Heaven and Hell (41 page)

“It wasn’t her fault,” he said with tears in his eyes. “So much pain, oh God, so much hurt. How could You have expected her to become anything other than what she became?”

He drew closer to the screen to read the confusing and jumbled verse that she was composing. It spoke of sweet death and suicide. He could read no more. Further ahead, yes, further. He had to find that woman he loved. He did his best to bypass the ugliest era of her life, her first marriage, the affairs, the drugs. He had to find the Serena he had come to love. He paged further ahead. At long last he found that special moment. He saw her working in that health food store, just as he entered the door for the first time. He felt as if he were seeing himself through her eyes—loving, kind eyes. It was not a busy day, and they ended up talking for over 20 minutes about vitamins. Vitamins, what an odd topic, yet it had led to so much more.

Another page turned, and he witnessed their first date, so quiet and innocent. He saw their first kiss, their growing love. For the first time, he came to realize that it was he himself and the love of God within him, that had pulled her from the pit of despair. She had arrived. The Serena he loved was here before him.

Time swept him forward as he turned more pages. He relived that wonderful afternoon when he proposed to her by the lake. The unexpected shower had given him the opportunity that he might not otherwise have found the nerve to take.

He became a guest at his own wedding, watching himself and his bride taking their vows. It was so wonderful. He could have passed this way a thousand times and not become bored with the moment. Then he experienced anew the days, weeks, and months that followed. It was such a wonderful time.

Yet amid it all he began to question himself. Might he have done a better job of trying to win his wife into the Kingdom of Heaven? Sure, he had spoken of Jesus and His sacrifice, but had he put his all into it? Did he realize the full gravity of the situation? No, rather than offend his wife, he had tiptoed around the issue. Oh, if only he had known what lay ahead.

Time passed as he gazed unceasingly at the woman he loved—he was lost in his obsession, watching bits and pieces of the last five years of his life. He was unsure how long he tarried here. Certainly it had been days, yet all too soon the last night approached. He could not bear to see the end. The time had come to either withdraw from the book or turn the page back to an earlier era, to relive still more of the good times.

Try as he might, he could do neither. He was inexperienced in this mode of travel through the lifetime of another. He had become so caught up in the experience that he had lost contact with reality, and the ability to close the book or reposition his hand to turn the pages back. Yes, this was what he had sought, an escape from reality; but he hadn’t anticipated this turn of events.

“Oh, no!” He cried, as he watched the car approach the icy curve on that dark night. The car began its fateful slide. He looked in horror as the truck careened toward them. There would be no changing the inevitable. The crash, the terrible scream, the end of Serena’s earthly existence, all passed before Chris. Surely the book would end, fade to black. But it didn’t. The images kept coming, and why not? Death was not the end of existence.

Chris witnessed the moments right after the crash when he realized that he and Serena were dead and they were preparing to begin their personal eternal destiny journeys. He saw himself leading Serena to the portal, toward the light. At that moment he truly believed that they were about to spend eternity together. Surely she would make the journey with him.

Yet at the very threshold of the tunnel his hand slipped through hers. Why hadn’t he noticed? Why hadn’t he returned for her? The answer was all too simple. He had lost all recollection of her. He was about to become a citizen of Heaven, separated from all of the memories that might get in the way of his happiness. In doing so, he had left her to make the journey through the tunnel alone, and that journey was a turbulent and frightening experience.

From the tunnel to the trial, he followed Serena as she knelt alone before the judgment seat of God. Without Christ as her advocate, the trial that followed could have only one conclusion. To hear his beloved condemned by God was the cruelest blow of all. His heavenly Father had condemned her to an eternity of pain and horror.

Then came Serena’s journey into outer darkness, her incarceration within that dreadful cell, and the terrible waiting. He was grateful that the man in the cell across from her had done his best to lend some comfort. He listened to their conversation closely. All he knew of the man across the hall was what he told Serena. He did not seem the sort of person one would associate with a one-way journey to Hell.

When Serena at last curled up on the floor in the corner of her cell, Chris remained. “I’m here, my love,” he said, walking over to Serena. He reached out to her but as with the hospital orderly, his hand passed through her like a phantasm.

Chris lingered for the longest time, even after his wife had fallen asleep. He felt so helpless, so useless. Eventually he turned the page forward by willing time to pass more quickly, moving in the only direction he could.

Exactly how much time had passed, he couldn’t judge, but he found Serena on her knees clothed in gray rags, her wrists chained behind her back before old slew foot himself.

The devil’s appearance surprised Chris at first. Yet thinking back on the Scriptures, he realized that it shouldn’t have. After all, satan had the ability to assume a pleasing form. Chris watched in stunned amazement as his brave wife defended herself before the slyest one of them all. She was calm and so very clever. Chris was proud of her. Maybe she could negotiate some sort of truce with this monster. She might find a way to turn his own sin of pride against him; but in the end she only managed to delay her sentence.

With Serena, Chris saw the horrors of Hell on the road to the sea of fire. He was moved by her tenderness and compassion as she encountered one tormented soul after another along the way. Who else would have tried to alleviate some measure of their suffering?

He beheld her moment of temptation, and her small victory, as she refused to pay the devil homage upon the mountaintop. Though satan used all of his charm and cunning, she would not yield. His mind wandered back to Christ’s temptation in the wilderness. It too had been a mountaintop experience. Like the Savior, Serena had denied the devil a victory and damaged his pride. How many others would have resisted the devil as she had? Yet all of her courage, all of her compassion, was for naught, for all too soon she reached the frightening precipice, overlooking the vast sea of fire.

There would be no salvation, no mercy, and no second chance for the woman who had captured his heart. Yet even now, Chris noticed, Serena showed courage. In the face of the ultimate terror, she remained in control of herself. Yes she cried, but in that last moment, she refused to give the devil the satisfaction of breaking her spirit. Chris wept as his love stepped silently to the precipice of terror. For a moment she stood like a statue. Then she leaned forward, allowing herself to fall.

Chris looked on in pure horror as his love plunged into the swirling black caldron. He watched as she flailed futilely about in the turbulent oily sea, as her body underwent a ghastly transformation. Her soft skin became brown and scaly as the heat of the scalding sea assaulted it. Within a minute her skin was ravaged with boils, and her long beautiful hair was burned to blackened stubble. Only her screams spoke of the pure agony she was enduring.

“No!” cried Chris, who could bear no more. “Make it stop!”

But it didn’t stop, it went on and on, as his love’s blood steamed and boiled within her, as flames swept over her again and again. How could she possibly remain alive and conscious through all of that? Why couldn’t she just die? How could a merciful God condone such a thing?

In desperation, Chris advanced the page only to encounter the same horror again and again. Of course it would be this way. Serena’s torment would be for all eternity. Chris turned the page a hundred times, yet the only thing that changed was the growing darkness of the sky, as the currents swept Serena into the realm of eternal night.

At times, demons flew overhead, taunting the tormented soul below. At other times great storms swept in, bringing rains of fire, brimstone, and acid, as if the scalding sea and the flames that swept across its surface were not enough.

How long had Serena endured this living, feeling nightmare? Chris had no way of knowing. Did time in Hell even pass at the same rate as it did in Heaven? Or did it drag, one minute becoming a millennium? For this question there would be no answer. Yet for now, Chris suffered with her. His was not a physical suffering, but one of mind and spirit. It gnawed at his sanity to see Serena in such absolute torment while he was powerless to prevent it. Within her black book, he had found his own version of Hell.

Suddenly, with the turn of one page there was an unexpected change. Serena was no longer being swept along by the rolling sea, but was climbing the face of a blackened cliff, the waves pounding beneath her. With determination born of desperation, she pulled her desecrated body up the precipitous slopes. Blood oozed from her fingers as she struggled for a handhold, any handhold, amid the sharp rocks. One of her arms appeared to be broken in several places, and yet she continued to climb.

Chris gasped in astonishment. Serena had somehow escaped the sea. Was he just imagining it, inserting his own hopes into this horrible vision, or was this real? He could not be sure of anything he saw at this point. He looked around, searching the blackness for any demons that might end his love’s bid for freedom; there were none. Yet, the infernal firmament held another peril. The sky was filled with lightning and the air with the report of thunder; a terrible sulfurous storm was approaching.

“Climb, Serena!” cried Chris, his voice choked with emotion. “You can do it, I know you can.”

And she did, pulling herself farther above the heaving sea, but toward what? At this point Chris couldn’t tell either, but it appeared to be a very long climb; and at the top of the sharp pinnacle, there could be no respite. Then he saw that Serena found a narrow shelf cut into the rock face, a sanctuary in which she could finally rest. She rolled into it.

She lay there on her back, gasping for breath. She had done it; she had actually done it! Again Chris looked around searching the sky for wandering demons, but there was only darkness. Serena appeared to be safe, at least for the moment. Slowly her body cooled and her incredible recuperative powers reversed a seeming eternity of damage wroth by the flaming sea. The desecrated mass of boils and scars was slowly becoming the beautiful woman Chris adored.

Through it all, Chris was with her, standing on that narrow ledge. If there were only something he could do. What he was witnessing, how long ago did it happen? If only he knew. Time was running out. The winds were rising, as the terrible storm drew ever closer, and with it a new source of agony. He could actually feel the wind, sense the terrible odor of sulfur. “Get up! Get up, Serena,” he cried, though he knew in vain. She could not hear him.

The hellish tempest was nearly upon her, when Serena finally rose to her knees, whole once more. She perceived the danger and frantically searched for shelter. To her amazement, she saw a deep cave in the rocks of the cliff.

Chris was hardly able to believe that his beloved had been so fortunate. In the midst of the turmoil, he hadn’t noticed the cave.

Through the howling winds and crashing thunder of the vision, Chris heard a new sound—a voice calling his name. He felt a warm hand on his shoulder, as he saw Serena scurry into the cave and safety.

Then the vision of Serena dissolved around him and the sounds faded to silence. He was in the Hall of Records once more and a man robed in white had taken the book from his hand and returned it to its place on the shelf. Chris tried to move, yet was unable. He was surrounded by a cloud of confusion. The robed man leaned over him.

“Easy, my son,” he said, slowly lifting Chris to his feet. “You’re going to be all right, I promise you. It will only take a short time.”

“But I’ve got to save her,” muttered Chris. “Don’t you see? She needs my help.”

“That may be,” came the gentle response, “but for now, you are the one in need of help.”

Like everyone in Heaven, Chris knew this man. There were, after all, no strangers here. Yet there was something more to his face. Somehow, he was doubly familiar. Had Chris known him on Earth? He gazed into the kind, brown eyes that met his. This man’s face was thin and his forehead a bit large. His hair was jet black, as was his short, pointed beard. Amid his confusion, Chris could discern that this man’s name was Johann. No, he couldn’t have known him on Earth. He had never known a Johann, of that he was quite certain.

“Come,” said Johann, placing his arm around the still reeling young man, “I will take you to my home. There you can regain your strength and composure. Then you can tell me of your quandary.”

Chris drew strength from Johann as he was led down the stairway and into the street. He was aware of the brightness, of the multitude around him, yet his mind was still in a fog that would not lift. Though he seemed to be able to walk well enough, reality whirled around him refusing to stand still. From time to time his mind drifted back to that terrible oily sea. The street around him would fade and he would again find himself in that dark realm. Yet, he knew he was walking, walking under his own power. His mysterious benefactor was directing his movements, but he was able to provide the locomotion. Despite Johann’s assurances, he wondered if he would ever be whole again.