Chapter 42
Teaching an Old Dog New Tricks
Charles was still in his funk. Robert had not told him about what he’d been doing in Darkwell, or what Pastor Rick had done. Charles could see no real purpose in his brokenness. He was still struggling to keep his head above water, in more ways than one. Legal fees were down. Expenses were unchanged. Life had thrown him a sucker punch that he wouldn’t have been able to duck if he had seen it coming. For the first time in many years he was forced to make a budget for his office and household expenses. Some things were sacred, such as Becky’s salary, so he had to trim costs where possible to preserve funds for such necessities. At the end of his budgeting process he found himself living almost exclusively off his real estate rental income with just enough legal fees to cover indispensable office expenses such as Becky’s salary, telephone service, rent, and utilities. Fortunately, he often reflected, Nancy was easy to please and did not have expensive tastes, so the cutback in income didn’t bother her too much. Since they had no debt, it actually made their lives simpler and, in some ways, more precious. In Nancy’s words, “The simple life is the good life.” So, while Charles searched for meaning and purpose in his career choices, they made do with a much simpler lifestyle.
Nancy believed something deeper was going on as she watched Charles’s spiritual and emotional depression show no signs of lessening. He slept a lot while home, and periodically walked around the house in his robe and slippers. He also gained another twenty pounds. He spent some of his time managing investments on the computer, but most of the time he just lounged around the house doing nothing. In truth, she suspected, his behavior at home probably wasn’t much different than what he was doing at the office, except that he at least wore a shirt and tie while he napped on the couch there. Of course, that only happened when he seemed able to motivate himself to even go to the office.
When the phone call came Charles was in his study at the house reading My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers, a habit that had only recently become a daily ritual. He hoped the daily devotional time would rekindle the fire in his belly, whatever that meant.
“Hello?” he answered.
“Grandpa?” Robert replied.
“Hey buddy, how are things in Texas?”
“Good.”
“So what’s going on?”
“I get it,” he cheerfully replied.
Sounding confused, Charles said, “Get what?”
“Why I was hurt, why I can’t play baseball anymore.”
Charles squinted his eyes and wrinkled his forehead as he tried to guess where this conversation was headed. Nothing came to mind. “What?”
“The purpose to it, why God let it happen.”
“I’m all ears.”
“You’ve got to promise me you won’t be mad.”
“I’m not sure if I like where this is going.”
“Promise.”
Charles shook his head side-to-side and reluctantly said, “Okay, I promise, as long as it doesn’t involve criminal activity.”
“It doesn’t, at least I don’t think it does.”
He paused for a moment, sensing that Robert wasn’t kidding when he expressed doubts as to the legality of what he’d been up to. “Okay, so what’s your revelation?”
“It’s about leading criminals to Christ.”
“Excuse me?”
“Have you ever shared the gospel with your clients?”
He thought hard about the question, trying to remember if he’d ever mixed his faith with his profession. His mind drew a blank. No, he realized. He had never thought such actions were appropriate. More to the point, he feared that telling his clients that he was a Christian and that they should live for Christ might lead them to believe he would sell them up the river, or worse, that they should move on to the next attorney who wouldn’t let his or her faith be an obstacle to zealous legal representation, and give some other scumbag defense attorney their money.
Truth be told, he had been more concerned about legal malpractice claims than saving souls or even the money he’d lose when he told them about his faith in Jesus.
“I don’t think so.”
“Can you think of anyone else in more need of salvation than criminal defendants?”
He chuckled. “Certainly not.”
“That’s why it happened.”
“I’m not following you.”
“Remember your promise.”
Charles waved his free hand, the left one, in the air, as if Robert could see the motion as reassurance that he was a man of his word. “Yeah, yeah, I won’t get mad. Please, tell me what’s up.”
“I met with Michael.”
“Who’s Michael?”
“Michael Thomas.”
Silence engulfed the conversation for several seconds. Charles’s usually pasty-white complexion changed into his passionate, legendary redness that was often a precursor to an explosion of mostly-controlled and well-calculated rage. “Objection! Your honor!” he’d yell, redfaced, in the courtroom as he interfered with the prosecutor’s sleazy attempt to elicit improper and inadmissible testimony from a witness. Although Robert had forgiven the man who almost killed him, Charles hadn’t. The scumbag had robbed him of his career, his confidence, and almost killed his grandson. He gripped the handset so tight that the blood rushed out of his hand and the knuckles turned bone white. He opened his mouth as he prepared to tell him what he really felt, but then remembered the promise. Whatever had changed in him since the accident, he was still a man of his word.
“Grandpa?” Robert said, fearing that the promise would soon be broken.
“Yeah, I heard you. What possessed you to do that?” he asked calmly but did little else to hide his anger and consternation. Had Robert been in the room with him he would have seen his grandpa’s face go from red to redder within a matter of milliseconds.
“At first I wanted to know why he did it. But after I met him in the jail, I realized the truth: he is a mess.”
“You had to see him to know that? He was my client. I could’ve told you that. He’s a loser and a waste of potential.”
“You don’t understand,” Robert added. “It’s spiritual. I had Pastor Rick visit him, and he accepted Christ.”
Charles couldn’t help being skeptical. “So God let you get hurt so Michael would be saved, is that it?”
“Not exactly.”
“Stop dragging this on. What’s the revelation?”
“I’m supposed to do what you do, but I’m also supposed to share the gospel with all my clients.”
It sounded preposterous at first. But then Charles felt something stir inside him. The blood of anger drained out of his face along with the emotion behind it. Suddenly and without a clear explanation or understanding of why, he felt peace in his spirit for the first time since the accident. Whatever anger he had felt after Robert first shared the news of his clandestine jail visits melted away.
“Yeah,” Charles replied, nodding his head in agreement. “Me, too.”
Broken: A story of hope and forgiveness Page 61
