Of a Very Important Man
by, Kenny Pearce
It all started before I was even born. I haven't space or time to start at the beginning, and the beginning of the story is most likely already known to the reader, so I suppose the best place to start is early in my childhood. The great man or whom I will tell you was a friend of my mother's, and she would take me weekly to his house to meet with him, but at first I paid only a little attention to him, being so young. He, on the other hand, seems to have taken a liking to me even before my birth. Of course, he is a great lover of people and loves all of them greatly, simply because they are human beings. This is the story of the huge effect this great man had on my life; an effect far greater than that of any other.
These weekly meetings continued as I grew up, and at perhaps six years old I was able to begin to really understand the man. I have still only begun to understand him, for no one can truly fathom this man's greatness. The summer before I began the second grade, I spent a week with him. This was to become a customary visit, taking place every summer.
I wasn't the only one to visit him at these times, and I came to meet many of his other friends, young and old. It was unclear to me at this time what it was he wanted with all of these people, myself included, but I much enjoyed my visits with him, and my mother was happy to see he and I spending time together, so the visits continued. The people I met through them were wonderful.
At some time, I'm not sure just when, I began to talk to the man between visits. Sometimes we talked as often as once or twice per day. During these times my life went very well. Other times we barely spoke at all, and other people would speak to him for me at our weekly meetings, while I remained silent.
During the later years of elementary school, I began to understand that the man had intentions for the lives of the people in the world, especially those who came to see him. I had taken a liking to him, and I began to try to fulfill his expectations for my life. Then came middle school.
The weekly visits continued, and the week each summer. During the seventh grade, I even began to go spend weekends at his property, in the same place where I spent that week every summer. However, the friendship I had developed with the man suffered. I spoke to him less outside of our meetings. I thought only occasionally of that plan he had for me, which had been important to me so short a time ago. Even as I continuously gave him more of my time, I cared less and less about him. The man had written a book many years ago; a sort of autobiography which included his ideas about the world and about how people should live their lives. I've since learned that all of his ideas are correct, for he is a very intelligent and knowledgeable man, but at that time there must have been times when, despite his impeccable record, I didn't believe him. I had read his book periodically as a young child, but, as I began my teenage years, my copy of the book fell into disuse.
The man is exceedingly rich. Sometimes it seems he owns the whole world. He has property everywhere. Previously, I had been visiting him at a small house he owned in my home town of Palouse each week and in the summers and on occasional weekends visiting him at a larger piece of property in northern Idaho. The summer before I entered high school, he invited me to a great party he was holding in central Washington, at a huge piece of land he was renting for the occasion. There would be many people and good music there, and the man wanted a chance to re-develop our failing friendship. I went.
There were about thirty thousand people there, and yet the man seemed to have time for every one of them individually. There were bands there, and they were very good and the people loved them. There were also speakers. The speakers spoke about the man. I'd heard many people speak about him many times, for it seemed that he liked to speak very quietly to a few people and then ask someone to convey his message to large groups. The man had advised some of his close friends “Whatever I tell you in the dark, speak in the light; and what you hear in the ear, preach on the housetops", and this is what the people did. Sometimes as the speakers spoke, the man would whisper in the ears of the people who listened, giving suggestions as to applications of the information to their own life. I went away from the party with a newfound love for the man and a devotion to living the way he wanted me to, but my summer was not over yet.
The party had lasted a weekend, and only a few weeks later it was time for me to go on my normal summer visit in Idaho. These week-long visits had about one hundred people, for the man's property there was very large and had many guest houses, and it seemed that no matter how many came he had personal time for all of them, even the servants who prepared food and fun for his guests. These gatherings were divided by age groups, each going at a different time during the summer, and this was the first time I could go to the gathering of high school students at the man's property, and I was much excited.
It was the man's custom to gather us all, including servants who were serving in certain capacities, in his room to just be with him for a while once or twice per day while we were there. During one such meeting that week we witnessed, for the first time for me and many others, the man's real power and wealth and glory and we marvelled. The experience cannot be adequately explained, so I will make no attempt. Instead I will simply tell you that this man's power and wealth and glory are as great today as ever, and no one can experience him without loving him and becoming at once willing to go to the ends of the earth or to die for him. As we witnessed his awesome glory, many laughed and many others cried. For myself, during the painful and frustrating years of trying to imitate others during middle school, I had forgotten how to cry, and it would take the man a very long time to teach me again - in fact, he still works at it today. But I laughed much with the others, and went away from the experience changed.
After that summer I came with a new vigor to our weekly meetings. I spoke to him daily and I wanted to show others what the man could do and how much the man loved them all. I wanted others to love the man as I did. I began to show my love for him publicly, and many mocked me, but it didn't matter, for the man approved of it and the man was happy with me. There were still many things that I did wrong, but I tried very hard to correct them, and he helped me. He still does.
The man doesn't like to punish those who follow him, but when they act wrongly towards him and don't live their lives as he instructs them, it hurts their relationship with him - a punishment in itself - and he often does punish them in order to help them act rightly. It must be very difficult for him to punish us, for I am told it is quite difficult for parents to punish their children, and earthly parents are not even capable of the kind of love he gives.
I'll tell you right now what it is He really wants. He has told me personally, and He also wrote it in His Book, which I've read much of since that meeting over two years ago. The Man wants every one of us to love Him and be with Him forever. He is not willing that any one of us should perish or be harmed in any way. We already stand in harm's way, and He wishes to save us if we will only ask Him to do so. He wants us to exist in relationship with Him, to love and be loved. We know His love by this - that while we were yet sinners, He died a painful and gruesome death in order to be with us forever. We know His power by this - that He who died nearly two thousand years ago lives still. I love Him with all my heart, and He is my reason for living. Indeed, there have been no men or women more important in my life than this Man, who loves us all to a greater extent than is possible for anyone else.