How like them we are, she thought. They found that food lying there, thinking they just came upon it, that it was a lucky accident of nature. Yet they were fed by a deliberate hand, providing for them with compassionate forethought, with a loving desire that they flourish. Don’t we all too often credit our own cleverness for the blessings that come into our lives? Don’t we praise our own devices, our own hard work, or even simple good fortune for the things that sustain us each day?
Her husband took a seat beside her. And at that moment, as if in welcome, Anna felt the baby kick.
“Oooh, she knows you’re out here,” she said, smiling. “She loves her daddy.”
“Or he does,” Dyson grinned. “Sure you don’t want to know?”
“I’m an old-fashioned girl. I love a surprise.”
They watched the leaves fall all around them, drifting down, coming to rest as they covered the world in a blanket of color. They brought to mind another more fearsome blanket, one of stark gray.
“Another thing,” he said, “I looked at a volcanological map online, up at Oldefield. The surge from Vesuvius traveled a relatively narrow path down the mountain before reaching the sea. I’m sorry to see Herculaneum buried again, but the flow stayed within the evacuated area. Same with the ashfall. Torre del Greco and points south suffered a pretty good dusting, but that was it. They had a mess to clean up, but there was no death toll to speak of.”
“Providence,” Anna recognized.
“I’d say so.”
“But why did the first scrolls have to become public at all?” she still wondered. “I know there was a reason, but why put the church through that?”
“Maybe to purify it,” Jack offered. “To separate the wheat from the chaff, true faith from apostasy. Those who are Christ’s are Christ’s. They can never be lost. Now, those remaining can look at one another and know the wolves are no longer among them.”
“‘Wolves,’” Anna whispered, remembering words spoken the night a snowstorm had driven her to take shelter. “The reverend at that little church I told you about … he mentioned wolves. He said a harvest was coming. He knew, Jack.”
“In hindsight, you can begin to see it,” he said, holding her close. “A manipulated scribe named Demas, and a group of hate-driven terrorists, and a greed-driven looter, and an angry, misled, deluded young man”—he looked into her face, a countenance aglow with impending motherhood—“and one very loving and very determined Anna Meridian. All were called upon to fill key roles in the outworking of a divine plan put into motion before this old world was created.”
She leaned into him, overwhelmed by it all.
“Anna Dyson,” she corrected. Her eyes glistened in the soft light. “For whatever time is left before the Lord comes.”
She melted into him, cradled in his strength.
“I take it back,” she said. “You do have all the answers.”
“Naahh,” he insisted. “I got lucky.”
“I love you,” she whispered, reaching up to caress his face.
They kissed, their souls a wondrous singularity, forevermore. As he held her, she again placed her hand gently over the beating heart of her unborn child.
We’re three, and yet we’re one.
“Maybe,” she said, “Angela would be a nice name after all.”
Author’s Note
“Who do you say that I am?”
This question is the very foundation of Christianity, for in its answer lies the spiritual condition of each of us. Too many of us don’t seem to understand what it means to be a Christian, believing that in our good deeds—our “Christian charity”—lies our salvation.
Yet even though Christ’s love bathes our hearts and souls with a compassion beyond our understanding, Christianity in its essence isn’t about being nice to one another.
Nor is it about building larger sanctuaries and drawing larger congregations each Sunday.
Nor is it even about feeding, clothing, or sheltering the poor.
All these things are wonderful and present a pattern for us to follow for the duration of the earthly portion of our lives. Through them we love others and show but a measure of the kindness our heavenly Father has shown us. But they don’t save anyone.
Nor is Christianity about displaying “tolerance” and being accepting of others wherever they happen to be. Jesus Christ was considered by those around him to be one of the least tolerant men they’d ever met. Consider that he didn’t say, “Come to the Father by whatever road you choose.” He didn’t say, “It doesn’t matter what form your faith takes or what you believe in, so long as you indeed have faith.”
He said, “I am the way … no one comes to the Father but through Me” (John 14:6).
No one.
Believe in him, believe he is God, or die in your sins.
One or the other.
To the worldly mind, trusting one’s eternal destiny to Someone who last walked the earth more than two thousand years ago isn’t simply difficult, or unlikely, or far-fetched.
It’s impossible.
This is why Jesus specifically told those who would follow him, “You did not choose Me but I chose you … no can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him.”
Our power to believe comes not from within ourselves but—like life and love themselves—from God.
Christianity isn’t about behaving our way into heaven. It isn’t about eating the right foods or wearing the right fashions or doing the right things. It isn’t about our own knowledge or will or persistence leaping in to save us from a destiny separated from God.
It’s about an act of self-sacrifice set into motion before Adam ever drew his first breath upon this earth.
It’s about God reaching down and setting foot among us, and dying in the place of a largely ungrateful people who have always hated him—because, for whatever unfathomable reason, it pleased him to do so.
“While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8).
Some well-meaning, self-proclaimed Christians have taken to insisting that God saves everyone. They say his love is such that he could never allow any of us to be lost. Those who believe this have no idea what it means to be a Christian, nor do they understand what Christ accomplished on the cross. When challenged, they ask, “Why wouldn’t God save everyone?” Unfortunately, that’s the wrong question.
The right question is, “Why does God save anyone?”
Yes, God is love. We see that every day as we hold our families and our children and our loved ones close. But God is also justice.
And, thankfully, he is mercy. We’re saved because he reached down to us. We’re saved according to his plan, his rules, his judgment. We were told specifically and unequivocally, Die without believing in Jesus, and you die in your sins.
So, what does it mean to believe? What is faith?
This question has been answered in many ways through the years. Some mistakenly think that faith must be blind. However, Christians are told to love God with all their hearts, souls, and minds. We’re to know what we believe and why we believe it. But we shouldn’t root our faith exclusively in the evidence of the intellect. The tangible facts behind our faith—while important in helping us “make a defense to everyone who asks [us] to give an account for the hope that is in [us]” (1 Peter 3:15)—should never be its sole basis. We should never rely solely upon worldly wisdom in judging the merit of what we believe, for the things of the Spirit are but foolishness to the world and are spiritually discerned (see 1 Cor. 2:14). True faith is rooted in many realms, from the physical to the historical to the experiential. God has touched our lives in many ways.
The deity of Christ and the reality of his resurrection lie at the core of saving faith. If Jesus wasn’t God—if he wasn’t raised from the dead—then believing in him saves
no one, and God finds no glory there.
I wish to recommend a few books that deal with the deity of Christ and with the “many infallible proofs” (Acts 1:3) we have of his resurrection that Sunday morning. More Than a Carpenter and Evidence That Demands a Verdict, by Josh McDowell, detail both historical evidence and reasoned affirmations that enable believers to rest secure in their faith. Who Moved the Stone, by English journalist Frank Morison, is unique in that the author originally set out to refute once and for all the Christian case and to prove Jesus a mere man. Yet, after more than a year of painstaking research, he reached the opposite conclusion and came to believe. The knowledge contained in these volumes can add much to one’s witnessing arsenal, and to the surety of one’s faith.
To believe in Jesus Christ is to believe that he is God in the flesh, who lived among us and died to satisfy the justice of the Father. It is to believe that Jesus died in our place, suffering our just penalty, so that we need not know spiritual death. It is to trust in him and in him alone for salvation, depending not on ourselves, or on our good works, or on any other means of humankind’s devising.
We’re saved only because God has chosen to save us through his Son. We receive salvation. We don’t buy it. We don’t pursue it. It’s a gift. There’s one narrow bridge by which we may reach God, a bridge he built because, otherwise, there could be none between us.
And if we place our trust in any other, if we try to cross that chasm by any other path, we just won’t get there.
—Shane Johnson
Summer 2006
Author’s Interview
1. How did you start writing? What was your first piece of writing like?
My first writing was a joint effort between myself and a close friend, a novel based on a creative writing assignment he had done in high school. That joint effort, more than two decades later, finally became my first novel, The Last Guardian.
2. Why do you write fiction?
That’s part of the above history, a posthumous promise kept.
3. Why do people remember a story more easily than a sermon?
Generally, I think having characters and events to whom one can relate makes it easier to remember a story. Sermons tend to feel more like lectures or lessons, carrying with them an inherent distance.
4. What do you hope readers will take away from your book?
The knowledge that, no matter now unpleasant or even tragic some events may seem at the time of their occurrence, all are being made to work together for the glory of the Lord.
5. Which character in the book is most like you?
That’s hard to say. As I write I become every character, expressing concerns and speaking as he or she would in turn. In many ways I’m most like the main character despite her experiences and losses, which are quite severe and lead to a crisis of faith. She ultimately believes and comes away with a stronger faith than she’d had before.
6. What actor would you picture playing (your main character) in a movie?
I wrote the book picturing Jennifer Love Hewett as the main character—she has the same playful quality as Anna yet can be focused and intense. In the prologue of the book Anna would be the age the actress now is, while the bulk of the story takes place many years later. Jack Dyson, the male lead, was Dennis Quaid from the start—his sense of humor, speaking voice, and overall character traits are perfect for the man I envisioned.
7. Which writers have influenced you most?
Charles Dickens, George Clayton Johnson, Hal Lindsey, and Charles Ryrie.
8. Describe your writing process.
As I write line-by-line, I jump from character to character “becoming” each in turn, seeing and feeling the unfolding events through his or her eyes and responding accordingly. In a very real sense my characters write my novels—and I’m sometimes surprised at where they take the story. And, as always, my wife’s input is invaluable—what a blessing she has been to my writing career. Without her, it would never have been possible.
9. Can you share a particularly memorable encounter with a reader?
No one face-to-face encounter stands out above any other, but I did once correspond via e-mail with a college student who had promoted The Last Guardian on her blog and considered it her favorite novel. I sent her copies of some of my later work, thanked her for her support, and over the following months exchanged several encouraging messages with her.
10. What is one fact about yourself that readers might find most surprising?
I was agnostic throughout my teenage years and early twenties, approaching the level of atheism a few times along the way. I was convinced that science had (or would have) an answer for every problem facing us all, and I was very much a humanist. But God saw fit to send a very good friend into my life who was Christian and knew why—the first such person I’d ever met. Along the way and as the years passed, others were placed into my path who helped me to better understand just how God had chosen in grace to deal with a mankind who had abandoned him.
Invite Shane Johnson to Your Book Club
Transport your book club behind the scenes and into a new
world by inviting Shane Johnson to join in your group discussion
via phone. To learn more, e-mail Shane directly at [email protected].
What People Are Saying about
The Demas Revelation
Looking for a great weekend read? If you like archaeological adventure stories and entertainment that still makes you think, you’ll love The Demas Revelation. Not since A Skeleton in God’s Closet has a Christian novel thoughtfully addressed a what-if question that might endanger everything we believe … and make us stronger for the process.
Lisa T. Bergren, best-selling,
award-winning author of The Begotten and The Betrayed
The Demas Revelation is a compelling, mind-boggling story that keeps you turning the pages. You find yourself seeking resolution with the revelation, as well as resolution within your own faith.
Nancy Moser, author of Mozart’s Sister
and The Good Nearby
Journey to Italy and its archaeological wonders in Shane Johnson’s historical twist that pivots on the incredible power of one man’s words. As you walk in the footsteps of the apostle Paul, you’ll be convinced that everything is not always what it first appears to be. It’s a descriptive story that challenges what you believe … and why.
Austin Boyd, author of The Proof and
The Mars Hill Classified series
The Demas Revelation Page 24
