!”
“I never knew before how good it feels to pray daily,” he said. “Now I want to get daily prayer into my walk with Jesus for now on.”
“Prayer today. Stories for Jesus tomorrow,” she said in encouragement at his stand for prayer he was now making for his first time.
“The way I feel now is funny inside, Heidi,” he said. “I feel that hacking away at my Wizardry of my saved life is not good enough for me and for God. The way I feel I need to hack away at the Wizard of the Heavens herself to show my true and sincere repentance I now feel.”
“Oooo! Be careful for what you wish; you just might get it,” warned the wise mythological girl.
She turned back to smile at him in exhortation.
His gaze, however, was focused to what was behind her up ahead on this Good Lord’s Footbridge. And he said in ambivalence, “It looks to be too late for me to take heed to that proverb,
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good and fair Heidi.”
She turned to look to what he was looking at. Behold, a blue Merle she-Collie dog with large red wings of a dragon standing upon the bridge with all the false beauty of Lucifer!
“Zack has finally come,” said Flanders.
“You know what you must do, Flanders,” said the mythological girl. “You must make Zack to go away so that she can never come back.”
“Can a human being prevail over her?” he asked.
“You can, Flanders, with help from God,” said Miss Breed. “You have the StraightSaber.”
He called out to her, “Zack, in my unsaved life, you kept my soul from seeking the Saviour Jesus Christ. In my saved life, you have tempted me and cost me my writing life for the Saviour Jesus Christ. And now you come upon this Good Lord’s Footbridge to hinder my journey to the other side so that the Saviour Jesus Christ can give me back my Christian stories to write with him.”
In final exhortation, the mythological girl said to Flanders, “It is time to choose between the devildog and your canon ministry, boyfriend!”
“I choose the canon ministry!” he exclaimed.
And he drew his StraightSaber from his scabbard in both hands. And he charged fearlessly in upon the real Zack. And Zack was taken aback by her former man’s boldness in Christ. And she sought flight into the air to escape this mighty man of valor and his sword. Flanders swung his saber in upon the devildog with two strokes with both hands at once just as the devildog lifted up off of the footbridge with her wings. The first sword stroke cut off Zack’s whole left wing. The second sword stroke cut off Zack’s whole right wing. And when this happened to her, she was already beyond the railing of the bridge and dozens of feet above the river far below. And the demon the Wizard of the Heavens fell down to her death into the River of Testings, below, her two dragon wings falling down after her; and all of the devildog’s carcass fell to the bottom of the waters never to rise again.
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“Wow! That’s done,” said the mythological girl.
“What great thing I have done just now,” he said.
“Look up ahead, the Park of Prayers Answered,” said Miss Heidi Breed.
“We have crossed our bridge,” he said. “Praise Jesus.”
And the two journeyers stepped off of the Good Lord’s Footbridge and walked out upon the bank of this side of the River of Testings.
Behold, a lawn of yellow hawk weed and orange hawk weed and much green grass. There were two picnic tables. And on the one picnic table there was a King James Bible and a pack of salvation tracts and a few sheets of yellow notebook paper and a pencil. And alongside this picnic table was a wooden sign on a wooden signpost three feet high that read, “for My daughter’s tract ministry.” “God wrote this sign,” said the mythological girl. “I am His daughter.” Then she said, “I think, Flanders, that God would have me sit here at this picnic table.”
And on the other picnic table there was a King James Bible and a collegiate dictionary and a laptop computer and the internet. And there was a wooden sign three feet high beside this picnic table as well; and it read, “for My son’s canon ministry.” Flanders said, “I am God’s son. These were my writing resources. God wants me to sit down now at this picnic table.”
The mythological girl and her Christian boyfriend sat down now at their respective picnic tables. “I want to begin a Bible study today right now,” said Heidi, opening the Holy Bible before her on this picnic table.
“And I want to pray finally now right here,” said Flanders Nickels.
And here at this Park of Prayers Answered, the mythological girl read from her Bible for over two hours continuously, and she was so happy in Jesus in doing so. And here with his girlfriend, Flanders talked his silent thoughts to God in great prayer for over two hours straight. This was the funnest fun he had ever had.
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And when they finished their quiet time worship of God, Miss Breed said, “Flanders, I’m going to do this again tomorrow, and every day after,” and Flanders said, “And I am just beginning with my prayer life. Not a day will go by for now one when I will not go to prayer to my Heavenly Father.”
Just then a traveler came up to them from having walked across the bridge. He was a stranger, but his countenance was of one who was kind and friendly. He said to them, “Good people, I have walked across the footbridge in search of God. Do you two know God?”
The mythological girl quickly jumped up to her feet, and she said, “Sir, I know God.” She proffered this lost fellow one of those salvation tracts that was on this picnic table, and he took it and thanked her. She bade him to sit with her at this picnic table, and he humbly accepted her offer. And this mythological girl began to bear spiritual fruit again after having endured a long dry spell in her witnessing labors.
Just then Flanders Nickels saw in today’s happenings an inspiration for a story to write. He suddenly had a host of ideas as to what to write down in this brand new wondrous short story. And he began to write for God for his first time now once again after so long a time away. And writers’ block was now quickly gone away from him. The computer was again alive with God’s good hand in the joy of writing for the writer.
It is written about the mythological girl with the revival in her tract ministry, “’And how shall they preach, except they be sent? As it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!’ Romans 10:15.”
As it is written about the mythological girl’s boyfriend with the revival in his canon ministry, “’How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation; that saith to Zion, Thy God reigneth!’ Isaiah 52:7.”
Then, at the daughter of God’s picnic table, Miss Heidi Breed did lead this visitor at the park
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through the sinners’ prayer unto his own so great salvation. And, at the son of God’s picnic table, Flanders finished up his short story with a culminating climax and a happy denouement.
The visitor then thanked the mythological girl and Jesus for his conversion to Christianity, and he began now to walk back across the bridge, his prayers for the truth now answered and his soul now saved.
Flanders looked at her from his picnic table and praised her. She then took up her pencil and her yellow sheets. This was her list of souls that she had won for Jesus over the years, the precious list that had fallen upon lean times because of that black prom gown that she should not have bought in her walk with Christ. And she wrote upon the most recent page of these pages, “Soul CCC—Regal Royal Sixpence.” That was the man’s name who had come for salvation here.
She said to Flanders, “Very soon I shall write down for myself and God on my yellow pages here, ‘Soul CCCI.’”
“Good job, my mythological girl,” said Flanders Nickels.
She then came up to his picnic table and said, “What did you just finish up writing, Flanders?” she asked.
“A whole new story, pretty Heidi,” he said.
“What is it about?” she asked.
“See the title for yourself, O fair Heidi,” he said.
She read out loud this story’s title, “The Mythological Girl,”
“Do you like it, girl?” he asked.
“It’s about me!” she said, flattered and honored and glad.
“It’s all about what happened today,” he said further.
“Flanders, you are going to win souls with this story,” said the mythological girl.
“It’s great for me to write stories again,” he said.
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“And it’s great for me to give out tracts again,” she said.
It is written, “’Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes.’ Song of Solomon 2:15.”
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