For Many Shall Come in My Name…
by Rob Chilson & William F. Wu
Illustration by Janet Aulisio Dannheiser
Dave Kiefer sat deeply slumped back into his sister’s soft, green and white flower-print sofa. The small living room in her mobile home was dimly-lit, the windows shadowed by the big trees all around it. The house was set off a gravel road in Missouri’s southern forest. All he could think about was his six-year-old son, Trippy.
“Davey?” Kathy Bender, his divorced sister, came into the front door and looked at him. “Did Laura call while I was out? Is there any word about… Trippy?”
Dave hardly heard her. His wife, Laura, was with Trippy now in the hospital over in Poplar Bluff. Trippy had fallen out of a tree last week and was in a coma with severe brain damage. The neurosurgeon had told Dave and Laura that even if he came out of the coma, he would never be a whole boy again.
“No.” He tugged his T-shirt down over his belly and started to take a drink to show her the beer can in his hand was empty. He let it drop to the floor, sat staring idly at the dark holovision.
“You thinking about what the doctor said? About having Trippy’s brain cells regenerated?”
“No!” Dave’s anger surprised even him. “They said it was experimental. My boy’s not a guinea pig. And…”
“What?”
“It just isn’t right. It’s God’s business. Resurrection—if God wants Trippy t-to stay with us, He’ll bring him around, without any fancy medical stuff. If He doesn’t, who are we to-to—” He stopped, his voice cracking.
Kathy looked at him for a long moment. Like him, she was tall and a little too heavy. Her long hair matched his in color: blonde darkening to light brown. They came from hardy German peasant stock in the little Missouri town of Westphalia.
“Well, Rev’ren’ Jason’s coming on now,” said Kathy, forcing false cheer into her voice. “Laura says you like him, too. I watch him every day, ever since I’ve been home on unemployment.”
Dave said nothing.
Kathy sat down on the far end of the old sofa, her weight making it sag slightly. She aimed and clicked the remote control. Instantly, the living room brightened.
Dave blinked in the sudden light, looking into the interior of a large church, in fact gigantic—wider than that end of the mobile home. A man in a perfectly pressed blue suit strode across a dais in front of an altar, grinning at a congregation sitting in pews with their backs to Dave and Kathy.
“Welcome!” boomed an unseen announcer, as music rose behind him. “This is the First New Testament Gospel World Fellowship, hosted by Reverend Jason Matthew Wayne. Join Reverend Jason and his devoted followers in worship and praising God!”
“Good,” said Kathy. “We skipped all the credits and junk and got right to the good part.”
The shot closed in on Reverend Jason until he seemed to be standing about ten feet from them. He had a head of very full, wavy brown hair and a big smile with large, perfect teeth. His eyes were a bright, sparkling blue and he had a long, firm, square jaw.
“Welcome, friends,” Reverend Jason called out in a resonant baritone. “I’m glad to see you today. Let’s go straight to a tape of this morning’s baptism in Jordan Brook, which runs right behind the Fellowship Church!”
The scene cut away instantly, to Reverend Jason standing knee-deep in a lazy, winding blue stream. His voice-over continued, introducing the two young women being baptized, while his image greeted them. Willows grew by the bank, trailing their green fingers in the water. The Reverend wore a plain back swimsuit.
Kathy whistled at him, then laughed. “Wow. Look at that.”
Dave allowed himself a slight grin at her enthusiasm. “Yeah, he’s in pretty good shape.”
Reverend Jason had perfectly shaped and sharply sculpted muscle definition. He looked like a classic movie hero from some adventure film. Two young women in identical, modest white swimsuits waded out to join him, looking adoringly up at him. The Reverend placed a hand on each of their heads and closed his eyes to pray.
“They’re cute, too,” said Dave, just to keep himself involved in the show.
“Too young for you,” said his sister, with a teasing glance.
When Reverend Jason had finished praying, he gently pushed both his companions under the water of the stream for a moment. Then they came back up, spitting out water in small, tidy arcs with their eyes closed and ecstasy on their faces. The camera cut back to Reverend Jason in the sacristy.
Dave got up and fumbled through the church scene into the kitchen. He knew that Kathy was just trying to get his mind off Trippy for a little while. Taking another beer out of the refrigerator, he decided he could humor her.
When he sat down again, Reverend Jason was pacing back and forth in front of the pulpit, but the stained glass windows behind him were overlaid by three holographic videos of Jesus healing the lame, the halt, and the blind. These scenes were based on famous ancient paintings, Dave knew.
Now the Reverend was speaking, waving his hands emphatically:
“ ‘The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them,’ saith the Lord Jesus!” the Reverend boomed. “Matthew eleven, five,” he added, sotto voce.
“ ‘Then he called his twelve disciples together, and gave them power and authority over all devils, and to cure diseases. And he sent them to preach the kingdom of God, and to heal the sick.’ Luke nine, one and two.”
The rising, urgent, exclamatory prayers of the congregants crescendoed, then the Reverend Jason came back again:
“ ‘Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you!’ Matthew seventeen, twenty.”
Two men carried in a sick girl on a stretcher, and in the animations behind the Reverend, others carried in sick people on cots. Reverend Jason bent over the child before him. “ ‘Suffer the little children to come unto me!’ Now, my daughter, we will pray together.” He closed his eyes and raised his hands, shouting aloud in Hebrew—according to the little scroll across the floor of the church, which translated it: “ ‘No man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.’ John three, two.”
“Arise and walk! Thy faith has made thee whole!”
And the child sat up, with the light of astonishment on her face. She beamed at the audience, then up at the handsome Reverend, saying, “I feel lots better now!”
The Reverend beamed back at her, the congregation cried “Hosanna!” Against the windows behind them, the animated lame, halt, and blind were rising and rejoicing also.
Under the stretcher, across the Reverend’s feet, ran the scrolclass="underline" “Simulated recreation of conjectural events described in letters to the minister.”
Several more miracles followed, then more booming quotes from the Scriptures. Not a single moment dragged. Reverend Wayne’s show concluded after thirty minutes, when the Merciful Sisters of Melody, three large but attractive women, came on and sang “What A Friend We Have In Jesus” with the Reverend. The congregation joined in, singing like a trained choir.
Afterward came the usual announcements: Join the Fellowship for special faxings, or the Reverend’s Compnet service, or a Special Appearance in your own home! of the Reverend. A matter-of-fact scroll mentioned the modest fee that this electronic service required.
“Davey!” Kathy reached over and gripped his arm, hard.
Dave winced; her grasp almost made him spill his beer. “What?”
“Let’s do it! Let’s invite the Rev’ren’ in and ask him about Trippy! It doesn’t cost much—Maybe he could heal Trippy—!”