Water Walker (The Full Story, Episodes 1-4)

by Dekker, Ted

  I was lying on my bed, silently crying in my sleep. I’d been there for two or three days, refusing to wake because I wanted it all to be over. Sleeping forever was far more attractive to me than waking to spend even one more hour in that living hell my mother forced me to call home.

  Or maybe Zeke had given me some drugs.

  “Why do you cry for yourself, Eden?”

  “What do you mean? I’ve been hurt!”

  “Is that really why you’re crying? Because you were hurt?”

  “Of course that’s why I’m crying. Zeke dropped his knees on my leg with all his weight and I felt my leg snap.” A shiver ran through my bones at the thought of it. “How could anyone do such a thing?”

  “You’re not crying because your leg is broken,” he said. “You’re crying because you think your leg is part of who you are, and so you think you’ve been attacked and you’re feeling sorry for yourself.”

  “Well, don’t you?” I demanded.

  “Don’t I what?”

  “Feel sorry for me?”

  “I have compassion for you because you’re crying. But there’s nothing wrong with you, so I don’t feel sorry for you.”

  “Of course there’s something wrong. My leg’s been broken!”

  “Your leg? Well, that’s only your costume. And as long as you hold onto the belief you are somehow your leg and have therefore been hurt, you will see yourself as a victim and continue to feel sorry for yourself.”

  I hated him saying that, I really did. I thought it was cold and inconsiderate and I didn’t want to listen to him anymore, so I turned away and tried not to listen.

  “Do you want to walk on water, Eden?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “When you do, I’ll be waiting to show you how.”

  “You already showed me how! And now I have a broken leg.”

  “Then maybe you weren’t listening. When you’re ready to listen, I’ll be in the boat. Maybe this time you’ll actually hear me. If so, you’ll be able to walk on water.”

  “I already did walk on water!”

  “And why aren’t you doing it now?”

  The questions stumped me because I knew by water he meant trouble, and he was right—I was drowning in all of my troubles.

  “Meet me in the boat, Eden. I’ll show you how to walk on water.”

  But I didn’t want to talk to him or think about it anymore. So I retreated into the darkness of a more comforting dream that was immediately and entirely forgettable.

  Sometime later I woke up and opened my eyes to see that my mother was at my window with her back to me, staring out. There were fresh bandages on my leg. She’d set it?

  I quickly sealed my eyelids and lay perfectly still, not wanting her to know I was awake.

  I could imagine the pain that she must be in, seeing her broken daughter lying helplessly on the bed. Or maybe that was wishful thinking. I hoped she was so sickened by her own cruelty that she couldn’t bear herself. I hoped it gave her an ulcer and kept her awake for weeks. Whatever pain she felt, she had it coming because she was right: we do reap what we sow. Now it was her turn to do a little reaping of her own.

  She must have given me some drugs and set my leg when I was under, because I had no recollection of having my leg set, and I still felt groggy. Maybe she kept giving me drugs to keep me asleep; that way I could never run, what with a broken leg and being asleep.

  Dream, Eden. Go back to sleep and dream. Dream of walking on water. Find the narrow way that so few find. The way to be saved from all of your troubles.

  The thoughts were mine, coming from me, like a long-lost memory calling to me. The words weren’t Outlaw’s; they were actually my own. It’s like I was calling to myself.

  Go to the boat, Eden. You were born to walk on water.

  And then I was asleep because the next thing I knew, I was lying at the bottom of the boat in a dream that felt far too real to be a dream.

  I gasped and scrambled to my knees, then pushed my head up to peer around. The boat was in the middle of the lake, as before. And the moment I stared out at the water, the wind began to gust and I knew that a storm was gathering.

  Fear welled inside me as the boat began to roll with surging waves whipped by the strengthening wind. I searched the distant shore but there was no sign of Outlaw, and I thought, Oh no! I’m going to drown this time. Oh no!

  A soft chuckle startled me, and I spun around.

  Outlaw sat on the rear bench, leaning back on the boat’s stern, smiling.

  “Hello, Eden,” he said.

  I stared at him, both relieved at his presence on my boat and slightly put off that he was so nonchalant while there was a storm building.

  “Are you ready to step out of this boat that seems to keep you safe from a sea that seems to boil with trouble? On your own this time?”

  So here we were again.

  “I don’t want to walk on water,” I said.

  “Why not?” He was still leaning back, arms hooked over the side of the boat, legs stretched out before him, as if he didn’t have a care in the world even though the waves were now foaming and the wind starting to whistle.

  “I could drown,” I said.

  “Well then, you seem to have a problem,” he said. “Because the only way back to shore is over those waves.”

  “We can row the boat.”

  “Not without oars, we can’t. Besides, the wind would only push the boat back, no matter how hard you rowed. Eventually, the water will splash over the side and the boat will sink and yes, you will drown.” He shook his head and tsked. “Such a problem to have.”

  “Then you can save me,” I said, thinking of the last time. The waves were slapping the hull with anger now, tipping us like a cork on a raging sea. “You can lead me.”

  “But I am, Eden. I am.”

  He drilled me with kind eyes, smiling mischievously, and it was only then that I noticed his hair. It was long and should be whipped about by the wind, but it wasn’t. In fact, the storm wasn’t having any effect on him.

  “You’re wondering why I don’t feel the effects of the storm,” he said. “It’s because this is your storm. You see the threats and so they’re real.”

  A larger wave slammed into the boat and sent me reeling. I grabbed the bench in front of me and hung on for dear life.

  “Help me!” I cried, twisting round to see that the waves were growing larger by the minute. “Help me!”

  “I am helping you,” he said.

  I whipped around and faced him. “Stop the waves!”

  His smile faded and he stared straight at me with such intensity and certainty that for a moment I thought he was angry. But only for a moment because when he spoke, there was only kindness in his voice.

  “You stop them, Eden.”

  “How?”

  “I told you how last time.”

  Panic crowded my throat and I searched my mind, but I couldn’t remember what it was that I was supposed to do.

  “Tell me again!”

  “Let go of the offense these waves cause you,” he said. “Forgive the water.”

  “Forgive it? That’s impossible! Forgive it for what? There’s nothing to pardon!”

  He unhooked his arms from the hull and stood, undaunted by the storm.

  “I didn’t say pardon. I said forgive. When I say forgive, I mean to see no fault or offense in the troubled sea. Let go of even the thought that it threatens you or has offended you. See it as innocent. Offer it no blame or defense. Stand tall and offer it, instead, your other cheek, no longer offended.”

  I didn’t see how that was possible. We were wasting time! I quickly scanned the horizon and saw only an endless stretch of bucking waves, all flowing toward the boat.

  “Help me!” I cried again, now completely desperate.

  “Look at me, Eden.”

  I spun back to him and locked on to his eyes.

  “Keep your eyes on me. Don’t look at the water. Can you do tha
t?”

  I was struck by my intense desire to check the waves again, just to make sure they hadn’t grown even more threatening. I had to protect myself from them, you see? I was terrified that a large wave would swamp the boat and leave me flailing in the water.

  “Can you focus on me?” he cried above the wind.

  “I am!”

  “Your eyes are on me, and yet your mind is on the danger presented by the waves,” he said. “You still see threat on all sides. As long as you feel the need to protect yourself from that danger, you know that you haven’t let go of it. Forgive the sea and put your mind on my word. Hear me!”

  “I am! Hurry!”

  “I can’t hurry, Eden. Only you can. I’m not the one with the problem, you are. The problem will only go away when you decide to let go. There are very few people on this earth who know what it means to truly forgive and even fewer who walk the path of forgiveness. But the power of that forgiveness is staggering. And I do mean staggering.”

  I saw that I was out of options, because he was intent on leading me to let go of whatever I had to let go of to survive.

  “Then tell me how to do it!” I started to look away.

  “Keep your eyes on me, Eden!”

  I fixed my stare and tried to calm the trembling in my limbs.

  “As long as you feel the need to defend yourself against that water, you see it as a threat.”

  “That’s crazy!”

  “Then your master was insane as well!”

  “What master?”

  “Jesus, the first water walker, of course. Why do you suppose he taught never to resist the evil man who comes against you? Why did he say we must turn the other cheek and love our enemies? Because he knew! Hear me, Eden and hear me well: Only in not defending are you ever truly safe. Every time you resist or defend against any perceived threat from the water, you give it power to fulfill that very perceived threat and it will crush you. But there’s another way!” His voice rose with intensity. “There’s a narrow way that few find but if anyone can find it, it’s you!”

  “They’re right there!” I shoved my finger at the tumultuous waves. “Would you also suggest that I put my hand in a fire to prove it can’t burn me?”

  “Touché!” He spread both hands and leaned forward. “Dead man walking; now you’re talking! Yes! There is a way not to be burned by the fire.” He jabbed his finger at the air to accentuate the word is. “There is a way to walk on water. There is a way to move a mountain. There is a way to part the sea. There is a way to be healed of any disease. There is a way to abide in perfect safety and love. And only one way!”

  He was talking about Jesus and his miracles, a subject I was altogether too familiar with, though I couldn’t remember him walking in fire.

  Dear God . . . how many nights had I spent in prayer, begging for him to make my way straight?

  “I do believe!” I yelled. “I believe and look where that’s gotten me!”

  “Ah yes, they believe what all devils believe. But they don’t trust. They have no faith! If you want to be saved from this troubled sea, you must surrender your mad belief in the danger it poses, and put your trust in that which truly keeps you safe instead. Forgive this world and all of its mad threats. Let go! See no harm in that which comes to destroy you because only your costume can be hurt. The real you is always safe in your Father’s arms. Always! You are his daughter!”

  Spray from the waves was now soaking me, head to foot—I could hardly deny the reality of that water threatening to swamp the boat. But one thing he’d said blared through my mind.

  Only in not defending are you ever truly safe.

  Could it be? Something about those words struck a chord deep in my bones. His ideas suddenly seemed a little less absurd. For the first time, they tempted me with a kind of deep certainty that I hadn’t yet felt. I say tempted because I only saw a glimmer of truth and then only in a single thought:

  What would it be like to not take any offense at what was done to me, ever? I would never be upset. Ever. What kind of power would such a person have? They couldn’t be hurt! They would be invulnerable, like their master.

  Outlaw must have seen something on my face because he flashed a smile.

  “Yes, you see, don’t you? Imagine the power you would have in this life, abiding in this truth alone.”

  “But . . . how can you not take offense when someone hurts you?” I asked.

  “Well, you have to change your thinking entirely, don’t you? Metanoia. Repentance, remember? A whole new operating system to transform the way you think and see the world. Being transformed by the renewing of your mind. And that takes faith, Eden. A complete letting go of what you think you know and trusting in what doesn’t necessarily make sense at first. Faith.”

  His words arrested me. What if it was true? It seemed utterly careless and reckless, but what if he was right?

  And suddenly I understood even more. These troubled waters around the boat were like the troubles I had with Mother. If I forgave her, she couldn’t hurt me. And by forgive, he meant seeing no offense . . .

  A twinkle came to his eyes, as if he could read my thoughts.

  “Ah, yes, now you are seeing. Forgive. See no fault, even as your Father sees no fault in you. Surrender to this knowledge and nothing can harm you. No storm, no misguided mother, not even a broken leg!”

  The simplicity of his words fell into my mind like rays of light that quickened a dormant set of laws deep in my soul, patiently waiting to be brought back to life.

  “Step out of the boat, Eden!” he cried, eyes fired. “If you can do it here, in your dream, you will be able to do it when you wake!” He pointed to his right. “Take a leap of faith and see that these troubled waters have no power over you unless you give that power to them, and even then they lie.”

  I took his outstretched hand to mean I could look at the water, so I did. Fear battered me and I lost my train of thought. All I could see were angry waves.

  “Everything in you cries out to remain in the safety you believe the boat offers you, doesn’t it? Of course it does! The boat is your defense against the water! But the very defense is what empowers the water to trouble you. Let go of this understanding. Faith, Eden. Faith!”

  He thundered the word above the storm and I felt a surge of confidence rise through me—just enough to give me the strength to take a step forward and grasp the hull with my right hand.

  But the threat of those waves looked utterly real to me. And the last time I’d stepped out, I’d gone under! And this time he wasn’t there to catch me!

  “I can’t!”

  “Well then . . . you’ll only drown here in your boat, won’t you? You will lie there in your bed with a broken leg, seething with anger and bitterness and you will live in terrible suffering, all because you can’t bring yourself to let go of your offense.”

  He’d said it all matter-of-factly, but he now jumped up next to me and yelled above the story, eyes wild.

  “No, Eden! No! You will not take the path the rest of the world takes. You will find the narrow path because it’s your destiny! Stepping off the edge may feel like death, but trust me, letting that old self die is no loss.”

  “I’m afraid!”

  “And yet perfect love casts out fear.”

  “I don’t feel perfect love!”

  “Nothing can separate you from that love. Nothing! It’s already inside of you, only forgotten.”

  He thrust his hand out to the waves.

  “Now step out!”

  “You’re pressuring me!”

  He withdrew his hand and stepped back as if reprimanded.

  “I’m simply passionate about showing you the only way you can be saved from these troubled waters. I didn’t make this stuff up. I’m only sharing it with you.”

  “Then who did make it up?”

  “It’s always been this way. You were raised in a monastery, didn’t they teach you?”

  I was?

  Li
ke a blossoming fireworks display, some of the memories so long suppressed by my mind suddenly erupted to life. By that light, I suddenly saw.

  My many prayers and invocations.

  The simple faith I’d had as a child a long time ago.

  A field of flowers under a bright, blue sky, swaying lazily in a peaceful breeze.

  And in that vision I suddenly knew that everything Outlaw had said was true. Our Master had made it so. Not the vengeful God that Kathryn had shown me, but the one who’d calmed the storm and walked on water.

  Oh ye of little faith. Peace be still.

  Outlaw started to speak, but I was suddenly moving, fixated on the simplicity of the path I saw in my heart, illuminated by even this thinnest sliver of light.

  I didn’t crawl over the side as I had before. I gripped the hull with both hands, jerked my right foot up and onto the bench-seat to give me a launching point, and, before I could reconsider, I shoved off my right leg and leaped over the side.

  I was midflight before my fear vanished completely and I realized what was happening.

  Oh, I thought, Outlaw’s right. There never was a storm. I only thought there was.

  I didn’t see the change at first because my eyes were closed, but I felt it when my feet landed in the water. I felt it because I didn’t sink.

  And then I saw it, because I opened my eyes and saw a crystal-clean surface stretching out in all directions. There were no clouds, no wind, no waves—only water perhaps an inch deep, before turning spongy solid, holding together in a way that prevented me from sinking.

  I stared in amazement, stunned. The glossy surface under my feet bowed slightly as I applied pressure.

  “Stephen!” I cried, spinning back, expecting to see him in the boat.

  But there was no boat. Stephen stood on the water where it had been, arms crossed, smiling wide.

  “Now you’re talking,” he said.

  I was so relieved, so excited, so overwhelmed with this turn of events that I let out a squeal.

  Outlaw raised his brow. “Indeed.”

  I walked to my right, testing each footfall, and then marched back.